29 March, 2026
What do gender ideology, Covid lockdowns, cancel culture, DEI, encroachments on academic freedom, NIMBYist planning restrictions, police and prison abolitionism, net zero climate policies, and the obsolescence of the male artist all have in common? It is tempting to say: nothing. In a loose sense, they are all frontiers in the ongoing culture war; perhaps they are all things that an...
The essay presents a compelling critique of what it calls "exceptionalism," a cognitive tendency to overcomplicate principles by making excessive exceptions. At its strongest, the argument highlights a real intellectual vice: the abandonment of general rules in favor of ad hoc adjustments that often lead to dysfunctional outcomes. The comparison to scientific overfitting is insightful, illustrating how an obsession with outliers can distort broader understanding. The authors effectively steelman...