Preposterous title aside, this is an excellent history of the Scottish Enlightenment

Review of How the Scots Invented the Modern World by Arthur Herman

As many intellectuals do – particularly when highly specialized in academia – this book takes things too far, extending an idea until it is so over-stated as to be almost ridiculous. Regardless of their many contributions, the Scots did NOT invent the modern world. Perhaps Herman wrote the book this way in order to market it to Scots in the US, who (lik…