Sarah started using heroin when she was 16, and soon after that she left home to live with her dealer. Heroin was one of the ways he had power over her. He was older than her, and often unfaithful. Over the three years that they were together, they frequently fought, sometimes violently. She would end Read more
I have just been cured of a major mental illness. The cure was cheap, effective and instant. And the original diagnosis did not involve any ‘road to Damascus’ experience after hours on the couch, years of painful soul searching in therapy, or complex cognitive behavioural therapy. No drugs or surgery either — NHS executives take Read more
There’s something in religious tradition that helps people be ethical. But it isn’t actually their belief in God. A couple of years ago, the idea of God came up, in an incidental way, in the Contemporary Moral Theory course I teach. I generally try not to reveal my particular beliefs and commitments too early in Read more
Let’s just say that suddenly you are a social scientist and you want to study peace. That is, you want to understand what makes for a peaceful society. Let’s say that, for years in your work in various parts of the world, you’ve been surrounded by evidence of violence and war. From individual people, you’ve Read more
Has the tradition of the crude and often cruel laboratory experiments, conducted in the name of psychology explained the human psyche to us? Has it brought us the understanding of how low humanity might sink, or of the importance of love? Or can we learn more from the laboratory of real life? These are the ethical Read more