Lorraine Daston on why rules don’t rule

Rules shape nearly every aspect of our lives—from how we work and drive to how we greet each other and mark life’s milestones. We may resent some and crave others, but no culture can exist without them. To understand why rules matter, one must trace their history: from legal codes and cookbooks to military manuals and traffic laws. Surprisingly, across centuries and contexts, their forms remain remarkably few.

In this conversation, acclaimed historian Lorraine Daston will explore the three enduring kinds of rules—the algorithms that calculate, the laws that govern, and the models that teach. She will show how rules evolve, how they stiffen or soften, and how once-irritating regulations become daily habits. Far from being mere constraints, rules are also resources—tools that reveal as much about human imagination as they do about order.