Rainer Forst (Frankfurt): Two Stories about Toleration. Georg Struver (DUI): Too Many Resources or Too Few? What Drives International Conflicts? The latest Analecta Hermeneutica is a special issue on "The Absolute Question" — i.e. God — which includes papers from a conference on the philosophy of religion hosted by the International Institute for Hermeneutics at Mount Allison University (New Brunswick) in August 2006. A review of The German Genius: Europe's Third Renaissance, the Second Scientific Revolution and the Twentieth Century by Peter Watson. Why do Americans have yards? A murder in Salem: In 1830, a brutal crime in Massachusetts riveted the nation — and inspired the writings of Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne. A review of Bring on the Books for Everybody: How Literary Culture Became Popular Culture by Jim Collins. A review of Animalkind: What We Owe to Animals by Jean Kazez. Aaron David Miller on five myths about Middle East peace. From NYRB, a review essay on Oscar Wilde, classics scholar. A review of Science’s First Mistake: Delusions in Pursuit of Theory by Ian O. Angell and Dionysios S. Demetis. Dan Ariely on new economists worth knowing. The Heidelberg Thingstatte is a Nazi edifice built on a sacred mountain site used by various German cults. Why democracies don't get cholera: It's about a lot more than just clean water. A review of Taliban: The True Story of the World's Most Feared Fighting Force by James Fergusson. A review of Spinoza and the Specters of Modernity: The Hidden Enlightenment of Diversity from Spinoza to Freud by Michael Mack. A review of Merchants of Culture: The Publishing Business in the Twenty-First Century by John B. Thompson.
