20 years ago, a book called Freakonomics became an instant bestseller and worldwide sensation. Tim Harford got his hands on the first copy that Steve Levitt ever signed… and promptly sold it on eBay.

The most interesting architecture story of recent months is neither Adrien Brody’s Oscar for playing an architect, nor Donald Trump’s executive order “Promoting Beautiful Federal Civic Architecture”.

John von Neumann — the man who created game theory, advanced many branches of mathematics and physics, and did more than anyone to design the modern computer — was someone who attracted a certain ...