Andrei Stoica

Not long after arriving at George Mason, Cowen read “Sexual Personae”by Camille Paglia, a buccaneering polemic about Western art across millennia. Although he didn’t agree with Paglia’s ideas, he saw this was the kind of book he wanted to write. Within months he was drafting a lively, popular history of markets and high culture. In 2003 he and... See more

There are still plenty of great third places where you can hang out comfortably as long as you want, of course—but they increasingly feel like luxury goods, carrying an expectation of higher spending or restricting access outright (there are also true public spaces like parks and libraries, which are a separate category altogether). When a single... See more

The Unaccountability Machine by Dan Davies is a fantastic book, which argues that people create these models because if you can reduce decision-making to an algorithm, or a formula, or a process, or a procedure, you avoid the risk of blame. Computer says no, effectively.

Instinctively, people love to codify things, and make them numerical, and turn... See more

Similarly, famous modern architect Philip Johnson designed Pennzoil Place, which won many accolades for its design (it was described as the “Building of the Decade” by architecture critic Ada Louise Huxtable), but its design was ultimately the result of feedback from developer Gerald Hines and Pennzoil chairman Hugh Liedtke1. From Raising the Bar ,... See more