WEBVTT

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Prof: Did I tell you the
story when one of my friends was

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offered--to buy from me?

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I was in upper Egypt and I was
traveling with a young lady,

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and a third woman,
a little bit older,

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sort of was traveling alone;
it's not terribly comfortable.

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She asked to join us I and said
'that's fine,' so the three of

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us were sitting there near
Aswan,

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and there were two men sitting
sort of across the room.

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One of them dressed in clearly
Arab garb,

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and one dressed in a rather
modern suit,

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and at some point the guy in
the suit came over,

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introduced himself very
politely, and he was a

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Palestinian and the other man
was a Saudi Arabian sheik,

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and they had noticed that I had
two wives and so the sheik had

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wanted to know--
would like to purchase the

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second--the older one,
the second wife from me.

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Since it was the somewhat older
one, he thought I wouldn't mind

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very much.

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It was a wonderful scene
because, as you know,

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Palestinians are very
sophisticated;

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they've been living with Jews,
who are basically Europeans,

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for a very long time so they're
just like anybody else.

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The Saudi Arabian sheik was
obviously living,

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not in the modern world and
this poor Palestinian had to

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intermediate,
so he was very scared how I

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would respond.

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Would I make a scene,
would I slug him,

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would I try to get him
arrested, or any of this sort of

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stuff?

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Of course it was immediately
obvious to me what was going on

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and to my two lady friends and
so we played it very cool and

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we,
you know--please sit down,

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let's discuss this,
how old is the sheik,

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how many wives does he already
have,

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how many has he divorced,
does he have any concubines in

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addition to his wives,
how much money do you have,

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etc., etc.

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We had a very,
very nice polite thing and you

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could just see the intermediary
his face just relaxed because he

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was expecting something
terrible.

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Everybody played along and it
went off very well,

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and in the middle of this the
sheik calls the intermediary

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over back to him,
and they talk something and out

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comes a velvet purse given to
the Palestinian and he gives it

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to me as a sign of good faith on
the part of the Arabian,

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he wanted me to have this.

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What is it?

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A set of Muslim prayer beads,
beautiful cat's-eye stones,

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many--not just a chain but
beautiful, beautiful handiwork

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and probably very valuable.

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I was looking for--to bring to
class--actually last time and I

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can't find it right now.

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Everything worked out,
the women paid very great

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attention to what was going on,
and we said politely at the end

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that we would consider and give
them an answer tomorrow.

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In the end she didn't want to
be bought, even though she's

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obviously going to have some
good chunk of change out of it,

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or at least I was.

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Two things will have to be
delayed because Eliezeri is not

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here and we have to add
something to Noah's

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presentation.

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Let's skip that.

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Last time we were discussing
Europe and we were coming into

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the--
we started to discuss the

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Middle Ages and we start with
Europe because we have the best

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data.

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We have very,
very good data about lots and

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lots of things from Europe.

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It's not so good from the rest
of the world.

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From about--for about 500
years, from 1200 to 1700 the

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data, poor as the data is,
shows that population really

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didn't rise terribly much.

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They were in some sort of
stasis.

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The reasons for this we had
discussed a little bit.

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We talked about the plague,
and the plague lasted like 500

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years--
this is--remember the plague

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hit Europe in 1347 so this table
where they have good data starts

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200 years later.

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The plague has been around for
200 years and still there's a

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number of cases;
that's not individuals but

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different cities and places in
which there was an outbreak and

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we just don't have good records
of how many people died,

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but 1550,1600,
1650, see the plague is dying

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out slowly and there's many,
many theories whether people

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got resistance to it,
or the rats that carried it,

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died or were out-competed by
another species of rats.

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Not known, but the plague did
eventually die out.

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From 1347 to 1849,
is 500 years where the plague

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keeps recurring.

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That was clearly one of the
reasons why population couldn't

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grow.

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Then there was violence,
there was constant small level

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violence,
and then when the Protestant

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Reformation happened,
the religious wars broke out

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and according to one of the
standard textbooks of European

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history they ran from 1531 up to
1657,

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so another 130 years of
slaughter and they rolled around

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different places in Europe.

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By the time they were done the
most contested--

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southern Europe stayed
Catholic, and very northern

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Europe became Protestant but the
middle of Europe was strongly

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contested--
and so something like a third

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to a half of everybody got
killed in this time because of

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the religious wars.

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This is the period that Malthus
is describing and we'll come

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back to Malthus--that Malthus
knew about.

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This is the history that he
understood and we'll come back

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to what his theories were,
but the historians now agree

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pretty much that productivity of
the land,

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especially agriculture,
because that was the main

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occupation,
was rising very slowly during

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this period,
but population is also rising

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very slowly during this period,
so pretty much the gains in

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agricultural productivity were
balanced by the gains in

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population and the average
standard of living did not

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improve and we'll talk a good
bit more about that.

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Now why--so the question I mean
is pretty obvious why they were

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not able to improve agricultural
productivity,

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why they were not able to
significantly improve any other

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kind of manufacturing
productivity,

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why they were not able to do
anything to fight these

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diseases.

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It comes down to,
that not only was there no

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scientific knowledge as we
currently understand the word

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scientific,
there really wasn't any

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particular interest in--
intellectually in the real

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world.

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Everything was focused on
religion and the other world,

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so there was not a lot of
intellectual energy expended in

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trying to understand what was
going on around your feet so to

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speak.

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Because they had all kinds of
problems that we take for

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granted,
all kinds of ways of dealing

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with the real world just were
not even--

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were not really thought about
in any serious way.

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Sanitation, up until the
eighteenth century,

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up until the 1800s actually,
the sanitation in Europe was

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just absolutely atrocious.

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There was no system for
disposing of human waste.

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Nobody bothered to pay
attention to what to do with

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human waste.

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Feces were basically everywhere.

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Wherever you went there was
someone else's feces.

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In the eighteenth century the
city streets everywhere had

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ditches down the middle of the
street and that's where the

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feces got dumped.

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There were buckets inside the
house and some servant,

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or the housewife would take the
bucket and dump it into these

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ditches.

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They were also used as
latrines, people would just go

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out there and if they didn't
have a bucket in the house,

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or if they didn't have a house,
go in and do it in the latrine.

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Again, in each case--I was in
Belize City in Latin--

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in Central America as you know,
not that many years ago in the

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middle of the street there's one
big latrine,

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and the stink was just
incredible.

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Now you didn't actually have
to--were not required to

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actually take your bucket of
feces and dump them in the

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street,
you could throw them out your

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window.

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But eventually people did start
thinking about that,

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and the issue was not to dump
it on someone's head.

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In Edinburgh,
Scotland they rang bells at

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10:00 p.m.

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at night when they figured
people should be off the street

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and that was the specified time
for dumping excrement out your

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window.

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Some of the older of you that
were properly brought up--

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the young men were maybe told
that you should walk on the

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street side when you're
escorting a young lady.

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Do you know what that's for?

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When stuff gets dumped out the
window it's to prevent splash

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from cars,
it's way earlier then cars,

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it was to--
so that when someone dumped

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stuff out the window it would--
the lady would be under some

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kind of awnings there.

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It wasn't only the common
people, the poor,

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the uneducated that were living
in such filth,

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it went right up to the royalty
and we have records of this.

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In 1665, there was a great
plague in London,

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one of those that I've showed
you there and that's the one

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that--
written about by Robinson

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Crusoe author,
Daniel Dafoe.

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The King, Charles II,
and his court took his refuge

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in Oxford University.

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Now Yale is modeled after--a
lot of Yale is modeled after

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Oxford, so you have a good image
of what it looks like.

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The plague was over,
it took about a year,

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the plague was over,
they went back to London and

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just left whatever they left in
Oxford,

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and the cleaning people came in
and what did they find?

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Excrement everywhere,
they described it excrement in

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every corner,
in chimneys,

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in studies, in coal houses,
in cellars, just all over the

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place.

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Now some of this information
comes from the diary of Samuel

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Pepys.

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How many of you are aware of
this?

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Some of you again if you've
taken history or literature,

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he was the famous diarist from
that.

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He was England's first
Secretary of the Admiralty,

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a Member of Parliament,
President of The Royal

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Scientific Society,
so he was not your ordinary

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average guy.

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He was educated,
had money and in the upper

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classes,
but he writes that -- when he

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had to defecate in the middle of
the night--

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he didn't bother to go to the
privy,

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he just deposited his feces in
the fireplace.

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You can see that it was a
smelly place to live in.

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Now along with no concern or no
thought about where you deposit

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your excrement,
the idea of keeping drinking

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water separate from this
excrement was not in anybody's

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mind.

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That very often if there were
public holes or someplace where

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the public could go to do their
thing,

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then maybe right next to it was
a drinking fountain.

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In terms of the waste in the
streets, it wasn't just feces

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but everything else was just
dumped into the streets.

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England especially had lots of
animals, Europe had animals,

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unlike China,
and when animals died--just

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left in the middle of the street
to rot.

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Butchers that pulled out the
entrails,

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the guts of the animals and
inedible parts,

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dump it in the street and so
the streets are just full of not

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only human excrement but the
waste of all the animals,

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and of course the flies and
insects lay their eggs in it and

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grow,
and it's very unsanitary.

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Dead people were not handled
any better than this.

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As more people died,
the urban cemeteries got filled

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up.

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There was not so much space and
so they stopped burying the poor

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people in--
properly in cemeteries but just

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what they call 'poor holes,'
just large pits in which piles

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of bodies were just laid out
side by side,

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row by row, and row on top of
row and they were not closed

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until they were full.

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You had these pits of rotting
bodies just festering there in

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the middle of all the cities
that had enough people to bury.

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Of course the stench was just
overwhelming and the rich people

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were not buried in these pits
but if they were--

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they could be buried in
cemeteries,

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but if they were really
important they bought space in

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the church crypt or they
contributed money and got space

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in the church crypt.

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Many of you have undoubtedly
gone to churches and in the

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basement they've got these
crypts of dead people and guess

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what?

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They were rotting and stank,
so the churches stank.

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One quote is that 'they stank
out parson and

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congregation'--that people just
couldn't stand to be there.

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In 1742, Dr. Johnson,
who you know wrote The Life of

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Boswell--excuse me,
Boswell's Life of

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Johnson, so he's quoting
Johnson.

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Described London as a city,
"Which abounds with such

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heaps of filth as a savage would
look on with amazement."

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The death rate--cities were so
unhealthy from all this filth

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that the death rates were
enormously high and cities did

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not keep themselves going.

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If left to itself a city's
population would just disappear

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and some estimates are that
about every generation,

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about a third of the
inhabitants of a city would die.

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I mean everybody died,
but the population left--

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the city just left to itself
would go down by a third in

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every generation,
and the only reason that cities

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were able to prosper was that in
the countryside where things

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were healthier just because of
space,

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there wasn't the demography,
there wasn't the crowding of

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people that constantly the
excess births,

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the excess population from the
countryside would keep migrating

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into the cities because they had
primogeniture in England,

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for instance.

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Only the oldest son could
inherit the land,

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so younger sons had to migrate
into the cities or into the army

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and that's what kept the cities
going.

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There's a constant stream of
people coming in from the

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countryside.

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Now it's not only London and
the great cities,

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and it's not only that part of
Europe,

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but we have descriptions of
some of the other cities,

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and one of them is currently
politically very relevant.

15:54.460 --> 15:58.930
It is Jerusalem and now all the
great Western religions claim

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that Jerusalem is central to
their religion and they compete

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viciously;
they fight viciously over

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Jerusalem.

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They all claim that they've
been interested forever in this,

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but in fact,
… until Napoleon's

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expedition to Egypt in the
Middle East,

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it was totally ignored as a
physical thing from the crusades

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to Napoleon it was totally
ignored.

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In 1840 it was a tiny town of
15,000 people;

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7,000 Jews;
5,000 Muslims;

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3,000 Christians from the
records that we have.

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In a place like that,
presumably the seed of the

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Western religions,
the feces were 50 feet deep and

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had been collecting since the
destruction of the second temple

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by the Romans.

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Before the Romans destroyed
Jerusalem there was some sort of

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sanitation going on,
but between then and 1840 the

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feces just kept going up.

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Of course in this filth
everybody was sick.

17:02.970 --> 17:06.430
Basically everyone had malaria,
and malaria was endemic there.

17:06.430 --> 17:09.000
When cholera came through,
which it came periodically,

17:09.000 --> 17:14.000
75% of the people would die of
it and one quote describing

17:13.998 --> 17:17.288
this,
"The sanitary condition of

17:17.288 --> 17:22.468
the city of God insure that any
pilgrim who sought to spend his

17:22.465 --> 17:27.555
last days on earth there could
look forward to fulfilling that

17:27.559 --> 17:30.649
ideal with great dispatch."

17:30.650 --> 17:33.220
Personal cleanliness:
this was also unknown.

17:33.220 --> 17:36.870
We have one professor of
medieval history who gives a

17:36.866 --> 17:40.796
great lecture and if he ever
gives it as a public lecture

17:40.795 --> 17:42.755
that I've seen him give.

17:42.759 --> 17:44.869
If he ever gives it again
absolutely go.

17:44.868 --> 17:49.108
It's called '1,000 Years
Without a Bath,' so this is in

17:49.105 --> 17:52.265
Europe,
the Romans were very careful

17:52.265 --> 17:57.015
about personal cleanliness and
they built these great big

17:57.016 --> 17:57.776
baths.

17:57.779 --> 18:02.779
… Have you visited the
baths of Caracalla in Rome;

18:02.779 --> 18:03.599
a couple of you have.

18:03.598 --> 18:07.358
How about Bath--the city in
England named after its baths

18:07.362 --> 18:08.372
and so forth?

18:08.368 --> 18:12.708
All these are Roman creations,
so the Romans very careful,

18:12.709 --> 18:16.899
as much as they could in a
place like that with personal

18:16.895 --> 18:17.805
hygiene.

18:17.808 --> 18:20.628
But after the fall of Rome the
morality changes,

18:20.630 --> 18:23.410
the church takes over,
and the church wants people to

18:23.407 --> 18:26.077
concentrate on their souls not
on their bodies,

18:26.078 --> 18:30.308
and washing was considered too
much of a sign of preoccupation

18:30.309 --> 18:33.839
with the body,
and especially for women.

18:33.838 --> 18:41.908
It's not good for women to pay
too much attention to their

18:41.913 --> 18:43.193
bodies.

18:43.190 --> 18:45.920
Europeans at that time,
boasted and you've probably

18:45.916 --> 18:49.186
heard this that they only wash
three times in their lives.

18:49.190 --> 18:50.810
How many of you have ever heard
that?

18:50.808 --> 18:52.858
Once when they're born,
once when they get married,

18:52.858 --> 18:55.638
and once when they die they get
washed,

18:55.640 --> 18:58.870
and the rest of that--not only
didn't they wash they thought

18:58.867 --> 19:01.657
that water that you washed with
carried disease,

19:01.660 --> 19:06.120
contagion, various theories and
that if you washed you would

19:06.115 --> 19:08.905
probably get sick from the
washing.

19:08.910 --> 19:11.690
The solution was not
cleanliness--the solution to the

19:11.694 --> 19:13.464
bad conditions--
but perfume,

19:13.460 --> 19:17.460
and perfume comes up in this
era because people stank so much

19:17.460 --> 19:20.220
that,
if they had the money,

19:20.221 --> 19:22.581
they would buy perfume.

19:22.579 --> 19:25.619
Anybody know why--yes?

19:25.618 --> 19:30.678
Student:  Was the water
likely to make you sick because

19:30.684 --> 19:32.184
it was so dirty?

19:32.180 --> 19:35.520
Prof: Good question,
was the water likely to make

19:35.520 --> 19:36.250
them sick?

19:36.250 --> 19:38.630
If they drank the water, yes.

19:38.630 --> 19:40.650
If they washed in the water, no.

19:40.650 --> 19:43.530
There's very little in
temperate zone water that's

19:43.529 --> 19:45.469
going to get through your skin.

19:45.470 --> 19:48.740
In tropical zones there can be
parasites in there and they can

19:48.740 --> 19:52.590
be dangerous,
but in Europe I'm not sort of

19:52.587 --> 19:59.077
aware of anything that washing
in the water will get you sick.

19:59.078 --> 20:02.388
Student:  On the hand if
you wash yourself and it stays

20:02.392 --> 20:05.652
on your skin and then you eat or
something could you then get

20:05.651 --> 20:06.141
sick?

20:06.140 --> 20:08.600
Prof: Yes,
if you wash yourself,

20:08.596 --> 20:12.216
it stays on your skin and then
you eat with your unwashed

20:12.218 --> 20:14.418
hands--
well probably what was on there

20:14.417 --> 20:16.337
before you washed is going to be
worse.

20:16.338 --> 20:20.058
In general, I think nobody
washed unless something comes

20:20.057 --> 20:23.707
off--the burden of whatever's on
the skin gets less.

20:23.710 --> 20:27.280
All of these things are what we
modern people think about,

20:27.278 --> 20:30.308
but obviously,
back then, just these kind of

20:30.305 --> 20:33.955
very simple straightforward
questions were not really

20:33.963 --> 20:35.023
considered.

20:35.019 --> 20:37.079
People back then,
George Washington,

20:37.078 --> 20:39.548
King George wore wigs--anybody
know why?

20:39.548 --> 20:44.438
Some of you probably know why
they wear wigs--underneath the

20:44.435 --> 20:49.065
wig was--
Student:  Head lice.

20:49.068 --> 20:51.168
Prof: Lots of lice,
shaved heads,

20:51.167 --> 20:52.027
they had lice.

20:52.029 --> 20:54.329
Lice was endemic,
they couldn't get rid of it,

20:54.327 --> 20:55.807
so they shaved their heads.

20:55.808 --> 20:58.648
I think we just saw that on
television with the John Adams

20:58.651 --> 20:59.051
story.

20:59.048 --> 21:02.738
Every so often--did any of you
see that TV show?

21:02.740 --> 21:09.800
HBO--anyway he takes off his
wig and there he is bald,

21:09.801 --> 21:13.401
that was to prevent lice.

21:13.400 --> 21:19.340
One of the reasons--one of the
major reasons for this lack of

21:19.336 --> 21:24.576
population growth for hundreds
of years in Europe,

21:24.578 --> 21:27.568
just no idea about sanitation,
hygiene,

21:27.569 --> 21:30.309
any of this kind of stuff.

21:30.308 --> 21:36.048
Another aspect which you'll be
reading about is infanticide.

21:36.048 --> 21:39.798
Infanticide was a very large
factor in European demography

21:39.800 --> 21:43.030
and the rest of the world,
as you will read about,

21:43.027 --> 21:45.657
but in Europe it was very
important.

21:45.660 --> 21:52.440
There was always a level of
infanticide and--

21:52.440 --> 21:55.790
of various sorts but in the
eighteenth and nineteenth

21:55.789 --> 21:58.109
centuries it apparently
exploded--

21:58.108 --> 22:01.258
the number of kids that were
done away with.

22:01.259 --> 22:07.269
In Milan, from 1840s to 1860s,
one third of all children born

22:07.267 --> 22:10.597
to married parents--
we're not talking about

22:10.595 --> 22:14.025
unmarried situations--
were left at foundling homes

22:14.025 --> 22:18.385
and in foundling homes the death
rate was near 100%.

22:18.390 --> 22:21.590
More than half of all the
children born to working class

22:21.585 --> 22:23.905
parents were left in foundling
homes,

22:23.910 --> 22:27.980
and almost all the illegitimate
children were abandoned and the

22:27.976 --> 22:30.576
death rates--
it was a form of infanticide,

22:30.575 --> 22:32.855
you just gave them to a
foundling home,

22:32.858 --> 22:35.318
they were taken,
basically, no care of,

22:35.321 --> 22:36.101
they died.

22:36.099 --> 22:38.849
It was out of sight.

22:38.848 --> 22:42.288
Again, not just the ordinary
ignorant person but you all know

22:42.291 --> 22:43.671
Jean-Jacques Rousseau?

22:43.670 --> 22:47.170
The famous French
philosophe who wrote a

22:47.173 --> 22:50.683
lot that encouraged the American
Revolution.

22:50.680 --> 22:54.790
This is a quote from him,
"My third child was thus

22:54.785 --> 22:59.115
deposited in a foundling home
just like the first two,

22:59.118 --> 23:01.688
and I did the same with the two
following.

23:01.690 --> 23:04.030
I had five in all.

23:04.028 --> 23:05.888
The arrangement seemed to me so
good,

23:05.890 --> 23:08.420
so sensible,
so appropriate that,

23:08.422 --> 23:11.352
if I did not boast of it
publicly,

23:11.348 --> 23:14.648
it was solely out of regard for
their mother."

23:14.650 --> 23:19.730
There was no--here they're
abandoning these children to

23:19.734 --> 23:24.544
almost certain death and
it--there was just no moral

23:24.538 --> 23:27.928
compunction about it whatsoever.

23:27.930 --> 23:31.370
Aside from absolute abandonment
to foundling homes or …

23:31.368 --> 23:33.398
just leaving them in the
streets--

23:33.400 --> 23:36.590
you'll read about American and
England where the kids were just

23:36.588 --> 23:38.028
often left in the streets.

23:38.029 --> 23:43.489
Another mechanism was sending
out children to nurse with wet

23:43.486 --> 23:49.126
nurses and the death rate of wet
nurse children was enormously

23:49.126 --> 23:49.956
high.

23:49.960 --> 23:53.630
So, if parents tried to rear
their children,

23:53.627 --> 23:57.977
the death rate was about one in
six at this time.

23:57.980 --> 24:04.800
In eighteenth century France
between a half and two-thirds of

24:04.800 --> 24:09.690
infants that were sent out to
nurse died.

24:09.690 --> 24:13.080
Even at a higher death rate
were the so called baby farms,

24:13.078 --> 24:17.228
in the nineteenth century
Europe there were--

24:17.230 --> 24:19.070
it's like we call them puppy
mills now,

24:19.068 --> 24:22.638
they were baby farms,
and they took in vast numbers

24:22.636 --> 24:25.416
of children presumably to wet
nurse,

24:25.420 --> 24:28.730
but almost none of them
survived.

24:28.730 --> 24:33.340
As I showed you from these and
all kinds of reasons,

24:33.336 --> 24:37.306
about a third of children died
in infancy.

24:37.308 --> 24:42.178
The idea of being a parent and
the family idea of childrearing

24:42.179 --> 24:46.169
was completely different then we
now understand.

24:46.170 --> 24:49.110
The standard thing was a child
was born, it was almost

24:49.112 --> 24:52.392
immediately sent out to wet
nurse, someone that doesn't care

24:52.386 --> 24:53.216
about them.

24:53.220 --> 24:55.710
A lot was written about wet
nurses getting drunk,

24:55.711 --> 24:57.631
having the baby in bed,
getting drunk,

24:57.631 --> 25:00.331
rolling over on the baby and
squashing the baby.

25:00.328 --> 25:04.948
Whether that was an excuse or
the real reason for the child's

25:04.946 --> 25:06.406
death is unknown.

25:06.410 --> 25:10.640
They would wet nurse for a
couple of years and then those

25:10.642 --> 25:14.122
that were still alive would come
back home,

25:14.118 --> 25:19.138
maybe age two or three or
something,

25:19.140 --> 25:23.760
and then by age seven they
would be sent back out to work

25:23.760 --> 25:26.650
again as an apprentice
somewhere.

25:26.650 --> 25:29.540
How many have read Charles
Dickens: David

25:29.535 --> 25:32.415
Copperfield,
and Oliver Twist?

25:32.420 --> 25:34.640
What age were they sent out to
work?

25:34.640 --> 25:35.070
Seven.

25:35.071 --> 25:39.101
Seven is the standard age,
there are scenes of one of the

25:39.104 --> 25:43.074
Dicken's characters going to
work in a dye factory dying

25:43.065 --> 25:46.505
cloth,
and he comes out black every

25:46.506 --> 25:48.986
day, covered with the dye.

25:48.990 --> 25:52.480
That was quite a standard thing.

25:52.480 --> 25:57.410
In 1646, the rich and very
progressive town of Leyden in

25:57.406 --> 26:00.846
the Netherlands,
Lehyden was one of the most

26:00.852 --> 26:05.132
advanced places in Europe,
limited the working day for

26:05.133 --> 26:08.173
children to 14 hours,
whether the law was obeyed or

26:08.169 --> 26:11.719
not we don't know,
but children could not do that.

26:11.720 --> 26:14.320
Of course Charles Dickens is a
couple of hundred years later in

26:14.320 --> 26:15.370
the nineteenth century.

26:15.368 --> 26:19.908
Apparently, in every one of his
novels, there's some scene of

26:19.909 --> 26:21.649
child labor going on.

26:21.650 --> 26:26.040
Now I'm talking about up to the
1800s but this does not

26:26.035 --> 26:27.005
disappear.

26:27.009 --> 26:29.999
Now you look what Europe--the
situation Europe was in,

26:29.999 --> 26:33.439
in 1800--some of the developing
countries are currently in.

26:33.440 --> 26:37.260
So official figures from India,
the government figures,

26:37.256 --> 26:40.786
say there are 12 million child
workers in India.

26:40.788 --> 26:45.248
Opponents, activists on the
labor issue, estimate that it's

26:45.247 --> 26:49.317
closer to 60 million children in
India are working.

26:49.318 --> 26:54.918
They do have child labor laws
now in India and they prohibit

26:54.923 --> 27:00.153
children under age 14 from
working in hazardous jobs.

27:00.150 --> 27:04.150
When the scandal about Gap,
our clothing manufacture Gap

27:04.146 --> 27:07.366
came out,
the factories that were

27:07.365 --> 27:13.275
investigated had children as
young as ten years old working

27:13.284 --> 27:18.284
up to 16 hours a day making the
dungarees …

27:18.282 --> 27:20.122
that we wear.

27:20.118 --> 27:25.228
All of this sort of misery
leads not only to physical

27:25.228 --> 27:29.648
misery but change in attitude
toward life,

27:29.650 --> 27:34.410
and death came very easily,
it was very common and so life

27:34.410 --> 27:35.580
was cheaper.

27:35.578 --> 27:39.628
There's no question about it
from the literature that life

27:39.625 --> 27:42.105
was cheaper then we consider
now.

27:42.108 --> 27:45.288
Because children especially
were so likely to die,

27:45.288 --> 27:48.638
as well as anyone else,
it was considered imprudent,

27:48.640 --> 27:52.030
not wise, to be particularly
affectionate with or emotionally

27:52.030 --> 27:54.180
entwined with any other human
being.

27:54.180 --> 27:57.630
Your husband might die
immediately, your kids might

27:57.627 --> 27:59.487
die, your wife might die.

27:59.490 --> 28:02.730
And so as far as we can tell
from the writings of the period,

28:02.730 --> 28:04.960
what we call affective
relationships,

28:04.958 --> 28:08.608
emotional relationships were
rather cool in this period,

28:08.608 --> 28:14.478
except of course violent anger
which always pops out.

28:14.480 --> 28:20.430
Going back to this,
here's all these problems,

28:20.426 --> 28:27.296
and what did people do about
some of these things?

28:27.299 --> 28:38.279


28:38.279 --> 28:42.789
An idea of disease comes from
the Greeks and probably farther

28:42.794 --> 28:47.334
back then the Greeks,
that the body is controlled by

28:47.327 --> 28:50.827
four humors,
fluids that run around the

28:50.829 --> 28:55.119
body, something like the Chi of
Oriental thought.

28:55.118 --> 28:58.458
And these four humorous must be
in balance.

28:58.460 --> 29:02.170
When you got sick the problem
was that the humors got out of

29:02.171 --> 29:02.801
balance.

29:02.798 --> 29:07.028
One of the things you did was
get bled.

29:07.029 --> 29:12.569
That was a standard procedure;
let the blood flow because that

29:12.565 --> 29:16.065
gets rid of the evil humors.

29:16.068 --> 29:18.918
George Washington was
apparently killed by an excess

29:18.917 --> 29:22.377
of bloodletting,
so when he was older he got

29:22.381 --> 29:26.651
quite sick and the doctors--
while he was sick,

29:26.650 --> 29:31.720
bled five pints of blood out of
him and then he died.

29:31.720 --> 29:34.700
We take--when we go to take
blood they take one pint and

29:34.701 --> 29:37.901
they consider that sort of the
maximum safe amount for young

29:37.900 --> 29:38.930
healthy people.

29:38.930 --> 29:42.330
Here he was old and sick,
five pints, he dies.

29:42.328 --> 29:48.248
His nemesis--George Washington
in America and King George III

29:48.253 --> 29:53.293
in England--you know the saying,
mad King George?

29:53.288 --> 29:58.838
He was mad and he was mad with
a genetic disease called

29:58.835 --> 30:04.375
porphyria which affects the
hemoglobin in the blood.

30:04.380 --> 30:07.200
It caused episodic madness,
so he would be sane,

30:07.200 --> 30:08.550
then he would be would mad,
then he would be sane,

30:08.548 --> 30:11.778
then he would be mad,
and when he was mad what did

30:11.779 --> 30:12.439
they do?

30:12.440 --> 30:14.880
They bled him;
they bled him enormously.

30:14.880 --> 30:17.180
They tied him to a chair,
they did all kinds of things to

30:17.182 --> 30:17.432
him.

30:17.430 --> 30:22.940
They had no clue either how to
handle any of these diseases nor

30:22.941 --> 30:26.081
of a humane way,
no idea of a humane way to

30:26.084 --> 30:29.614
treat someone who has something
wrong with them that you have no

30:29.607 --> 30:32.067
clue what it is or what to do
about this.

30:32.068 --> 30:34.768
If you ever want to see that,
there's a great movie,

30:34.769 --> 30:37.499
The Madness of King
George, about 1995 if you

30:37.501 --> 30:43.761
ever want to--
it describes this aspect of his

30:43.755 --> 30:44.795
life.

30:44.798 --> 30:48.228
Leeches, another form of this
bloodletting was,

30:48.230 --> 30:51.760
instead of taking a razor blade
or a blade and cutting a vein,

30:51.759 --> 30:55.169
which is hard to sew up,
leeches are wonderful.

30:55.170 --> 30:59.180
You stick leeches on you and
the blood--

30:59.180 --> 31:04.250
leeches suck out the blood and
we know this goes back at least

31:04.250 --> 31:09.320
to the ancient Romans and it was
practiced for 2000 years,

31:09.318 --> 31:11.998
this bloodletting,
on this ancient theory of the

31:11.997 --> 31:12.507
humors.

31:12.509 --> 31:16.259
1860, we have data,
in the hospitals just in

31:16.261 --> 31:20.191
London, so in 1860 that was Rule
Britannia.

31:20.190 --> 31:24.240
England was the richest,
most educated ruler of the

31:24.238 --> 31:26.018
whole world in 1860.

31:26.019 --> 31:30.989
In the hospitals in one city,
London--7 million leeches were

31:30.990 --> 31:31.580
used.

31:31.578 --> 31:38.118
The idea again being that until
you know what you're doing,

31:38.118 --> 31:41.568
you don't know what you're
doing and just use anything and

31:41.573 --> 31:44.613
it's all--
no evidence whatsoever that any

31:44.612 --> 31:47.652
of this ever helped anybody,
and of course we now know it

31:47.650 --> 31:49.970
was in fact--
not only didn't it help them,

31:49.969 --> 31:51.359
it made them sicker.

31:51.358 --> 31:59.338
We now have sort of a rage in
America and Europe for natural

31:59.336 --> 32:04.336
medicine, and its various
versions.

32:04.338 --> 32:08.978
Well this has a very old
history and so how many know the

32:08.979 --> 32:12.119
author Wilkie Collins,
Moonstone,

32:12.115 --> 32:15.525
Woman in White,
it's one of the--they're on PBS

32:15.534 --> 32:19.404
Television all the time,
you've seen them.

32:19.400 --> 32:23.460
He had gout which was--what
happens is back then they ate a

32:23.463 --> 32:26.693
lot of meat, had a lot of
protein in the blood,

32:26.686 --> 32:29.486
the breakdown part,
protein is urea.

32:29.490 --> 32:32.730
If you don't excrete it fast
enough it's not very soluble.

32:32.730 --> 32:35.940
It crystallizes in your joints
and then every time you move a

32:35.944 --> 32:38.844
joint these little sharp
crystals grind in there and it

32:38.837 --> 32:41.997
makes it very hard to move and
your joints get swollen;

32:42.000 --> 32:45.880
a very, very unpleasant disease.

32:45.880 --> 32:48.290
What did they do for gout?

32:48.288 --> 32:52.698
Late in the 1880s they treated
gout with a poultice of cabbage

32:52.702 --> 32:56.892
leaves covered with silk,
with oiled silk,

32:56.894 --> 33:02.354
and this particular author,
Wilkie Collins wrote about it,

33:02.347 --> 33:05.407
that's how we know some of the
details and it didn't give him

33:05.405 --> 33:06.675
any relief whatsoever.

33:06.680 --> 33:08.440
Surprise, surprise.

33:08.440 --> 33:10.650
What he did,
he turned to opium to dull the

33:10.647 --> 33:12.697
pain because opium really does
work,

33:12.700 --> 33:16.530
it's the basis of morphine and
he probably died partly of opium

33:16.526 --> 33:20.226
poisoning because it does other
bad things to your system.

33:20.230 --> 33:24.320
Now continuing this story of
what happened,

33:24.316 --> 33:29.956
this all relates to death rates
in pre-scientific times.

33:29.960 --> 33:34.250
You American history buffs,
what happened to President

33:34.251 --> 33:35.631
James Garfield?

33:35.630 --> 33:38.010
He was assassinated,
he was shot,

33:38.011 --> 33:41.591
but he wasn't really--
he was shot but he wasn't

33:41.587 --> 33:45.877
really assassinated because he
lived like for a year after he

33:45.881 --> 33:46.741
was shot.

33:46.740 --> 33:49.340
So whether you call that
assassination or not,

33:49.342 --> 33:50.212
I don't know.

33:50.210 --> 33:54.680
The bullet went in--apparently
into his back and lodged in some

33:54.676 --> 33:55.106
fat.

33:55.108 --> 33:58.338
Now fat is not very permeable
to anything,

33:58.338 --> 34:00.628
the bullet lodged in a lump of
fat,

34:00.630 --> 34:02.700
the lead doesn't--the lead
poisoning from the bullet

34:02.699 --> 34:05.989
doesn't get out,
nothing much gets out so it's

34:05.991 --> 34:11.561
not a really dangerous thing to
have a bullet in a lump of fat.

34:11.559 --> 34:13.499
His doctors,
and some of them were

34:13.496 --> 34:15.686
homeopaths,
which was the big thing back

34:15.692 --> 34:20.082
then, and some were allopaths--
what those words mean you can

34:20.077 --> 34:25.297
ask me after class,
and they had opposing theories.

34:25.300 --> 34:28.660
Homeopaths thought that
whatever is wrong with you--

34:28.659 --> 34:30.729
so I am telling you the
theories--whatever was wrong

34:30.731 --> 34:33.071
with you,
you should give a little bit of

34:33.070 --> 34:35.520
the same thing and that would
cure you,

34:35.518 --> 34:37.778
and little bit meant you could
dilute it infinitely so that

34:37.784 --> 34:40.014
there's actually nothing in what
they were giving you,

34:40.010 --> 34:42.760
maybe pure water but that was
supposed to cure you.

34:42.760 --> 34:45.890
Allopath was supposed to give
them something of the opposite,

34:45.889 --> 34:48.329
and there's been--you can see
it in every drugstore nowadays,

34:48.329 --> 34:51.639
homeopathic remedy and what
that legally means is,

34:51.639 --> 34:55.839
there's nothing in it but
that's okay.

34:55.840 --> 34:59.610
They had these opposite
theories and they kept fighting

34:59.614 --> 35:03.324
about what to do with this
President who was sick,

35:03.320 --> 35:07.330
so what they did is,
they stuck metal rods into his

35:07.331 --> 35:12.221
wound to try to pull the bullet
out even though the bullet was

35:12.224 --> 35:16.384
doing no danger,
although sterilization--Lister

35:16.376 --> 35:19.016
had done his work--
was known already,

35:19.021 --> 35:21.191
these doctors didn't believe in
that,

35:21.190 --> 35:25.910
so they stuck in these metal
rods with no sterilization.

35:25.909 --> 35:30.329
He of course got infected,
apparently not from the bullet

35:30.333 --> 35:34.443
because he lived a year,
but from the metal rods that

35:34.440 --> 35:36.810
they kept poking into him.

35:36.809 --> 35:40.489
Their understanding of,
or their interest in,

35:40.490 --> 35:45.430
physiology was so nil that they
insisted, for reasons that I

35:45.427 --> 35:49.107
have not found,
that he be fed rectally.

35:49.110 --> 35:53.890
They fed him beef bouillon,
egg yolks, milk,

35:53.891 --> 35:58.231
whiskey, and drops of opium
rectally.

35:58.230 --> 36:02.010
The problem is the rectum does
not absorb food;

36:02.010 --> 36:06.470
the purpose of the rectum is to
take water out and conserve

36:06.465 --> 36:07.075
water.

36:07.079 --> 36:10.339
They're feeding him this way,
this was the only way he was

36:10.344 --> 36:11.494
allowed to be fed.

36:11.489 --> 36:14.289
It's not healthy to put food in
this way and so what happens,

36:14.291 --> 36:15.601
what do you think happens?

36:15.599 --> 36:17.989
He loses weight;
how much does he lose?

36:17.989 --> 36:20.869
A 100 pounds from July to
September.

36:20.869 --> 36:23.999
In three months this guy loses
100 pounds.

36:24.000 --> 36:25.600
Does anybody notice this?

36:25.599 --> 36:27.499
Does anybody pay attention to
this?

36:27.500 --> 36:30.240
Does anybody have the
scientific cast of mind that,

36:30.239 --> 36:33.489
'well I have a theory and I'm
applying that theory,

36:33.489 --> 36:37.289
and, oh my, it's not working,
so maybe my theory is wrong.'

36:37.289 --> 36:41.659
No, that's just not the
critical scientific mindset.

36:41.659 --> 36:45.829
They knew that that was the
right thing to do and so they

36:45.829 --> 36:50.069
would not give up their theories
and basically it seems he

36:50.074 --> 36:51.644
starved to death.

36:51.639 --> 36:56.439
They infected him and starved
him to death.

36:56.440 --> 37:03.930
What happens when new ideas do
come out in a pre-scientific

37:03.925 --> 37:04.695
era?

37:04.699 --> 37:08.079
One of the current public
health measures is you don't eat

37:08.077 --> 37:09.437
food with your hands.

37:09.440 --> 37:11.140
Your mother tells you that all
the time,

37:11.139 --> 37:13.529
because you wash your hands
first which they didn't do,

37:13.530 --> 37:15.840
but even then you eat with a
knife and fork,

37:15.840 --> 37:18.710
which your mother has--or your
dishwasher has--

37:18.710 --> 37:22.030
cleaned very nicely.

37:22.030 --> 37:24.950
Europeans of course,
as you've seen from any movie,

37:24.949 --> 37:28.739
ate with their hands for many
hundreds of years,

37:28.739 --> 37:32.249
but at that time the Arabs were
much more civilized then we

37:32.246 --> 37:35.376
were;
we, the Europeans,

37:35.382 --> 37:40.632
and so in the Levant,
the middle eastern coast there,

37:40.628 --> 37:43.498
where Venice had lots of
commerce they were already

37:43.496 --> 37:47.676
eating with knives and forks--
used a fork.

37:47.679 --> 37:51.359
Well this was first introduced
into the Europe by the Duke of

37:51.356 --> 37:53.256
Venice,
the Doge of Venice,

37:53.260 --> 37:57.400
and his wife became aware that
the Arab civilization was doing

37:57.402 --> 38:01.212
this thing of eating with forks
and she thought she would

38:01.206 --> 38:04.056
introduce it into her dinner
parties.

38:04.059 --> 38:09.449
She started having forks at her
dinner parties.

38:09.449 --> 38:16.189
And the cardinal--one of the
cardinals at that time was St.

38:16.190 --> 38:21.890
Peter Damien and he says
that--he was just totally

38:21.885 --> 38:24.205
opposed to this.

38:24.210 --> 38:27.710
And the idea was that the stuff
that you eat are animals and

38:27.706 --> 38:30.586
plants,
they're God's creations,

38:30.594 --> 38:36.144
and that by using a fork she
had set herself up above God's

38:36.141 --> 38:41.051
creation and the quote is,
"To touch meat with a fork

38:41.047 --> 38:44.987
was impiously to declare that
God's creatures were not worthy

38:44.992 --> 38:47.692
of being touched by human
hands."

38:47.690 --> 38:52.680
That kind of phrase was
repeated all the way into the

38:52.681 --> 38:58.541
seventeenth century and forks
came very slowly into Europe.

38:58.539 --> 38:59.999
Lightning rods.

39:00.000 --> 39:03.700
When Benjamin Franklin invented
lightning rods what was most

39:03.695 --> 39:05.945
likely to get struck by
lightning?

39:05.949 --> 39:08.449
It was a church steeple,
right, because they stuck up

39:08.447 --> 39:09.887
into the sky and had points.

39:09.889 --> 39:12.319
As you may know,
if you take physics points

39:12.322 --> 39:14.182
attract lightning,
pointy things,

39:14.175 --> 39:17.705
so churches were always getting
lightning and burned out.

39:17.710 --> 39:21.040
Benjamin Franklin invents the
lightning rod,

39:21.039 --> 39:24.009
and oh my God,
the opprobrium that he came

39:24.014 --> 39:27.574
under because lightning was
obviously one of God's

39:27.570 --> 39:30.070
creations,
that he was punishing people

39:30.067 --> 39:30.517
with it.

39:30.518 --> 39:35.948
Now Benjamin Franklin was
interfering with God's

39:35.947 --> 39:37.447
punishment.

39:37.449 --> 39:40.189
Going back to the family,
which is relevant to the

39:40.186 --> 39:42.026
population more than lightning.

39:42.030 --> 39:48.130
So one of the--of this whole
brutal society in which life is

39:48.130 --> 39:52.260
very insecure,
people are very violent to each

39:52.257 --> 39:54.447
other,
they're not careful with their

39:54.447 --> 39:56.077
persons or anything like that.

39:56.079 --> 40:03.569
Childrearing practices don't
escape this whole context in

40:03.570 --> 40:06.380
which people lived.

40:06.380 --> 40:10.960
And the traditional Christian
view in the West,

40:10.960 --> 40:15.470
and this was strongly
reinforced by Calvinist theology

40:15.471 --> 40:19.041
after the reformation,
was that children were born

40:19.043 --> 40:20.063
with original sin.

40:20.059 --> 40:22.769
Original sin is the view of
human nature.

40:22.768 --> 40:25.248
What is human nature considered
to be in these times?

40:25.250 --> 40:28.850
Now we think of human nature as
genes versus environment,

40:28.849 --> 40:32.699
but back then it was original
sin and children were born into

40:32.704 --> 40:33.224
sin.

40:33.219 --> 40:37.229
The only hope of holding the
sin in check was thought to be

40:37.231 --> 40:41.181
the most ruthless repression of
child's will and its total

40:41.175 --> 40:44.285
subordination to the will of the
parents.

40:44.289 --> 40:48.159
He was subordinate to his
parents, to school masters,

40:48.155 --> 40:51.125
and to anyone with authority
over him.

40:51.130 --> 40:55.480
Theologians and moralists
insisted that parents ruthlessly

40:55.478 --> 40:59.518
crush the wills of young
children by physical force if

40:59.521 --> 41:00.591
necessary.

41:00.590 --> 41:02.930
That has political
ramifications.

41:02.929 --> 41:05.699
If you're taught when you're
young,

41:05.699 --> 41:08.169
and your parents believe,
that the most moral thing is

41:08.168 --> 41:11.368
that you must be obedient,
you must not have a will of

41:11.365 --> 41:14.365
your own;
this leads you to believe that

41:14.373 --> 41:18.403
authoritarian political
structures are the normal and

41:18.400 --> 41:21.810
right way that humans should be
governed.

41:21.809 --> 41:26.409
The American Puritans were very
much a part of this and the

41:26.411 --> 41:30.781
primary concern with respect to
childbearing of American

41:30.777 --> 41:35.377
Puritans was in making children
sin free enough to merit an

41:35.380 --> 41:38.110
afterlife,
so they threatened totally

41:38.112 --> 41:41.252
healthy children by telling them
that they would soon die.

41:41.250 --> 41:43.490
Jonathan Edwards,
for whom one of the Yale

41:43.485 --> 41:46.265
Colleges is named and he was
President of Princeton,

41:46.268 --> 41:51.008
he was not President of Yale;
once I said he was I was wrong.

41:51.010 --> 41:54.340
He lectured a group of
children: "I know you will

41:54.340 --> 41:55.660
die in little time.

41:55.659 --> 41:57.399
Some sooner than others.

41:57.400 --> 42:00.220
It is not likely you will all
live to grow up."

42:00.219 --> 42:05.249
Children's storybooks,
one of the popular children's

42:05.248 --> 42:08.898
books was A Token for
Children:

42:08.896 --> 42:15.256
"If other children die,
why may not you sicken and

42:15.255 --> 42:16.565
die?"

42:16.570 --> 42:19.160
Again, we try to protect our
children nowadays,

42:19.159 --> 42:22.549
nurturing, loving,
try to protect our children

42:22.545 --> 42:27.055
from these worries but back then
it (1) it was a reality,

42:27.059 --> 42:32.829
and (2) that reality was used
to suppress their-- what was

42:32.826 --> 42:38.486
called then their will and
subject them to enforcement by

42:38.490 --> 42:40.110
the parents.

42:40.110 --> 42:43.410
Of course in the literature
there's a--

42:43.409 --> 42:47.159
this sort of reading of history
came about 50 years ago when

42:47.155 --> 42:50.955
this was sort of noticed and
there's been a large reaction to

42:50.963 --> 42:53.233
it that no--
some parents at least were

42:53.233 --> 42:55.843
loving during this long stretch
of European history,

42:55.840 --> 42:59.680
and of course,
not all parents were sort of--

42:59.679 --> 43:03.489
so brutal to their children but
some were.

43:03.489 --> 43:07.679
They were--one of the things
was to force a child into the

43:07.675 --> 43:11.785
mold, the behavioral mold that
you like and also into the

43:11.788 --> 43:13.108
physical mold.

43:13.110 --> 43:16.060
So girls were supposed to have
narrow bodices,

43:16.059 --> 43:19.379
narrow waists,
there's at least one case on

43:19.380 --> 43:24.440
record where a girl was put into
an iron cage to squeeze her,

43:24.440 --> 43:28.310
and as she grew older the cage
squeezed more and more and she

43:28.311 --> 43:32.251
couldn't breathe and she died of
suffocation from being put in

43:32.246 --> 43:35.926
this iron cage to mold her
physical body to the shape that

43:35.925 --> 43:37.985
was wanted by the parents.

43:37.989 --> 43:43.489
The conclusion is that life in
this pre-- modern,

43:43.485 --> 43:50.005
pre-scientific times was not
only sort of miserable in the

43:50.014 --> 43:58.034
physical sense but probably also
quite miserable in an emotional,

43:58.030 --> 43:59.850
inward kind of sense.

43:59.849 --> 44:05.979
That people were not warm and
loving to each other very much

44:05.983 --> 44:11.803
but very frequently cold and
disciplining and controlling

44:11.804 --> 44:13.784
kind of people.

44:13.780 --> 44:19.040
We have some centuries of this
period and you can go back to

44:19.043 --> 44:23.863
maybe the fall of the Roman
Empire when really learning

44:23.862 --> 44:28.952
about reality in the West kind
of stopped with the fall of

44:28.949 --> 44:32.029
Rome,
so you have more than 1,000

44:32.032 --> 44:35.612
years where sort of no
intellectual progress with

44:35.612 --> 44:37.852
respect to reality is made.

44:37.849 --> 44:43.089
Then things all of a sudden
start to change and we're going

44:43.090 --> 44:45.350
to talk about that now.

44:45.349 --> 44:51.139
Within 200 years the death rate
falls dramatically and so has

44:51.144 --> 44:54.724
the birth rate--falls
dramatically.

44:54.719 --> 44:58.679
These changes are sort of the
centerpiece of what,

44:58.679 --> 45:00.249
of course in
demography--historical

45:00.246 --> 45:02.226
demography anybody that usually
studies--

45:02.230 --> 45:04.780
is called the demographic
transition: the fall in the

45:04.780 --> 45:06.940
death rate and the fall in the
birth rate.

45:06.940 --> 45:10.950
You'll hear this many times
because it's so basic that in

45:10.954 --> 45:14.044
these periods,
old periods the birth rate is

45:14.036 --> 45:17.116
very high, the death rate is
very high.

45:17.119 --> 45:23.179
They're about equal so
population basically grows not

45:23.175 --> 45:26.665
at all or very,
very slowly.

45:26.670 --> 45:29.600
What we're going to talk about
now in turn is first,

45:29.599 --> 45:34.239
the fall in the death rate,
and the second,

45:34.242 --> 45:40.552
then the fall in the birth
rate, and then theories that we

45:40.545 --> 45:47.395
have to explain these enormous
changes in what it means to be a

45:47.398 --> 45:49.388
human being.

45:49.389 --> 45:53.889
What happened--we don't know
the causes or we have many,

45:53.889 --> 45:55.199
many theories.

45:55.199 --> 45:57.519
Maybe we many,
many times know what the causes

45:57.519 --> 45:57.829
are.

45:57.829 --> 46:03.879
One of the standard textbooks
of European History says--

46:03.880 --> 46:08.810
this is going back to the wars
of religion which is just before

46:08.813 --> 46:13.113
all these changes started
happening before Galileo,

46:13.110 --> 46:16.430
for instance--"One thing
was clear, 130 years of

46:16.431 --> 46:20.011
senseless bloodletting in the
name of religion inevitably

46:20.009 --> 46:23.969
sparked off a reaction in the
minds of intelligent people.

46:23.969 --> 46:28.529
The wars of religion offered
fertile soil for the fragile

46:28.534 --> 46:30.984
seeds of reason and science.

46:30.980 --> 46:35.240
People began to realize that
religiosity was hostile to

46:35.235 --> 46:36.885
civilization."

46:36.889 --> 46:39.749
Europeans say,
because of this period of sort

46:39.748 --> 46:43.258
of utter irrationality,
that the bad results of it were

46:43.255 --> 46:45.785
so immediately obvious to
everyone.

46:45.789 --> 46:49.039
Everyone was getting scared of
getting killed by the people in

46:49.041 --> 46:51.921
the neighboring town who were of
the other religion;

46:51.920 --> 46:57.310
they rejected all that and were
ready for some sort of a

46:57.313 --> 47:00.653
rational attitude toward things.

47:00.650 --> 47:08.380
The results of that we can see
were really quite dramatic.

47:08.380 --> 47:13.700
Here is what we can reconstruct
of life expectancy and going

47:13.695 --> 47:18.735
back 8,000 years ago where the
records are very poor,

47:18.739 --> 47:20.989
but it certainly wasn't much
better than this.

47:20.989 --> 47:25.349
And there was wavering,
and probably some slow increase

47:25.353 --> 47:27.053
in life expectancy.

47:27.050 --> 47:31.500
This, just above 20 years of
life expectancy is what I showed

47:31.501 --> 47:35.881
you in the graph of Cisalpine
Gaul from Roman Times and what

47:35.878 --> 47:40.398
I've told you is true of Europe
during these hundreds of years

47:40.402 --> 47:43.002
that I've been talking about.

47:43.000 --> 47:45.730
That stays more or less the
same with perhaps some

47:45.730 --> 47:46.510
improvement.

47:46.510 --> 47:49.250
It doesn't matter whether
you're looking at France-the

47:49.251 --> 47:52.201
dotted line, or you're looking
at China-the solid line.

47:52.199 --> 47:57.189
As far as we can tell they're
pretty much the same until

47:57.188 --> 48:01.078
around 1700,
all of a sudden something

48:01.083 --> 48:05.853
majorly changes and the life
expectancy goes--

48:05.849 --> 48:07.449
starts going sky high.

48:07.449 --> 48:10.579
We're talking about not just
one of many,

48:10.579 --> 48:13.939
many things that happened in
history that you can take all

48:13.943 --> 48:17.743
kinds of history courses about,
but in terms of what it means

48:17.735 --> 48:22.155
to be a human,
you finally can stay alive

48:22.157 --> 48:25.857
beyond the age of 20 or 25.

48:25.860 --> 48:31.980
That is such a tremendous
change in life that there's

48:31.976 --> 48:35.266
nothing else as important.

48:35.268 --> 48:39.688
Of course a large part of this,
to reinforce this,

48:39.686 --> 48:41.756
was infant mortality.

48:41.760 --> 48:46.770
Look what happens,
back here it's going up and

48:46.769 --> 48:50.889
down like crazy and it's very
high.

48:50.889 --> 48:55.759
This a quarter of children and
this is European data,

48:55.764 --> 49:00.924
so this is about a fifth to a
quarter of children die as

49:00.920 --> 49:04.390
children and it's out of
control.

49:04.389 --> 49:07.929
You can see that the epidemics
come through and then times get

49:07.934 --> 49:10.434
good, and then something else
comes through,

49:10.432 --> 49:12.992
and so it's very variable and
very high.

49:12.989 --> 49:18.069
Then it starts swooping
downward, and not only does it

49:18.065 --> 49:22.865
come down but it evens out,
that we start getting control,

49:22.871 --> 49:26.801
not only over the overall level
but all the things which cause

49:26.800 --> 49:28.540
these wild swings in it.

49:28.539 --> 49:35.779
Again, an amazing change in
what it means to be human.

49:35.780 --> 49:39.050
Well what is this date where
things start happening?

49:39.050 --> 49:42.450
1770s we're into the
Enlightenment and you all have

49:42.454 --> 49:45.594
probably, at least in your high
school history,

49:45.588 --> 49:48.038
have heard of the
Enlightenment.

49:48.039 --> 49:53.139
And that is the big opening out
in Europe of rational discourse

49:53.137 --> 49:57.327
on almost everything,
and everything from science to

49:57.331 --> 49:58.401
politics.

49:58.400 --> 50:02.490
Disease, for instance,
was considered divine

50:02.485 --> 50:07.995
punishment upon mankind for
their sins, that's a quote from

50:07.998 --> 50:09.328
somewhere.

50:09.329 --> 50:13.029
Medical research was considered
sacrilegious.

50:13.030 --> 50:15.850
Dissection of cadavers what
objected to because "If you

50:15.847 --> 50:18.517
cut the bodies into pieces
what's going to happen to them

50:18.523 --> 50:20.533
at the time of the
resurrection?"

50:20.530 --> 50:24.950
There are all kinds of reasons
that you shouldn't do anything

50:24.947 --> 50:28.917
to get even the most basic
knowledge of what's inside a

50:28.922 --> 50:33.342
human body and without that you
can't make any progress.

50:33.340 --> 50:38.400
The major, major event in the
enlightenment is Newton's

50:38.398 --> 50:40.178
Principia.

50:40.179 --> 50:43.859
Newton's discussion of
something that sounds rather

50:43.860 --> 50:44.670
abstract.

50:44.670 --> 50:47.660
What he was worried about was
how the bodies go around in

50:47.659 --> 50:48.139
heaven.

50:48.139 --> 50:50.749
That's what everyone was trying
to figure out.

50:50.750 --> 50:54.930
You may remember Copernicus had
already said that things didn't

50:54.925 --> 50:58.695
go around the earth but they
went around the sun that was

50:58.695 --> 50:59.365
older.

50:59.369 --> 51:01.669
Keppler had gotten the
mathematics right,

51:01.668 --> 51:04.538
so they went around not in
circles but in ellipses,

51:04.541 --> 51:07.071
but nobody had any explanation
for this.

51:07.070 --> 51:10.630
It was a simple theory;
it was great regularity,

51:10.634 --> 51:13.024
but no one had any idea why.

51:13.018 --> 51:17.598
Newton's gravitation was what
made it rational in the sense of

51:17.601 --> 51:22.031
understanding that it was just a
simple force of gravity and

51:22.034 --> 51:25.044
people don't always understand
the--

51:25.039 --> 51:29.489
you know the story of the apple
dropping on his head?

51:29.489 --> 51:33.409
The story is that gave him the
idea of gravitation.

51:33.409 --> 51:37.249
Apparently--(1) the story is
probably apocryphal totally but

51:37.246 --> 51:41.076
the import is what everyone was
trying to figure out was the

51:41.083 --> 51:42.453
heavenly motions.

51:42.449 --> 51:44.739
The moon around the earth,
the earth around the sun,

51:44.737 --> 51:46.977
the planets around all of these
sorts of things.

51:46.980 --> 51:51.360
He goes to sleep under the tree
and the apple falls on his head

51:51.364 --> 51:55.894
and he wakes up and he realizes,
'oh my God the apple fell on my

51:55.887 --> 51:59.907
head for the same reason that
the moon is held in orbit around

51:59.914 --> 52:00.844
the earth.'

52:00.840 --> 52:03.170
As you know if there was no
gravity the moon would just--

52:03.170 --> 52:04.980
here's the earth,
the moon goes around,

52:04.976 --> 52:07.636
you shut off gravity the moon
goes off in a straight line

52:07.639 --> 52:08.209
forever.

52:08.210 --> 52:10.510
That was kind of understood
already by Galileo,

52:10.512 --> 52:13.422
that things in motion will go
in a straight line unless you

52:13.418 --> 52:14.668
pull them in somehow.

52:14.670 --> 52:17.460
They knew that the earth--the
moon was constantly falling

52:17.461 --> 52:18.411
toward the earth.

52:18.409 --> 52:20.419
The earth was constantly
falling toward the sun;

52:20.420 --> 52:22.850
all the planets were constantly
falling towards the sun.

52:22.849 --> 52:25.429
That was understood,
and they knew that apples fell

52:25.427 --> 52:28.517
to the earth but they didn't put
the two of them together.

52:28.518 --> 52:31.518
The great insight of Newton
apparently was realizing that

52:31.521 --> 52:34.471
this thing on earth that we
could observe and measure on

52:34.469 --> 52:37.749
earth,
was the same reason that the

52:37.753 --> 52:42.063
heavens worked,
and this was sort of a

52:42.056 --> 52:49.326
bombshell that led to the whole
theory of celestial mechanics

52:49.331 --> 52:56.001
and gravitation and all of
Western science really starts

52:56.001 --> 52:57.821
from this.

52:57.820 --> 53:01.820
Within 25 years--and people
were--Newton was lionized during

53:01.822 --> 53:02.842
his lifetime.

53:02.840 --> 53:08.120
It was realized what a
tremendous achievement this was,

53:08.119 --> 53:12.019
and the relationship to this is
not only the scientific

53:12.016 --> 53:16.276
achievement that the planets
orbited by the same force which

53:16.275 --> 53:19.765
drops an apple,
but it was previously believed

53:19.773 --> 53:23.543
that yes well events on earth
might work by some sort of

53:23.536 --> 53:26.476
physical laws,
you had Galileo working on

53:26.480 --> 53:29.770
that, but heaven was ruled by
supernatural laws,

53:29.768 --> 53:31.968
and now Newton's great insight
was,

53:31.969 --> 53:33.619
no they're the same laws.

53:33.619 --> 53:36.149
That there's nothing special or
different about the heavens.

53:36.150 --> 53:41.210
That they work by exactly the
same laws as stones and apples

53:41.210 --> 53:42.840
falling on earth.

53:42.840 --> 53:46.610
This was really a tremendous
impetus to realize the power of

53:46.606 --> 53:50.306
rationality and so within 25
years the whole attitude about

53:50.311 --> 53:52.611
everything changes tremendously.

53:52.610 --> 53:57.680
As the bubonic plague receded,
for reasons we don't know,

53:57.681 --> 54:02.841
that I showed you that data,
then smallpox starts becoming

54:02.842 --> 54:07.492
the leading cause of death;
one replacing the other.

54:07.489 --> 54:10.809
As opposed to what had gone on
before,

54:10.809 --> 54:12.899
which was supernatural ideas
about it,

54:12.900 --> 54:16.700
in the 1710s very shortly after
Newton,

54:16.699 --> 54:18.879
The Royal Scientific Society
again started,

54:18.880 --> 54:22.180
at this same time,
began a search program,

54:22.179 --> 54:25.669
research program to gather
information from any place in

54:25.670 --> 54:29.290
the world on how smallpox could
be controlled or cured.

54:29.289 --> 54:32.709
Just a new kind of way of
dealing with disease that just

54:32.706 --> 54:35.996
hadn't been seen before,
and so what did they find?

54:36.000 --> 54:39.100
They found that,
in Turkey, that they were

54:39.096 --> 54:42.336
inoculating people,
and what inoculation is,

54:42.344 --> 54:46.804
the early form--they take
someone that has the disease;

54:46.800 --> 54:50.970
they take pus from the
disease--what is pus?

54:50.969 --> 54:54.779
It's white blood cells that
have eaten the virus or

54:54.784 --> 54:57.084
bacteria,
depending on whether it's

54:57.079 --> 54:59.929
plague or smallpox,
and have engulfed it and they

54:59.929 --> 55:02.599
kill the bacteria or virus,
the pathogen.

55:02.599 --> 55:05.569
You have a dead pathogen but
it's molecules are still there

55:05.570 --> 55:09.250
and so you can take the pus,
inject it, just cut the skin,

55:09.253 --> 55:12.563
put it on a person,
and hopefully they're not

55:12.557 --> 55:16.277
exposed to anymore of the live
virus but the dead--

55:16.280 --> 55:20.560
presumably the white blood
cells have killed the virus,

55:20.559 --> 55:25.549
and you just get their
molecules and that induces an

55:25.545 --> 55:31.015
immune reaction and you become
immune to this disease.

55:31.018 --> 55:34.978
Local governments started--I'll
tell you more about smallpox in

55:34.976 --> 55:36.376
a couple of minutes.

55:36.380 --> 55:42.870
In 1750s, again this very early
time, local regulations for

55:42.867 --> 55:47.117
sewage disposal are getting
started.

55:47.119 --> 55:51.469
In the 1790s the rich start
using water closets which are

55:51.465 --> 55:53.245
toilets of some sort.

55:53.250 --> 55:58.080
Not only do they introduce
vaccination, but 1796 they try

55:58.076 --> 55:59.796
to make it better.

55:59.800 --> 56:02.770
They don't just say,
oh this works by some magic,

56:02.768 --> 56:05.128
they try to figure out what it
makes it better,

56:05.130 --> 56:08.630
and Jenner discovers
vaccination, which is instead of

56:08.628 --> 56:11.588
using pus from a person who had
smallpox--

56:11.590 --> 56:15.970
there's a very closely related
disease called cowpox which the

56:15.974 --> 56:19.094
cow maids--
the milk maids get very

56:19.094 --> 56:21.074
frequently,
and it was noticed,

56:21.070 --> 56:22.980
because they're now observing
all these things,

56:22.980 --> 56:25.910
that these women would get sick
but most of them would recover.

56:25.909 --> 56:29.409
This was a not a lethal
disease, so instead of taking

56:29.407 --> 56:34.647
the actual smallpox virus,
which vaccination--the early

56:34.646 --> 56:37.596
inoculation--
did not always work and you

56:37.596 --> 56:39.626
sometimes did catch the disease
and died.

56:39.630 --> 56:43.080
Taking it from cowpox rather
than smallpox was less

56:43.081 --> 56:45.951
dangerous,
but since the viruses are

56:45.952 --> 56:50.612
closely related to each other a
lot of the molecules are the

56:50.612 --> 56:57.082
same and you get--
from cowpox you get immunity to

56:57.081 --> 57:04.691
smallpox and so these diseases
start going down.

57:04.690 --> 57:09.900
Not only in health but it
starts the industrial

57:09.902 --> 57:15.682
revolution, in 1711 James
Newcomen invents the steam

57:15.682 --> 57:16.932
engine.

57:16.929 --> 57:19.979
It's a very,
very inefficient steam engine,

57:19.981 --> 57:23.761
and it's used only where you
had--can have a very big

57:23.762 --> 57:27.762
placement and it's used to pump
water out of mines.

57:27.760 --> 57:32.130
Coal is becoming important for
England to fuel the industrial

57:32.134 --> 57:35.854
revolution, and you have mines
that are underground,

57:35.851 --> 57:38.041
and water seeps into them.

57:38.039 --> 57:41.199
You've got to suck out the
water, so how do you pump it

57:41.204 --> 57:43.554
out, well he invents the steam
engine.

57:43.550 --> 57:47.290
Then James Watt figures
out--looks at it more

57:47.289 --> 57:49.799
scientifically,
more rationally,

57:49.797 --> 57:52.977
and again just like inoculation
being supplanted with

57:52.978 --> 57:55.178
vaccination they start
improving.

57:55.179 --> 57:57.289
It's not just that something
works and our ancestors did it

57:57.293 --> 57:58.863
this way and we don't know why
it works,

57:58.860 --> 58:00.920
we don't why care it works,
we do it the same way our

58:00.916 --> 58:01.546
ancestors did.

58:01.550 --> 58:04.860
No they keep thinking about
what they're looking at,

58:04.860 --> 58:08.570
what they're working on,
and he improves it and in this

58:08.570 --> 58:12.450
case what James Watt did is,
after the steam comes out,

58:12.449 --> 58:16.489
he had a condenser to condense
the steam so drop the pressure

58:16.485 --> 58:19.105
on one side of the piston going
out.

58:19.110 --> 58:22.030
Just by taking the condenser
instead of--

58:22.030 --> 58:25.110
letting--having a way of
cooling the steam really

58:25.114 --> 58:28.654
improves the efficiency of a
steam engine and now with a

58:28.650 --> 58:32.380
greater efficiency you can make
a smaller steam engine that

58:32.378 --> 58:35.928
works just as well,
and you can put it on wheels

58:35.931 --> 58:39.291
and you start getting the
railroad and all kinds of

58:39.291 --> 58:42.721
smaller factories can start
using steam engines.

58:42.719 --> 58:48.409
In politics,
this idea is also terribly

58:48.411 --> 58:50.211
important.

58:50.210 --> 58:55.380
The previous idea was that of a
hierarchical system with God

58:55.380 --> 59:00.060
appointing kings being--
ruling over nobility and then

59:00.061 --> 59:03.291
everyone else must obey up this
chain.

59:03.289 --> 59:05.989
Well what is Newton's idea?

59:05.989 --> 59:09.739
That everything obeys the same
law: gravity.

59:09.739 --> 59:13.839
That the sun attracts the earth;
the earth attracts the sun,

59:13.840 --> 59:14.860
equally and opposite.

59:14.860 --> 59:16.200
There's no difference.

59:16.199 --> 59:18.589
The sun does not rule the
universe, it's not better then

59:18.592 --> 59:20.682
the earth, it works by exactly
the same rules.

59:20.679 --> 59:23.099
The sun and the earth,
the earth and the moon,

59:23.099 --> 59:27.099
everything acts by the same
rules, there is no need for some

59:27.101 --> 59:30.631
sort of central sentient
coordinator of all this,

59:30.630 --> 59:34.660
but each individual planet,
each individual body,

59:34.659 --> 59:38.699
all bodies, apples,
working by their own laws,

59:38.699 --> 59:41.929
by the same laws as everyone
else the universe works

59:41.931 --> 59:42.821
beautifully.

59:42.820 --> 59:45.060
In fact it works as it does it
work.

59:45.059 --> 59:49.659
This idea is very consciously
taken over into politics and the

59:49.657 --> 59:53.267
idea of democracy,
again changes that each person

59:53.266 --> 59:57.156
acting under his own desires,
his own self interest,

59:57.164 --> 1:00:01.744
his own morality can,
by interacting in the same way

1:00:01.742 --> 1:00:04.922
the planets do,
can come out with a system that

1:00:04.916 --> 1:00:05.286
works.

1:00:05.289 --> 1:00:10.019
The original theorists of
democracy were very conscious of

1:00:10.018 --> 1:00:14.668
this shift in the way they
looked at the way the universe

1:00:14.666 --> 1:00:17.816
worked and very conscious of
its--

1:00:17.820 --> 1:00:20.400
their debt to Newton on that.

1:00:20.400 --> 1:00:24.450
In economics,
how many of you are economics

1:00:24.451 --> 1:00:25.321
majors?

1:00:25.320 --> 1:00:27.070
The bust has really taken
effect;

1:00:27.070 --> 1:00:29.670
we used to have lots of
economic majors.

1:00:29.670 --> 1:00:32.290
What is Adam Smith's idea?

1:00:32.289 --> 1:00:36.639
The basis of modern economics
is Adam Smith's--

1:00:36.639 --> 1:00:39.829
that no you don't need a
Mercantilist government to

1:00:39.827 --> 1:00:43.027
control everything,
that if each person acts in

1:00:43.025 --> 1:00:46.615
their own self interest by their
own internal rules,

1:00:46.619 --> 1:00:51.639
then the economy will work just
wonderfully and be more

1:00:51.641 --> 1:00:52.851
productive.

1:00:52.849 --> 1:00:55.779
Freedom of religion is again
the same thing,

1:00:55.780 --> 1:00:59.160
freedom of conscience,
it's a similar kind of idea

1:00:59.155 --> 1:01:05.815
that each person has its own--
has his own way of working

1:01:05.815 --> 1:01:15.065
things out and that does not
destroy the harmony of the

1:01:15.072 --> 1:01:17.132
universe.

1:01:17.130 --> 1:01:24.990
We see that this rationality
changes everything about the way

1:01:24.994 --> 1:01:26.834
humans live.

1:01:26.829 --> 1:01:30.319
One of its most important
effects is demography.

1:01:30.320 --> 1:01:34.550
That the population stops dying
and can start increasing,

1:01:34.552 --> 1:01:37.202
and this is exactly what
happens.

1:01:37.199 --> 1:01:41.329
As all this rational attitude
toward death and toward disease

1:01:41.326 --> 1:01:44.046
starts taking hold,
the death rate falls

1:01:44.047 --> 1:01:47.907
tremendously as I've shown you,
the life expectancy goes up,

1:01:47.905 --> 1:01:51.455
infant mortality goes down,
and population starts

1:01:51.460 --> 1:01:53.390
increasing tremendously.

1:01:53.389 --> 1:01:55.579
Most people,
at that time,

1:01:55.583 --> 1:02:00.413
believed that a big population
was a wonderful thing and

1:02:00.413 --> 1:02:03.753
they're very optimistic about
it,

1:02:03.750 --> 1:02:07.090
and one of the standard ways of
judging a government,

1:02:07.090 --> 1:02:08.590
when you saw a country that had
a lot of people in it,

1:02:08.590 --> 1:02:11.310
well obviously the government
was doing something right.

1:02:11.309 --> 1:02:15.029
The king at that time was doing
something right because people

1:02:15.032 --> 1:02:16.622
were able to stay alive.

1:02:16.619 --> 1:02:20.589
If you saw a country with a low
population, well something was

1:02:20.594 --> 1:02:23.594
wrong, and that was not
necessarily an improper

1:02:23.592 --> 1:02:24.442
attitude.

1:02:24.440 --> 1:02:27.460
Up until Malthus,
with some exceptions,

1:02:27.463 --> 1:02:31.523
it was generally the idea that
there was no limit to

1:02:31.523 --> 1:02:36.063
population, that the more the
population the merrier.

1:02:36.059 --> 1:02:44.039
Malthus came along and said,
'hmm there is a problem with

1:02:44.043 --> 1:02:52.603
population,' and he had been
watching--he collected very good

1:02:52.596 --> 1:02:53.876
data.

1:02:53.880 --> 1:02:56.320
You read his stuff,
it's really wonderful to read

1:02:56.320 --> 1:02:59.580
because it's extremely modern in
that he tells you the data he is

1:02:59.577 --> 1:03:01.187
collecting;
he analyzes it;

1:03:01.190 --> 1:03:03.910
he tells you what he--what's
wrong with the data,

1:03:03.911 --> 1:03:07.371
why he believes it to a certain
extent but not beyond that and

1:03:07.371 --> 1:03:09.131
all things about the data.

1:03:09.130 --> 1:03:15.120
Very--he's writing is like 1798
but it reads like a modern PhD

1:03:15.117 --> 1:03:17.177
thesis, just about.

1:03:17.179 --> 1:03:22.309
His knowledge was the
following, and it's very simple

1:03:22.309 --> 1:03:23.789
what he said.

1:03:23.789 --> 1:03:27.859
He did not say--many people
thought that--

1:03:27.860 --> 1:03:31.000
as previous people had often
said like Edmond Burke,

1:03:31.000 --> 1:03:32.260
who was the father of
conservatism,

1:03:32.260 --> 1:03:36.310
that the economic pie is
constant, there's just so much

1:03:36.306 --> 1:03:39.496
stuff out there,
and the more people you just

1:03:39.503 --> 1:03:42.293
have to divide the pie smaller
and smaller.

1:03:42.289 --> 1:03:44.199
That's one way of looking at it.

1:03:44.199 --> 1:03:47.779
Then it's perfectly obvious
that population is a bad thing

1:03:47.782 --> 1:03:51.742
because there's fixed production
and you have more people to eat

1:03:51.744 --> 1:03:53.194
up that production.

1:03:53.190 --> 1:03:57.670
Malthus was much smarter,
by the time he wrote in 1798

1:03:57.673 --> 1:04:01.993
the Enlightenment had started to
produce results.

1:04:01.989 --> 1:04:06.419
He could see that agricultural
production was improving year by

1:04:06.418 --> 1:04:09.028
year;
modern methods were--modern at

1:04:09.034 --> 1:04:12.844
that time--were beginning to
take over and he knew that

1:04:12.840 --> 1:04:14.180
production rose.

1:04:14.179 --> 1:04:17.629
What he assumed,
and what he saw from the data

1:04:17.630 --> 1:04:20.470
was that production rose
linearly,

1:04:20.469 --> 1:04:24.989
that every year there was sort
of--you could produce a little

1:04:24.994 --> 1:04:27.034
bit more out of the land.

1:04:27.030 --> 1:04:30.340
Now he said,
but what about population?

1:04:30.340 --> 1:04:34.800
In population if you have 100
people and they increase by

1:04:34.804 --> 1:04:39.514
let's say 50% that's 150 people,
you've gained 50 people.

1:04:39.510 --> 1:04:42.930
But now from the next
generation you again grow by

1:04:42.931 --> 1:04:46.841
50%, you're starting with 150
people you have--now you're

1:04:46.842 --> 1:04:48.312
adding 75 people.

1:04:48.309 --> 1:04:57.719
The graph--this is time,
this is agricultural product,

1:04:57.719 --> 1:05:05.179
and Malthus said this is
growing like this,

1:05:05.177 --> 1:05:12.987
which was quite reasonable for
his time.

1:05:12.989 --> 1:05:18.789
Population, no matter where it
starts grows--

1:05:18.789 --> 1:05:22.299
he called it geometrically,
we call it exponentially,

1:05:22.300 --> 1:05:29.270
so if it starts that there's
just enough food for people to

1:05:29.268 --> 1:05:32.988
eat,
then it almost immediately goes

1:05:32.990 --> 1:05:35.130
above food production.

1:05:35.130 --> 1:05:38.260
If it starts even below,
it doesn't matter;

1:05:38.260 --> 1:05:42.460
it eventually rises--catches up
with food production and goes

1:05:42.460 --> 1:05:43.300
beyond it.

1:05:43.300 --> 1:05:47.470
He believed that there was no
doubt that population increases

1:05:47.465 --> 1:05:50.305
geometrically,
or exponentially as we say,

1:05:50.311 --> 1:05:53.091
that means a certain percent a
year.

1:05:53.090 --> 1:05:57.840
It may increase one percent a
year or two percent a year,

1:05:57.840 --> 1:06:01.070
or three percent a year,
but remember that's one percent

1:06:01.065 --> 1:06:03.875
of an increasing number so it's
more and more.

1:06:03.880 --> 1:06:08.410
Whereas, agriculture he thought
increased linearly by the same

1:06:08.409 --> 1:06:12.269
fixed amount each year,
and if that's the case you're

1:06:12.268 --> 1:06:14.718
going to run into starvation.

1:06:14.719 --> 1:06:22.869
He said, since population can
always outrun productivity,

1:06:22.869 --> 1:06:26.099
eventually you get into
trouble, that whenever you

1:06:26.101 --> 1:06:30.871
increase the number of people--
if you ever--you're at some

1:06:30.865 --> 1:06:35.005
sort of stasis level,
where resources fit the

1:06:35.007 --> 1:06:36.017
population.

1:06:36.018 --> 1:06:40.678
But then as you get some
increase in productivity it

1:06:40.679 --> 1:06:45.249
allows a rise in population only
to match that,

1:06:45.250 --> 1:06:48.820
but then the greater number of
people eat up that increase in

1:06:48.822 --> 1:06:52.042
productivity so you're right
back down to where he--

1:06:52.039 --> 1:06:54.109
you started with.

1:06:54.110 --> 1:06:59.640
His idea was that increasing
population was not a good thing.

1:06:59.639 --> 1:07:04.579
It could not lead to any
improvement if it outran your

1:07:04.579 --> 1:07:08.489
productivity gains,
and this led to all kinds of

1:07:08.492 --> 1:07:11.552
what we now consider very
conservative and even

1:07:11.554 --> 1:07:13.754
retrogressive political ideas.

1:07:13.750 --> 1:07:17.070
So poor laws--he was initially
against poor laws.

1:07:17.070 --> 1:07:20.650
There's no sense to keep the
poor alive because if you keep

1:07:20.650 --> 1:07:24.040
them alive they're going to
reproduce and make even more

1:07:24.043 --> 1:07:27.813
children and you're right back
to where you started from.

1:07:27.809 --> 1:07:33.399
He was a strong conservative in
that sense.

1:07:33.400 --> 1:07:36.740
He later changed his mind as he
got smarter about things.

1:07:36.739 --> 1:07:40.039
He was also aware of,
even though population could

1:07:40.039 --> 1:07:42.869
increase like this,
maybe and he was aware,

1:07:42.867 --> 1:07:46.837
that people were smart enough
to stop this in some way.

1:07:46.840 --> 1:07:50.410
He knew about various methods
of contraception,

1:07:50.407 --> 1:07:54.357
withdrawal and so forth,
and various perverse sexual

1:07:54.364 --> 1:07:55.454
practices.

1:07:55.449 --> 1:07:58.589
But he was so opposed to them
morally,

1:07:58.590 --> 1:08:00.810
as was everyone else in his
time, that you should not

1:08:00.806 --> 1:08:02.886
control reproduction,
that that was immoral,

1:08:02.885 --> 1:08:05.235
but he said 'people are never
going to do that.'

1:08:05.239 --> 1:08:09.529
That what happens to balance it
is not people themselves

1:08:09.527 --> 1:08:12.877
controlling this in a very
rational way,

1:08:12.880 --> 1:08:15.910
which he thought was not
possible at that time,

1:08:15.909 --> 1:08:20.069
but famine would come in,
disease would come in,

1:08:20.069 --> 1:08:22.339
and whenever your population
got too big people would get

1:08:22.341 --> 1:08:22.831
very poor.

1:08:22.828 --> 1:08:25.838
They were open to some disease,
the disease would wipe you out.

1:08:25.840 --> 1:08:30.230
You either starved directly
immediately from too much--

1:08:30.229 --> 1:08:34.669
the population getting ahead of
agriculture productivity,

1:08:34.670 --> 1:08:38.710
you either starved or you got
to so weak that diseases come

1:08:38.708 --> 1:08:40.588
through and wipe you out.

1:08:40.590 --> 1:08:46.780
Okay we will--time is up we
will continue onward next time.

1:08:46.779 --> 1:08:58.999