Philip Bess, in an old two-part essay at Public Discourse (here and here), makes the surprising argument that the proposition “human beings should make walkable mixed-use settlements” ought to be considered a hypothetical tenet of the natural law. While making appropriate qualifications (e.g., Bess does not claim that living in such settlements is morally obligatory or makes one morally superior), Bess suggests that our cultural patterns of building are not merely about subjective or aesthetic judgments; rather, they root in substantive understandings of human nature and the telos of human life. Which means that the anthropology implied by “urban sprawl” is an individualist one, enamored of choice and personal freedom and private property and home ownership. As a good Thomist, Bess believes that “walkable mixed-use settlements” better accord with our nature and allow us to more fully realize our ends.