The ancient book that invented the modern world

Lost for over a millennia, this book contains radical ideas that shaped the modern world. How was the book found, and how did the ideas - which threatened the religious sensibilities of the day - survive and kickstart the Renaissance? In this video essay, I explore the book’s origins, its disappearance, and its eventual discovery, and how its radical ideas inspired thinkers like the humanists and the architects of the Enlightenment. All explained with a dash of Monty Python.
🔥➡️Support this channel on Patreon: [patreon.com/JohnBurton859]( / johnburton859 )
🔥➡️Support this channel by purchasing books used in the making of this video:
The Swerve, by Stephen Greenblatt:
USA Amazon: amzn.to/45G32Qz
UK Amazon: amzn.to/3VWDYkV
On The Nature Of Things, by Lucretius:
amzn.to/3Lnaabj
Cambridge Companion to Lucretius:
amzn.to/3RMeAf4
Lucretius on Creation and Evolution: A Commentary on De Rerum Natura, Book Five, Lines 772-1104 (Oxford Classical Monographs):
amzn.to/4cBUcp8
Lucretius and the Early Modern, Ed. by David Norbrook:
amzn.to/3RM61B9
This video explores the work of Democritus, Epicurus, Lucretius, and how Poggio Bracciolini rediscovered Epicurean thought, helping to fuel humanism in the Renaissance and eventually providing a solid philosophical framework for Montaigne, the heliocentric ideas of Galileo, the atheism of Giordano Bruno, the atomic theory of Isaac Newton, Darwin’s theory of evolution, and even the socialist atheism of Karl Marx.
ABOUT Dr John:
My on-screen debut was in a 1994 Channel 4 documentary about my work in language teaching, and I later acted in a documentary about Victorian England, narrated by Gregory Peck. I was born and raised in the suburbs of London, before going to an all-boys school and then living for a couple of years in Montreal where I learned to speak French. When I returned to the UK I began a career teaching English, which eventually took me to Seville for a few years. I learned Spanish, I painted, took pictures, wrote poetry, learned to be a barber, and did my doctorate in literary studies while living in rural west Wales. I am now based near Bristol.

[@Dr.Johnreads]

CORRECTION: Galileo wasn’t executed, but imprisoned and then put under house arrest for the remaining decade of his life.

[@BonnyLopez-on6yy]

Very glad that you've made this correction!

[@larrybowe774]

I have no idea how your video appeared on my YT page today but pleased that it did. I have read “The Swerve” a few times since it was published, and Prof. Greenblatt directed me down a rabbit hole that has engulfed me for what seems like a long time. Recently there has been a good deal of discussion about western society and its values under threat in a rapidly changing world. Interesting you showed a brief snippet of Prof. Greenblatt with historian Tom Holland at the Jaipur Literary Festival of 2018, Holland published “Dominion” in 2019, where he postulates in a nutshell our morals and liberal democratic (Western) society is, whatever our individual religious affiliation, staunchly and irrefutably Christian based. He postulates we owe a debt of gratitude to the Christian church for giving us our morals and forming us as we are. But most importantly it must be defended and upheld. I wonder if the 2018 discussion were held today if Holland would take Lucretius in a different light or defend the Church for its handling of Galileo, Bruno et al. I always considered the Enlightenment and Renaissance advanced civilisation despite the Church not because of it!!! The recent conversion (?) of the long-time advocate for atheism Ayaa Hirsi Ali to Christianity in what appeared to be politically inspired “swerve” (as opposed to a “faith” based epiphany), for me falls into what may be a rush to marking territory of who has the moral high ground in a pending heavy weight bout. The Roman Catholic church in the 1960s (?) revisited Bruno Giordano’s case from the Vatican files and concluded it was “regrettable” (especially for Bruno) he was burned at the stake, but the title of “Heretic” was still appropriate based on their review. So, from 1600 to 1960 where is the enlightenment and development as far as the church is concerned with its past? Catholic Encyclopedia -I quote verbatim: “Bruno chose suicide-by-the-state rather than being humble enough to keep his vows as a Dominican priest.” If that was all it came down to why was his tongue stapled to each cheek to prevent him speaking as he died an horrific death, what could he say that the Church would fear so much? Sorry for the long-winded comment.

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Thanks for commenting, and I’m glad you enjoyed the video. The main reason for making these videos is to provoke these kinds of thoughts and questions, so thank you for commenting. You make a very interesting point about Bruno and the revisiting of his execution by the Catholic Church. I probably should have included this in the video, but it’s already long enough! I’m aware of Holland’s book Dominion, though I’ve yet to read it. It sounds like his argument may have similarities to Roger Scruton’s position? Alain De Botton has also written about the influence of Christian theology on western culture. In my view the church and its theology was so much a part of the air that people breathed that it’s impossible to extract it from thinking of the time. While we may now think of ‘religion’ as a distinct intellectual and spiritual pursuit, in the past it was not so separate in lived experience. Lucretius rang a division bell that began a long process of extracting religious thinking from other forms of experience and observation. Interesting thoughts!

[@savannahshepherd2283]

Wow ive heard, studied, and have read so much. This is absolutely incredible and im mindblown that this isnt more well known and spoken about. Ive never heard of Lucretious or seen a video anywhere about him! 😅😊

[@Dr.Johnreads]

It’s quite a story isn’t it? Glad you enjoyed.

[@bryandraughn9830]

Sean Carroll, a physicist and philosopher mentions him, but doesn't go into this kind of depth. Talk about an astounding visionary!

[@valdmertheii1354]

I actually spoke to Greenblatt while he was doing a book tour for the swerve. I talked to him backstage and asked him a question in the audience... Silly to me now, but then I was young and asked if it was possible to predict when Humanity was about to make a sudden swerve, by studying history and it's patterns (I was quite obsessed with chaos theory and myths telling stories in circular time). I wondered whether it was possible, by studying our history (the stories we tell ourselves of it), to tell when humanity was about to make a sudden shift from an system of order, to one of chaos. The theory being that you could see a buildup of tension by the increasing rigidity of polarities (much like we have in the world right now)... Anyway, a wonderful book!

[@Dr.Johnreads]

That’s not a silly question! You certainly do see the polarities become more rigidly binary and I think we can sense the tensions build toward something shifting again. His more recent book on Tyrants is a voice of warning, so perhaps you might have prompted his thinking more than you realise?

[@valdmertheii1354]

@@Dr.Johnreads Hmm, maybe. I'll have to check out Tyrant then. Thank you for recommending it. I think he was correct in that you cannot determine exactly when or what may exactly happen, but you can certainly see a system stressed and pushed towards change. I mean that is the whole point of chaos theory, to map out the borders of order and chaos. Problem is, in real life there are so many variables and therefore the challenge in discovering the deterministic ones are high, making the borders blurry.

[@VesnaVK]

I love The Swerve! One of my favorite mind-blowing books. Thanks for bringing this to life in this video.

[@13krava]

Nice video man, great topic and you do it justice.

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Thank you!

[@abdirahmanadena201]

Really enjoyed this man good job. Glad the algorithm is working in ur favor

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Much appreciated!

[@fortunatomartino8549]

This is a great explanation of the thought process from the Renaissance on

[@AntonyAsks]

Well done this is a fantastic video

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Glad you enjoyed it

[@bryandraughn9830]

I'm hooked!

[@alenbacco7613]

Very nice, thank you for this.

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Glad you liked it!

[@tardman8250]

Great video👍

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Thanks!

[@SeiroosFardipour-wf4bi]

Tell us also about Leibnitz and other thinkers who just before renaissance went in Asia binary logic, Algorithm,maths from Egypt,and India,but not only,let the world know we are brothers and sisters and like atoms interact, exchanges,and learn one from another.Not still persisting vision that all I have is mine and all you have is mine too including your integrity

[@SeiroosFardipour-wf4bi]

There at last something that make sense ❤

[@ramiroaka9]

Can i find a copy of that book as originally written ?

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Link in description.

[@ramiroaka9]

@@Dr.Johnreads thank you

[@ramiroaka9]

@@Dr.Johnreads would you like to know how they though about these “atoms”?

[@fortunatomartino8549]

@@ramiroaka9 I'd like to know

[@ramiroaka9]

@@fortunatomartino8549 i think this is how they got the ideea :Close one eye the other keep it almost close letting a little bit of light to enter and try to see the bacteria in your tear floating on your eye

[@hughcards]

The Swerve is a great book.

[@bryandraughn9830]

"I told him we've already got one!" 😅 Great video! As much as I'm aware of the fact that we have no evidence of a purpose or importance as sentient beings, I also get the impression that the universe allowed a path for such beings to occur. Even if we are the result of a purely statistical arrangement of atoms, there are so many more ways for us not to exist, it's one hell of a fluke. One could say there was a 100% probability that we would come to exist and we are the evidence, but we know that the wave function never predicts a 100% probability for anything. There's a fundamental uncertainty beneath our most successful model of physics and that uncertainty is NECESSARY for the occurrence of sentient beings where the determinism drops off. The fact that we exist combined with the function of our minds indicates not 1, but 2 extraordinarily unlikely events in the same place at the same time. I'm sure that I cannot imagine exactly how the universe turned out this way, I only think that it's doubley unlikely given the scale of what we are able to observe.

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Thanks! ☺️

[@bryandraughn9830]

​@@Dr.Johnreads Sry about the long edit but you really got me thinking! Thank YOU!

[@Dr.Johnreads]

I’m glad you added more to your comment! The real purpose of the video is to provoke these kinds of discussions and thoughts. You’re absolutely right about the infinitesimal odds against our existence in the state we are, and it’s probably worthy of another video! Hmm. I’m thinking about that now.

[@intellectually_lazy]

i can speak. omg, it feels so good. i'm back, youtube

[@profskmehta]

How do you think Lucretius “know” about atoms and their behaviour? And more importantly, why do you think Europeans took this “ knowledge” seriously?

[@Dr.Johnreads]

The thinking goes like this: take a sheet of aluminium foil. Tear it in half. Then keep tearing it in half, smaller and smaller. The Epicureans (including Lucretius) believed that eventually you would get to a point where you cannot divide the material any further. The tiny amount of material left is indivisible; an atom. This idea seemed a good possibility based on observation. All things appear to be composed of smaller particles. We eat food and it sustains us. There must be particles in the food that are useful to the particles in our bodies. Water seeps through invisibly small fractures in cave walls. Water must therefore be invisibly small too. Competing ideas did not readily comply with these common observations.

[@profskmehta]

@@Dr.Johnreads The idea that you cannot spit any piece of matter for ever is very very old. A Hindu Rishi called Kanaad proposed it long time back. But it was just a belief. No proof was ever provided. So why Lucretius’ idea was taken seriously? There are other points too, like random movement in mostly empty space. How did a very closed minded society (controlled by the church) ever allowed this idea to flourish?

[@chillyprotocol]

I think some kind of backing ambient audio track would help a lot here. Your speech delivery turned me off a little bit. Also, could this have been a little bit shorter. 42 minutes is a long time. #feedbackfriday

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Thanks for the feedback

[@zizkovhoodmoments1590]

he first articulated the exact kind of stupid modern nihilist reductionism that we struggle against to this day lmao. Atomism is simply choosing a particular scale level and disregarding all structure beyond atoms, even though atoms aren't fundamental, they're emergent just like organisms. I'd say neoplatonism is more philosophically advanced, Its kind of a shame that atomist reductionism was the philosophy that prevailed.

[@Dr.Johnreads]

I’m sure there are criticisms to be made about the Atomists and Epicureans, but I refrained from offering them since this is a history video and my interest was in the incredible story of how the passing on of their branch of knowledge came down to a single copy of Lucretius’ book.

[@zizkovhoodmoments1590]

@@Dr.Johnreads Yes its undeniably an integral part of how the enlightenment came to be. After quantum mechanics undone traditional atomist conceptions of unbreakable billiard-ball-like atoms and empty void, and the atomist metaphysics was superseded by... absolutely nothing. metaphysical quietism that ensued from the rupture of foundational scientific assumptions is still deafening, although theres been attempts to rectify that, like Whiteheads Process philosophy (which descends from neoplatonic tradition and the "everything flows" conception of heraclitus)

[@daddygad]

There are too many things wrong with what you are saying to enumerate them, but almost every one of these "implications" has now been de-bunked by more cutting edge science. Continuing to cling to these ideas as "smart" or "enlightened" is now more akin to buying into a life-style brand than it is a product of rational or critical thought.

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Lucretius really did write as I have reported, particularly the implications - which are all his, not mine. I have only reported on his writings and nowhere did I address how his beliefs are “clinged to” today. My video explores how his writing influenced thinkers in the Renaissance and Enlightenment directly, and later scientists more indirectly. This is a history video, not a lifestyle or even science video.

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Oh, and if I have reported anything incorrectly about what Lucretius wrote, please let me know. I would hate my video to have inaccuracies. Thanks

[@jonathanengdahl9045]

@@Dr.Johnreads Galileo was never executed. That statement alone makes your supposed knowledge of history highly questionable

[@Dr.Johnreads]

Thanks for the heads up! I’m happy to write a correction comment. This is how peer review works ☺️

[@bryandraughn9830]

"Enumeration" =1😅