The (Mis)measure of Man

The (Mis)measure of Man

The Tyranny of Metrics by Jerry Z. Muller. Princeton University Press, 2018. Hardcover, 220 pages, $25. Reviewed by Gene Callahan One way of defining “rationalism” (when the term is understood as a flaw rather than a virtue) is that it is the attempt to replace...

A Tale of Contagious Enthusiasm

How Dante Can Save Your Life: The Life-Changing Wisdom of History’s Greatest Poem. by Rod Dreher. Regan Arts, 2015. Hardcover, 300 pages. $30.This is a book written in a surge of enthusiasm—in both the original and the modern sense of the word—and it has the virtues...

Happier Cities, Happier Lives?

Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design by Charles Montgomery. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013. Hardcover, 290 pages, $27.This is a fascinating and informative but at the same time maddening book. It contains a wealth of evidence making the case that...

Can Rationalism Make it in the Long Run?

Oakeshott on Rome and America by Gene Callahan Charlottesville: Imprint Academic, 2012 Hardcover, 250 pages $50. Paperback, 200 pages, $40.Gene Callahan’s Oakeshott on Rome and America brings Oakeshott’s famous critique of Rationalism to bear upon the concrete...