This is a very challenging book about science, climate change and pandemics. It asks what we can do about these things. What we can expect science to do. And what will happen if we seemingly allow science to solve all these problems for us. Dougald is a former BBC journalist and a philosopher and social thinker. These times have been very strange for everybody and there’s a sense in which we all need to take stock. How though do we get objectivity on this and stop wandering in the dark? I can’t say this any better than to quote the author: “Modernity has gone round the world making no end of scars. Under its spell, we think the world is trying to kill us, because we have forgotten that dying is part of what we are here for and have come to treat it as an error in need of correction.” I have to stress, the issues in this book are vast but it’s not difficult to read.

224pp, 216 x 140 mm, Hardback, 2023, RRP £22.00