WEBVTT

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lost in the fog of a cosmic storm floating on

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whimsical wavelengths is the norm dancing through

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the stars chasing spectrums of light riding the

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waves that are just out Before modern medical

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science existed, as much as 50 % of Europe's

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14th century population died due to the Black

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Death. Yes, yes, I know. It's a dark way to start

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a whimsical Wavelengths episode. This is also

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a solo episode. This episode is inspired by a

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listener. That should be a cue for any of you

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out there that have an idea or something you

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want to hear more of on the show to reach out.

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And this particular listener wanted more ammunition

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to frame discussions and push back against those

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who play fast and loose with reality. In season

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one, we did a bit of this with Nikola Tesla and

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HARP, the High Arctic Auroral Research Program.

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And we've also had many episodes which add little

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tidbits about the sausage making of science,

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which are super important to understand everything.

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If one understands the complexities of scientific

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methods and the instruments and institutions

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we use to conduct it, It changes your perception.

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For example, in the same way that vaccines, if

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you understand science, become one of humans'

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greatest inventions, climate change stops being

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political and starts being something physical.

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They're observable truths. My dear listener,

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Robin, described the need for information in

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a more general way, but gave the example of vaccines.

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First, I thought from Star Trek, I'm a geophysicist

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and volcanologist, not an MD, damn it. But I

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understand science and its methodology. I figured

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I could go out and approach this from a historical

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viewpoint and how we ended up in the position

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we're in. In other words, spin you a whimsical

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yarn. It's actually crazy when we get down to

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it and look at it that the opposition to disease

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intervention didn't begin with vaccines. You

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could argue it began with varulation. And we'll

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come back to that later. This is where they infect

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people with a milder version of the disease.

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I should also mention that throughout this episode,

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I'm going to be butchering people's names and

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other scientific terms and the way they're pronounced.

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I'm going to give it my best shot, but I'm human

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and this isn't AI voice. What can I say? I have

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the face for radio. So while we'll come back

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to variolation, there's even an earlier belief

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that disease was not something humans should

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interfere with. Like it was divine will. Like

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so many of these things, they hearken back to...

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the distant past. They're reactionary in an effort

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to disbelieve something in the present or to

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explain something in the present in a more, I

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don't know what the word is, relatable way. But

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before we get into all of this, there's some

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ground rules because this episode is health related.

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Number one, I am not your doctor. this is not

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medical advice well it is likely that a vaccine

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will be a net benefit to you there are cases

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when that is not true due to allergic reactions

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of ingredients inside the vaccine like eggs for

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instance or those that are immunocompromised

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like you're going undergoing cancer treatment

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when these vaccines are taken on a population

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scale when we remove the individual which may

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or may not have a good reason to not take a vaccine,

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when we take them on a population scale, i .e.

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everyone who should take it, it can wipe out

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or severely reduce the amount of sickness that

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is in the public. It's an evolutionary arms race

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out there, and vaccines are an important tool

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to give us the upper hand. This episode does

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not constitute medical advice, as I already said.

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This isn't a debate episode. It's a walkthrough

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of how the evidence has accumulated. and which

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ideas survived contact with reality. So, as a

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couple of these solo episodes have already gone

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down this path in rabbit holes, it's really about

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the history of science, the observations, the

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repeatable data, the experiments, and how we

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got from then to today. If we don't understand

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the past, it's damn difficult to understand the

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present. This time, we don't need to go all the

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way back to the Roman Empire in antiquity to

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start my whimsical tale. Today, we're going to

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start with the Black Death and its hindsight

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observations, and then pivot to the old ideas

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of disease and the data that led up to germ theory,

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and an idea that says disease isn't caused by

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microbes at all, but by the condition of the

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body itself. The Black Death. Why start the story

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here? Well, because. It represents a pathogen

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before any semblance of modern understanding.

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It was well written about. We have lots of records

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about it. And there was no microscopes. Bacteria

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wasn't yet discovered. And infection wasn't really

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a concept. The Black Death represented something

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terrible. People dying from something no one

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understood. Getting sick in medieval times was

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thought of in several different ways. The most

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common was divine punishment or divine will.

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specifically with the Black Death, people would

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whip themselves or fast, hoping for God's forgiveness.

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There were other darker things done too, like

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pointing at minorities and persecuting them because

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they believed it must be their fault. I purposely

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did not go too far in this vein during my research,

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in part perhaps for my own sanity. Today or any

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other time in human history, humans can be terrible.

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To other humans. For the ideas of fasting, while

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the body is weakened by it, you're not getting

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the nutrients you need when dealing with disease.

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Not exactly useful. That's not to say that fasting

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can't be good for you under the right circumstances,

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but that's not today's episode. Causing bodily

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damage to oneself, looking for salvation, like

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where you see, particularly if you... have watched

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the holy grail from monty python and there will

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be at least one more call out to that show as

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we move along where doremniacrine and they whip

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themselves well that's that process of looking

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for salvation and really it's just making bacterial

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infection easier you're creating open wounds

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yeah not good and the persecuting others through

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violence and massacres and terror of course that

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doesn't help you get the picture But the Black

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Death was a terrible time. Governments were failing.

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Religious institutions were failing. People were

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willing to turn to anything, including astrology,

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which is also a turn back to the alignment of

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the stars, a call out to the last solo episode.

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Basically, the occult and the supernatural. We

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still see this today in Western culture. The

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most scientific explanation at the time was miasma

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or bad air. here the idea goes if the air is

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bad you get sick which is some truth to it when

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london finally got sewers to deal with the stink

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to take away all the bad air cholera cases went

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way down as much less contamination with all

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sewage and you know all that nastiness was removed

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one other example of miasma or how it was used

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to explain observations is swamps they often

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smell different It's also where mosquitoes are

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at their highest concentration. Move away from

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those swamps and there's less mosquitoes. There's

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less malaria, less bad smell. Maybe this is another

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point where we should make the case that correlation

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does not always equal causation. Okay, so I've

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seen a reference in the research to a plague

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doctor mask as well in reference to miasma and

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the black death. The bird -like beak that is

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shown in popular costumes. I could have done

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a whole episode on the masks and their origins,

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but that's not very on -brand for whimsical wavelengths.

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But it does seem like they came about in the

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mid -1600s during another cycle of the plague

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or Black Death. There at least is some discussion

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of them out there that the idea of the beak could

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hold nice -smelling things and remove the bad

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air and therefore protect those caring for the

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sick. History and humans are definitely strange.

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Today, we do know what caused the Black Death.

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Yersinia pestis, a bacteria, a hyperparasite,

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which means it's a parasite and its host is a

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parasite. So primarily, if you wanted to describe

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it a different way, it's a parasite of a parasite.

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Typically, Yersinia pestis infects fleas feeding

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off of what they would eat from their hosts,

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who in this case are rats. Keep in mind... At

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this point in our story, people being infected

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had no idea of any of this. Okay, let's go on

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a bit of a tangent here. We're going to do this

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multiple times throughout this whimsical story.

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A side story, if you will. Understanding this

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pathogen goes a long way to understanding history.

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The first time it spread across Europe was between

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541 AD and 750 AD, during the reign of the Byzantine

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emperor Justinian I, who contracted it in...

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542 AD and survived. So that's how the plague

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got its name at the time. It killed up to 25

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% of Europe's population. It was also a point

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in history when the Byzantine Empire was growing,

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trying to restore the Roman Empire. Maybe they

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would have succeeded if not for the fact that

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the plague weakened them. Understanding Yersinai

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Pestis' spread, is a scientific sleuthing game

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and it has big effects on how we understand history

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back into the story at hand and in the same vein

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an interesting observation or pattern kind of

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emerges when you start looking at all the data

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from behind the black death stable hands horse

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handlers and some rural workers that worked with

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cows seemed to fare slightly better during outbreaks

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through the many waves of disease that rolled

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through europe Now, before we go and get too

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excited or go down a rabbit hole, better doesn't

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necessarily mean safe. It doesn't mean immune.

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It definitely doesn't mean protected in any modern

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sense when we start talking about vaccines. These

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people still, many of them got sick. Many still

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died. The Black Death was catastrophic across

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all classes and professions, rich and poor. But

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when historians and epidemiologists go back through

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the record, like burial counts and documents,

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there is a signal there. Certain groups, especially

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those working closely with large animals like

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horses and cows, had slightly lower mortality

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rates comparison to others, like the densely

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packed urban population. At the time, nobody

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knew why. It wasn't a theory. It wasn't even

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medicine when these observations were first made.

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It wasn't even really science as we'd recognize

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it. It was simply pattern recognition, lived

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experience and hindsight reconstruction. So what

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was the possible cause? Well, chances are they

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were exposed to something that increased their

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chances of survival. A specific pathogen. And

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those pathogens are the evolutionary cousins

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or ancestors to the plague bacteria, Yersinia

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pestis. See, the plague bacteria is actually

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a fairly recent newcomer. Based on the estimates

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on how fast genetics change, we think Yersinia

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pestis emerged around 6 ,000 years ago. It evolved

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from what we call today Yersinia pseudotuberculosis.

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Their genetic code is extremely similar. In fact,

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up to 95 % similar. and urinary pseudotuberculosis

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is present in soil, water, and animal waste,

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and would have existed all across Europe at the

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time. If one eats contaminated food with this

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bacteria, it can cause a mild, short -term, food

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-borne illness. In other words, everyone who

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dealt with livestock would have been exposed.

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That exposure may be the reason more in rural

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communities had better outcomes. Episodic exposure

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to a similar -looking pathogen allows the immune

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system to mount a at least a faster response,

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increasing the survival chance. Remember, no

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100 % here, but enough to change probabilities

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at the margins when half the continent is flipping

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dying. So two broad ways of thinking began taking

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shape, even if no one at the time would have

00:13:07.159 --> 00:13:09.200
described them that way. If you lived through

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the Black Death, you absolutely saw that nutrition,

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stress, housing, poverty affects who lives and

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dies. That part is undeniable. Today, you perhaps

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would call this the social economic determinants

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of health. But you also see waves of illness

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sweeping through towns, following trade routes,

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moving along rivers, and strike people who were

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perfectly healthy just days earlier. The problem

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is, without tools, many explanations can be made

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to fit the same observations. And that's where

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we are, historically, at the end of the Black

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Death. A world full of observations, suffering,

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and patterns. But still missing one thing that

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science requires before it can really begin to

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work. A way to isolate cause from coincidence.

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Of course, I'm skipping so much. That's what

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happens every time you want to do a bit of a

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scientific deep dive through history. So one

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of the things I'm skipping is really getting

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into how the Black Death during medieval time

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also changed the social fabric of Europe, effectively

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breaking serfdom. which was the way people were

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organized. I am your king. Listen, strange women

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lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis

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for a system of government. But we're here right

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now looking for a rough historical tale of how

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we get to vaccines. The next observation that

00:14:33.100 --> 00:14:37.799
is needed deals with other diseases. And one

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of those observations is like survivors. They

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often don't get sick. again from the same thing.

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Smallpox, for the time, is one of the most obvious

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examples. If you survived it once, the odds of

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catching it again were pretty close to zero.

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Measles behaved similarly. Entire communities

00:14:55.429 --> 00:14:58.049
noticed that recovered individuals could care

00:14:58.049 --> 00:14:59.870
for the sick without falling ill themselves.

00:15:01.309 --> 00:15:05.110
That's a data point. Immunity or resistance happened

00:15:05.110 --> 00:15:08.470
during the Black Death too. Hard -earned immunity.

00:15:09.149 --> 00:15:13.929
Those that got sick and survived the immune system

00:15:13.929 --> 00:15:18.970
remembers when new waves of the plague came through

00:15:18.970 --> 00:15:23.029
many of those that survived did not get sick

00:15:23.029 --> 00:15:28.769
a second time another pattern is clustering disease

00:15:28.769 --> 00:15:31.789
follows ships trade routes armies it moves through

00:15:31.789 --> 00:15:35.990
households it respects proximity far more than

00:15:35.990 --> 00:15:40.129
it does astrology The alignment of stars in the

00:15:40.129 --> 00:15:44.669
sky. This leads to early interventions like quarantine.

00:15:45.429 --> 00:15:49.909
Venice's 40 -day isolation policy, the quarantina.

00:15:50.070 --> 00:15:53.769
It wasn't based on biology, but it was based

00:15:53.769 --> 00:15:57.110
on observation. Hold ships offshore and fewer

00:15:57.110 --> 00:16:00.139
people died. It was picked specifically at the

00:16:00.139 --> 00:16:02.220
number 40 because 40 is referenced in the Bible.

00:16:02.340 --> 00:16:04.759
It reigned for 40 days and 40 nights. It was

00:16:04.759 --> 00:16:07.240
not chosen based on observations or any real

00:16:07.240 --> 00:16:09.840
sort of understanding. It was a decision made

00:16:09.840 --> 00:16:12.759
in part to assert control over the situation.

00:16:13.700 --> 00:16:15.820
And if you're going to assert control over the

00:16:15.820 --> 00:16:19.379
situation at this time frame, you needed to couch

00:16:19.379 --> 00:16:21.720
it or have some way to point back to something

00:16:21.720 --> 00:16:24.980
that people did understand. And the Bible was

00:16:24.980 --> 00:16:28.409
one of those things. However, looking back, the

00:16:28.409 --> 00:16:30.809
outcome was measurable. It was a correct action

00:16:30.809 --> 00:16:34.049
for incorrect reasons. Even those of learned

00:16:34.049 --> 00:16:37.289
persuasions couldn't understand much of anything.

00:16:38.149 --> 00:16:40.490
Because at this stage, only the effects are visible.

00:16:40.769 --> 00:16:43.690
To identify a cause, you need to see the agent.

00:16:44.629 --> 00:16:47.429
And now we get to the same similar discussion

00:16:47.429 --> 00:16:51.169
as we did for telescopes. For most of human history,

00:16:51.389 --> 00:16:54.830
being able to see bacteria were physically impossible.

00:16:55.720 --> 00:16:58.039
Most disease -causing bacteria are on the order

00:16:58.039 --> 00:17:02.519
of one micrometer in size. One thousandth of

00:17:02.519 --> 00:17:06.599
a millimeter. Yersinia pestis, that bacterium

00:17:06.599 --> 00:17:09.099
responsible for the plague, is roughly one to

00:17:09.099 --> 00:17:13.059
two micrometers long. To resolve something that

00:17:13.059 --> 00:17:16.240
small with visible light, you need magnifications

00:17:16.240 --> 00:17:19.740
of around 400 to 1 ,000 times with good lenses

00:17:19.740 --> 00:17:24.160
and minimal distortions. Early microscopes just

00:17:24.160 --> 00:17:28.859
simply couldn't do that. Anton van Leeuwenhoek,

00:17:29.059 --> 00:17:32.000
he was working in the late 1600s and famously

00:17:32.000 --> 00:17:36.400
observed what he called amicals using handcrafted

00:17:36.400 --> 00:17:40.259
single lens microscopes, reaching perhaps 200

00:17:40.259 --> 00:17:44.700
to 300 times magnification. He absolutely saw

00:17:44.700 --> 00:17:47.279
bacteria, but he couldn't distinguish species

00:17:47.279 --> 00:17:50.900
or trace causality or connect them to a disease.

00:17:51.420 --> 00:17:54.960
in a reproducible way also at a certain point

00:17:54.960 --> 00:17:59.200
resolution matters more than magnification early

00:17:59.200 --> 00:18:02.619
lenses suffered from severe optical aberrations

00:18:02.619 --> 00:18:06.519
images were blurry distorted you could see motion

00:18:06.519 --> 00:18:10.259
but not structure you couldn't reliably distinguish

00:18:10.259 --> 00:18:14.720
one microorganism from another microscopes in

00:18:14.720 --> 00:18:18.480
general improve slowly from the 1700s into the

00:18:18.480 --> 00:18:23.769
1800s but still suffered from optical aberrations.

00:18:23.930 --> 00:18:26.789
It's a bit like, okay, now we have the magnification.

00:18:27.150 --> 00:18:29.549
I can see it, it's nice and big, but the image

00:18:29.549 --> 00:18:31.769
is blurry. And that's kind of what I mean by

00:18:31.769 --> 00:18:35.990
optical aberrations. It wasn't until the 1830s

00:18:35.990 --> 00:18:38.329
and 1840s, with advances in lens manufacturing

00:18:38.329 --> 00:18:41.029
and illumination, that microscopes truly became

00:18:41.029 --> 00:18:43.869
a consistent scientific instrument instead of

00:18:43.869 --> 00:18:48.049
just the curiosities of the rich. And now, at

00:18:48.049 --> 00:18:51.059
this time, it becomes realistic. possible to

00:18:51.059 --> 00:18:54.200
see disease agents clearly enough to compare

00:18:54.200 --> 00:18:57.599
cases. And even then, viruses remain completely

00:18:57.599 --> 00:19:00.900
out of reach. Viruses are typically tens to hundreds

00:19:00.900 --> 00:19:06.059
of nanometers across. So we're getting even smaller

00:19:06.059 --> 00:19:09.940
and smaller. Nano, ten to the minus nine. Which

00:19:09.940 --> 00:19:12.839
is an order of magnitude smaller than bacteria.

00:19:13.720 --> 00:19:16.980
No optical microscope, no matter how perfect,

00:19:17.019 --> 00:19:20.519
can resolve them. That leap has to wait until

00:19:20.519 --> 00:19:23.720
the electron microscope was invented in the 1930s.

00:19:23.720 --> 00:19:26.460
Until then, viral diseases could only be inferred

00:19:26.460 --> 00:19:29.839
from their effects. Plague bacteria in particular

00:19:29.839 --> 00:19:32.579
required one more technique to be added to the

00:19:32.579 --> 00:19:36.960
mix. They required staining techniques and controlled

00:19:36.960 --> 00:19:40.039
sampling to be able to be identified, because

00:19:40.039 --> 00:19:42.180
most bacteria are nearly transparent under visible

00:19:42.180 --> 00:19:45.500
light. Even with good lenses, they don't naturally

00:19:45.500 --> 00:19:49.440
stand out against the background of tissue, blood,

00:19:49.859 --> 00:19:52.559
or fluid. So early microscopes just weren't fighting

00:19:52.559 --> 00:19:55.099
poor resolution, they were fighting a contrast

00:19:55.099 --> 00:19:59.259
problem. Stains, or dyes, solves this by chemically

00:19:59.259 --> 00:20:03.420
binding color to specific structures in bacterial

00:20:03.420 --> 00:20:06.140
cells, making them darker, more visible, and

00:20:06.140 --> 00:20:09.009
more distinct from their surroundings. Different

00:20:09.009 --> 00:20:12.049
strains attached differently to cell walls, membranes,

00:20:12.089 --> 00:20:14.849
or internal components, allowing microbes to

00:20:14.849 --> 00:20:17.009
be grouped, compared, and eventually classified.

00:20:17.349 --> 00:20:20.589
But this required controlled sample preparation,

00:20:20.990 --> 00:20:24.250
standardized dyes, and reproducible protocols.

00:20:24.630 --> 00:20:27.630
And this didn't happen until the mid -1800s,

00:20:27.630 --> 00:20:31.769
when bacteria became not just visible, but finally

00:20:31.769 --> 00:20:34.740
identifiable. Only then does it become possible

00:20:34.740 --> 00:20:37.359
to say this organism shows up consistently with

00:20:37.359 --> 00:20:39.980
this disease, and it just doesn't show up at

00:20:39.980 --> 00:20:42.900
all in healthy tissue. So while the optical measurements,

00:20:43.079 --> 00:20:45.420
in this case the evidence we're improving, new

00:20:45.420 --> 00:20:47.740
ideas are also hypothesis, or the philosophy

00:20:47.740 --> 00:20:51.740
we're also emerging. Actually, if you go back

00:20:51.740 --> 00:20:55.299
and take a look at all disciplines in science,

00:20:55.539 --> 00:20:58.559
it's normal that humans seem to push the boundaries

00:20:58.559 --> 00:21:01.240
before we can realistically detect or find evidence.

00:21:01.849 --> 00:21:04.069
The heliocentric model, hearkening back to the

00:21:04.069 --> 00:21:06.450
previous solo episode, is one example. If I wanted

00:21:06.450 --> 00:21:08.490
to take one from geology, I could use continental

00:21:08.490 --> 00:21:13.630
drift. A more modern idea would be general relativity,

00:21:13.849 --> 00:21:17.170
where black holes and gravitational waves were

00:21:17.170 --> 00:21:20.289
essentially predicted from a mathematical framework

00:21:20.289 --> 00:21:25.049
and then only more recently found. So going back

00:21:25.049 --> 00:21:27.609
actually quite a long ways, which is kind of

00:21:27.609 --> 00:21:33.059
surprising. In the 1500s, proposed that diseases

00:21:33.059 --> 00:21:37.420
are caused by transferable seeds. An idea centuries

00:21:37.420 --> 00:21:40.759
ahead of its tools in time. At the same time,

00:21:40.819 --> 00:21:44.299
another major conceptual roadblock had to fall.

00:21:44.700 --> 00:21:49.380
The idea of spontaneous generation. The idea

00:21:49.380 --> 00:21:51.960
that life could arise from non -living matter.

00:21:52.920 --> 00:21:55.119
Maggots, for instance, just kind of showing up

00:21:55.119 --> 00:21:59.680
on rotting meat. Microbes or... spoilage of stagnant

00:21:59.680 --> 00:22:03.099
broth. And this idea that you could get life

00:22:03.099 --> 00:22:07.819
just spontaneously dominated for centuries. The

00:22:07.819 --> 00:22:11.460
same researcher that first really described bacteria

00:22:11.460 --> 00:22:15.579
in microscope, Lin -Wen Hock, himself argued

00:22:15.579 --> 00:22:19.339
that life only comes from life. But it wasn't

00:22:19.339 --> 00:22:22.140
until the 1700s that you could kind of test this

00:22:22.140 --> 00:22:28.309
experimentally. In 1765, lazaro balazzani boiled

00:22:28.309 --> 00:22:32.430
broth and sealed it showing that no microorganisms

00:22:32.430 --> 00:22:36.630
appeared unless new ones were introduced that

00:22:36.630 --> 00:22:39.789
quietly undermined the idea that microbes were

00:22:39.789 --> 00:22:42.890
simply materializing out of nothing before anyone

00:22:42.890 --> 00:22:45.930
could name a bacteria or sketch a virus people

00:22:45.930 --> 00:22:49.849
were already running these crude remarkably insightful

00:22:49.849 --> 00:22:53.329
experiments on disease They didn't call it immunology

00:22:53.329 --> 00:22:56.549
or controlled exposure. They just noticed patterns

00:22:56.549 --> 00:22:59.329
and pushed on them. And we're going to come back

00:22:59.329 --> 00:23:01.869
to smallpox. It's where one of those patterns

00:23:01.869 --> 00:23:03.769
just became impossible to ignore. And I've already

00:23:03.769 --> 00:23:06.349
mentioned that once you got smallpox, you didn't

00:23:06.349 --> 00:23:09.349
get it twice usually. And really, when you start

00:23:09.349 --> 00:23:12.190
looking at time in the 1600s and 1700s, this

00:23:12.190 --> 00:23:14.990
virus was a relentless killer across Europe,

00:23:15.069 --> 00:23:18.309
Asia, and beyond, taking out approximately a

00:23:18.309 --> 00:23:21.299
third of those infected. It was predictable in

00:23:21.299 --> 00:23:24.359
the way the Black Death wasn't. The plague felt

00:23:24.359 --> 00:23:27.359
chaotic. Some people in crowded cities died.

00:23:27.519 --> 00:23:30.140
Others survived. And to many observers, it looked

00:23:30.140 --> 00:23:33.859
like fate or divine will or constitution. Smallpox

00:23:33.859 --> 00:23:36.019
added another layer to that story. People noticed

00:23:36.019 --> 00:23:38.039
something very specific. If you survived it,

00:23:38.099 --> 00:23:40.839
you didn't get it again. That wasn't a vibe or

00:23:40.839 --> 00:23:42.920
a belief. It was a reproducible observation.

00:23:43.500 --> 00:23:47.160
The core of the scientific method. Survival came

00:23:47.160 --> 00:23:51.730
with durable consequence. immunity. And even

00:23:51.730 --> 00:23:54.769
hinted, even in the 1600s, that the body could

00:23:54.769 --> 00:23:57.390
remember an infection. So shortly after that,

00:23:57.549 --> 00:24:01.410
us humans got a whole lot bolder. Someone came

00:24:01.410 --> 00:24:05.609
up with virulation. See, by the late 1600s, early

00:24:05.609 --> 00:24:08.250
1700s, several cultures, including China, India,

00:24:08.369 --> 00:24:10.789
and the Ottoman Empire, had developed a practice

00:24:10.789 --> 00:24:13.589
called virulation. It reached England in about

00:24:13.589 --> 00:24:17.589
1721. The idea was both simple and, quite frankly,

00:24:17.750 --> 00:24:20.799
terrifying. It would take the material from somebody

00:24:20.799 --> 00:24:24.039
with an active smallpox infection, often dried

00:24:24.039 --> 00:24:27.200
scabs or pus, talk about gross, and introduce

00:24:27.200 --> 00:24:30.019
it into a healthy person, usually through a small

00:24:30.019 --> 00:24:33.039
cut in the skin, or you would breathe in dried

00:24:33.039 --> 00:24:37.779
powdery scabs. Yeah, talk about gross. Really

00:24:37.779 --> 00:24:40.359
gross. Besides the grossness, the whole thing

00:24:40.359 --> 00:24:43.109
to me is just crazy. Because people at the time

00:24:43.109 --> 00:24:45.289
didn't understand anything about smallpox. They

00:24:45.289 --> 00:24:47.269
couldn't isolate the cause. They couldn't see

00:24:47.269 --> 00:24:49.430
it. There's no germ theory yet, and we'll get

00:24:49.430 --> 00:24:52.009
to that in just a few moments. I don't even...

00:24:52.009 --> 00:24:55.829
What's the proper analogy? Okay, so I had to

00:24:55.829 --> 00:24:58.809
go looking for a proper analogy. And after some

00:24:58.809 --> 00:25:02.269
searching, maybe, maybe scurvy? In that particular

00:25:02.269 --> 00:25:04.970
case, as another aside, a physician, James Lind,

00:25:05.190 --> 00:25:09.289
conducted experiment in 1747, considered one

00:25:09.289 --> 00:25:12.230
of the first controlled clinical trials in medical

00:25:12.230 --> 00:25:15.690
history. He took 12 sailors with scurvy and divided

00:25:15.690 --> 00:25:18.049
them into pairs, giving each a different treatment.

00:25:18.250 --> 00:25:20.750
Only the pair given oranges and lemons recovered

00:25:20.750 --> 00:25:25.480
quickly and dramatically. Well, it did take a

00:25:25.480 --> 00:25:27.339
couple decades for it to be mandated as part

00:25:27.339 --> 00:25:29.920
of the rations for the Brits and the Britons

00:25:29.920 --> 00:25:33.420
on long voyages. It did when it was. It gave

00:25:33.420 --> 00:25:36.359
them a significant advantage. Healthier crews.

00:25:37.119 --> 00:25:40.900
It helped make them a naval superpower. And this

00:25:40.900 --> 00:25:44.579
was well before we knew what vitamin C was, how

00:25:44.579 --> 00:25:48.160
it helped the body. It's also the reason British

00:25:48.160 --> 00:25:50.299
sailors, and then eventually all of the Britons,

00:25:50.299 --> 00:25:54.690
got the nickname Lymies. Okay, so back to virulation

00:25:54.690 --> 00:25:58.730
and smallpox. No one could reliably predict a

00:25:58.730 --> 00:26:01.890
mild case in the modern sense. What they did

00:26:01.890 --> 00:26:04.329
have was experience. Some patients seemed to

00:26:04.329 --> 00:26:07.750
have less severe disease. And practitioners preferentially

00:26:07.750 --> 00:26:11.390
used material from those cases to infect others.

00:26:11.670 --> 00:26:14.650
It was empirical, but not mechanistic, meaning

00:26:14.650 --> 00:26:17.650
they didn't understand the cause. But it was

00:26:17.650 --> 00:26:20.799
still a deliberate choice. controlled exposure

00:26:20.799 --> 00:26:24.019
instead of waiting for random exposure. And this

00:26:24.019 --> 00:26:26.200
is perhaps the craziest part. The numbers were

00:26:26.200 --> 00:26:28.920
stark. Nactual smallpox killed about, you know,

00:26:29.000 --> 00:26:31.019
one in three, as I said, about 30 % of those

00:26:31.019 --> 00:26:34.539
infected. Virulation brought that risk down to

00:26:34.539 --> 00:26:38.700
about 1 % to 2%. That's crazy. It's still a terrifying,

00:26:38.759 --> 00:26:41.819
gross gamble if you're the person being infected

00:26:41.819 --> 00:26:45.599
or virulated, but at a population level, it was

00:26:45.599 --> 00:26:49.390
a massive improvement. From there we get what

00:26:49.390 --> 00:26:53.049
I would call the first vaccine. And the craziest

00:26:53.049 --> 00:26:55.670
thing of all, the first vaccine came about before

00:26:55.670 --> 00:26:57.990
we get a true modern understanding of disease.

00:26:58.589 --> 00:27:03.369
And this, I cannot stress it enough, is wild

00:27:03.369 --> 00:27:08.369
to me. It's just crazy. It's so amazing what

00:27:08.369 --> 00:27:11.769
humans can put together and make as far as leaps

00:27:11.769 --> 00:27:16.049
of logic. We are quite clever and amazing. Cowpox.

00:27:17.099 --> 00:27:20.539
It birthed vaccination. You see, moving towards

00:27:20.539 --> 00:27:23.299
the late 1700s, a pattern emerged from the countryside

00:27:23.299 --> 00:27:26.039
of what today is the United Kingdom. Dairy workers

00:27:26.039 --> 00:27:29.319
who caught cowpox, a mild blistering disease

00:27:29.319 --> 00:27:32.339
from cows, seemed to be protected from smallpox.

00:27:32.579 --> 00:27:35.700
This wasn't a one -off anecdote. It was a repeated

00:27:35.700 --> 00:27:38.380
observation across farms and villages. People

00:27:38.380 --> 00:27:41.720
who had cowpox scars did not get smallpox. In

00:27:41.720 --> 00:27:46.339
1796, Edward Jenner decided to test this directly.

00:27:46.880 --> 00:27:49.259
He took material from a cowpox lesion, which

00:27:49.259 --> 00:27:53.200
is like a sore, on a milkmaid's hand and oculated

00:27:53.200 --> 00:27:56.160
a young boy. The boy got sick with cowpox, recovered,

00:27:56.420 --> 00:27:58.980
and then Jenner later exposed him to smallpox.

00:27:59.220 --> 00:28:02.940
No disease. Jenner repeated this with more people.

00:28:03.019 --> 00:28:06.319
Same result. This is the birth of vaccination.

00:28:06.680 --> 00:28:11.259
And you can even look at the word vac. Vaca is

00:28:11.259 --> 00:28:16.259
from Latin for cow. Vaccination takes its name

00:28:16.259 --> 00:28:20.380
from cows. I'm pretty sure there is a Gary Larson

00:28:20.380 --> 00:28:23.400
cartoon in there somewhere. And yes, I'm going

00:28:23.400 --> 00:28:25.980
to continue to date myself with my pop culture

00:28:25.980 --> 00:28:29.299
references. Sorry, not sorry. At the risk of

00:28:29.299 --> 00:28:31.200
sounding like a broken record or skipping record,

00:28:31.359 --> 00:28:34.019
if you will, all of this happened before anyone

00:28:34.019 --> 00:28:38.559
had a formal theory of germs. No one knew what

00:28:38.559 --> 00:28:41.819
a virus was. No one had ever seen a Viron. And

00:28:41.819 --> 00:28:44.200
yet they figured out that the exposure to one

00:28:44.200 --> 00:28:47.160
disease cowpox protected against another. And

00:28:47.160 --> 00:28:49.880
that protection was durable. It didn't depend

00:28:49.880 --> 00:28:52.759
on wealth or personality or moral character or

00:28:52.759 --> 00:28:56.039
how healthy or unhealthy someone was. And when

00:28:56.039 --> 00:28:58.039
we get down to it, what a vaccine really is,

00:28:58.059 --> 00:29:00.140
if we strip away all that modern jargon, a vaccine

00:29:00.140 --> 00:29:02.920
is just this. A vaccine is a controlled, safer

00:29:02.920 --> 00:29:06.099
exposure that trains the immune system without

00:29:06.099 --> 00:29:08.279
making you pay the full cost of the disease.

00:29:08.799 --> 00:29:10.440
If you wanted to explain it a little bit more,

00:29:10.519 --> 00:29:12.259
it's like a rehearsal instead of a catastrophe.

00:29:12.680 --> 00:29:16.000
You give the body a preview of the threat, just

00:29:16.000 --> 00:29:18.880
enough to learn from, so that when the real thing

00:29:18.880 --> 00:29:21.319
shows up, the response is fast and effective.

00:29:22.079 --> 00:29:26.200
Now, when we get to the mid -1850s, things speed

00:29:26.200 --> 00:29:28.680
up again, which coincides with improvements in

00:29:28.680 --> 00:29:30.440
the microscopes and the staining techniques we

00:29:30.440 --> 00:29:33.220
were talking earlier. Ignaz Mel Weiss, a medical

00:29:33.220 --> 00:29:36.039
doctor, showed that hand washing reduces maternal

00:29:36.039 --> 00:29:39.539
deaths even before anyone knows why. In 1854,

00:29:39.819 --> 00:29:42.259
a cholera outbreak in London, the physician,

00:29:42.480 --> 00:29:45.160
John Snow, no, no, not that type of John Snow,

00:29:45.240 --> 00:29:47.559
this person actually really did exist, unlike

00:29:47.559 --> 00:29:50.019
the one in Game of Thrones, did something quite

00:29:50.019 --> 00:29:53.880
radical. He mapped disease cases, like a proper

00:29:53.880 --> 00:29:57.849
epidemiologist, and traced water sources. He

00:29:57.849 --> 00:30:00.589
showed that the cholera outbreak clustered around

00:30:00.589 --> 00:30:03.789
the Broad Street pumped and declined when the

00:30:03.789 --> 00:30:07.630
pump handle was removed. Snow didn't know about

00:30:07.630 --> 00:30:12.470
vibrocholerae. He couldn't see the pathogen.

00:30:12.589 --> 00:30:15.250
But he demonstrated that cholera behaved like

00:30:15.250 --> 00:30:19.269
a transmissible agent carried by water, not bad

00:30:19.269 --> 00:30:22.049
air. John Snow's work didn't immediately convince

00:30:22.049 --> 00:30:25.250
everyone. The miasma theory was deeply entrenched.

00:30:25.819 --> 00:30:29.799
But it added a crucial plank. Diseases followed

00:30:29.799 --> 00:30:33.680
physical pathways. At the same time, others were

00:30:33.680 --> 00:30:37.960
tightening the experimental screws. Louis Pasteur

00:30:37.960 --> 00:30:41.579
showed in the 1850s and 1860s that microorganisms

00:30:41.579 --> 00:30:45.000
caused fermentation and spoilage, and that sterilization

00:30:45.000 --> 00:30:47.480
prevented it. So one example of sterilization

00:30:47.480 --> 00:30:51.480
is boiling or heating something up. Joseph Lister

00:30:51.480 --> 00:30:54.529
applied these ideas to surgery. and introduced

00:30:54.529 --> 00:30:59.109
antiseptic techniques in the 1860s. Surgical

00:30:59.109 --> 00:31:02.549
mortality rates dropped dramatically. By the

00:31:02.549 --> 00:31:05.950
time Robert Koch identified the bacteria responsible

00:31:05.950 --> 00:31:09.589
for anthrax, tuberculosis, and cholera in the

00:31:09.589 --> 00:31:12.829
1870s and 1880s, the groundwork had been laid

00:31:12.829 --> 00:31:15.890
by decades of instrument improvement, careful

00:31:15.890 --> 00:31:20.049
observations, and the methodological discipline.

00:31:20.700 --> 00:31:23.319
This is not a sudden revolution, it was an accumulation.

00:31:23.619 --> 00:31:27.019
However, you could say, once that happened, you

00:31:27.019 --> 00:31:30.440
could argue it was a revolution. But it was built

00:31:30.440 --> 00:31:34.500
on that slow drip, well, speeding up drip, of

00:31:34.500 --> 00:31:38.000
observations and data. Patterns first, then tools,

00:31:38.079 --> 00:31:41.539
then mechanisms. By the mid -1800s, science had

00:31:41.539 --> 00:31:43.700
finally had enough resolution, both optical and

00:31:43.700 --> 00:31:46.440
conceptual, to stop arguing about what disease

00:31:46.440 --> 00:31:50.329
might be, and start asking what it was. Pasteur,

00:31:50.410 --> 00:31:52.690
based on the observations of fermentation and

00:31:52.690 --> 00:31:55.990
spoilage, argued passionately for what we now

00:31:55.990 --> 00:31:59.210
know as germ theory. As a complete aside, just

00:31:59.210 --> 00:32:02.650
before I move on, Pasteur is the person we've

00:32:02.650 --> 00:32:05.829
honoured to make the word pasteurise. So germ

00:32:05.829 --> 00:32:08.890
theory, specific microbes invade a healthy body

00:32:08.890 --> 00:32:10.869
from the outside and cause specific diseases.

00:32:11.329 --> 00:32:14.109
In other words, the baseline for our modern understanding.

00:32:14.809 --> 00:32:18.490
We'll come back to this in just a moment. So

00:32:18.490 --> 00:32:21.750
what was the opposite to what became our modern

00:32:21.750 --> 00:32:25.390
understanding? Well, the competing idea was championed

00:32:25.390 --> 00:32:29.089
by the researcher Bal Champ, called terrain theory.

00:32:29.269 --> 00:32:32.109
It was not a fringe theory or concept at the

00:32:32.109 --> 00:32:35.349
time. It was a well -respected scientific framework.

00:32:35.910 --> 00:32:38.910
The core claim of terrain theory was simple,

00:32:39.029 --> 00:32:43.589
yet profound. Microbes do not cause disease.

00:32:44.349 --> 00:32:48.119
Instead... Disease arises when the terrain, i

00:32:48.119 --> 00:32:51.660
.e. the body, the internal environment, becomes

00:32:51.660 --> 00:32:54.279
unhealthy, weak, or unbalanced. In this view,

00:32:54.440 --> 00:32:57.220
microbes were simply the scavengers, a consequence

00:32:57.220 --> 00:33:01.180
of sickness, and not the cause. If the body was

00:33:01.180 --> 00:33:04.720
strong, healthy, and nourished, a microbe could

00:33:04.720 --> 00:33:07.920
not take hold. The terrain was everything. This

00:33:07.920 --> 00:33:11.640
is crucial to emphasize. Terrain theory didn't

00:33:11.640 --> 00:33:14.630
really deny that microbes existed. It denied

00:33:14.630 --> 00:33:16.809
that they were the primary cause of sickness.

00:33:17.170 --> 00:33:19.650
But Champ and his followers believed that those

00:33:19.650 --> 00:33:22.569
tiny organisms were opportunistic, that they

00:33:22.569 --> 00:33:24.630
were the cleanup crew that arrived after the

00:33:24.630 --> 00:33:27.750
mess was already made. The debate was a genuine

00:33:27.750 --> 00:33:31.470
scientific clash. And for a long time, many observations

00:33:31.470 --> 00:33:36.190
seemed to side with the terrain theory. And it

00:33:36.190 --> 00:33:38.970
was appealing, because it aligned perfectly with

00:33:38.970 --> 00:33:40.710
everyday observations that people made about

00:33:40.710 --> 00:33:43.289
life and death. The most compelling observation

00:33:43.289 --> 00:33:45.869
was simple. Not everyone exposed to a disease

00:33:45.869 --> 00:33:49.170
got sick. During the outbreaks of cholera or

00:33:49.170 --> 00:33:52.269
tuberculosis, physicians would note that some

00:33:52.269 --> 00:33:55.109
people living in close, unsanitary quarters would

00:33:55.109 --> 00:33:57.210
fall ill and die, while their neighbors remained

00:33:57.210 --> 00:34:00.869
healthy. Terrain theory offered a clear answer.

00:34:01.150 --> 00:34:04.849
The healthy neighbors had better terrain. We

00:34:04.849 --> 00:34:06.490
can look back at the events like the Black Death

00:34:06.490 --> 00:34:08.690
in the Middle Ages. The plague disproportionately

00:34:08.690 --> 00:34:13.110
ravaged crowded, impoverished cities, where malnutrition,

00:34:13.110 --> 00:34:15.469
constant stress, and poor living conditions amplified

00:34:15.469 --> 00:34:18.210
mortality rates. To a medieval observer, it was

00:34:18.210 --> 00:34:20.469
clear that poverty, crowding, and malnutrition

00:34:20.469 --> 00:34:24.590
created fertile ground, the terrain, so to speak,

00:34:24.750 --> 00:34:27.949
for the disease to flourish. So terrain theory

00:34:27.949 --> 00:34:30.369
correctly identifies these aspects. A way to

00:34:30.369 --> 00:34:33.250
think of it is like risk modifiers. It correctly

00:34:33.250 --> 00:34:35.110
observed that your diet, stress level, hygiene,

00:34:35.250 --> 00:34:39.110
and living conditions all matter immensely to

00:34:39.110 --> 00:34:42.610
your health outcomes. However, terrain theory

00:34:42.610 --> 00:34:46.969
makes a fundamental error in causation. The terrain

00:34:46.969 --> 00:34:51.630
absolutely can determine if you get sick and

00:34:51.630 --> 00:34:55.340
or how sick you get. but it is the microbe that

00:34:55.340 --> 00:34:58.960
pulls the trigger, so to speak. And that is the

00:34:58.960 --> 00:35:02.440
necessary initial cause of a specific illness.

00:35:03.179 --> 00:35:05.300
The really strange thing is we know this. We

00:35:05.300 --> 00:35:07.940
have all the data. It is viruses and bacteria

00:35:07.940 --> 00:35:10.760
that get us sick. Terrain modifies the outcome.

00:35:11.139 --> 00:35:15.739
The data is basically impeachable. However, given

00:35:15.739 --> 00:35:18.099
the current state of things in North America,

00:35:18.320 --> 00:35:21.219
I'm looking southward across the border with

00:35:21.219 --> 00:35:24.550
the... Make America Healthy Again movement, this

00:35:24.550 --> 00:35:28.409
M -A -H -A movement, is fixated on terrain. It

00:35:28.409 --> 00:35:30.429
tries to shift the blame for one's sickness or

00:35:30.429 --> 00:35:34.550
cancer or to the individual. I guess it can be

00:35:34.550 --> 00:35:36.750
empowering to think that you have control over

00:35:36.750 --> 00:35:39.929
all of this, but essentially, a modern movement

00:35:39.929 --> 00:35:43.250
hung on an 1850s idea that doesn't even support

00:35:43.250 --> 00:35:48.670
the data on its own. It is so strange. It actually

00:35:48.670 --> 00:35:51.599
breaks my brain. It's also a common issue with

00:35:51.599 --> 00:35:54.400
these quote -unquote ideas. Flat earthers often

00:35:54.400 --> 00:35:57.179
invoke that gravity doesn't exist. It's all based

00:35:57.179 --> 00:36:00.360
on density and buoyancy, which is an old idea

00:36:00.360 --> 00:36:03.280
to explain gravity that doesn't work and doesn't

00:36:03.280 --> 00:36:08.099
reproduce the data. As crazy as that seems, that

00:36:08.099 --> 00:36:11.320
flat earth has similarities to the anti -vaccine

00:36:11.320 --> 00:36:16.139
movements, it comes back to an idea that is incomplete.

00:36:16.809 --> 00:36:19.409
It's almost like people need things to be simple

00:36:19.409 --> 00:36:21.429
or they rebel. Their brain just kind of goes

00:36:21.429 --> 00:36:25.389
poof. Can we blame education? Or maybe it's hidden

00:36:25.389 --> 00:36:29.889
people pulling the strings. I don't know. So

00:36:29.889 --> 00:36:34.789
before we kind of slowly move on, keeping in

00:36:34.789 --> 00:36:38.530
mind that terrain absolutely matters. It does.

00:36:38.829 --> 00:36:41.909
How healthy you are, how you eat, how you sleep

00:36:41.909 --> 00:36:45.769
really does matter. Let's turn to the framework

00:36:45.769 --> 00:36:47.630
that really spawned our modern understanding.

00:36:48.769 --> 00:36:52.409
Germ theory. By the time Pasteur and Velkamp

00:36:52.409 --> 00:36:54.690
were arguing their cases, the scientific world

00:36:54.690 --> 00:36:57.130
finally had enough resolution. Microscope sharp

00:36:57.130 --> 00:36:59.789
enough to see them, and the conceptual tools

00:36:59.789 --> 00:37:01.929
sharp enough to test the ideas instead of just,

00:37:01.989 --> 00:37:05.690
like, admiring them and talking about them philosophically.

00:37:06.090 --> 00:37:08.590
And this is the moment where the debate stops

00:37:08.590 --> 00:37:11.170
being all about those philosophies and becomes

00:37:11.170 --> 00:37:14.559
empirical. Because germ theory didn't win. Just

00:37:14.559 --> 00:37:17.360
because it was prettier or simpler. It won because

00:37:17.360 --> 00:37:20.400
it made predictions that could be proved wrong.

00:37:20.840 --> 00:37:23.820
Which is always at the heart of all scientific

00:37:23.820 --> 00:37:26.539
methods. A scientific idea has to stick its neck

00:37:26.539 --> 00:37:29.300
out there. It has to say, if I'm right, X should

00:37:29.300 --> 00:37:32.300
happen. If I'm wrong, Y will. Germ theory did

00:37:32.300 --> 00:37:36.139
that. Immediately. Train theory didn't or couldn't.

00:37:36.179 --> 00:37:39.420
It explained outcomes after the fact. But it

00:37:39.420 --> 00:37:42.739
didn't generate testable forecasts. Once Pasteur

00:37:42.739 --> 00:37:45.380
and others proposed that specific microbes cause

00:37:45.380 --> 00:37:48.579
specific diseases, the theory instantaneously

00:37:48.579 --> 00:37:52.699
produced risky predictions. If a germ caused

00:37:52.699 --> 00:37:55.239
infection, then removing germs should reduce

00:37:55.239 --> 00:37:58.559
infection. And when surgeons sterilized instruments,

00:37:58.840 --> 00:38:02.739
washed hands, and cleaned operating rooms, infection

00:38:02.739 --> 00:38:06.420
rates didn't just dip, they collapsed. That is

00:38:06.420 --> 00:38:09.000
not just based on philosophy. That's a controlled

00:38:09.000 --> 00:38:12.070
variable producing a measured outcome. Germ theory

00:38:12.070 --> 00:38:14.769
also predicted that preventing exposure should

00:38:14.769 --> 00:38:19.150
prevent disease, even in people with wildly different

00:38:19.150 --> 00:38:22.429
terrains. Vaccination is the clearest example.

00:38:23.030 --> 00:38:25.650
If you prime the immune system before the pathogen

00:38:25.650 --> 00:38:27.989
arrives, people shouldn't get sick. And across

00:38:27.989 --> 00:38:30.750
continents, decades, and diseases, that prediction

00:38:30.750 --> 00:38:34.590
held. Terrain theory had no comparable mechanism.

00:38:35.030 --> 00:38:37.449
It couldn't say who would be protected or why.

00:38:38.300 --> 00:38:40.639
It could only reinterpret the results afterwards.

00:38:41.900 --> 00:38:44.039
Another prediction, if microbes spread between

00:38:44.039 --> 00:38:46.900
people, then isolating infected individuals should

00:38:46.900 --> 00:38:50.420
stop transmission. Regardless of their constitution,

00:38:50.920 --> 00:38:53.400
diet, or stress level. And again, that's exactly

00:38:53.400 --> 00:38:55.739
what happened. Quarantine worked in medieval

00:38:55.739 --> 00:38:58.760
ports, in the 19th century hospitals, and in

00:38:58.760 --> 00:39:02.239
modern outbreaks. I mean, just look at the COVID

00:39:02.239 --> 00:39:05.320
-19 pandemic. The whole idea of staying home.

00:39:05.900 --> 00:39:08.519
to bring down the total amount that is circulating

00:39:08.519 --> 00:39:12.239
in the community. It works. You don't need to

00:39:12.239 --> 00:39:14.679
know someone's terrain to understand why separating

00:39:14.679 --> 00:39:16.940
them halts the chain of infection or transmission.

00:39:17.320 --> 00:39:19.880
The mechanism is straightforward. No contact,

00:39:19.960 --> 00:39:23.380
no transmission. Terrain theory, by contrast,

00:39:23.539 --> 00:39:26.900
was unfalsible. If someone got sick, the terrain

00:39:26.900 --> 00:39:29.039
was weak. If they didn't, the terrain was strong.

00:39:29.659 --> 00:39:31.780
If two people were exposed and only one of them

00:39:31.780 --> 00:39:34.000
fell ill, terrain theory could always retrofit

00:39:34.000 --> 00:39:37.280
an explanation. That's not prediction. That's

00:39:37.280 --> 00:39:41.280
narrative flexibility. This is where the engineering

00:39:41.280 --> 00:39:43.500
mindset becomes a useful metaphor. Engineers

00:39:43.500 --> 00:39:45.659
don't just describe systems. They change one

00:39:45.659 --> 00:39:47.860
variable and watch what happens. If altering

00:39:47.860 --> 00:39:50.599
a single input reliably shifts the output, you've

00:39:50.599 --> 00:39:52.760
learned something real about causation. That's

00:39:52.760 --> 00:39:55.699
how I done my science. Germ theory behaved just

00:39:55.699 --> 00:39:58.980
like that too. Change the microbial load, change

00:39:58.980 --> 00:40:02.699
the outcome. Change the exposure pathway, change

00:40:02.699 --> 00:40:05.960
the outcome. Changed the immune priming. Changed

00:40:05.960 --> 00:40:08.539
the outcome. By the time we reach the 1880s,

00:40:08.539 --> 00:40:11.760
the world has changed. Jenner's cowpox vaccine

00:40:11.760 --> 00:40:16.039
had been saving lives for nearly a century. Virulation

00:40:16.039 --> 00:40:18.800
had faded. And the scientific community had finally

00:40:18.800 --> 00:40:21.559
embraced germ theory, thanks to the work of Pasteur,

00:40:21.719 --> 00:40:25.199
Koch, and others. It was caused by specific microbes

00:40:25.199 --> 00:40:28.960
with specific life cycles. And that set the stage

00:40:28.960 --> 00:40:32.570
for the first post -germ theory vaccine. The

00:40:32.570 --> 00:40:34.929
one that finally united the mechanism with the

00:40:34.929 --> 00:40:37.590
practice. We're talking about Pasteur's rabies

00:40:37.590 --> 00:40:41.769
vaccine in 1885. This is a pretty cool story

00:40:41.769 --> 00:40:46.769
because rabies is terrifying. See, unlike smallpox,

00:40:47.010 --> 00:40:50.250
which was common and visible, rabies was rare,

00:40:50.389 --> 00:40:54.230
but universally fatal once symptoms appeared.

00:40:54.710 --> 00:40:57.750
It had a long incubation period, sometimes weeks,

00:40:57.949 --> 00:41:02.570
sometimes months. That delay created... a scientific

00:41:02.570 --> 00:41:06.449
opportunity. Maybe you could train the immune

00:41:06.449 --> 00:41:09.469
system after exposure, before the virus had,

00:41:09.570 --> 00:41:12.369
you know, fully gotten into your system, and

00:41:12.369 --> 00:41:14.210
with our modern understanding, before it had

00:41:14.210 --> 00:41:18.829
reached the brain. By 1879, Pasteur had already

00:41:18.829 --> 00:41:21.610
shown that weakening a pathogen, what he called

00:41:21.610 --> 00:41:24.730
attenuation, could produce immunity without causing

00:41:24.730 --> 00:41:27.989
full -blown disease, first by an accident with

00:41:27.989 --> 00:41:30.969
chicken cholera, then deliberately with anthrax.

00:41:31.309 --> 00:41:33.889
He demonstrated that you could tame a microbe

00:41:33.889 --> 00:41:37.750
just enough to train the immune system. That

00:41:37.750 --> 00:41:40.250
insight is what made the rabies vaccine possible.

00:41:40.570 --> 00:41:43.570
But rabies was different. No one had ever seen

00:41:43.570 --> 00:41:45.590
a virus, and they were just too small for the

00:41:45.590 --> 00:41:48.130
microscopes of the time. Yet germ theory gave

00:41:48.130 --> 00:41:50.570
Pasteur the conceptual confidence, you know,

00:41:50.590 --> 00:41:54.010
the guardrails, the understanding of how to proceed.

00:41:54.469 --> 00:41:57.530
If rabies was caused by a microbe of some sort,

00:41:57.670 --> 00:42:00.739
then it should be possible to weaken it. to control

00:42:00.739 --> 00:42:03.400
it, and to use it to train the immune system.

00:42:04.239 --> 00:42:06.079
Pasteur and his colleagues began passing the

00:42:06.079 --> 00:42:09.000
rabies agent through a series of animals, especially

00:42:09.000 --> 00:42:12.980
rabbits. Each passage changed the pathogen slightly.

00:42:13.380 --> 00:42:16.400
By drying the infected spinal cords of these

00:42:16.400 --> 00:42:19.199
animals for different lengths of time, they created

00:42:19.199 --> 00:42:22.900
a gradient of weakened virus, from very mild

00:42:22.900 --> 00:42:26.239
to the real McCoy. This was the first rational,

00:42:26.360 --> 00:42:30.090
process -driven... Vaccine design in history.

00:42:30.889 --> 00:42:33.949
Jenner stumbled onto cowpox by observations.

00:42:35.010 --> 00:42:37.570
Pasteur was engineering immunity on purpose.

00:42:37.929 --> 00:42:40.610
Then came the moment that forced the theory into

00:42:40.610 --> 00:42:44.210
practice. In July 1885, a nine -year -old boy

00:42:44.210 --> 00:42:48.469
named Joseph Meister was brought to Pasteur after

00:42:48.469 --> 00:42:51.650
being severely bitten by a rabid dog. The boy

00:42:51.650 --> 00:42:54.230
had multiple deep wounds. Without intervention,

00:42:54.530 --> 00:42:58.090
he would almost certainly die. Pasteur wasn't

00:42:58.090 --> 00:43:00.409
a physician, and he knew the ethical stakes,

00:43:00.610 --> 00:43:04.050
but he also knew the science. The virus travels

00:43:04.050 --> 00:43:07.409
slowly from the bite site into the nervous system

00:43:07.409 --> 00:43:09.570
and into the brain. If he could train the immune

00:43:09.570 --> 00:43:12.349
system fast enough, he might outrun the infection.

00:43:12.829 --> 00:43:15.710
Over 10 days, Pasteur administered a series of

00:43:15.710 --> 00:43:18.230
injections, starting with the most attenuated

00:43:18.230 --> 00:43:20.369
material and gradually moving towards stronger

00:43:20.369 --> 00:43:24.690
preparations. It was a controlled immunological

00:43:24.690 --> 00:43:28.630
ramp. The stepwise rehearsal for the immune system.

00:43:29.269 --> 00:43:32.590
And it worked. The kid never developed rabies.

00:43:32.690 --> 00:43:35.269
This was the first time a vaccine had been used

00:43:35.269 --> 00:43:37.769
therapeutically, not just to prevent disease

00:43:37.769 --> 00:43:40.550
before exposure, but to stop a deadly infection

00:43:40.550 --> 00:43:43.849
already underway. And it was also the first vaccine

00:43:43.849 --> 00:43:47.610
designed with a, you know, a proper understanding

00:43:47.610 --> 00:43:50.150
of microbes, attenuation, and immune priming.

00:43:50.469 --> 00:43:53.829
Pasteur wasn't guessing. He was applying germ

00:43:53.829 --> 00:43:56.530
theory directly. And this is where the contrast

00:43:56.530 --> 00:44:00.090
with terrain theory becomes unavoidable. Terrain

00:44:00.090 --> 00:44:02.210
theory couldn't explain why a weakened pathogen

00:44:02.210 --> 00:44:05.489
would protect against a stronger one. It couldn't

00:44:05.489 --> 00:44:08.010
explain why timing mattered, why attenuation

00:44:08.010 --> 00:44:11.010
mattered, or why a series of graded exposures

00:44:11.010 --> 00:44:13.730
could outrun a virus. Germ theory, on the other

00:44:13.730 --> 00:44:16.150
hand, predicted all of this. If a disease is

00:44:16.150 --> 00:44:19.389
caused by a replicating microbe, then a weakened

00:44:19.389 --> 00:44:22.429
microbe can reduce disease, exposing the immune

00:44:22.429 --> 00:44:26.590
system safely. induces protection. Intervene

00:44:26.590 --> 00:44:28.769
early and you can beat the pathogen's replication

00:44:28.769 --> 00:44:31.550
clock. Pasteur's rabies vaccine was the first

00:44:31.550 --> 00:44:33.690
demonstration of these principles in action.

00:44:33.869 --> 00:44:36.989
It also marked the beginning of modern vaccinology.

00:44:37.389 --> 00:44:40.289
After 1885, vaccines were no longer accidents

00:44:40.289 --> 00:44:42.710
of nature like cowpox, but engineered tools.

00:44:43.170 --> 00:44:45.869
Scientists could now design them, weaken pathogens

00:44:45.869 --> 00:44:48.730
intentionally, and tailor immune system responses.

00:44:49.210 --> 00:44:51.809
The rabies vaccine wasn't just a medical triumph,

00:44:51.869 --> 00:44:55.099
it was a conceptual one. It proved that once

00:44:55.099 --> 00:44:56.559
you understood the cause of disease, you can

00:44:56.559 --> 00:44:58.099
manipulate it, control it, and even sometimes

00:44:58.099 --> 00:45:00.760
reverse it. If you zoom out and look at the history

00:45:00.760 --> 00:45:03.179
of vaccines as like a time -lapse, it's astonishing

00:45:03.179 --> 00:45:05.719
how quickly the field accelerates once germ theory

00:45:05.719 --> 00:45:09.099
fully lands. The early steps from virulation

00:45:09.099 --> 00:45:12.579
to Jenner's cowpox vaccine are, you know, before

00:45:12.579 --> 00:45:15.320
we understood. They work. But no one knew why.

00:45:15.400 --> 00:45:18.679
After 1850, everything changes. So let's do a

00:45:18.679 --> 00:45:20.940
little bit of rapid fire, or at least more rapid,

00:45:21.039 --> 00:45:23.500
I won't go into that much detail, of some of

00:45:23.500 --> 00:45:25.940
the vaccines and milestones. As I already mentioned,

00:45:26.000 --> 00:45:29.159
the first one was in 1885, the rabies vaccine.

00:45:29.960 --> 00:45:33.239
In the 1890s, dipheria antitoxin. So this isn't

00:45:33.239 --> 00:45:35.840
a vaccine yet, but it's a milestone. As researchers

00:45:35.840 --> 00:45:38.159
show that the body produces specific factors

00:45:38.159 --> 00:45:41.239
or antibodies that neutralize the toxins that

00:45:41.239 --> 00:45:44.349
this particular bacteria makes. That's right,

00:45:44.429 --> 00:45:47.289
they figure out that the body produces antibodies

00:45:47.289 --> 00:45:51.369
that can bind and remove toxins. This discovery

00:45:51.369 --> 00:45:54.650
becomes the conceptual backbone of immunology.

00:45:55.050 --> 00:45:57.969
And then finally, 30 years later in the 1920s,

00:45:57.969 --> 00:46:01.369
we get taxoid vaccines for diphtheria, which

00:46:01.369 --> 00:46:03.889
we just mentioned in the 1890s, and tetanus.

00:46:04.269 --> 00:46:06.429
Okay, I've got to admit, when I was going through

00:46:06.429 --> 00:46:10.250
this, this one also surprised me. See, I am a

00:46:10.250 --> 00:46:13.110
volcanologist geophysicist, and there's lots

00:46:13.110 --> 00:46:15.269
I don't know, which is, again, the reason why

00:46:15.269 --> 00:46:17.969
I love doing this podcast. So these vaccines

00:46:17.969 --> 00:46:21.750
do not target the bacteria, diphera and tetanus

00:46:21.750 --> 00:46:24.869
specifically. It targets the toxins of these

00:46:24.869 --> 00:46:28.349
diseases, like tetanus, because tetanus is actually

00:46:28.349 --> 00:46:31.389
caused by C. tetani, and when it replicates in

00:46:31.389 --> 00:46:34.010
low -oxygen environments, it creates a neurotoxin,

00:46:34.010 --> 00:46:36.889
and it is this neurotoxin that gets us sick.

00:46:37.260 --> 00:46:41.440
So these vaccines use the toxin essentially in

00:46:41.440 --> 00:46:44.099
the safe form so the body can recognize it, but

00:46:44.099 --> 00:46:46.940
it doesn't actually get as sick. And it allows

00:46:46.940 --> 00:46:49.260
the body to just figure it out and says, oh,

00:46:49.300 --> 00:46:53.780
I know what this is. Bind it, create these toxoids

00:46:53.780 --> 00:46:57.780
and remove it from the body. It chemically activates

00:46:57.780 --> 00:47:02.900
the immune system to inactivate toxins. Wow.

00:47:03.639 --> 00:47:05.760
If bacteria ever shows up in the body, the body

00:47:05.760 --> 00:47:07.400
can just remove the toxins due to the immune

00:47:07.400 --> 00:47:10.719
system figuring it out. Before they ever get

00:47:10.719 --> 00:47:12.480
to the nervous system, in the case of tetanus,

00:47:12.500 --> 00:47:16.159
this was a first major expansion of vaccine logic

00:47:16.159 --> 00:47:19.340
beyond just weakening the pathogen because it

00:47:19.340 --> 00:47:22.119
doesn't even target the pathogen directly. In

00:47:22.119 --> 00:47:25.219
the 1940s, we ended up getting Petrusis and the

00:47:25.219 --> 00:47:30.239
first combination vaccines, DTP, Deferia, Tetanus,

00:47:30.239 --> 00:47:33.610
and Petrusis. This is the moment public health

00:47:33.610 --> 00:47:36.550
vaccination becomes scalable. Instead of dozens

00:47:36.550 --> 00:47:40.630
of injections, you get one. And uptake skyrockets.

00:47:40.929 --> 00:47:45.389
In the 1950s, polio, which had gone into two

00:47:45.389 --> 00:47:47.829
different strategies, both revolutionary. You

00:47:47.829 --> 00:47:51.510
have Salk, which uses an inactivated virus, safe,

00:47:51.670 --> 00:47:55.409
stable, injectable. And Sabin, which uses a live

00:47:55.409 --> 00:47:58.050
attenuated oral vaccine, easy to administer,

00:47:58.289 --> 00:48:00.869
gives excellent immunity. Together, they drive

00:48:00.869 --> 00:48:05.230
polio to the brink of eradication. 1960s and

00:48:05.230 --> 00:48:08.769
1980s, the viral vaccine boom. This era gives

00:48:08.769 --> 00:48:13.070
us measles, mumps, rubella, varicella, hepatitis

00:48:13.070 --> 00:48:15.510
B, and more. The key innovation in the growing

00:48:15.510 --> 00:48:19.050
virus is in cell culture, allowing precise attenuation.

00:48:19.369 --> 00:48:22.929
The MMR combination vaccine in 1971 becomes a

00:48:22.929 --> 00:48:26.969
global public health cornerstone. In 1990s, conjugate

00:48:26.969 --> 00:48:29.710
vaccines is the major leap for infinites, so

00:48:29.710 --> 00:48:32.449
there are certain types of bacteria, which we

00:48:32.449 --> 00:48:36.170
used to have sugar -coated capsules to get that

00:48:36.170 --> 00:48:39.670
vaccine in, but young immune systems often couldn't

00:48:39.670 --> 00:48:42.690
recognize the piece that we were adding to it

00:48:42.690 --> 00:48:45.750
because of that sugar capsule. Conjugate vaccines

00:48:45.750 --> 00:48:49.289
chemically link those sugars directly to a protein

00:48:49.289 --> 00:48:52.489
flag, making them much more visible to the immune

00:48:52.489 --> 00:48:57.769
system, which means... We can truly target young

00:48:57.769 --> 00:49:01.329
immune systems for bacteria that causes things

00:49:01.329 --> 00:49:05.610
like meningitis and sepsis. And their cases plummet.

00:49:06.309 --> 00:49:09.210
In the 2000s, we had HPV and cancer prevention.

00:49:09.369 --> 00:49:11.650
For the first time, a vaccine prevents cancer

00:49:11.650 --> 00:49:16.389
by blocking the infection with onogenic HPV strains.

00:49:16.710 --> 00:49:19.670
This reframes vaccines not as just a tool against

00:49:19.670 --> 00:49:22.670
infectious disease directly, but as a long -term

00:49:22.670 --> 00:49:25.929
disease prevention technology. And of course,

00:49:25.969 --> 00:49:30.409
in this decade, we've got the mRNA vaccine. Decades

00:49:30.409 --> 00:49:33.210
of research actually converge to create the mRNA

00:49:33.210 --> 00:49:36.929
platforms through rapid design, precise antigen

00:49:36.929 --> 00:49:40.510
targeting, and we have no more need to grow pathogens.

00:49:40.849 --> 00:49:45.550
The COVID -19 accelerates deployment, but the

00:49:45.550 --> 00:49:47.869
platform is now being explored for others like

00:49:47.869 --> 00:49:51.730
influenza, RSV, HIV, and even personalized cancer

00:49:51.730 --> 00:49:54.760
vaccine. It's looking pretty good. Maybe I should

00:49:54.760 --> 00:49:57.980
get somebody in to really explain that MNRA vaccines

00:49:57.980 --> 00:50:02.219
do not mess with your DNA. They do not. They

00:50:02.219 --> 00:50:05.340
just don't. Regardless, across this timeline,

00:50:05.420 --> 00:50:07.780
the pattern is clear. As our understanding of

00:50:07.780 --> 00:50:10.119
microbes and immunity deepens, vaccines shift

00:50:10.119 --> 00:50:12.300
from empirical hacks to engineered biological

00:50:12.300 --> 00:50:15.380
tools. Okay, now that I've laid this all out,

00:50:15.440 --> 00:50:17.079
I've done the quick little TikTok of like how

00:50:17.079 --> 00:50:19.559
we got from the first vaccine and all the vaccines

00:50:19.559 --> 00:50:22.260
to this point. I haven't really gone into all

00:50:22.260 --> 00:50:25.809
the empirical data. I'm a volcanologist. I'm

00:50:25.809 --> 00:50:28.210
not an immunologist. But I'm pretty good at reading

00:50:28.210 --> 00:50:30.769
the history and following evidence and understanding

00:50:30.769 --> 00:50:34.170
the scientific method. One of the things I really

00:50:34.170 --> 00:50:35.929
need to poke at though before we start moving

00:50:35.929 --> 00:50:38.070
on a little bit more is vaccine schedules aren't

00:50:38.070 --> 00:50:40.510
arbitrary. I've seen a lot of people try to push

00:50:40.510 --> 00:50:42.989
back on this online. They're built from three

00:50:42.989 --> 00:50:45.369
overlapping principles. The first is immune system

00:50:45.369 --> 00:50:49.610
timing. So we understand when infants and children

00:50:49.610 --> 00:50:54.139
respond to different antigens. So... That's important.

00:50:54.579 --> 00:50:57.559
Some vaccines work brilliantly at two months.

00:50:58.420 --> 00:51:00.780
Others need a mature immune system before the

00:51:00.780 --> 00:51:03.840
immune system can recognize it and build a proper

00:51:03.840 --> 00:51:07.119
immunity to it. Schedules are tuned to when the

00:51:07.119 --> 00:51:09.480
body can generate the strongest, safest, and

00:51:09.480 --> 00:51:12.940
most durable response. There's a lot of information

00:51:12.940 --> 00:51:16.909
that goes into that. And second, Epidemiology

00:51:16.909 --> 00:51:19.389
and risk windows. Vaccines are also timed to

00:51:19.389 --> 00:51:21.909
protect people before they enter high -risk periods.

00:51:22.349 --> 00:51:25.090
For example, Petrusis is the most dangerous in

00:51:25.090 --> 00:51:30.050
early infancy. So the DTAP series starts early.

00:51:30.750 --> 00:51:33.849
HPV vaccination is given before sexual exposure.

00:51:34.409 --> 00:51:38.230
Seasonal vaccines like influenza are timed to

00:51:38.230 --> 00:51:41.630
circulating strains. And lastly, booster logic.

00:51:41.969 --> 00:51:45.179
That's where you go take a booster shot. Immunity

00:51:45.179 --> 00:51:47.519
isn't binary. Some vaccines produce lifelong

00:51:47.519 --> 00:51:51.639
production. Others need reinforcement. Boosters

00:51:51.639 --> 00:51:54.440
are scheduled based on measured antibody decay,

00:51:55.019 --> 00:51:59.039
memory cell persistence, and real -world outbreak

00:51:59.039 --> 00:52:01.920
data. The result is a schedule that is not just

00:52:01.920 --> 00:52:04.559
medically optimized, it's engineered to protect

00:52:04.559 --> 00:52:07.079
the population at the exact moments when immunity

00:52:07.079 --> 00:52:12.960
matters most. The data is clear. It should really

00:52:12.960 --> 00:52:17.480
end there. Our immune system can take that. It's

00:52:17.480 --> 00:52:21.420
better the vaccines than the diseases. Could

00:52:21.420 --> 00:52:23.460
there be tweaks that improve with outcomes of

00:52:23.460 --> 00:52:26.019
new data and so on and such? Yeah, sure. But

00:52:26.019 --> 00:52:27.900
the structure of all the current and past data

00:52:27.900 --> 00:52:31.420
suggests it broadly should stay. It's not going

00:52:31.420 --> 00:52:34.539
to drastically change. Let's just quote a major

00:52:34.539 --> 00:52:38.159
World Health Organization -Lancet analysis, where

00:52:38.159 --> 00:52:41.739
vaccines have saved at least 154 million lives

00:52:41.739 --> 00:52:47.460
in the past 50 years. Most of them infants. Yeah.

00:52:47.659 --> 00:52:50.579
That single shift in childhood survival is one

00:52:50.579 --> 00:52:52.239
of the biggest reasons global life expectancy

00:52:52.239 --> 00:52:55.800
has risen so dramatically. Vaccination isn't

00:52:55.800 --> 00:52:57.800
just a medical tool. It's one of the most powerful

00:52:57.800 --> 00:53:00.639
life -extending technologies humans have ever

00:53:00.639 --> 00:53:05.340
created. Nothing is going to extend your life

00:53:05.340 --> 00:53:09.949
longer than vaccines. and perhaps not smoking

00:53:09.949 --> 00:53:12.530
so you'd think terrain theory has safely died

00:53:12.530 --> 00:53:15.769
and retired to the 19th century at least on a

00:53:15.769 --> 00:53:19.489
by itself filed somewhere between i don't know

00:53:19.489 --> 00:53:23.710
right around a for arsenic tonics for vitality

00:53:23.710 --> 00:53:28.070
but it reappears not in scientific journals but

00:53:28.070 --> 00:53:30.650
in the sprawling wellness economy detox kits

00:53:30.650 --> 00:53:33.389
cleanse programs immune boosting supplements

00:53:33.389 --> 00:53:35.829
and the glossy lifestyle brands promising to

00:53:36.429 --> 00:53:39.949
Optimize your terrain. And the language is instantly

00:53:39.949 --> 00:53:43.010
recognizable. Diseases can't exist in a healthy

00:53:43.010 --> 00:53:46.489
body. Cleanse your system. Boost your terrain

00:53:46.489 --> 00:53:50.969
so pathogens can't take hold. It's bechomp all

00:53:50.969 --> 00:53:53.590
over again, but with better branding and a subscription

00:53:53.590 --> 00:53:57.110
model. You see it everywhere. Gwyneth Paltrow's

00:53:57.110 --> 00:54:00.449
goop market detox teas, infrared sauna blankets,

00:54:00.690 --> 00:54:03.769
and cleanse programs that promote... to reset

00:54:03.769 --> 00:54:07.429
your system biohacking personalities like dave

00:54:07.429 --> 00:54:11.530
asprey promote mitochondria optimization cold

00:54:11.530 --> 00:54:15.050
plunges and supplements stacks as a way of making

00:54:15.050 --> 00:54:18.829
your body unfriendly to pathogens he's also a

00:54:18.829 --> 00:54:21.710
backer of rfk jr wanting more deregulation in

00:54:21.710 --> 00:54:24.949
the biohacking sphere oh my god he also says

00:54:24.949 --> 00:54:28.170
that he believes that he's going to live to 180.

00:54:29.159 --> 00:54:30.860
And he takes like a hundred supplements a day

00:54:30.860 --> 00:54:32.880
or something. I don't know. It's freaking crazy.

00:54:33.079 --> 00:54:34.780
There's other quacks out there too, like Anthony

00:54:34.780 --> 00:54:38.920
William Covilio, aka the medical medium who pushes

00:54:38.920 --> 00:54:41.900
celery juice and liver rescue cleanses as a way

00:54:41.900 --> 00:54:44.360
to eliminate mystery toxins and prevent illness.

00:54:44.980 --> 00:54:49.260
He is a complete quack. No data. Influencers

00:54:49.260 --> 00:54:53.099
sell parasite cleanses, heavy metal detox drops,

00:54:53.500 --> 00:54:57.139
lymphatic drainage tools, and terrain support

00:54:57.139 --> 00:55:00.179
elixirs. which includes Alex Jones, actually,

00:55:00.260 --> 00:55:03.420
that claim to make your infection -proof. Supplement

00:55:03.420 --> 00:55:07.179
brands like Orgafani, Moon Juice, and Bulletproof

00:55:07.179 --> 00:55:10.139
market powders and tonics framed as immune boosters

00:55:10.139 --> 00:55:14.059
and detoxifiers. None of these people deny microbes

00:55:14.059 --> 00:55:17.659
exist. It's much more subtle than that. The message

00:55:17.659 --> 00:55:20.579
is, if you perfect your terrain, infections simply

00:55:20.579 --> 00:55:24.079
won't happen. The microbe becomes optional. You

00:55:24.079 --> 00:55:26.440
can ignore it. Terrain becomes everything. And

00:55:26.440 --> 00:55:28.980
this framing is seductive. It's deeply seductive

00:55:28.980 --> 00:55:32.159
because it feels empowering. It suggests that

00:55:32.159 --> 00:55:33.699
you can control everything that happens to your

00:55:33.699 --> 00:55:38.179
body. You just need to try it. It removes the

00:55:38.179 --> 00:55:41.219
randomness from the equation, which also harkens

00:55:41.219 --> 00:55:43.380
back to the Black Death and just people randomly

00:55:43.380 --> 00:55:46.780
getting sick. It offers simple, accountable solutions

00:55:46.780 --> 00:55:50.150
to systems that are anything but simple. And

00:55:50.150 --> 00:55:52.150
if you're anxious about health, terrain -only

00:55:52.150 --> 00:55:54.170
thinking is comforting. It tells you illness

00:55:54.170 --> 00:55:57.170
isn't chaotic or unfair. It's a solvable puzzle.

00:55:57.349 --> 00:56:00.150
It's a worldview that promises certainty in a

00:56:00.150 --> 00:56:03.550
biological universe that is fundamentally probabilistic.

00:56:04.469 --> 00:56:07.449
It almost sounds like I'm talking about quantum

00:56:07.449 --> 00:56:10.750
mechanics. Okay, but here's the critical distinction.

00:56:11.349 --> 00:56:14.369
Supporting health is not the same thing as preventing

00:56:14.369 --> 00:56:18.199
infectious disease. You can eat perfectly. You

00:56:18.199 --> 00:56:20.460
can sleep eight hours a night, meditate, hydrate,

00:56:20.579 --> 00:56:24.039
cold plunge, sauna cycle, and have a microbiome

00:56:24.039 --> 00:56:27.059
that looks like a national park. You can still

00:56:27.059 --> 00:56:30.000
get influenza, RSV, or norovirus or measles if

00:56:30.000 --> 00:56:33.159
you're unvaccinated. Because microbes don't check

00:56:33.159 --> 00:56:34.840
your wellness routine before they replicate.

00:56:35.099 --> 00:56:37.820
They don't care how optimized your mitochondria

00:56:37.820 --> 00:56:40.559
are. They care about access and exposure and

00:56:40.559 --> 00:56:44.480
susceptibility. And this happens. People died

00:56:44.480 --> 00:56:48.139
in the U .S. and Canada last year in 2025 due

00:56:48.139 --> 00:56:53.119
to the measles, a preventable disease. So terrain

00:56:53.119 --> 00:56:55.159
matters, nutrition, stress, chronic illness,

00:56:55.400 --> 00:56:57.400
and living conditions all shape how sick you

00:56:57.400 --> 00:56:59.639
get. They influence severity, recovery time,

00:56:59.719 --> 00:57:02.260
and complications. But they do not determine

00:57:02.260 --> 00:57:04.480
whether a virus can infect you in the first place.

00:57:06.460 --> 00:57:09.280
I could go on and on and on. It drives me crazy.

00:57:09.440 --> 00:57:12.159
Because modern detox culture collapses just that

00:57:12.159 --> 00:57:14.480
distinction completely. It treats supporting

00:57:14.480 --> 00:57:17.360
health as a shield against infection, when in

00:57:17.360 --> 00:57:20.300
reality it's more like padding. And then there's

00:57:20.300 --> 00:57:22.780
the detox framing itself. It flushes out toxins.

00:57:23.440 --> 00:57:27.960
Resets your system. Cleanses your body of impurities.

00:57:28.960 --> 00:57:32.579
These phrases can sound scientific, but they're

00:57:32.579 --> 00:57:35.280
not tied to anything measurable. There's no measurable

00:57:35.280 --> 00:57:38.800
toxin, any defined mechanism, or even validated

00:57:38.800 --> 00:57:42.829
endpoint. They're... metaphors, useful for marketing,

00:57:42.949 --> 00:57:45.710
not for immunology. Your liver and kidneys already

00:57:45.710 --> 00:57:48.630
detox for you continuously. Your immune system

00:57:48.630 --> 00:57:51.349
already clears pathogens. You don't need a three

00:57:51.349 --> 00:57:54.670
-day juice cleanse, a $300 supplement bundle,

00:57:54.789 --> 00:57:58.570
or a lymph -activating jade roller to do what

00:57:58.570 --> 00:58:01.449
your body already is doing for you right now

00:58:01.449 --> 00:58:03.949
for free. And as I've already mentioned, the

00:58:03.949 --> 00:58:06.289
irony is that there's real evidence -based ways

00:58:06.289 --> 00:58:09.000
to support your terrain. that are profoundly

00:58:09.000 --> 00:58:14.460
unsexy. Like eating well, sleeping enough, exercising,

00:58:14.940 --> 00:58:20.059
managing your stress, vaccination, clean water,

00:58:20.179 --> 00:58:22.440
sanitation, access to healthcare. These don't

00:58:22.440 --> 00:58:24.579
trend on social media because they're not novel.

00:58:24.940 --> 00:58:28.760
They're not branded. They don't promise transformation

00:58:28.760 --> 00:58:33.480
in 48 hours. But they work. The modern resurrection

00:58:33.480 --> 00:58:35.860
of terrain theory thrives because it offers a

00:58:35.860 --> 00:58:38.000
narrative that feels good. It gives people agency.

00:58:38.320 --> 00:58:40.639
It gives them a sense of control in a world where

00:58:40.639 --> 00:58:43.820
viruses are invisible, unpredictable, and indifferent

00:58:43.820 --> 00:58:47.699
to our preferences. So the core truth hasn't

00:58:47.699 --> 00:58:51.579
changed. Terrain shapes the severity of the fire,

00:58:51.679 --> 00:58:55.019
or the viruses. And the microbe is the match

00:58:55.019 --> 00:58:58.139
that starts it. One last thing before moving

00:58:58.139 --> 00:59:01.869
on. RFK Jr. and others... They get this wrong

00:59:01.869 --> 00:59:05.469
all the time with terrain. Secondary infections.

00:59:05.989 --> 00:59:08.650
They're the ones of the clearest examples of

00:59:08.650 --> 00:59:12.449
how terrain matters, but not in the way wellness

00:59:12.449 --> 00:59:16.090
culture imagines. You can have a near perfect

00:59:16.090 --> 00:59:19.289
health, great sleep, balanced nutrition, a whole

00:59:19.289 --> 00:59:22.230
package, and a simple viral infection can still

00:59:22.230 --> 00:59:24.190
open the door for something worse, not because

00:59:24.190 --> 00:59:26.710
your terrain was weak, but because the first

00:59:26.710 --> 00:59:29.929
pathogen temporarily reshaped. Your terrain.

00:59:30.110 --> 00:59:32.510
A cold virus can strip away the protective lining

00:59:32.510 --> 00:59:34.869
of your throat, suppress local immune defensives,

00:59:34.909 --> 00:59:39.590
and create tiny breaches in the mucosa of your

00:59:39.590 --> 00:59:42.190
throat. And suddenly bacteria that normally live

00:59:42.190 --> 00:59:45.530
harmlessly in your nose or mouth, like streptococcus,

00:59:45.630 --> 00:59:48.289
have an opportunity they didn't have yesterday.

00:59:48.949 --> 00:59:51.070
That's how you get strep throat after a cold

00:59:51.070 --> 00:59:54.170
or a bacteria pneumonia after influenza. The

00:59:54.170 --> 00:59:57.110
terrain didn't fail. The terrain or the pathogen

00:59:57.110 --> 01:00:00.679
altered it. Another microbe exploited the new

01:00:00.679 --> 01:00:04.599
landscape. It's a reminder that terrain isn't

01:00:04.599 --> 01:00:07.980
a static personal attribute. It's a dynamic battlefield

01:00:07.980 --> 01:00:10.480
constantly shaped by the microbes that entered

01:00:10.480 --> 01:00:13.599
it. It's also one of those flipping common refrains

01:00:13.599 --> 01:00:17.320
about, oh, COVID -19 doesn't kill people, all

01:00:17.320 --> 01:00:19.739
this other stuff does. Yeah, well, what changed

01:00:19.739 --> 01:00:22.440
the terrain in the first place? If you don't

01:00:22.440 --> 01:00:25.059
get as sick with COVID -19, you have less avenues

01:00:25.059 --> 01:00:27.679
for other secondary infections to take hold.

01:00:29.780 --> 01:00:32.320
And again, it's sometimes the most dangerous

01:00:32.320 --> 01:00:33.900
infections aren't the ones first through the

01:00:33.900 --> 01:00:36.800
door, but the ones that followed behind. If you

01:00:36.800 --> 01:00:39.960
have immunity from a vaccine, even for a pathogen

01:00:39.960 --> 01:00:42.860
that rarely has fatalities, you don't need to

01:00:42.860 --> 01:00:45.059
worry about those possible secondary infections.

01:00:45.400 --> 01:00:48.119
The one that takes a healthy person to one that

01:00:48.119 --> 01:00:52.239
may not make it. Over population scales, the

01:00:52.239 --> 01:00:55.260
effect is huge. If you step back and look at

01:00:55.260 --> 01:00:57.320
this whole story, from the Black Death to detox

01:00:57.320 --> 01:01:00.099
culture, it's really a story about how humans

01:01:00.099 --> 01:01:04.159
try to make sense of suffering. In the 1300s,

01:01:04.159 --> 01:01:05.860
when plague tore through Europe, people had no

01:01:05.860 --> 01:01:09.860
tools to see the cause, no microscopes, no scientific

01:01:09.860 --> 01:01:13.659
framework. Disease felt cosmic, spiritual, fated.

01:01:13.780 --> 01:01:16.940
You survived because God willed it. The explanations

01:01:16.940 --> 01:01:20.480
were comforting because they were familiar. Then

01:01:20.480 --> 01:01:23.480
the world slowly sharpened. We started to get

01:01:23.480 --> 01:01:26.119
the evidence from microscopes of a hidden universe.

01:01:26.900 --> 01:01:29.719
We started to see and push the boundaries of

01:01:29.719 --> 01:01:33.579
our relation. And Jenner's cowpox vaccine proved

01:01:33.579 --> 01:01:36.300
immunity could be engineered. Staining techniques

01:01:36.300 --> 01:01:39.639
in the 1800s let scientists isolate actual bacteria

01:01:39.639 --> 01:01:43.139
and things that were causing us to get sick and

01:01:43.139 --> 01:01:45.719
watch them underneath the lens. Germ theory finally

01:01:45.719 --> 01:01:48.400
connected the dots. Disease wasn't mystical,

01:01:48.539 --> 01:01:51.179
it was microbial. And we have all this data.

01:01:51.710 --> 01:01:55.530
It is so crystal clear. And yet here we are circling

01:01:55.530 --> 01:01:58.789
back to the same old ideas of a couple hundred

01:01:58.789 --> 01:02:02.889
years ago. I still don't get it. I still don't

01:02:02.889 --> 01:02:04.590
get it. I don't even know how to convince people

01:02:04.590 --> 01:02:09.360
that are just so believing in this stuff. You

01:02:09.360 --> 01:02:11.539
know, the whole modern terrain -only thinking

01:02:11.539 --> 01:02:14.579
isn't new. It's the Black Death with better branding,

01:02:14.679 --> 01:02:17.119
and it's medieval belief that illness reflects

01:02:17.119 --> 01:02:19.639
moral or personal failure, just repackaged as

01:02:19.639 --> 01:02:22.260
toxins and cleanses and boosting your terrain.

01:02:22.659 --> 01:02:25.260
It's an idea that if you just live purely enough,

01:02:25.420 --> 01:02:28.119
disease can't touch you. That you have total

01:02:28.119 --> 01:02:30.880
control, or conversely, if you get sick, it was

01:02:30.880 --> 01:02:33.539
meant to be. These explanations sometimes feel

01:02:33.539 --> 01:02:36.400
good because they make the world legible. They

01:02:36.400 --> 01:02:39.179
give us agency. But they collapse the distinction

01:02:39.179 --> 01:02:41.599
that took centuries to uncover a terrain, shapes

01:02:41.599 --> 01:02:44.079
the outcome, but microbials initiate the event.

01:02:44.280 --> 01:02:46.500
When you get down to it, you know, people are

01:02:46.500 --> 01:02:48.820
not powerless. We have vaccines. We have modern

01:02:48.820 --> 01:02:50.440
scientific understandings. We're not doomed.

01:02:50.820 --> 01:02:52.739
We're not at the mercy of fate. We're living

01:02:52.739 --> 01:02:54.719
in the first era of human history where we can

01:02:54.719 --> 01:02:56.659
see the cause of disease, measure it, weaken

01:02:56.659 --> 01:02:59.199
it, block it, and sometimes eliminate it completely.

01:03:00.239 --> 01:03:02.599
And it's still a story we're writing. We're still

01:03:02.599 --> 01:03:04.840
inventing new things. We're still looking at

01:03:04.840 --> 01:03:07.659
new ways of using vaccines. It's pretty cool,

01:03:07.780 --> 01:03:11.260
but I just wish we would stop revisiting these

01:03:11.260 --> 01:03:15.619
old ideas. It drives me crazy. So that brings

01:03:15.619 --> 01:03:18.880
to an end here for this solo episode yet again.

01:03:19.739 --> 01:03:21.940
Hopefully I did it some justice, and hopefully

01:03:21.940 --> 01:03:26.320
Robin is glad that I did it and enjoys it. Hopefully

01:03:26.320 --> 01:03:28.719
the rest of you guys do too. Remember, you can

01:03:28.719 --> 01:03:32.579
definitely send me an email. It's in the show

01:03:32.579 --> 01:03:35.440
notes. You can leave me some messages on social

01:03:35.440 --> 01:03:39.099
media. poke me and kind of push the show in different

01:03:39.099 --> 01:03:41.760
directions. What kind of guests should I actually

01:03:41.760 --> 01:03:44.420
be trying to get at? This episode was fun to

01:03:44.420 --> 01:03:47.179
put together. These solo episodes actually take

01:03:47.179 --> 01:03:48.480
up a lot of work, especially when they're not

01:03:48.480 --> 01:03:50.920
in my wheelhouse. So it'll be a while before

01:03:50.920 --> 01:03:53.360
I probably do another one of these. I'll see

01:03:53.360 --> 01:03:56.820
you guys again in two weeks with a guest. It's

01:03:56.820 --> 01:04:03.460
going to be awesome. Bye. So misbehaved echoes

01:04:03.460 --> 01:04:10.780
of melodies remind us it's always colors. We've

01:04:10.780 --> 01:04:17.800
stories painting the sky swaying to rhythms as

01:04:17.800 --> 01:04:19.699
the galaxies fly by.