A.J. Dunning (1930-2009) was Professor Emeritus of Cardiology at the University of Amsterdam. He wrote Broeder ezel (‘Brother Donkey’, 1981), about the limitations of medicine, and Uitersten (‘Extremes’, 1990), about extreme forms of human behaviour. The latter sold more than 50,000 copies in less than a year. In 1997 he published Stof van dromen (‘The Stuff of Dreams’), a history of dreams, concepte and evolutions.
(J.M. Meulenhoff, 1997, 224 pagina's)
Following on from his successful books about the limitations of medicine and extreme forms of human behaviour, A.J. Dunning’s most recent collection of travelling reflections goes a step further and enters the no-man’s-land between religion and science. A sympathetic outsider, Dunning is interested in the comfort of others’ beliefs. The Christian concept has, however, been superseded by modern natural science, which sees man as a transient and coincidental by-product of a cold and indifferent universe: in Dunning’s own words, ‘a magnificent accident we have to learn to live with’.
