CONFERENCES
Upcoming conferences

FIELD NOTES
Pigs in Poland/Confrontation in Cambridge/You've got to admit, he's getting vetted, and more

INSIDE PUBLISHING
Bourdieu's boxer/Karl Kraus's Vienna/The good censor, and more

BREAKTHROUGH BOOKS
Cuba

HYPOTHESES
Jim Holt on sex competition in the womb.

The Mystery of the Millionaire Metaphysician
A highly secretive author has paid scholars more than a hundred thousand dollars to review a treatise on the purpose of existence. Who is behind this, and why? A philosophical investigation.
BY JAMES RYERSON

Settling Scores
He calls Stravinsky a liar. He denounces his opponents as "idiotic." He plays a mean viola da gamba. Musicologist Richard Taruskin marches to the beat of his own drum.
BY PAUL MITCHINSON

Gender Trouble
Feminist superstars, post-Soviet politics, and loads of George Soros's money. What could go wrong? Central European University found out the hard way.
BY LAURA SECOR

Passions of a Prussian
Immanuel Kant: good philosopher, bad bacchanalian. According to legend, Kant was as dull and plodding as his prose. A new biography sets the record straight.
BY JONATHAN RÉE