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Scientific progress is the defining feature of our age, according to Barry Werth’s Billion Dollar Molecule (Simon & Schuster, £9.99, ISBN 0 671 51057 6). He tells the story of Vertex, one of the first drug companies to move away from random screening and redesign molecules structurally. Werth tracks the growth of the drug industry in well-researched detail towards its goal: the “microbial promised land of no disease”. But the single idea he offers readers is that the enlightened but competitive world of science may be the best way to understand society … full stop.