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What We Are Reading Today: The Border by Diarmaid Ferriter

What We Are Reading Today: The Border by Diarmaid Ferriter
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Updated 08 September 2025

What We Are Reading Today: The Border by Diarmaid Ferriter

What We Are Reading Today: The Border by Diarmaid Ferriter

This book will help you understand why the Brexit issue is so intractable, saying that it has always been the ordinary people of Northern Ireland who have paid the price. They deserve better.

The border has been a topic of dispute for over a century, first in Dublin, Belfast and Westminster and, post Brexit referendum, in Brussels. 

Yet, despite the passions of Nationalists and Unionists in the North, neither found deep wells of support in the countries they identified with politically. 

The writer reveals the political, economic, social and cultural consequences of the border in Ireland.

The book is a timely intervention by a renowned historian into one of the most misunderstood issues of our time, according to a review on goodreads.com.


What We Are Reading Today: ‘Life in Sync’ by Philippa Gander

What We Are Reading Today: ‘Life in Sync’ by Philippa Gander
Updated 17 sec ago

What We Are Reading Today: ‘Life in Sync’ by Philippa Gander

What We Are Reading Today: ‘Life in Sync’ by Philippa Gander

All of life is profoundly shaped by the daily, monthly, and yearly cycles of our planet, and all creatures have internal timekeeping systems that rely on cues from the surrounding environment.

With modern technology, we are changing our environments — and by proxy, the ecosystems around us— to override these innate rhythms of life.

But at what cost? “Life in Sync” reveals how Earth’s rotations shape our biology, what human sleep cycles looked like before the advent of artificial light, and why technology can’t free us from the constraints of our circadian clocks.


What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Brain, In Theory’ by Romain Brette

What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Brain, In Theory’ by Romain Brette
Updated 21 October 2025

What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Brain, In Theory’ by Romain Brette

What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Brain, In Theory’ by Romain Brette

Mainstream theories of the brain are often expressed through engineering concepts—computation, code, control, reverse-engineering, optimization.

These theories cast the living organism as a machine and the brain as a computer. The fact that cognition is a biological phenomenon seems merely anecdotal; biology is considered just “implementation.”

“In The Brain, In Theory,” Romain Brette argues that the brain is not a “biological computer” because living organisms are not engineered. 


What We Are Reading Today: ‘On Truth in Politics’ by Michael Patrick Lynch

What We Are Reading Today: ‘On Truth in Politics’ by Michael Patrick Lynch
Updated 20 October 2025

What We Are Reading Today: ‘On Truth in Politics’ by Michael Patrick Lynch

What We Are Reading Today: ‘On Truth in Politics’ by Michael Patrick Lynch

Do any of us really care about truth when it comes to politics? Should we? In a world of big lies, denialism, and conspiracy theories, democracies are experiencing two interlocked crises: a loss of confidence in democracy itself and the growing sense among many that politics is only about power—not truth. 

In this book, Michael Patrick Lynch argues that truth not only can — but must — matter in politics. He shows why truth is an essential democratic value — a value we need to sustain our democratic way of life — and how it can be strengthened.


What We Are Reading Today: ‘Calculus 2 Simplified’

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Updated 19 October 2025

What We Are Reading Today: ‘Calculus 2 Simplified’

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  • Oscar Fernandez provides a “Goldilocks approach” to learning the mathematics of integration, infinite sequences and series

Author: OSCAR E. FERNANDEZ

Second-semester calculus is rich with insights into the nature of infinity and the very foundations of geometry, but students can become overwhelmed as they struggle to synthesize the range of material covered in class.

Oscar Fernandez provides a “Goldilocks approach” to learning the mathematics of integration, infinite sequences and series, and their applications—the right depth of insights, the right level of detail, and the freedom to customize your student experience.

 


What We Are Reading Today: Great Power Diplomacy by A. Wess Mitchell

What We Are Reading Today:  Great Power Diplomacy by A. Wess Mitchell
Updated 18 October 2025

What We Are Reading Today: Great Power Diplomacy by A. Wess Mitchell

What We Are Reading Today:  Great Power Diplomacy by A. Wess Mitchell

From the beginning of time, human societies have found themselves confronted by enemies too numerous or ferocious to defeat solely by force of arms.

In these dramatic moments, wise leaders have turned to diplomacy to rearrange the gameboard in their favor and stymie seemingly unstoppable foes. In Great Power Diplomacy, American historian and diplomat A.

Wess Mitchell recounts the forgotten story of how history’s most legendary empires have used diplomacy as a tool of grand strategy to outwit, outmaneuver, and outlast militarily superior opponents.