The Ego Trick

My new book is out. Here I'm going to keep a list of related links. For upcoming talks, click here. Click here to buy from Amazon or The Book Depository.

Reviews
"In this entertaining, educative and gracefully written book, Julian Baggini explores the question of the nature of the self and in what sense it persists through time. ... This is one of the best, most readable and most stimulating introductions yet written about this intriguing topic. Enjoy, and profit." AC Grayling in the FT.

"Baggini works on a broad canvas, citing Hume and Locke alongside the reflections of sex-change patients and victims of dementia. While leaving the ego in pieces, he gives your mind a thorough workout." One of Maggie Fergusson's picks of the Season in Spring's Intelligent Life

Articles by me
The blurred reality of humanity (Independent, 21 March)

The self: why science is not enough (New Scientist, 12 March)

Ideas for modern living: you (Observer, 13 March)

We’re more than the sum of our pasts (Sunday Herald, 6 March)

Audio
Start the Week with Andrew Marr, BBC Radio Four, 2 May

Guardian Science podcast with Alok Jha, 4 April

Nightwaves, BBC Radio Three, 24 March.

Video

The Ego Trick digested into 4 minutes for Ignite Bristol



A longer (20 minute) talk on the book given at the RSA



This short (3 minute) "home movie"introduces the theme.



This talk at the How The Light Gets In festival in Hay focuses on the issue of character.



Video interview by Jules Evans at The Politics of Well-Being blog

The Shrink & The Sage: Self-love

For self-love to have any value, we must be able to find things within ourselves that make that love worthy. Rather than trying to love ourselves, we should simply try to make ourselves lovable, and the rest will follow.

Latest column in the FT Weekend Magazine.

Burnham-on-Sea - 4 May

Talking about my new book The Ego Trick at 7.30. Full details here.

The whole truth

Moral codes that stress the avoiding of telling lies are more legalistic than moral because they ultimately focus on the technical issue of whether a claim is true or false, not on the moral issue of whether one is being appropriately truthful.

Article in latest Prospect (May 2011), available online to subscribers.

A hard shoulder to cry on

There is a paradox of convenience. The more convenient something becomes, the more people will tend to use it. Over time, however, this increased usage will only create new inconveniences. Car travel is the exemplar par excellence. As more people can afford cars and a wider motorway network makes the country more accessible, we spend more of our time in cars. But of course it is not convenient to actually be in a car travelling, nor to be expected to constantly move from place to place. And the more people avail themselves of the opportunities motorways present, the more congested roads get and the less convenient the whole business becomes.

Article in today's Independent.

The Shrink & The Sage: Spirituality

I'd prefer to leave the word to the religious. Rather than use this one, big fuzzy term to cover a multitude of virtues, we should talk about the specific things that bring our ultimately physical world to profound, experiential life.

Latest column in the FT Magazine (16/17 April)

The Review Show - BBC Two

I was on this week's programme (live on Friday 15 April) discussing, among other things, David Foster Wallace's posthumous novel The Pale King and the new exhibition of Joan Miro at Tate Modern. On iPlayer until Friday here.

The moral formula: How facts inform our ethics

In his new book, The Moral Landscape, Sam Harris sets out to convince us that science can not only help us to understand human values, but determine them. Richard Dawkins has said of the book that "moral philosophers will find their world turned upside down". However, when the book was released in America last year, they argued it was Harris, a Stanford philosophy graduate, who had got things the wrong way up. I got the opportunity to put some of their criticisms to Harris when I met him in Santa Monica, not far from his Los Angeles home.

Interview with Sam Harris in today's Independent

The Ego Trick - Review by AC Grayling

"In this entertaining, educative and gracefully written book, Julian Baggini explores the question of the nature of the self and in what sense it persists through time. ... This is one of the best, most readable and most stimulating introductions yet written about this intriguing topic. Enjoy, and profit."

AC Grayling reviews The Ego Trick in the FT (9/10 April)

Why humans want more than happiness

Back in 1998, Martin Seligman used his presidency of the American Psychological Association to promote the idea that psychology should not just be about solving problems, but creating better mental health in everyone. Since then, the rise of ‘positive psychology’ has been all but unstoppable, with Seligman’s book Authentic Happiness (Nicholas Brealey Publishing) its key text. But Seligman was not happy. Instead of positive psychology being about living a rich, full life, as he intended, it was perceived as a pure ‘happyology’ – all about achieving a cheerful mood. So now, in his book Flourish, happiness is out and wellbeing, or ‘flourishing’, is in.

Interview with Martin Seligman in May's Psychologies. (Only introduction available online)

The Shrink & The Sage: True to yourself?

"The trouble with the idea of being true to yourself is that it assumes we know what we are being true to. In fact, the nature of the self is somewhat elusive, and the best description neuroscience and philosophy can give flies in the face of common sense.."

Latest column in the FT Magazine (9/10 April)

Guardian science podcast

Talking on Alok Jha's programme about science and the self, as featured in my new book, The Ego Trick. More details and download here.