The coronavirus outbreak shows no signs of slowing down, and the world is on edge. Is this just a regional epidemic that has sparked pandemonium through social media? Or might this be the big one, an unstoppable killer spread through the pathways of globalization that will devastate nations and bring modern medicine to its knees? We discuss.
00:02:45.820Prince Philip said, if it has four legs and it isn't a chair, or if it swims and it isn't a submarine, or if it flies and it isn't a plane, the Cantonese will eat it.
00:02:58.620But yes, we're going to talk about the coronavirus, and I think we'll touch upon just some of the newsy aspects of it.
00:03:11.460But I think it's more important to take a couple steps back and talk about, A, just the hysteria that can spread extremely quickly.
00:03:24.180But then also the kind of way in which a pandemic, or even the idea of a pandemic, is a kind of dark side of globalization.
00:03:33.280And also whether, and I guess I'm getting quite dark here, we have a global population built on effectively dysgenic breeding, and we have very low mortality rate, child mortality rates.
00:03:53.900And overpopulation, and just the degeneration of the population is a serious issue.
00:04:02.980And this must be part of the context that we think about this, you know, global pandemic virus.
00:04:12.020Anyway, let's start off with the just newsy aspects, you know, and then kind of jump into deeper questions.
00:04:21.280So as of Monday, reportedly, 80 people have died, but the infection is much higher.
00:04:33.520There is, again, I'm taking these from mainstream sources, New York Times, Wikipedia, the infection is approaching 3,000.
00:04:44.920And it's, so that would be a fairly low mortality rate, but the infection rate, you know, again, this is the reported infection rate.
00:04:54.040Many people have suggested that the information is being suppressed, and so on.
00:04:59.480But the reported infection rate is climbing at a, you could say, parabolic rate.
00:05:05.380And it is not increasing in a linear fashion, it is parabolically increasing.
00:05:13.520Diseases, the way of thinking about them is this basic reproduction number, which is that if you have it, how many people are going to be affected?
00:05:23.660And, you know, much like you can think about it like a birth rate, effectively of a population, if the basic reproduction number is less than one, that means that if you have this flu or whatever virus that you will affect, you will pass it on to less than one person on average.
00:05:44.060And that means that if you have infection rates in that, you know, above one, especially if it's something like four or eight, which is quite high, you are going to start to get exponential spreading.
00:05:59.780It will breed like rabbits, it will double and double and double, and it's doubling the doubling, compounding the problem, and it can be a terrible thing.
00:06:08.320So the basic reproduction number of this virus seems to be between 1.4 and 3.8, which means that, I mean, again, this is a mainstream report.
00:06:18.880I guess we can plausibly assume that it's an underestimation.
00:06:24.420So this means that the virus will continue.
00:06:30.140We can remember avian flu and SARS and a couple of other pandemic fears that made the media and got everyone excited for about a month and then were forgotten about.
00:06:46.700But I would say at some point, this actually is going to be real.
00:06:53.920And so anyway, what do you all, I think we should put it all in context.
00:06:58.100I mean, remember, some, it was between 60,000 and 80,000 people died of influenza in the United States last year.
00:07:39.000We've seen this, as I've mentioned earlier, we've seen these kinds of things before, and they've resulted in deaths and hysteria, but then they've ultimately faded and kind of left the news cycle after a month or two.
00:07:54.220So, what do you think is going to happen with the coronavirus?
00:08:00.380And also, you know, is hysteria justified in the sense, you know, not necessarily that this will be the big one, but that these kinds of things have occurred throughout world history and will occur again?
00:08:16.600Yeah, I mean, I guess it's hard to know at this stage how to see if people are taking it seriously enough or not serious enough.
00:08:27.000But, you know, it is one of those things that as advanced as we're getting technologically, there's still things we can't really protect ourselves against.
00:08:35.240And there's things that the system can't really deal with.
00:08:38.060I mean, like, there's this problem now that's a direct result of globalization, like antibiotic-resistant diseases.
00:08:45.160And, you know, that's directly due to the spread of first-world medicine to third-world countries.
00:08:54.440Because either the patient is not taking the full term of the medication, and so they're kind of killing off the weak virus and the strong survive, and thus they're, you know, evolving into stronger viruses.
00:09:08.860Or, you know, there is that, you know, tiny percentage that will survive the full term of the medication, and the viruses are going stronger.
00:09:17.920It's almost a kind of pendulum effect with the spread of medicine, where you can, you know, we can resist the small-level diseases, but we almost create more intense ones.
00:09:32.340Yeah, and I mean, you know, one of the other things that gets discussed a lot, probably more on the left, is, like, the impact of climate change and how we're going to see all these catastrophes.
00:09:42.140And, you know, whatever you think about climate change, there's definitely historical precedent for these kind of pandemics coinciding with big climactic changes.
00:09:53.160I mean, like, you know, the sort of golden age, or when the Roman Empire really came to its pinnacle, was during an ideal climate period.
00:10:04.160They called it the Roman Climate Optimum, which was, like, 200 BC to 150 AD.
00:10:08.600And then in 150 AD, when you get kind of an interim period, that's the start of the Antonine Plague.
00:10:19.060And that's probably smallpox now, looking back at it.
00:10:23.100But, you know, that's a time when Marcus Aurelius is in power.
00:10:26.380It may have actually been what killed Marcus Aurelius.
00:10:30.880But that was a time of huge social change in the Roman Empire that was brought about by this pandemic that was, in turn, brought about by climate change.
00:10:40.660And I've been reading some interesting stuff on that.
00:10:43.700And some of the more recent work done on this, you know, like, the fall of Rome is something that's been theorized a lot.
00:10:49.180I think there was a German classist that put together, like, over 200 reasons that have been invented for the fall of Rome.
00:10:56.980But one thing we have available now that someone like Gibbon didn't have available is this large record of evidence now we have about the climate from that period.
00:11:07.140Like, you can actually see from Arctic ice deposits, they've seen that a result of the Antonine Plague was that Roman mining fell to pre-empire levels.
00:11:19.580So, you know, we're starting to discover that these plagues had probably a fair greater impact than we would have thought.
00:11:26.160Like, Gibbon did put down one of the reasons for the fall of Rome being that it spread itself too thin.
00:11:30.960But obviously, if you lose, you know, half your pop has probably happened in about 550 AD with the Justinian Plague, which was another, that probably was bubonic plague.
00:11:42.120And that followed, again, the start of a mini ice age that was caused by volcanic activity.
00:11:48.840But one of the interesting effects, you know, this gets to the social effects that these things have throughout history that are often maybe overlooked, is I've written some stuff about the rise of Christianity, because the start of the 3rd century was especially a significant time.
00:12:03.700You know, around 180 AD was, I think, was when Marcus Aurelius wrote his meditations.
00:12:08.840And that was a time when Rome was under severe pressure in terms of losing their agricultural base, losing soldiers to this, because it's especially spread among soldiers, you know, due to conditions.
00:12:20.340But one of the things this caused was a massive, massive rise in Christianity, because some of the recent work done on it, you know, there was this, there was this practice of exposure by Romans,
00:12:32.200where they left children to the elements, and it was often thought that this was a form of birth control, basically.
00:12:39.840But we've discovered recently that there was actually common herbal forms of birth control that would have been popular.
00:12:46.720And so this wasn't done for family planning, it was done for other reasons, like, you know, the kids having deformities or whatever.
00:12:52.980But probably one of the most common reasons was that they were born girls.
00:12:56.480And there's someone compiled a lot of verses by various Roman poets where they talk about this practice as being common among girls.
00:13:05.320And that, you know, there was a particular quote from a Roman poet that even the rich families get rid of the girls and even the poor families keep the boys.
00:13:15.340And one of the things was that there was a dowry for girls that put an economic pressure on poor families, especially.
00:13:20.320But this wasn't a practice among Christians.
00:13:23.840And so one of the things that was theorized was when there was this huge falling off of population, that it wasn't so much that Christians were affected less.
00:13:31.420So they probably were due to, you know, their own forms of charity within their community and stronger social bonds.
00:13:38.100But actually they were able to rebound far, far better than the pagans because, you know, there was a much greater stress because there was less Roman women to start with.
00:13:48.200But then they also had to have more children to make up for, you know, the exposures, whereas Christians had a much more even balance.
00:13:57.940And also it was a time when there was like a 40 percent conversion rate to Christianity.
00:14:02.500So most converts were tended to be younger.
00:14:04.880So not only did they have an even balance between men and women, but they had a fair younger population and they had this kind of stronger social solidarity with the charity that was done in this time.
00:14:16.220So it is interesting to look at the social effects these things have.
00:14:19.680I mean, you look at the meditations and you read that and it's much different from the kind of paganism that would have come before Marcus Aurelius.
00:14:27.220It's much more, I guess it's much more kind of a, yeah, well, stoic.
00:14:32.520And I mean, then even you look at, you know, following the bubonic plague in the 14th century and you have like the cloud of unknown, which is this great mystical text that's much closer to kind of Eastern spiritualities than traditional Christianity.
00:14:45.840So, I mean, yeah, we, I guess the conclusion for all this is, you know, we have a much better idea now of how these things impacted world history.
00:14:54.460And it seems like there were, there were much more causatives than we would have thought.
00:14:59.200And yeah, as, as, as we, yeah, I can see similar things happening today.
00:15:05.460Uh, with, with people gazing into the abyss, uh, of, of, of global catastrophe and, uh, moving away from the kind of happy consumerist liberalism and, and reverting back to a, uh, either a kind of Eastern mystical religion or a more primitive Christianity or something.
00:15:27.860I, I think there are actually strong trends in that direction now, you know, uh, anyway, uh, regardless of, of, of, of whatever happens to coronavirus.
00:15:37.440Um, uh, Ed, uh, what do you think about this subject of, you know, pandemics in global history and their effects on the population and also their effects on religiousness and kind of world outlook?
00:15:54.720Yeah, it's very interesting. It's a very interesting point that, uh, Keith made that I pick up on about why it's fascinating that it would have caused, uh, the, the plagues in Rome would have caused less damage to Christians.
00:16:07.080It also makes sense in terms of intelligence because intelligence would have, uh, the people that were converting to Christianity tended to be middle class.
00:16:14.540There's this sort of urban myth that they were working class and they were poor. It's not true.
00:16:18.300An analysis even of the kind of names they had indicates that these people tended to be from the middle class of society.
00:16:23.860Being in middle class is associated with intelligence and intelligence would be associated with, um, making plans to avoid plagues.
00:16:31.420It would be associated with having money, which would allow you to avoid these problems as well.
00:16:35.560And intelligence is also associated with the low level of mutational load.
00:16:38.900And if you have a low level of mutational load in the brain, then you're going to have it probably in the body as well.
00:16:42.940And so therefore with a greater resistance to play. So it completely makes sense that this would have elevated, uh, the demographics of, of Christians.
00:16:50.480Um, and so I, uh, that, that makes sense, but more, more broadly in terms of these plagues, yeah, there is a sense in which they, they, they make key changes.
00:16:57.680One is to intelligence and the other is to religiousness. So in terms of intelligence, so obviously, yeah, better immune system.
00:17:04.260If you're more intelligent, uh, you're more able to plan for the future. You're more able to get away from the situation.
00:17:09.180You're more able to successfully pursue your plans. And so, um, plagues will tend to elevate intelligence.
00:17:15.920And this is quite clear. If you look at the black death, that it does elevate clear, very clear that it elevates intelligence.
00:17:23.120Because in a hundred years after the black death, you have the Renaissance and the Renaissance is a manifestation of the, of a Europe that has become much more intelligent.
00:17:32.280Can I jump in real quick? Um, I don't want to interrupt your flow, but there is a, a, uh,
00:17:38.660a theory about the black death and just the creation of the middle class itself, uh, from a purely economics, uh, point of view in the sense that, uh, you had a, uh, lower supply of labor and therefore higher prices of, of labor.
00:17:56.420And just this general kind of upward push that generated, uh, a more urban middle class, just because, you know, your, your labor was worth more after this catastrophe.
00:18:09.320Um, and that this is actually a tremendous, you know, tremendously important in the creation of the modern world yet, you know, we don't generally like to think of, you know, die-offs inventing liberalism and middle-class lifestyle itself.
00:18:24.360Yeah. You know, for catastrophe, something wonderful, I guess.
00:18:28.580Yes. The black death kill. It's true. Well, I don't know. It depends on how the middle class people that we are, it's a double-edged sword because they're often attracted to left wing.
00:18:59.420Because, of course, they were poorer, and so it was only those that had, for random genetic reasons or just through nepotism working against them,
00:19:07.620who had been kept down in that class, in the lower class, uh, who suddenly found that their labor was worth an enormous amount of money.
00:19:14.980And so, yes, it certainly had this kind of interesting effect. But the other effect was, I think, was the elevation of religiousness.
00:19:21.620So what religiousness is, there was actually an interesting study on this in terms of the pacification of Europe on the issue of execution.
00:19:28.920And it was found, um, it was found that across the medieval period, we executed about 2% of the male population every generation,
00:19:37.340because all felonies carried the death penalty. And that, that 2% would have been young and would have been male
00:19:44.760and would, would seemingly have been at the bottom of society. And there's records to indicate that.
00:19:49.940And so, obviously, intelligence, the heritability of intelligence is about 0.8. Intelligence is associated, low intelligence is associated with criminality.
00:19:57.620And the heritability of personality traits is at least 0.5. And it's low conscientiousness and low agreeableness that are associated with criminality.
00:20:05.840So we're removing from the population, due to this execution, the system of widespread execution, every generation, stupid, psychopathic men who are young.
00:20:16.740And so, of course, they're not passing on their genes. And so this is going to act to pacify Europe, to change the personality of Europe.
00:20:23.560But I argued in a paper, we traced across time, the extent of people being, dedicating themselves to religion to the extent of becoming monks or nuns.
00:20:31.540And we show that it increases across the medieval period, quite steadily, as there's this increase, which would be consistent when it's becoming more religious.
00:20:39.260Now, religion is about 0.4 heritable, and it's associated with precisely these personality traits that would predict low criminality.
00:20:46.260It's associated with conscientiousness, i.e. impulse control, rule following, and it's associated with agreeableness, i.e. altruism and empathy, for various reasons.
00:20:53.260But those associations are there. So what we demonstrated was that it was certainly the case that we were becoming more religious across the medieval period.
00:21:00.320Now, to the extent what the plague would have done, then, is not only would it have selected for intelligence, it would have selected for religiousness, indirectly.
00:21:09.420Because religious people being higher in conscientiousness and higher in agreeableness would be of higher socioeconomic status than the more psychopathic people.
00:21:17.700And they would also be more able, being higher in conscientiousness, to make plans and alliances and whatever to get out of the situation.
00:21:23.300So it seems that the plague did those two things. It elevated intelligence, substantially, so you get the Renaissance, but it also elevated religiousness, and consequently you get the Reformation.
00:21:34.060And it creates general social chaos, and one of the things at the environmental level that's associated with religiousness is chaos, is a feeling of insecurity and uncertainty.
00:21:45.260So then you get this massive religious revival under John Wycliffe and people like this, and it continues.
00:21:50.400And it seems that we were selecting for religiousness right up until the Industrial Revolution, and also for intelligence.
00:21:57.560And then, of course, Darwinian conditions are relaxed. So, yeah, I think it's probably that was what was going on in ancient times, and it's what was going on more recently.
00:22:04.200And if there was a complete breakdown, and Darwinian select, because of this coronavirus, which is unlikely, let's face it, but anyway, then I would suspect that those two things would be under selection pressure once more.
00:22:14.300We definitely become more religious across the medieval period, and we proved this.
00:22:18.760But the proxy we used in our study was the percentage of the population that are adjoining monasteries and things.
00:22:23.680And it goes up across the medieval period and then starts to go down.
00:22:27.260And what seems to be happening is that we're just becoming more religious, because we're selecting for religiousness, because religious people breed.
00:22:32.680Religiousness is associated with a general factor of personality. It's associated with high social status in these societies.
00:22:40.000So religious people pass on their G. It's associated with conscientiousness, which gives you high status, and high status is what predicts breeding.
00:22:46.980And so religious people seem to breed. And so we become more religious.
00:22:49.860And it's probable that the Black Death would have massively selected in favor of religiousness, because what would have predicted surviving it would have been high impulse control, ability to cooperate with other people.
00:22:59.340And those things are associated with religiousness, which would have elevated religiousness massively, which would expand intelligence as well.
00:23:05.380It would have selected for intelligence, which which would explain why a hundred years later, you see both the Renaissance, i.e.
00:23:13.760a function of the high intelligence and the Reformation, i.e.
00:23:18.280Right. So those are my thoughts on what Keith was saying.
00:23:23.920Just to put a point on this matter, one of the narratives in the mainstream media with global warming is it kind of reminds me of the old joke of the world ends.
00:23:37.100This is a New York Times headline. The world ends women and minorities most affected.
00:23:41.480And this notion that, you know, obviously it's picking a victim, but this notion, the basic narrative is that global warming, A, is terrible, and B, it's going to actually affect the third world more in the sense of rising, rising water levels.
00:24:02.940And yes, I think in the words of Andrew Yang, you've got to get your thousand dollars a month and run to high ground.
00:24:09.260But to the contrary, at least taking, you know, taking an historical global view on it, warmer climates are going to positively affect the third world.
00:24:23.220It's simply easier to survive when it's warmer, as simple as that.
00:24:27.960And we've seen that. I mean, northern populations are not growing.
00:24:34.040They're stagnating or declining. Africa is exploding, sub-Saharan Africa in particular.
00:24:40.540So this notion, you know, the general, I mean, whether, you know, if we accept general global warming trends, this is something that is very positive for the third world.
00:24:53.740And a global cooling would result in much harsher living for lower IQ people.
00:25:03.300That's right. Well, there's the mediating factor of health care and whatever.
00:25:09.620But as we were to become, as we select against intelligence, as we know, these things are, I think, are a temporary thing that are going to decline.
00:25:16.280And if there were a massive pandemic of the kind that people like to speculate on the possibility of, then, yeah, undoubtedly, the people that it's going to affect will be people who can't access health care, of course, which is the third world.
00:25:28.280But also the mutants within the first world, such as trans, you know, transsexuals and left wing people and whatever, will affect them because they have poor genetic health.
00:25:37.020It's just a fact. So they'll be more likely to die.
00:25:40.400They have poor immune system. Literally, they have poor immune systems.
00:25:43.220There's studies on this. Religious people have better immune systems than atheists.
00:25:48.700So, yeah, so I think it's it's it's not it's not necessarily an entirely bad thing from that perspective.
00:25:54.760It could even be everyone on this podcast will perish.
00:25:57.880A white hill. Yeah, we'll be all right.
00:25:59.840We'll be all right. I'm no concern about it.
00:26:01.960But but but I guess I broadly agree with Keith on what I think some very interesting points.
00:26:07.260But I think it's I just enjoy putting it back into the science.
00:26:10.320I think we can do that with the collapse, the rise and fall into the climate.
00:26:13.920And we can do it with the with the religion and what he said about the was the one you mentioned.
00:26:18.800But to get more arty farty out of the matters, do you think that the the obsession with the global pandemic,
00:26:29.000even in what you're saying, Ed, it does express a certain religious sentiment that this that that some kind of omnipotent being will kind of wipe out.
00:26:42.520I people that we don't like or or us because we've kind of send and we in a way deserve it.
00:26:50.060Now, I don't I don't necessarily dispute what you're saying.
00:26:53.440I think everything you're saying makes logical sense.
00:26:55.620But this notion that, you know, the low IQ and mutant transsexuals will not survive.
00:27:02.020There does seem to be a kind of comeuppance, you know, sentiment involved in all of that.
00:27:08.340I know, no, no, I'm only interested in the data.
00:27:11.300And if the data happens to me, no, no, no, no.
00:27:13.820One thing that Keith mentioned was what Keith was saying before in the sense of there, there, you know,
00:27:19.780the human being has to deal with this in some way.
00:27:23.600It was I caught the coronavirus virus, you could say.
00:28:52.800He survives and he takes care of his daughter.
00:28:54.580But there is a at least implied in the film, a kind of comeuppance for this woman that you can't have it all.
00:29:03.580And you can't just be this silly person flying all over the globe, you know, doing corporate nonsense and not kind of be punished for it.
00:29:13.080And everyone in the film, it kind of has a either a great or small sin that brings them down.
00:29:20.000And I think this film, which was it was directed by Steven Sonnenberg, it was written for high IQ white liberals, like no question.
00:29:27.500They're the only people who liked this movie, even among them, the most rational, like least religious, et cetera.
00:29:34.700Even among them, there is this kind of religious instinct for punishment on a global scale.
00:29:40.800And I think in a way, this is this is the kind of like flip side of global secularism in the sense that I mean, I'm just going to be speak frankly.
00:30:17.220I mean, I was I've got quite a lot of things.
00:30:19.920Yeah, well, no, I just say, yeah, I noticed that trend.
00:30:24.120You do get that a lot in the right, especially these like collapsical people that like, you know, they don't they're very pessimistic about everything and they don't want to get involved in the sort of power process of politics.
00:30:37.940But they have this like it's kind of like, you know, save Western civilization with this one weird trick.
00:30:43.200And it's like it's going to it's going to wipe out all the problems that they have overnight because everyone in the cities is going to die.
00:30:51.860And in the rural communities, it's going to be ethnically homogenous because, you know, non-whites live in cities.
00:30:58.900And, you know, it's like all their problems are going to be solved kind of overnight with this this one collapse.
00:31:08.600God or nature, you know, Deus, Suv, Natura, like Spinoza.
00:31:11.760But I just find it's like, you know, those people tend to be very passive because everything comes back to, you know, well, nature is going to return to harmony and fix all this anyway.
00:31:21.680But I mean, I said it on the last show I was on with you guys that like it's unbelievable how many people like whether they're left or right, everyone seems to believe that there's going to be some catastrophic collapse in the next, you know, in this century.
00:31:34.640It's like I just find it incredible how widespread this, you know, at a time when we have such technological progress and, you know, our elites tell us we've never had it so good.
00:31:43.680And Steven Pinker is writing the better angels of our nature saying that this is like the best time ever to be alive.
00:31:49.260And like everyone you speak to thinks there's going to be like a full scale apocalypse within a few decades.
00:31:54.680So, like, I do think it's interesting, the contrast there.
00:31:59.500And there have been studies of this that people tend to, that there is a kind of wisdom of crowds in this.
00:32:05.100When people have this ability, we have this ability of reading signals on an adaptive thing, on reading subtle signals in all kinds of ways of social interaction.
00:32:13.860We have the ability to read these things.
00:32:16.480And that's one of the reasons why pessimism will spread around a population and then optimism will spread around a population.
00:32:22.500It's one of the reasons why you get equal collapses on the stock market or whatever.
00:32:25.880People have this sort of instinct and it's a correct instinct often of how other people are going to behave.
00:32:31.200And so if we do think there's going to be an apocalyptic collapse or there's going to be serious violence, I mean, the negative, the thought is there's going to be serious violence in the next 10 years, let's say.
00:32:41.000And that's consistent with serious research by super forecasters that have been like this guy, this guy Turkin, Pete Turkin.
00:32:49.680That's precisely what is predicted to happen, that 2020 is going to be the most appallingly violent decade.
00:33:00.440I don't know if I've mentioned this on a podcast that you two have been on, but I've long been fascinated by this stock market forecaster named Robert Prechter.
00:33:12.280He has a social mood hypothesis, which is basically that many people think that the stock market causes depression in society.
00:33:23.360So the economy and the stock market will crash and then people get depressed.
00:33:27.160And he actually takes, he thinks the causality is reverse.
00:33:30.800News, this is kind of funny to say, news does not create stock market volatility.
00:33:36.620Stock market volatility creates the news.
00:33:38.820And stock market volatility is itself just an expression of social mood and pessimism, which is periodic and predictable.
00:33:49.220And again, I'm not positive I buy into it wholly, but it is actually interesting.
00:33:55.300And what he showed this, he traces this through popular culture.
00:33:58.480And things like the return and revitalization of the horror movie genre is usually precedes a stock market crash.
00:34:08.900And popular music is actually very interesting.
00:34:12.140You go from very upbeat bebop, et cetera, to the kind of 1970s of this soft rock and ballads and so on.
00:34:23.200And then you end up in punk music, which is kind of like the ultimate expression of nihilism, you know, banging away a good car and screaming.
00:34:30.760And then that kind of flips over and you get pop music again.
00:34:33.340And this is traceable to stock market.
00:34:38.380The most famous one and the most kind of obvious one is the miniskirt.
00:34:42.840And so basically, as times get better and people are more euphoric, and again, remember, euphoria can be just as dangerous, if not more, than pessimism.
00:34:53.700But as things get euphoric, basically, the skirts get higher and sexier.
00:34:59.200And they end up being the unbelievable miniskirt, effectively, you're wearing a bikini.
00:35:04.880And then basically, by the 1970s, the popularity was the maxi skirt.
00:35:09.220That is a skirt that was literally dragging on the ground.
00:35:25.100For it to be a good theory, it should make predictions at every level.
00:35:29.140There shouldn't be all these ad hoc exceptions where you can say, oh, well, accept those lapels and accept that skirt.
00:35:33.860But the lapel size, if you look at photos from the 1930s, the classic thing is a double-breasted suit and this massive lapel that goes to your shoulders.
00:35:44.520Then if you go to the mid-1960s, so peak euphoria, peak stock market boom, what did we have?
00:35:49.980We had tiny little thin lapels and tiny little ties.
00:35:56.4601970s, big fat lapels, depression, low economic activity, stagflation, et cetera.
00:36:02.940And you can actually see this come back again.
00:36:04.880I remember when he was – in the late 90s, maybe early 2000s, when Steve Jobs returned to Apple computer, he gave a speech at one of these Macworld or whatever.
00:36:17.640And he was literally wearing a coat without a lapel.
00:36:22.340So it had gone to zero, the lapel indicator.
00:36:44.580Well, the skirt makes sense in the sense of you're euphoric, it's sexy, you're floating on air kind of thing.
00:36:52.380And then you're – when there's a greater pessimism, there's a greater tendency towards, you could say, prudery or prudishness in fashion.
00:37:06.140And also, housing bubble era, what was popular?
00:37:09.440Mad men and wearing these tiny lapel suits and tiny little thin ties.
00:37:14.060That kind of mid-60s thing came back right at the moment of the housing boom.
00:38:18.860Okay, it's almost a parody of pop music, and so it can't go any further.
00:38:23.740Much like punk became a kind of parody of rock where, you know, it's – you're banging three chords and you're screaming out of tune into a microphone.
00:39:37.160And what is – I listen – after we talked about her, I went and also forced myself to listen to Billie Eilish.
00:39:44.340It's not certainly the worst thing I've ever heard, but what's interesting is this depressive attitude that we were getting at.
00:39:52.780It's like she's – it reminds me of music from the early 90s.
00:39:56.340It was like I can't even – I can't even bring myself to sing this song, and I'm almost mumbling while I'm singing it.
00:40:04.120But it's a very – it's an interesting look, and I think it bespeaks at some level this general depression in the anxiety that she is the artist of the moment.
00:40:16.620She's kind of the Madonna of the moment.