Your ancient and latent animal instincts will not be denied. Despite all the efforts of civilised society, these impulses lurk beneath the surface ready to break out and overwhelm when the opportunity arises. This can occur most dramatically in a number of extreme situations, such as when the regulating framework of society collapses. A fictional account of this relapse into savagery is the theme of the 1954 William Golding novel Lord of the Flies, but a true account of a shi

Once all the religious ideas of the past are dispensed with - ideas such as god, heaven and hell, the immortal soul, sin, the wheel of karma, reincarnation and so forth – we are left with the bare fact of the human being as no more than an animal. As far as we can know, however, this animal differs from other animals in a key respect – its uniquely rational conscious mind. A mind equipped to reason, yes, but also a mind full of contradictions, doubts, insecurities, yearning f