What We Are Reading Today: ‘Doctors by Nature’ by Jaap De Roode

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Updated 15 January 2026
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What We Are Reading Today: ‘Doctors by Nature’ by Jaap De Roode

Ages before the dawn of modern medicine, wild animals were harnessing the power of nature’s pharmacy to heal themselves. “Doctors by Nature” reveals what researchers are now learning about the medical wonders of the animal world. 

Drawing on illuminating interviews with leading scientists from around the globe as well as Jaap de Roode’s own pioneering research on monarch butterflies, he demonstrates how animals of all kinds—from ants to apes, from bees to bears, and from cats to caterpillars—use various forms of medicine to treat their own ailments and those of their relatives.


What We Are Reading Today: ‘Prehistoric Textiles’ by E.J.W.Barber

Updated 26 January 2026
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What We Are Reading Today: ‘Prehistoric Textiles’ by E.J.W.Barber

This pioneering work revises our notions of the origins and early development of textiles in Europe and the Near East.

Using innovative linguistic techniques, along with methods from paleobiology and other fields, it shows that spinning and pattern weaving began far earlier than has been supposed.

“Prehistoric Textiles” made an unsurpassed leap in the social and cultural understanding of textiles in humankind’s early history.