Andrew Berry

Surprisingly, it is not at all clear why sex exists. Requiring the contribution of two parents in the production of offspring is remarkably inefficient. In evolutionary terms, hermaphroditism is . . . twice as efficient a reproductive strategy as sex. Why, then, isn’t the natural world dominated by male-less species?

In 1904, George Bernard Shaw announced that there was now ‘no reasonable excuse for refusing to face the fact that nothing but a eugenic religion can save our civilisation’; in 1912, Major Leonard Darwin, Charles Darwin’s son, jubilantly launched a campaign for eugenic legislation designed ‘to stamp out feeble-mindedness from future generations’; and in 1919,...

For three days – les trois glorieuses – at the end of July 1830, Paris was in turmoil. The attempt by Charles X and his ultra-royalist first minister, the Prince de Polignac, to stamp out liberal discontent with a set of repressive ordinances had backfired. By 28 July, insurgents had raised barricades, taken the Hôtel de Ville, and driven royalist troops out of Paris. Charles...