A new year has dawned and, as the light strengthens across the Northern Hemisphere, David Solway reminds us that how we choose to experience our world is at least as important as understanding how it came to be. In the first instalment of this two-part series, the writer illuminated the irreducible paradox at the heart of all theories concerning the universe’s creation, then scrutinized the seemingly unbridgeable gap between quantum physics and the physical world we live in. In Part II he considers an even tougher and, so far, unsolved scientific challenge: gravity. Some of the finest minds in science think it actually is insoluble without some kind of creative intelligence to oversee it. In other words, a miracle. To Solway, the true miracle is the fact of a marvellous world and our freedom to experience and wonder at it.

We’ve long been told that science and religion occupy two incompatible poles – one of reason and fact, the other of faith, superstition and even irrationality. But what if it isn’t so? In this two-part series, David Solway proposes a new Grand Unified Theory of cosmology aimed at bringing science and religion back together. In the opening instalment, Solway illuminates the irreducible paradoxes at the heart of all theories concerning the universe’s creation, then scrutinizes the seemingly unbridgeable gap between quantum physics and the physical world we live in – a gap that nevertheless is bridged into an integrated and orderly reality. What, then, might this say about the apparently irreconcilable differences between 21st century science and theology? Perhaps, Solway ventures, they’re more like two peas in a pod – and should consider forging a new entente to support humanity’s eternal search for Truth.

All of us have a favourite tune – perhaps a whole list of them. But when was the last time any of us asked ourselves what melody actually is, where it came from or how it differs from other pleasing sounds? The animating spirit of music, melody travels deep into the human soul, moves the heart like no other sound and can be traced to the dawn of humanity. But what is it? Probing the evanescent force that is melody, David Solway finds that while the metaphysics may remain forever enigmatic, posing the question is more than half the fun. In this most magical, joyful and musical of seasons, Solway provides a taste of honey that might just cause your heart to skip a beat as you look to the stars, sense the transcendent and hear the sounds of the heavens.

If there is a politico-historical thread running from Louis Riel and the buffalo-hunting Métis rebels in Confederation-era Manitoba, via Ottawa’s creation of three second-class Prairie provinces, followed by decades of friction over resource ownership and taxation, all the way to the convoys of diesel-powered trucks that rumbled into Ottawa to protest federal vaccine mandates in the winter of 2022, few have taken note. David Solway is one. As the main convoy leaders await a court verdict, Solway is taking the long view. He asserts that the truckers’ protest is a powerful contemporary manifestation of a recurring theme – perhaps the defining theme – of how Canada is governed, and to whose benefit. But while Canada’s late-19th century leaders were flawed men who made mistakes, Solway finds, the country’s current federal leadership appears outright bent on destruction.

It is the most improbable of political ventures, the most far-fetched of stories. A nation that returns conquered lands to countries that attack it. A people who provide material aid and medical care to those who mistrust them. A culture that laughs at its brushes with extinction. And a stirring embodiment of the Western idea in a lonely and vulnerable outpost. David Solway examines Israel and finds a modern Jewish homeland whose Diamond Jubilee next month merits international celebration, a model the world should be shooting for, not shooting at, a country that provides an image of the possible while serving as a touchstone of the real.

In these, the longest nights of midwinter, Canada feels as “northern” as it ever gets. Though we may dream of beaches and warm sunshine, our nation is second only to Russia in its sheer northern expanses, and most Canadians still seem to think of themselves as northerners, even if reluctant ones. But what is the north? Does it, in one writer’s words, dazzle with the promise of “the luminous, pearl, interior day”? Is it, as another put it, “a physical challenge and a hard thought”? Or does it signify something else entirely? David Solway harnesses an impressive troupe of writers and artists to help him explore these questions, finding that, for some, heading North can be a one-way journey.

“When a clown enters the palace, he does not become king. The palace becomes a circus.” That ancient Turkish proverb applies equally well to North America’s current education system. Here smugly ignorant “students” collide with dogma-driven “educators” fixated on ideological indoctrination. The result is a fetid system that’s no longer capable of nurturing literate citizens, but instead is focused on cranking out institutional foot soldiers for the cultural revolution. Having spent most of his career working in this decaying palace, David Solway has every reason to be bitter. Yet his own experiences tutoring the seemingly unteachable, changes afoot in the educational firmament and the growing alarm of parents have him hoping still.

“As a valued customer, a dedicated member of our expert team will be with you very shortly.” All of us encounter variations on this ubiquitous line – at minimum insincere, exaggerated and misleading, if not deliberately false. Many of us barely even notice, while nearly all have given up fighting it. But what does it actually take to inure a culture to misdirection, deception and falsehood – to lying? What is the motive source that would seek such comprehensive degradation? And where might it lead? David Solway explores how lying has become institutionalized into a structural component of cultural and political life, seeing its origins in deep recesses of human nature, its contours outlined by theologians of ancient times – and its dreadful potential exploited and put to unprecedented uses today.

It is perhaps one mark of how far the public discourse has been skewed and our perspectives warped that we even need to remind ourselves of this simple fact: mask-wearing is not “normal.” Nor, except in a few situations, is it good. David Solway applies scientific evidence, psychology and philosophy to this erudite discussion of the deeper – and mostly dire – implications of mass masking during the pandemic, an enforced yet often eagerly embraced practice that, he warns, has rendered many of us travesties of our own humanity. Solway also reminds us of the eternal magic of the human face – one of the keys to our individuality, humanity and childhood development.

Is each human being a unique individual of incalculable intrinsic worth, to be valued and respected in all circumstances? Or an interchangeable object to be managed, manipulated and used? And what might this have to do with Covid-19? Quite a lot, in fact. The pro-restrictions/pro-mask/pro-vaccine side has wrapped itself not only in the lab-coat of science but also, implicitly, in the robe of morality. Opponents aren’t just misinformed, misguided or even irrational, they’re bad. But is this really the case? David Solway examines the ethical concepts underlying – and, whether people realize it or not, shaping – the two main contesting viewpoints towards pandemic management.