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Thinking about thinking is like trying to play tennis in slow motion. But John Campbell uses cool-headed philosophy in Past, Space and Self (MIT Press, £10.50/$12.50, ISBN 0 262 53131 3) to show how self-consciousness and our concept of the past are uniquely human ways of thinking, intrinsically linked to the way in which we view space and time. If you cannot follow every line of thought in this book, don’t worry – as long as you can remember what happened yesterday.