Pathogenesis: A History of the World in Eight Plagues

by Jonathan Kennedy

If one of our distant ancestors hadn’t been infected by a virus hundreds of millions of years ago, humans would reproduce by laying eggs.

Let’s build that Time Machine rn

The discovery that the microscopic bacteria in our guts are able to influence our feelings and behavior in indiscernible but important ways suggests that humans are not even fully in control of their own minds.

Disappointed but not surprised

Outside of fantasy novels, ancient mythology and sci-fi, the idea of humans procreating with other humanoid species seems preposterous—perverted even.[*2]

lol when was this written bc this author has not checked kindle unlimited lately

In my own experience, when we began to give our daughter solid foods, the first things we tried included Weetabix mixed in milk and creamy porridge. I can’t imagine it would have gone as well if we’d used venison and walnuts.

Ok but did you even try

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), pneumonic plague kills almost all infected people if it is left untreated, compared to between 30 and 60 percent for bubonic plague.

Where do I get the vaccine for this pls

The exploits of his son, Alexander the Great, were even more astonishing. He inherited his father’s throne at the age of twenty, in 336 BCE. Soon after, this “drunken juvenile thug”—in the words of the British classicist Mary Beard—began

Loooool Mary tell me how you really feel

Roman cities also boasted magnificent public toilets, with tightly spaced seats for dozens of people to sit side by side.

I will NOT be visiting ancient Rome on my time machine

the Cloaca Maxima, which was, according to Pliny the Elder, high and wide enough to allow the passage of a wagon loaded with hay. This drain was even protected by its own goddess, Cloacina.

And yet y’all still got malaria and shit on the regular so what was Cloacina doing with her time

Tersoria, the shared sponges on sticks that the Romans used to wipe their bottoms, were another oddity that highlighted the lack of basic hygiene.[21]

Among so many jfc

One apocryphal tale from the Roman author Aelian describes how a giant octopus swam from the sea into the sewer and entered the house of a wealthy merchant in the Bay of Naples through the toilet, then proceeded to eat all the pickled fish in his pantry.[22]

My being afraid of something hiding in my toilet doesn’t seem so crazy now does it

Researchers have examined microbes in human feces before and after they were colonized by Romans for signs of microbes,

I want to meet an archeological poop researcher

Galen’s discussion of the causes and cures of the disease reveals the poor state of Roman medicine. He believed that it was caused by an excess of the humor called black bile, and suggested treatments including mountain cows’ milk, dirt from Armenia, and boys’ urine.[30]

Galen out here throwing spaghetti at the wall

great gerbils and marmots, both of which live in mountainous areas of Central Asia, have partial resistance to Yersinia pestis. Their bodies provide an environment where the bacteria can reproduce without killing the host.

Not a nice marmot you’ve got there

According to one chronicler, the grape harvest was so poor that “there was no wine in the whole kingdom of France.”[5] Another noted that the poor ate dogs, cats, bird droppings and even their own children.[6]

Idk why eating bird shit is more horrifying to me than cannibalism

Supposedly, Italian merchants contracted plague in the autumn of 1346 when Mongol soldiers besieged Kaffa and catapulted the corpses of plague victims over the city walls. This story is apocryphal, but that hasn’t stopped some scholars identifying it as the first instance of biological warfare.[14]

Not cool bros!

Another eyewitness in Florence wrote of throwing bodies into a mass grave, covering them with earth, adding more bodies and then earth, “as one makes lasagne with layers of pasta and cheese.”[15]

Pls don’t ruin lasagna for me

For obvious reasons, Cortés and his colleagues’ written accounts emphasize the Spanish role in the victory. In reality, the conquistadors fought alongside several rebellious tributary states, who made up about 99.5 percent of the forces arrayed against the Mexica.[20]

The lies I was taught in school though Jesus

The founder of economics, Adam Smith, agreed that New World slavery was morally repugnant, but he also pointed out that it was economically inefficient. In The Wealth of Nations Smith argued that “the work done by free men comes cheaper in the end than the work performed by slaves.”

THANK you! Like it’s evil but ALSO makes no sense economically!!

the most notorious sexual predator was Thomas Thistlewood, a British plantation owner in Jamaica whose diary describes 3,852 acts of sexual intercourse with 138 enslaved women over thirty-seven years in the mid-1700s.[43]

I hope he died slowly and in great pain

A recent study based on the DNA provided to the biotech company 23andme by 50,000 people demonstrates that he was far from the exception.[44] Almost twice as many males were transported across the Atlantic as females, and yet African women provided twice as much DNA to the modern-day population of former British colonies in the Caribbean.

Thank you I hate this

the Colonial Ministry in Paris issued a series of decrees in the mid-1780s calling upon plantation owners and their agents to give enslaved laborers a day off per week, provide enough food so they wouldn’t starve, and refrain from murdering them. The French population in Saint-Domingue vehemently opposed these decrees and the court in Cap-Français refused to recognize them.

I feel like the prohibition against blaming the victim can’t apply to the Haitian revolution bc the Blancs, both Grandes and Petites, truly were begging to be overthrown in the most violent way possible.

the dysfunction in the U.S. health care system is, in monetary terms, more of a handicap than the reparations that Germany had to pay following the First World War.

Fucking own goal ass healthcare system

The liberal democracies’ laissez-faire approach to dealing with Covid-19 was disastrous in health terms. Despite the fact that the virus originated in Wuhan, the official death rate in the U.S. is more than 300 times higher than in China; in the UK it is more than 250 times higher than in China.[4]

Bloop