Rules: A Short History of What We Live By

This book traces the development of rules in the Western tradition, showing how they have evolved from ancient to modern times. Historian Lorraine Daston draws on various examples, including legal treatises, cookbooks, military manuals, traffic regulations, and game handbooks, to illustrate the diverse content and surprisingly few forms of rules.

Daston identifies three enduring kinds of rules: algorithms, laws, and models. She demonstrates how rules can change, stiffen, or become everyday norms, and probes when rules work and when they don’t. The book explores philosophical problems about rules that are as ancient as philosophy itself while others are as modern as calculating machines.

Rules offers a comprehensive view of the constraints that guide us, whether we are aware of them.

(This book may contain a sharpie mark on the top or bottom edge and may show mild signs of shelfwear.)