What Slate Can Teach Us About Tropes

Judging from the book catalogs stacked on my desk, 2012 is shaping up to be a banner year in things teaching us things about other things. January will see the publication of Shimon Edelmanâ??s The Happiness of Pursuit: What Neuroscience Can Teach Us About the Good Life, following closely on the heels of Andreas Kluthâ??sHannibal and Me: What Historyâ??s Greatest Military Strategist Can Teach Us About Success and Failure. In the spring, weâ??ll get to read Darwinâ??s Devices: What Evolving Robots Can Teach Us About the History of Life and the Future of Technology and Zoobiquity: What Animals Can Teach Us About Health and the Science of Healing(not to be confused with 2005â??s Raising the Peaceable Kingdom: What Animals Can Teach Us About the Social Origins of Tolerance and Friendship).