The Man Who Accidentally Killed The Most People In History

One scientist caused two environmental disasters and the deaths of millions. A part of this video is sponsored by Wren. Offset your carbon footprint on Wren: ​www.wren.co/start/veritasium. For the first 100 people who sign up, I will personally pay for the first month of your subscription!
Special thanks to our Patreon supporters! Join the community to help us keep our videos free, forever:
ve42.co/PatreonDEB
Massive thanks to Prof. Francois Tissot for suggesting we make a video on the topic of isotope geochemistry. Huge thanks to Prof. Bruce Lanphear for consulting with us on lead and cardiovascular diseases. Thanks to Rayner Moss for the help with the fire-piston.
Patterson’s 1995 interview audio courtesy of the Archives, California Institute of Technology.
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Other great resources you should check out:
Bill Bryson has a chapter in his fantastic “A Short History of Nearly Everything”
Radiolab have a wonderful podcast: www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/...
Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey has a wonderful episode - S1E7 which does a great job of telling the story of Clair Patterson
A fantastic Mental floss article - www.mentalfloss.com/article/9...
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References:
Much of the lead-crime hypothesis data is from Rick Nevin’s work - ricknevin.com/
WHO factsheet on lead poisoning - www.who.int/news-room/fact-sh...
WHO press release about the end of leaded gasoline news.un.org/en/story/2021/08/...
UNICEF report - ve42.co/UNICEF
Needleman, H. (2004). Lead poisoning. Annu. Rev. Med., 55, 209-222. ve42.co/Needleman1
Needleman, H. L. (1991). Human lead exposure. CRC Press. ve42.co/Needleman2
Needleman, H. L. et al. (1979). Deficits in psychologic and classroom performance of children with elevated dentine lead levels. New England journal of medicine, 300(13), 689-695. - ve42.co/Needleman3
Needleman, H. L. et al. (1996). Bone lead levels and delinquent behavior. Jama, 275(5), 363-369. ve42.co/Needleman4
Kovarik, W. J. (1993). The ethyl controversy: the news media and the public health debate over leaded gasoline, 1924-1926 ve42.co/Kovarik2
Edelmann, F. T. (2016). The life and legacy of Thomas Midgley Jr. In Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania ve42.co/Edelmann
More, A. F. et al. (2017). Next‐generation ice core technology reveals true minimum natural levels of lead (Pb) in the atmosphere: Insights from the Black Death. GeoHealth, 1(4), 211-219. ve42.co/More1
McFarland, M. J., et al. (2022). PNAS 119(11), e2118631119. ve42.co/McFarland
Kovarik, W. (2005). Ethyl-leaded gasoline. International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health, 11(4), 384-397. ve42.co/Kovarik3
Nevin, R. (2007). Understanding international crime trends: the legacy of preschool lead exposure. Environmental research, 104(3), 315-336. - ve42.co/Nevin2007
Ericson, J. E., et al. (1979). Skeletal concentrations of lead in ancient Peruvians. New England Journal of Medicine, 300(17), 946-951. - ve42.co/Ericson1
Patterson, Claire. The Isotopic Composition of Trace Quantities of Lead and Calcium ve42.co/Patterson1
Boutron, C. F., & Patterson, C. C. (1986). Lead concentration changes in Antarctic ice during the Wisconsin/Holocene transition. Nature, 323(6085), 222-225. - ve42.co/Boulton1
Patterson, C. (1956). Age of meteorites and the earth. Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, 10(4), 230-237. - ve42.co/Patterson2
Lanphear, B. P. et al (2018). Low-level lead exposure and mortality in US adults: a population-based cohort study. The Lancet Public Health, 3(4), e177-e184. - ve42.co/Lanphear1
Schaule, B. K., & Patterson, C. C. (1981). Lead concentrations in the northeast Pacific: evidence for global anthropogenic perturbations. Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 54(1), 97-116. - ve42.co/Schaule1
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Special thanks to Patreon supporters: Inconcision, Kelly Snook, TTST, Ross McCawley, Balkrishna Heroor, Chris LaClair, Avi Yashchin, John H. Austin, Jr., OnlineBookClub.org, Dmitry Kuzmichev, Matthew Gonzalez, Eric Sexton, john kiehl, Anton Ragin, Diffbot, Micah Mangione, MJP, Gnare, Dave Kircher, Burt Humburg, Blake Byers, Dumky, Evgeny Skvortsov, Meekay, Bill Linder, Paul Peijzel, Josh Hibschman, Mac Malkawi, Michael Schneider, jim buckmaster, Juan Benet, Ruslan Khroma, Robert Blum, Richard Sundvall, Lee Redden, Vincent, Stephen Wilcox, Marinus Kuivenhoven, Clayton Greenwell, Michael Krugman, Cy 'kkm' K'Nelson, Sam Lutfi, Ron Neal
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Written by Derek Muller, Petr Lebedev, Chris Stewart, and Katie Barnshaw
Edited by Trenton Oliver
Filmed by Petr Lebedev
Animation by Fabio Albertelli, Jakub Misiek, Ivy Tello, Mike Radjabov, and Caleb Worcester
SFX by Shaun Clifford
Additional video/photos supplied by Getty Images
Music from Epidemic Sound
Produced by Derek Muller, Petr Lebedev, and Emily Zhang

[@veritasium]

Happy Earth Day! If you want to offset your carbon emissions I will personally cover the first month of your subscription at ve42.co/wren (for the first 100 people to sign up)

[@MrUssy101]

Why am I being recommended these videos by YT. Some stoopid guy made an error like really old time ago and we have to learn about it??? Why !!!!!!

[@MrUssy101]

PS: I hate earth !!!

[@pinuelajamesmezack7054]

3rd comment lol

[@fluffupp8450]

Do the lead pencils we use have the same lead? ✏️✏️✏️

[@sherlock118]

Bro I am waiting for the new n updated video on electricity

[@A.Mere.Creator]

Gives an entire generation lead poisoning. Rips a hole in the ozone. Refuses to elaborate, gets strangled by his own invention.

[@whymustyouignorereality]

Greed is the worst drug known to mankind.

[@loger_2floofyboogaloo278]

@@whymustyouignorereality alcohol is a close second

[@raymondqiu8202]

@@whymustyouignorereality wrong, everybody has a little bit of greed, capitalism that enables this greed by putting profit above any human instead of the other way around is the real problem

[@thecaynuck4694]

In a way though, he was a hero or anti hero as he was instrumental in making the world know the dangers of stuff with lead in it in more depth than they had before. Can't really blame him too much for greed with the refrigerant, as it actually seemed safer and better than the existing alternatives of the time, how was he supposed to know about its effect on the Ozone?

[@a3d4e]

Would make a great film.

[@FlyntofRWBY]

Imagine being the person responsible for making an entire generation dumber on average. That’s a sad legacy to leave behind.

[@andrewnorris5415]

Not one person is behind the legacy media?

[@BlueCheeseCrumbles]

And now the younger ones are suffering from it

[@privileguan9127]

There seem to be a lot of groups contesting for the title, nowadays.

[@aihamkadiri4992]

@Actually, Movies seems like u got high levels of lead in ur bones

[@nameless1016]

have you been on truth social? Patterson's record is being challenged daily.

[@sgalvan-urdyhm]

I wouldn't call this "accidentally", I would call this "on purpose" disregarding safety for the profit

[@lorenz8126]

America First!

[@pjottrpjottr3468]

I guess the title mixes up the invention of leaded fuel and the discovery of lead contamination.

[@CatherineStankina]

Yes. You are absolutely right. I said the same thing when I heard him say "accidentally". I guess he's covering his A** so the family or the companies can't sue him. We all need to speak up and say it straight out. They purposely kill us for profit and continue to do so without regard because they can!! That's the way a capitalist country works. We need to set up new rules or it's just going to get worse. America the greatest country in the world. Used to be but not anymore. They are not looking out for us anymore. They are only interested in making more money and our government is just as bad and friends of the big name companies. Look at Nancy Polosey. She is a millionair many times over and she's just an example of all our government employees that are informed before the product goes on the market and our government employees go and and buy their stock while it's still cheap. This is really illegal!!!

[@Hexapod1112]

Just reminds me about oil companies willingly lying about global warming or car manufacturers lying on problems with micro plastic

[@daveh1065]

​@@lorenz8126America?! They were global at that point. Yea an American invented it, but it was a worldwide mega corporation then too.. same companies that bought & hid the patents for cars that run on water, hemp, air, & wtf knows what else?! & same companies that hid better cleaner technologies to profit off their suspect ass chemicals, which are the root cause of the problems... But true, America only bans about 8 of the known controversial chemicals of the , what 80k banned in other counties?! So yea in a way your 100% right haha.. not coming at ya, its bn worldwide for over 130+ years, evil mega monopoly corporations that ruin our planet that is.

[@ziofonta]

This video should be shown in every school, It would deserve a movie adaptation. You made an excellent job here!

[@nicoluvrs]

It should be a documentary

[@ROLtheWolf]

The moment that Midgley pretended that Ethyl wasn't dangerous (especially after HE, HIMSELF, had just recovered from lead poisoning) was the moment that it was no longer an "ACCIDENT" that he poisoned the world.

[@chez-bubulle]

The amount of times this kind of disregard for human safety has happened disgusts me.

[@jimwerther]

Very interesting....and full of BS. Lead is bad, true. But all the claims about millions of deaths and vastly increased crime and rampant stupidity as a result? That is so absurd as to be laughable. Violent crime rising between the 1960s and the 1990s, and falling thereafter, has numerous causes, most of which are far more direct and obvious than the ridiculously stretched idea presented here. (The lead theory presented here is at least as detached as the one presented in Freakonomics, which is the legalization of abortion.) In fact, when criminal reform took hold, crime took off. When attitudes changed and society cracked down, crime plummeted. And since "defund the police" and rioting in big cities became a thing? Crime rates have shot up. Surprise! Or has there been an increase in lead levels recently? Violent crime is overwhelmingly committed by poor people in inner cities, the very people who rarely see the inside of a car. And before you say, yes James, but how about all that air they are breathing in? Well, okay, how about the folks tha live a mile or two away? Right next to Harlem is the Upper West Side, and very close to the South Bronx is Riverdale. How is it that neither the UWS nor Riverdale has high crime rates? To the contrary, violent crime is nearly unheard of there. Okay, so you'll point to lead paint in the antiquated apartment buildings. Here's my question: ALL the apartment buildings had lead paint in the 1920s. Where was all the violent crime in the '30s, '40s, and '50s? Personally speaking, my father is one of the smartest people I ever knew, and is still accomplishing at age 94. He drove a car that took leaded gas past the point that one could find such things in gas stations. I remember at a very young age when my father would ask for leaded gas until it became increasingly difficult to find stations that sold it, and then became impossible. Yet those supposed intelligence and heart problems apparently forgot to visit my father. Me? I was born during the years that supposedly were the worst ones according this video (something like 1950 - 1980, without going back to check). I grew up in a working class NYC neighborhood, with lead paint in the walls and with unclean air just outside, and traveled in my father's car. And my IQ was measured in the 99th percentile. Somehow all the stupid people around us have managed to create more inventions in the last 100 years than in all of prior world history combined, including those which have extended life expectancy by decades. Wild, isn't it? The previous handful of videos I've seen on this channel were interesting, informative, and well-made, as was this one, actually. But now I am doubting everything I ever learned here, or thought I did, having just watched a piece of utter propaganda. Lastly, if the channel host really wanted to produce a video which lives up to this one's title (save a small change, adding a "wo" in front of "man"), he could tell the world about Rachel Carson's war on pesticides, which has led to the death of more than 50m Africans and counting, with an offsetting gain of nearly or literally nothing. Somehow, though, I doubt that video will be forthcoming. Doesn't fit the narrative.

[@chez-bubulle]

@@jimwerther quite the monologue just to disagree with literally every scientist in the world saying that lead is dangerous. Your proof being "trust me bro, my dad is smart"

[@kentslocum]

The moment we failed to listen to Ben Franklin was when it stopped being an accident.

[@gaiasguardian205]

In all reality, the companies, banks, and other companies involved would have simply hired someone else to advertise the product anyway. Most likely a worker, I mean - they used the radium girls. The advertising point was safety, and "nothing says safe better than breathing it!"

[@MrJZ367]

Clair Patterson was a big part of getting lead out of gasoline. He didn't just do the research, he testified to lawmakers as well. He's one of those true heroes that we shamefully never get told about in school.

[@prinstyrio0]

@gioyu comi I would say he grossly underestimated how bad they were rather, given he expected 10 times less lead in bones today as opposed to thousands of years ago. Who can say though if he was trying to be optimistic and ignore "skepticism" from others or were completely ignorant, he's still terrible for knowingly exposing himself to the chemicals just to fool others and make a profit. I think greed can make many go far even to risk their own life than risk being honest and losing everything, but I'm not sure he might've risked as much if he knew what he know today, especially since he did a lot of the studies himself on lead to find out, whether out of conscience or to save his invention's reputation.

[@jedahn]

Let the market decide. The government will raise taxes to remove the lead pipes still in use. TAX IS THEFT!

[@torineg.847]

So that's why millions of kids were uninterested in school in the late 50s and 60s 17:10 And we pay tax es., it should be re versed for poi son ing the pub lic !!

[@Greyraes]

@@prinstyrio0 no. You've mixed it up, it was PATTERSON that measured and expected 10 times less, and found his predictions blown out of the water. Rewatch at 16:04 Midgley spent months recovering from lead poisoning in Florida and avoiding his own product. If anyone was to know about the effects of lead first hand it would have been him.

[@Vousie]

@@prinstyrio0 That skepticism is today known in covid contexts as "anti-vaxxers"... And at the centre of it all, we find once again a very greedy company making huge profits at the cost of millions of people's health.

[@eliasreissmuller6131]

Thank you so much for such an amazing video and production. I’d only wish you would have mentioned the lead mines in Kabwe (Zambia) in the end, which still have an effect for more than 200.000 people today. It’s one of the biggest environmental problems which no one ever talks about.

[@davidbarraco2045]

Thank you, I appreciate your segment.

[@xliquidflames]

If it's a story about chemistry hurting people, you can bet DuPont is going to be mentioned at least once.

[@TheWunder]

Nah, they sponsored the video.

[@johndupont1413]

No I won’t

[@9PlatinumGamer9]

DuPont is the second Horseman of the (waterbased) Apocalypse. Nestlé steals your water, DuPont poisons it and gets away from it.

[@Ewr42]

@@SerunaXI you're right. DuPont's aren't accidental, just collateral damage.

[@yunusjauhari]

😂

[@ddognine]

Let's be honest. Thomas Midgley did not operate in isolation. He had many enablers and was ultimately just an employee of General Motors. By putting the blame on Midgley, it offers a convenient escape from culpability to GM, Standard Oil, DuPont, and many other corporations.

[@bramkivenko9912]

Don't worry, Schwab is killing more people ss we speak.

[@ninjabluefyre3815]

You have a point.

[@Emily-pr3qc]

Absolutely.

[@user-pn4fy7eb2n]

thanks for pointing that out. what you said is true but the title says “the man” so it makes sense to stick to that for now

[@Genexus8]

I see you are not a spawn of this disaster, you see the obvious right in front of you. Similar to uranium decaying into lead over a 4+billion year time being taught as a fact, when there is no solid evidence of it. To say you one has scientifically proven such would mean they watched the process over time, no matter if it's true or not its hypothetical yet they teach the dumbed down masses created by this disaster as if it were without question a fact. I'm glad to see there is at least one person affected by it 😛

[@warrenbelford6508]

Your productions are so well done and informative. Thank you

[@lovihlongwane6142]

Now... with all the work that goes into his videos (together with his team), imagine how frustrating it can e when somebody watches he whole video without liking it.

[@drallak442]

WOW these videos are packed with things I've not heard much about and it does it in a very well manner!

[@thernly]

A very well manner? Did you breathe a little too much lead?

[@Imperiused]

I think "accidental" is more than a little generous. They knew it was poison. They just chose to ignore it because of the opportunity for profit.

[@nikkialkema1032]

I think they mean accidental as in it wasn't the intent, but I do agree with you.

[@cosmicreef5858]

Funny think is without people there is no profit so. They are completely blinded and we let them continue they will only wake up when it will be too late and out planet just burns up(literally).

[@Elliandr]

Which is all the more ironic when you consider that the original intent was to solve the safety issue caused by the cranks. They wanted less people to die, but killed more people instead.

[@velocirapper8862]

What about the freons? It wasnt mentioned if he knew the dangers it would have on the ozone. Not trying to sympathise with him, just saying that maybe that one was an actual accident.

[@Elliandr]

@@velocirapper8862 that one actually does seem like an accident to me. It is after all very stable and safe to be around. It's not like he would have known that widespread use would have resulted in the gas ending up in the upper atmosphere where it could be chemically altered. That said, someone really should have taught him the precautionary principle of science. Assume that something is dangerous until proven safe.

[@sealeo5772]

Telling Patterson's story in parallel with Midgley's is such a good choice, really shows that the side effects of leaded gasoline were not something unknown to the generation that implemented it. they just valued easy profit over human life. Though one thing that irks me about the way that science history (and most history for that matter) is presented by stories like these is showing Patterson alone on a boat or in the arctic gathering samples. Scientists work in teams and the research credited to Midgley or Patterson is not the work of one man but a whole bunch and the people who support them.

[@demoncloud6147]

Midgley, an inventor with some of the best worst inventions 😅

[@the193thdoctor5]

I think this narrative is mentioned in the book the theory of everything. And it is probably the main source of this video.

[@andbirg]

I mean at the end of the day he has to keep idiots like us interested so.

[@notfound3358]

Thank god they don't value easy profit over human life anymore... Oh wait🤔

[@bravelemonade6894]

Go back to cleaning the lab equipment buddy

[@JGibbgg]

I lost my Father in Dec of 2022 to a very unexpected cardiac arrest. He was an Aerospace engineer for most of his life and he loved his work, his succesfull team projects and seeing the world. He worked at Biggin Hill airport for around 10 years, then in Helsinki(Finair), Bristol (Rolls Royce Aerospace) & finally in Frankfurt. He had diabetes but he was very proactive about it, although he lost his big toe due to sepsis he was on the mend pretty quick, 6 months later his health dipped and hospital visits became frequent during the height of Covid, he was taken into hospital with shortness of breathe and lower back pain, he was diagnosed with Covid 19 and told he would be released the following day, he died later that night of a heart attack. Im probably clutching at staws here but this has given me hope that died for something he loved.

[@RobotsCanDoAnything]

Excellent commentary, fantastic job. Thanks.

[@IHatePeopleOfColor]

?

[@Irobert1115HD]

you can claim that the damage he caused with CFCs was a accident but leaded gasoline was actually something he knew from the getgo was bad. it wasnt even the best solution to the problem he wanted to solve.

[@gdheib0430]

Yeah didn't we have to use weather balloons along with satellites before we realized CFCs were bad?

[@Irobert1115HD]

@@gdheib0430 yes. in the case of leaded gasoline he knew that it was bad. in the case of CFCs he tried to find a good solution to a big problem and peoples overused it wich increased the damage he didnt knew he was doing.

[@troll2637]

@@Irobert1115HD but still, man was a walking disaster. Edit: people don't like my comment because of my name. That's annoying. It's the same people who worship racial discrimination.

[@Irobert1115HD]

@@troll2637 in the case of leade gasoline he knew that.

[@jchampagne2]

Yeah, Derek said that ethyl alcohol was written off because it was too expensive but any hayseed with a still can make it and it's literally what we put in our gasoline now instead. The problem was that you can't patent a process as simple as distillation, so there was no money to be made from it. Plus oil companies didn't like it because it increased fuel efficiency, so there was outside economic pressure against it as well.

[@ssor]

It's interesting that the person who caused the harm in this case did so much of it and did it with a huge amount of support. Meanwhile, the person who tried to undo it had to go to great lengths to prove there was a problem and was still seen as extreme at the time.

[@MegaShrooom]

Its the same with microplastics and phthalates these days. Openly destroying this generation's reproductive health but still used in everything, driven by profit.

[@StalemateNZ]

Hmm reminds me of Pfizer 🤣

[@seanhubbard6033]

@@StalemateNZ vaccines are not dangerous, grow up.

[@michalg4824]

@@seanhubbard6033 🤣 You mean gene therapy?

[@shadowdragon3521]

People who fight against power structures are always labelled as extreme by those who want to hold on to their power

[@garyhope2]

Wow,....thank you for this video. Fascinating and informative. I didn't know all or much of this. Knowledge is power. Thank you.

[@DannyHustle]

This was an outstanding program. Thank you. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

[@bnbaustralia4932]

the fact that this isnt taught in school ought to scare the hell out of everyone that watches this. i have a chemical physics degree and knew of the science, but not the industrial economic and social dimensions. awesome video.

[@Magikarp_king]

There are a lot of things not taught in school that we should know about. Especially things we apparently should know about but if we don't we could go to jail. Taxes, basic law, property, waste disposal, how much reproduction has an impact on not only your life but the world... Education needs to be rebuilt from the ground up.

[@StuntpilootStef]

I was taught this in the Netherlands.

[@jedahn]

That's because lead is perfectly safe for consumption. The only reason you think it's toxic is the government told you that. I can assure you they'll want to steal your money to remove our lead pipes is through more taxes. There's no way someone would've ignored this with the free market in play, or else a competitor would've stolen their business. The only thing that makes sense is the government lied to keep us dumb.

[@ZacharyKentVT]

Agreed 💯

[@electrictroy2010]

It WAS taught in school, but being a kid you didn’t pay attention .

[@JoshucaVA]

"Accidentally" *talks about how he nearly died from lead poisoning, got others killed, and proceeded to tell people that it wasn't actually a problem*

[@Montezuma0]

Hey at least he made more money before he inevitably died

[@darshakparikh5908]

🔥🔥🔥“This is fine!”🔥🔥🔥

[@rodittis]

Thank god he contracted polio. God only knows how many other horrors he would have unleashed on the world.

[@randomuser5237]

Accidental has nothing to do with the person, but the whole sequence of events and their timings. None of this would have happened if the lady's car didn't break down or someone else came up with a less toxic additive or a different design for combustion engine etc. No matter what his real intentions were there was no way he could have known the extent of damage his actions brought.

[@rasheemthebestfirstone3274]

@Darius Bostic 🙏🏽🙏🏽

[@MsWoodgnome]

Excellent. Contextualised facts that I knew but an impact that I did not.

[@hhairball9]

Well done mini doc! Very informative! Thank you!

[@philip_fletcher]

Just as a point of order: he didn't 'accidentally' harm or kill millions of people. He (and others) knew the consequences of their actions but was prepared for others to py the (ultimate) price for his pieces of silver. Greed is, and will continue to be, the downfall of mankind.

[@sheilamarie1481]

Bingo baby.

[@noahr.5515]

It is not innate human greed that is the problem, it is the current economic system that makes, encourages and celebrates greed.

[@FREDDIECASH229]

Stream Young Loud 😈

[@Simon-gv4md]

@@noahr.5515 And that's why we need a more social economic system aimed fulfilling people's needs and the needs of our environment, instead of maximising private profit.

[@ThaJay]

@@Simon-gv4md Indeed, EAT THE RICH and replace the system.

[@UniqueHandleName]

This isn't mentioned in the video, but Clair Patterson was blacklisted for speaking out against lead in gasoline. When the government finally formed a National Research Council panel to investigate it eight years after Patterson raised the alarm, he was excluded despite being the world's leading expert on the subject. Before publishing his paper in 1963, his work was largely funded by oil companies to the tune of around $20k per year. That funding was immediately rescinded, and he also lost a contract with the Public Health Service. The oil industry asked the Atomic Energy Commission to stop funding his work, and members of the board at Caltech tried to have him silenced. He spent most of his life in relative obscurity because of the efforts to blacklist him. Some of that has changed in the past decade or so, and these days, a lot of people know who he is.

[@branewalker]

I don't know the details about Patterson's employment, but I do know that anti-science conservatives are opposing academic tenure now; no doubt it such a loss of academic freedom would be leveraged to silence all sorts of inconvenient science. They're also usually the first to decry government funding of the arts and sciences.

[@rivershen8199]

Nothing has changed, our lives are still in the hands of lobbyists and corrupt politicians. In a few years or decades we'll be looking back at the scientists that are being silenced right now and wish we listened to them. If you know, you know

[@EyreEver]

Sounds very familiar.

[@dlo111]

Never heard of him until today. This is such a sobering video.

[@thecircumcisedheartofricha7344]

It was mentioned in the second version of Cosmos when Neil Tyson took over.

[@Mentepermanente]

Wow, such an impressive production! This is probably the best informative KZbin Channel out there. Who would know Lead had this level of impact. Amazing... Thank you

[@jacobjoy1200]

Amazing video, great way of explaining a concept

[@alextam4607]

"Accidentally" is a bit generous considering he knew the dangers and intentionally covered them up

[@Jove3321]

I find the word "accidentally" used consistently for the conscious anemic.

[@chriswillis713]

I came here to say this but also add "he had a much safer alternative but refused to use it because it wasn't chemically unique enough to get a patent for it."

[@dogfellow3848]

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say he didn't fully intend for all those people to get lead poisoning

[@krischan67]

Most people don't intend to kill others as well when doing irresponsibly dangerous things, like driving much faster than allowed. I still want them to go into jail if that happens. Of course, he wasn't the only one who went on that road while knowing it, but the excuse "If I could get away with it, but give it up, then others will get away with doing it anyway" was and is the cause of a lot of the most terrible things done by humans.

[@chriswillis713]

@@dogfellow3848 he took a vacation in Miami after accidentally poisoning himself (specifically to give his lungs a break). He had to start his own company because Dupont was tired of the product killing his employees and for that company he repeatedly had to start new factories because his employees kept dying/going mad/etc.

[@EugeneKhutoryansky]

That is one way to be one of history's most influential inventors.

[@vincemarenger7122]

Thank you for your channel. It's very precious

[@cboy-ou2hr]

Nice to see you here I also learned a lot from your channel

[@FatRescueSwimmer04]

🤣🤣

[@thelamergamer1894]

Fancy seeing you here. Your channel has been so important to me and my physics education.

[@electronresonator8882]

but you make tons of money, and when people realized, the problem is no longer yours, ...Lead, Freon, Carbon and many more... the business man repeats the very same trick, ...do you think that Thomas Midley Jr. jailed for thousand years, or confiscated entire of his wealth for that lead poisoning and million of deaths?

[@MickeyHz]

Thank you, this is an outstanding example of how one individual can have an effect on the environment and other individuals

[@garnGad]

Wow I am astounded , amazing Channel, brilliantly communicated, if I hadn’t so much lead in my body , I’d have been smart enough to have known this earlier in life 😅. We should all be compensated for this unacceptable injustice. Thanks for the most outstanding video posted this week at least. I’m looking forward to watching more from this excellent Channel.❤

[@zachklaphaak441]

Considering he spent a year recovering from lead toxicity, claiming he "accidentally" killed the most people in history seems a bit generous.

[@abbyynorman2874]

You never truly recover from Lead Poisoning...your brain is damaged beyond repair.

[@jonathonholifield3166]

Yeah, it really does. He prioritized profits over public health, just like major corporations do today

[@jayspeidell]

Yeah, lead was known to be harmful. I think a good contender for "person who accidentally killed the most people" might be Mao Zedong killing off the sparrows to protect crops, which were then decimated by insects whose population exploded without predators. This triggered one of the worse famines in history.

[@GVS]

KZbin title optimization

[@rcortez3899]

@@jayspeidell yeah, f that guy

[@strikeslayer3911]

This man just managed to cover history, psychology, science, chemistry, math, and human studies.

[@groundsymphony]

Honestly I got really mad because at first he moved between so many subjects, but boy this is the most amazing video ever imo

[@VincentChee001]

…and animation!

[@MilesLoden-vn6wr]

A true renaissance man.

[@numinous4789]

Textbook pessimism. The statement is true, in part, but is definitely not the whole story and is presented in a selective manner that disregards this fact.

[@haraldhonk4650]

And geology!

[@hornetgaming2888]

This was a very educational video, learnt alot. Thank you!!

[@unredeconstructed]

I like your videos. I almost never comment, but since I respect your work so much, I wanted to let you know that you spelled received wrong in Franklin's quote @ <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="712">11:52</a>. Keep up the good work!

[@evilnet1]

His death was kind of a reflection of his life. He tried to engineer solutions to problems only for them to backfire to create an even bigger one. Rather poetic.

[@artistaustrian1443]

Mankind in general really ,well industrial countries anyways

[@Reni3r]

I'm just sad the bed was only able to strangle him to death once for what he did. Somehow he is far more evil than ppl who killed because they believe they did the right thing. This guy was not mentally ill, he know 100% what he did, he caused huge damage and all of it because he just wanted to get rich. That's so mundane and pathetic.

[@PrestonGarvey69]

Don't go chasing waterfalls stay with the rivers and lakes you know.

[@vinsanity40k]

who else can claim to have created more than just one environmental disaster in a single lifetime

[@michaelquintana8533]

is this real?? or a n attempt to shift focus from off the other evil men we think of..;; " Shitler AKA Hitler Stalins and what ever that Gengivits Kahns...

[@garya7129]

"We'll go down in history as the first society that wouldn't save itself because it wasn't cost effective" Kurt Vonnegut

[@david2869]

Except that we won't go down in history, history will go down with us!

[@gangleweed]

It is true to say that the Human animal is so inefficient due to it not living long enough to show a return on investment.

[@InhalingWeasel]

I don't want to be THAT guy but cost/benefit analysis is more than capable of accounting for negative externalities including apocalyptic events. It's just rarely done and only when the situation is really really bad. So technically humanity will save itself only when the price for not doing so is high enough in the short term.

[@DeminicusSCA]

a thing to note the heptane was rapidly become a useless and abunduint waste product with out a octaine booster. At the time the suplus heptane was just dumped in the river. the addition of lead was to convert that waste product from oil refining in to something usefull . when he said we will make 200mill it was because he prevented all that waste , and ironitlly pollution. Had they continued to dump extra the heptane in the rivers, what would that disaster look like ? in refining oil you get more heptaine than octaine, before lead the rivers next to refinerys would literally burn for months on end do to all the excess heptane being dumped. compared to that the lead probably seemed like a win win.

[@david2869]

@@Randrew Yes, and when we die back to sustainability, most of history, along with our technology, will be lost. We will enter the "Trash Age" where we live off of our ancestors trash and whatever else we can scrounge.

[@dalegribble420]

i did not expect to learn what octane readings actually mean when i clicked on this video, but i did anyway. good job lmao, very informative and entertaining! the story of why cars no longer have cranks was neat too, i'd never heard it before. makes me wonder how much longer car cranks would've been a thing if that dude didn't get his jaw destroyed by one, and how different things would be.

[@bronsonpercy1699]

ik this KZbin channel has been around for a while but i was never really interested in it until I watched the blue LED vid, and now this one made me subscribe. I love how much information is needed to create new things, and i love that they put it all in the vid, and i loved learning about fuel compression ratios, i have a 5.7 hemi and its recommended to use mid grade gas and i never new why till now! 💯

[@bronsonpercy1699]

I was waiting for the car stuff to go back to the nuclear stuff and when he made the connection my jaw dropped lol the lead on his samples from cars

[@BenEater]

The FAA has been dragging their feet on approving unleaded aviation fuel for years even though a fleet-wide replacement (G100UL) has passed all of the necessary certification tests multiple times. Naturally, approving it would create economic winners and losers, so I guess that's the holdup?

[@konradp5915]

The timing of infrastructure changes always coincides with keeping money in the same pockets.

[@wannabecarguy]

Peer reviewed data proves that decay is accelerated by other materials.

[@Joan-xy5wm]

At least the aviation version is "low lead" (100LL). I think that's about half of the normal lead level.

[@masternobody1896]

sadlife. but in order to solve this we have brilliant ad. xD makes us 20 times smarter by watching yt tutorials

[@ct1762]

you mean AVgas yes, but only for piston engines. Jet engines, which are responsible for 90% of the emissions, use JetA.

[@alienvseditor]

A lady's car breaking down, leading to a man's immediate death, leading to a development of a really loud car, leading to the development of leaded gasoline, and finally leading to the poisoning of an entire generation.

[@damarsasongko20]

Moral of this story: Everytime you men decide to help a stranded woman who's having a car breaking down on the road side, don't forget to say this to her "Ma'am, you probably can be a person who might change a course of a history of invention and destruction at the same time."

[@skimask4381]

So.. capture and enslave all women?

[@thefinalfrontear]

@@damarsasongko20 speeds past a stranded driver “no way ecoterrorist, i won’t fall for your tricks!”

[@hman2912]

Think about how many people were brought out of poverty, how high the human life expectancy went up, how high human population got and the advancement of modern medicine over the same period.

[@Liwet.]

Another example of why women shouldn't drive. /s

[@ronlucock3702]

What an absolutely brilliant article. Well done.

[@Kiltoonie]

Really neat and tidy presentation!

[@marc509mtz4]

The irony of him poisoning himself, poisoning others, then dying from his own contraption. This guy was the grim reaper.

[@SaveMoneySavethePlanet]

Yea, he definitely sounds like someone who deserves more of our hate

[@jmchez]

For years, I have referred to him in my classes as Dr. Frankenstein; everything he created, turned evil.

[@oldmandoinghighkicksonlyin1368]

Karl Marx has him beat easily.

[@skhtrm]

@@oldmandoinghighkicksonlyin1368 no the people who butchered his ideas and implemented a shitty version deserve it

[@maxpelletier2237]

He was definitely cursed.

[@At0mix]

I feel like "accidentally" only applies to the second time that man caused a global environmental catastrophe, the one with the lead seemed like willful ignorance. It's honestly crazy how much damage to the earth a single man was able to do in his pursuit of short-term gain.

[@krustysurfer]

Not willful ignorance... Its was criminal behavior

[@At0mix]

@@krustysurfer You're right, "feigned ignorance" is probably more accurate. He knew, but decided to do it anyway, downplaying the dangers every step of the way

[@peterkiss501]

okay, so now you watched this video and you are sooooo smart

[@xAxMxWx]

I prefer to say a single generation because he definitely couldn’t have done it all alone.

[@Kay-jg6tf]

@@peterkiss501 You're not making a great case for your own "smartness" right now, what's your point?

[@michaelwinter8633]

What a terrific video. Informative and very well researched.

[@bgw33]

Another powerful video. Thanks.🎉

[@floridasoldat]

Being able to correlate historical events related to human civilization like the rise and fall of empires and the Black Death by observing lead levels in the ice cores in Greenland is so crazy.

[@LeLe-pm2pr]

@@cewla3348 it was both the poles and greenland

[@user-lp7tx1fe6t]

Earth is a closed system 🤷‍♂️

[@FREDDIECASH229]

Stream Young Loud. 😈

[@BHBalast]

@@user-lp7tx1fe6t It is not, it gets sun energy

[@senankannangara6825]

@@BHBalast Earth is a closed system, but not an Isolated system. Closed systems absorb/release energy with outside, but isolated systems do not.

[@LarvaHeroes]

Considering he spent a year recovering from lead toxicity, claiming he "accidentally" killed the most people in history seems a bit generous

[@77mcmarine]

"Recovering" is 💯% going into his lawyers defense of him if he lived long enough to be sue for negligence

[@hankmoody7513]

@@77mcmarine It is a genuine tragedy that it didn't kill him before he could do what he did.

[@palehorserider1407]

it was all by design ! Jus like 9/11 and this Scamdemic

[@lad458]

exactly

[@hankmoody7513]

@@palehorserider1407 take your meds.

[@phychmasher]

Wow. I love this channel. Thank you.

[@Darium856]

Beautifully made video brotha. Such a good job intertwining two lives and illuminating the horrors of our predecessors.

[@superepicgaming3535]

Every time this guy made a “non toxic” product, it proved to kill the most people ever

[@paulelderson934]

You gotta respect the sheer courage of the person asking the guy who made all children dumb and violent to be in charge of making yet another "safe" chemical compound.

[@aparnarai3708]

@@paulelderson934 respect+++++

[@gwho]

*cough* covid vaccines *cough*

[@sserenities3581]

@@gwho shh the fbi's coming to get u

[@jimwerther]

Very interesting....and full of BS. Lead is bad, true. But all the claims about millions of deaths and vastly increased crime and rampant stupidity as a result? That is so absurd as to be laughable. Violent crime rising between the 1960s and the 1990s, and falling thereafter, has numerous causes, most of which are far more direct and obvious than the ridiculously stretched idea presented here. (The lead theory presented here is at least as detached as the one presented in Freakonomics, which is the legalization of abortion.) In fact, when criminal reform took hold, crime took off. When attitudes changed and society cracked down, crime plummeted. And since "defund the police" and rioting in big cities became a thing? Crime rates have shot up. Surprise! Or has there been an increase in lead levels recently? Violent crime is overwhelmingly committed by poor people in inner cities, the very people who rarely see the inside of a car. And before you say, yes James, but how about all that air they are breathing in? Well, okay, how about the folks tha live a mile or two away? Right next to Harlem is the Upper West Side, and very close to the South Bronx is Riverdale. How is it that neither the UWS nor Riverdale has high crime rates? To the contrary, violent crime is nearly unheard of there. Okay, so you'll point to lead paint in the antiquated apartment buildings. Here's my question: ALL the apartment buildings had lead paint in the 1920s. Where was all the violent crime in the '30s, '40s, and '50s? Personally speaking, my father is one of the smartest people I ever knew, and is still accomplishing at age 94. He drove a car that took leaded gas past the point that one could find such things in gas stations. I remember at a very young age when my father would ask for leaded gas until it became increasingly difficult to find stations that sold it, and then became impossible. Yet those supposed intelligence and heart problems apparently forgot to visit my father. Me? I was born during the years that supposedly were the worst ones according this video (something like 1950 - 1980, without going back to check). I grew up in a working class NYC neighborhood, with lead paint in the walls and with unclean air just outside, and traveled in my father's car. And my IQ was measured in the 99th percentile. Somehow all the stupid people around us have managed to create more inventions in the last 100 years than in all of prior world history combined, including those which have extended life expectancy by decades. Wild, isn't it? The previous handful of videos I've seen on this channel were interesting, informative, and well-made, as was this one, actually. But now I am doubting everything I ever learned here, or thought I did, having just watched a piece of utter propaganda. Lastly, if the channel host really wanted to produce a video which lives up to this one's title (save a small change, adding a "wo" in front of "man"), he could tell the world about Rachel Carson's war on pesticides, which has led to the death of more than 50m Africans and counting, with an offsetting gain of nearly or literally nothing. Somehow, though, I doubt that video will be forthcoming. Doesn't fit the narrative.

[@leomessiandrescuccitini6080]

“We do not feel justified in giving up what has come to the industry like a gift from heaven on the possibility that a hazard may be involved in it” That’s the sort of things a cliche villain from a sci-fi movie would say.

[@francodegasperi3814]

That guy must have been so proud when he spoke those words. Must have felt like the most righteous and smartest person alive.

[@ghoul4748]

@@francodegasperi3814 >implying rich people care about anything at all except making more money. lol

[@tilmerkan3882]

Perfect crime and he even felt good about it.

[@joshbobst1629]

It often strikes us just how dumb are the people who rule our world.

[@MonCappy]

It's what a Capitalist would say. So basically, the same thing.

[@Kid.Nimbus]

This is one of the best videos on this website

[@eyeessee]

This was fascinating. Great video. I used to work with lead in printing. It was in ceramic ink. I also drove cars when lead was in fuel. 😮

[@BlueBetaPro]

He did NOT "accidentally" kill the most people in history, he had PLENTY of chances to make things better at ANY point.

[@chrislangtiw6395]

Indeed. Willfully downplaying and ignoring the hazards, real and potential, can hardly be called accidental. All in the name of making money. Unfortunately that time period in particular has many examples of that kind of behavior, the consequences and results of which the world continues to deal with today. And don't forget industrial lobbying.

[@elhajjmalikel6266]

Wait until you see the aftermath of Bill Gates and his 'safe & effective' shot....

[@thecaynuck4694]

Would've been hard for him to undo all of that. Sad, because he was a great scientist and even helped find the age of the Earth and helped nuclear technology, but one innovation had more problems than he could've ever imagined.

[@FerdEdits]

The title is just as much of an "accident"

[@russell2449]

Yeah, he KNEW from the very beginning that his product was harmful and he chose greed and self-interest over the good of his fellow man, that's just plain evil, smh.

[@acorgiwithacrown467]

I love how whenever some horrible chemical is introduced that screws with humanity, dupont always has a hand in it.

[@marciasloan534]

EXACTLY

[@krustysurfer]

[sarcasm alert] Saginaw bay and surrounding despoiled lands and people loves the Dupont family.....

[@anmweather8668]

Ever see the csb videos Dupont is there lmao

[@ayushk4543]

@@anmweather8668 csb full form

[@ps92809]

@@Karim12-1 Dude you have some of the most generic content in the world you even have a "Don't click this video" video

[@bigjimtrucker6042]

I love your videos all your research is outstanding

[@batooljahan1047]

I recently started watching your videos and realised that physics chemistry history all these subjects are not that boring as the schools have made them. These subjects are actually quite interesting and far from anything that is boring. I love your videos ❤❤

[@Digglesisdead]

I was a kid in the 70's and 80's. I remember my parents saying to never pick roadside blackberries because they were full of lead from the car exhaust. They must have heard about this on the news.

[@wenmoonson]

This is one of those things where future people think past people were more ignorant than they actually were. We knew.

[@poopsmith6853]

I remember parents saying not to eat paint chips too, how much of 'disparity in IQ' that they try to blame on lead exposure also came from inattentive parents.

[@VenerhiaStellarvore]

@@poopsmith6853 They could only do so much though, it was in the sea water and air from cars all around the world..

[@poopsmith6853]

@@VenerhiaStellarvore and it was in every water pipe since about 2500 years ago until a few decades ago. This videos creator had some overzealous, and at times simply incorrect sources. Burned lead is absolutely a danger, so is directly consuming it like kids with paint chips, lead pipes are only a danger when the fluid going through them is acidic as sediment buildup prevents the denser lead from leaching into the fluid. Lead exposure is used as an excuse to handwave away genetic disparity in IQ, videos like this serve to protect chemical companies who could have lobbied to use ethanol as it's not at all expensive but was illegal at the time, and to have a non genetic reason for repeatable and proven IQ disparities. My family were farmers, probably exposed to as much burning fuel as urban kids, yet if there's any lowered IQ from it that's measurable (the 10 points the video talks about is actually within a standard deviation of 15 and therefore not measurable as a real reduction), it would only make the genetic disparity larger.

[@VenerhiaStellarvore]

@@poopsmith6853 Even if it's not as iq impacting as he claims it, my point still stands there's only little parents could do back then to save their kids from any kind of pollution like that. It wasn't removed from all these products for nothing yknow, maybe it didnt made boomers go dumb per say but it definitly hasnt helped them.

[@joshuajansen4701]

Man, this episode has it all! A hero, a villain, a tragic back story, a shocking plot twist. It's got my vote on Sundance.

[@MicheleDelGiudice-mykys]

I want a movie about these events.

[@Seraphim262]

And clickbait in the title.

[@roby4504]

I apologize for this comment but I am not really patient, however I am really curious to hear what the man did. Could someone (who spent 25 minutes watching this video) recap it for me?

[@jasongronn6764]

@@roby4504 Made fuel out of lead (causing lead pollution - lead is extremely dangerous), and also made a chemical that destroyed the ozone layer

[@roby4504]

@@jasongronn6764 Thanks man, I appreciate it.

[@w00000]

Great presentation!

[@tylerh21]

This was so informative. I didn't realize how bad lead was. It frustrates me when practices negatively impact me and I can do nothing about it.

[@someundeadtalent2016]

Pretty insane if you keep in mind that a very similar problem nowadays has come up with plastic. And people don’t want to get rid of it due to the same reasons - cost effective, practical, flexible in use.

[@Sergmanny46]

Yes but you don't get poisoned to death when touching/licking plastic, unlike lead.

[@Kamitube]

@@Sergmanny46 They discovered we have plastic particles in our lungs. No one knows how that will affect us long term.

[@Sergmanny46]

@@Kamitube We have particles of literally anything and everything in our bodies, from the pans and pots you use to cook, to the cutlery and knives you use to eat your food, to the glass and plastic cups you use to drink your stuff. So let's not nitpick here, at this point it's just a matter of what thing will kill us first. At least nothing will be worse than lead.

[@damnyejustgotbewitchedbyth2802]

@@Sergmanny46 plastic's shrinking our dicks

[@The_OwO_Shogun]

@Elina Well then, now what?

[@leopold7562]

I'll accept that the Freon thing was probably accidental. Given the sequence of events that would need it to be broken apart to react with ozone, it's probably something one could easily overlook. But using lead in a compound that is being intentionally converted into a gas? Lead, a heavy metal that was discovered to be highly dangerous to humans almost two centuries earlier? Nah, that's no accident. That's despicable greed. Everything done by the Ethyl company was nothing more than a poor cover-up for the truth.

[@bentraquet]

This is the correct take. All about money.

[@JSR80]

Academic research in Europe at the same time already knew that CFCs in the upper atmosphere would degrade ozone, however there was no way an industrialist in the US would easily come across that research.

[@demenster7279]

Ya the lead part was entirely intentional. It was a money decision.

[@p10091518]

Yeah I kept waiting for there to be a surprise second person mentioned who actually killed people on accident thrown in at the end.

[@Alexander_Kale]

It is not a stretch to assume that BOTH were entirely accidental, and if we are honest, then the mere notion that Freons might NOT have been would mark one as someone whose tin foil hat has been on way too tight for way to long. Keep in mind the dates. These inventions were effectively riding the coat tails of the later days of the industrial revolution. Science as a whole had simply not advanced enough. Remember Dr. Harvey Wiley and his work to eliminate poisonous chemicals from american Foodstuffs. Those chemicals had not been put in there for shits and giggles or because greedy American industrialists wanted to kill consumers. They had been put in there becuase they worked and because a cursory examination had deemed them safe. Again, it was not like the people mentioned in THIS video DIDN'T do any safety testing. The inhalation of Freons and Ethyl is CLEARLY mentioned. They THOUGHT it was safe at first, and it simply took DECADES for any evidence to the contrary to come along. No one had as of yet imagined that regulations like the one we have today might be necessary. Something was either toxic or it wasn't, and if the former, you would feel consequences in a short timeframe. You would die, or your teeth would fall out, or your bones would rot (all real things that happened in early industrialization, look up "Phossy Jaw" if you want to traumatize yourself...). Studies on long term exposures to dangerous chemicals were just beginning to emerge. The very concept of such stringent rules as we now know to be necessary would have seemed needlessly alarmist to EVERYONE. People simply did not know better yet. If anything, this highlights how incredibly important agencies like the FDA are (again, see Dr Wiley), to prevent something like this getting into common use in the first place.

[@njp4340]

Just brilliant information.

[@okotbryan2011]

Good content bravo

[@janbogar1250]

After knowing that he "spent a long time recovering from lead poisoning and wouldn't go anywhere near the product", calling the deaths accidental is not appropriate, it's at least gross negligence and at worst mass murder. Anyway, great video! I am in awe.

[@electrictroy2010]

There are many chemicals that are poisonous in large quantities, but okay in small amounts. Like salt, sugar, and various vitamins .

[@Dryblack1]

@@electrictroy2010 There is no safe level of lead.

[@pinklefoo]

@@electrictroy2010 yeah, it's when you mix in the greed of capitalism that it poisons people.

[@heskey333]

@@electrictroy2010 But lead is not OK in any quantity. The more you have, the more poisoned you are - who knows how much smarter you and I would be if folks had used a little more common sense back then?

[@darko6666]

@gioyu comi so many scientists went out of their way to combat corporate greed. They are forgotten because of paid smear campaigns and are never given the recognition they deserved. They were heroes that saved lives.

[@mjhobo5520]

I worked as an apprentice in a lead smelter back in the early 90’s, blood tests for lead contamination were carried out monthly, you would be removed from the smelter if the contamination was about 30ppm, my usual levels were around 11-15ppm. The smelter was based in a small mining town in a rural and remote part of Australia and we were sent to one of the capital cities for 6 weeks for college component required as part of our training for the apprenticeship. My accomodation was in a block of flats situated on a main road in the city, with constant traffic, this was in the early 90’s and lead additives to fuel hadn’t yet been phased out. At the completion of that block of college, and on returning to work, my first day back coincided with the blood test for lead, and it came back higher than I’d ever had, only a couple of ppm lower than the allowable threshold. I put it down to the lead additives in the fuel from the city traffic, it’s bizarre to think that it’s safer to work in a lead smelter than it was to live beside a high traffic area.

[@Meemsnt]

Horrifying. Thank you for sharing, really puts this issue into perspective.

[@clumeroo]

Nice to hear an Aussie perspective on the issue too. How ironic..

[@walterbo7687]

@@clumeroo a small town called Mount Isa have the highest lead concentration in Australia

[@johnkaplun9619]

Makes sense though. When you melt lead now one is very carefully not to reach the temperature at which it vaporized, so you can't breath it in. Not true with leaded gasoline.

[@pronumeral1446]

And now think that the current Liberal National Coalition government has refused to put in place emissions regulations and fuel economy regulations for cars (unlike the EU, UK, US, Canada, Japan, India and China). As a result, Australia is becoming a dumping ground for extremely dirty vehicles which are undoubtedly causing more air pollution (not to mention climate change) than is necessary.

[@danielklee2933]

A video on the world wide use of aerosols is another topic of discussion that many are missing out on.

[@timjolly777]

Love all your videos

[@NineSun001]

Can't call it "by accident" if he activly tries to keep the truth about the toxicity away from the public. He and his boss are surely in the top ten of worst human being ever lived on this planet. It does not matter if it was intentional or not. The damage he had done is irredeemable.

[@meganj2799]

@@peepeepoopoo5932 Hitler purposefully had people marched out of their homes, left to die from the elements, shot and suffocated and starved to death--and he purposefully targeted people he considered to be worth less than the "superior" race, including people with disabilities. I think this is an unfair comparison. But I would compare the man who put lead in gasoline to heads of food corporations today who deny how much sugar is harming people's health and shortening their lives because sugar helps them make a better profit.

[@meganj2799]

I could also add MSGs, GMOs, pesticides, herbicides, hormones, and other artificial things in common USA foods that are wreaking havoc on our bodies

[@theolympiyn8670]

@@meganj2799 hormones? GMOS? Wha

[@derrshnipp4344]

@@meganj2799 lmao

[@holdenennis]

@Peepee Poopoo He said they were in the top ten, not that they were first and second.

[@aishwaryabg8073]

Make no mistake Midgley was 100% aware of the effects his inventions would cause in fact there were throughly researched articles about it which were buried by him and the company that he was working for so that they could make an epic amount of money. Greed really knows no bounds.

[@michaelccozens]

Quite right. Midgley knew exactly what he was doing. At one point he made a PR stunt of playing with lead for the media to supposedly demonstrate its "safety", while knowing full-well that the concern wasn't acute exposure but chronic. He was counting on the public being too ignorant to know the difference. Don't give bad-faith actors the benefit of the doubt. They've already shown they'll abuse it, and in continuing to give it to them anyway, you've deliberately made yourself complicit in their malfeasance. People tend to do it anyway because they're desperate to pretend the problem is one of ignorance instead of deliberate ignorance, as you can teach your way out of the first but must fight your way clear of the second. MLK called such people who place their privileged comfort over the rights of others "white moderates", and rightly labeled them a bigger threat to civil rights than the outspoken bigots.

[@TropicalMAYHEM45]

welp hes in yea..

[@darkshadow2314]

He had a stroke

[@easphone8357]

Varitesium was 100000% aware of it.

[@briannasusz]

I would maybe go so far to compare corporations like this to sex trafficking operations. It’s really all for money in the end. Everything is now. It’s gross. But 🤷🏼‍♀️ literally what can we do about any of it? it’s their world, we’re just living in it. Maybe it’s the lead poisoning talking, but honestly I life everyday wondering if anyone even cares about the earth, or other human lives. But in the end it’s true, nobody cares more about money than the millionaires/billionaires. SMH

[@lelouchlamperouge8560]

Back in 1984 or 85, during my training days in Shell Philippines located in Tabangao, Batangas, my training instructor and I were assigned to received a routine delivery by boat of TEL. We have to wear protective suits. I was told that this gasoline additive was highly toxic. I never knew it killed millions. Thanks heavens I’ve finished my six month training alive and well. Thanks for making this vid, it’s an eye opener.

[@LilJollyJoker]

This video blew my mind!

[@kaynanpompeu2574]

This guy is basically Dr. Catastrophe. Absolutely everything he did went wrong, remarkable.

[@orterves]

I dunno, for a beautiful moment in time he created a lot of value for shareholders.

[@Dmyra]

@@orterves rofl... almost as beautiful as the moment when you epic-ly reflected on it. sighh

[@junarshfago]

Well he is also responsible for today success too. Without him your ears would have been rapture.

[@alexipestov7002]

@@junarshfago We have a blend of E85, which is the ethanol solution to the knock problem. Without his input, we'd probably be in the same place today, minus some of the damage

[@junarshfago]

@@alexipestov7002 and when exactly this happen

[@Facadeee]

I've spent 20 years on this earth, and this is the first time anybody has meaningfully explained octane rating of fuel to me. Thank you very much.

[@1998ichigokurosaki98]

What can i say.. modern education

[@amansaxena5898]

Seriously, the same impression I had, and I am of roughly same age

[@karlmarx7037]

same

[@kyleduddleston4123]

@@karlmarx7037 You are a close second for making people less intelligent. Thank you advertising for the conservative social movement. Lol

[@lynnamarsh6384]

did u goto public school ?

[@sypiermusic]

Thanks I learn a lot today

[@AntonVattay]

Wow. I knew about the toxicity of lead and leaded fuel but I had no idea how massive of a societal effect this had. Wild that we still have lead raining down on us from 100LL aviation fuel.

[@Snowboarding182]

I remember being in class at school, when I was young and we were learning a brief history of Romans, and the teacher talked about how their downfall came to many factors, invasion, internal strife, and the fact that they used lead as their plumbing and many people in Rome were being slowly poisoned. And as someone who worships history, I never forgot one kid who said: People in the past were so stupid, how could they not realise they were poisoning themselves. And the teacher said: Well we today might be using materials that in the future they will learn are actually poisonous to us.

[@AdNoctemMedia]

Like, say, microplastics?

[@jeremiahdewitt2072]

Lead poisoning from lead pipes was probably not the cause of lead poisoning bc the mineral deposit effectively kept the water from coming into to contact with the lead pipes. It would have most likely came from the ruling class of Romans and elites drinking and dining with pewter cups and plates.

[@somaday2595]

Upper class Romans used lead to sweeten wine. If the pH stays relatively high (for drinking water) and the pipes have calcium scale, Pb levels will stay low. I am not advocating using lead pipes, but the lead levels can be minimized by monitoring and acting on the chemistry.

[@FernandoTorrera]

Yeah thanks for mentioning this there were things that mitigated lead poisoning. Also this is a great way of illustrating how humans need the scientific method to process info. Simply observing things in everyday life isn’t going to give you the answer.

[@AutPen38]

Like, say, the internet? While we sit around watching KZbin, Google and the other big tech companies are using their profits to build AI robots that will have a catastrophic effect on humanity. By merely acting as consumers (just like the people who had to use leaded petrol to get to work) we're culpable in messing up the world for future generations. Have a nice day.

[@ClemensAlive]

Wow! That whole octane explanation was the best one I've ever seen. Just so easy to understand.

[@billythekid5628]

But, failed to say what is in the fuel today to help lubricate the engine parts instead of using lead.

[@chefgiovanni]

Happy Earth Day! The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. Why not get a few and plant them now ?

[@xxxxxGhostBoyxxxxx]

@@billythekid5628 that's for u to figure out next. does everything has to be spoonfed?

[@ls6jay]

@@billythekid5628 the engine parts have changed. No need to be lubed by fuel.

[@spvillano]

@@ls6jay true, though it's part lubrication, partly cushioning the valves when they closed. Modern components can withstand those stresses, old engines either needed a change of valves and seats or have leaded fuel. But, confounding the story is another source of lead that remains a problem today, lead paint. Ironically, there's still another source and one that's two feet away from me, lead solder for electronic circuits. Now, modern solders use greater amounts of silver and tin, which then introduces tin whiskers into the mess...

[@user-lx9lz9hv2b]

Your description of knock in the video is describing preignition. Knock occurs after combustion, and is what leaded fuel prevented.

[@michaelarrowood4315]

Very informative video. Thank you... I had of course heard of leaded gasoline (and pumped it myself many times decades ago), but did not know all of this information. (A side note: this is the first time I've heard the British pronunciation of solder (SOL-der) used instead of the typical American pronunciation (SAH-der). Is that a thing now?)

[@Thegamingmaster74]

These sets are absolutely incredible! It’s insane how far veritasium has come!

[@MrUssy101]

Hypocrisy of this guy thinks he is clever and we are stoopid. He is here to educate us?

[@toseltreps1101]

no

[@alvaroampudia4382]

@@MrUssy101 unless you have a PhD in physics, yes... he's going to educate you

[@Ebani]

@@MrUssy101 You do seem stupid. As Forrest Gump succinctly put it: "Stupid is as stupid does"

[@gustopher6500]

@@MrUssy101 yo what lmao

[@jmchez]

A few years ago, on a talk show, Stephen Fry gave a clue to the other guests; "This man is considered to be the worst polluter in the history of mankind". The guests couldn't understand how a man could be a worse polluter than a country or a corporation. I knew who he was referring to.

[@ccubsfan94]

Ah, I figured it was a Blue Whale

[@peppermintnightmare4741]

@@ccubsfan94 mmm salty oceans

[@Dauthdart]

I think I learned this from a Citation Needed episode (Tom Scott)

[@EagleKai]

@@Dauthdart Heard about him both from Citation Needed as well as "A Short History of Nearly Everything" by Bill Bryson

[@YoutubeChannel-ll6sw]

he certainly couldn't've done it without the help of corporations

[@harnamsingh7071]

Thanks for such an informative and enlightening video. With all my education at Master of Arts degree level, I was never aware how dangerous is lead added fuels for vehicles including aeroplanes. Lets hope the world would be more safer with the awakening of more and more people to save the earth.

[@johnharvey848]

Just proves that science isn't always reliable in the real world.

[@fishyfish201]

One person single handedly decreased the average intelligence, increased crime rates, made a hole in the ozone layer, killed millions of people (himself included), and made people worldwide help him AND pay.

[@HelenaOfDetroit]

Not necessarily. There were other sources of lead than just the gasoline back then. Lead paint, lead pipes, etc. To blame all the lead poisoning on one guy is a false narrative

[@rightsideup6304]

@@HelenaOfDetroit But not necessarily a wrong one. Leaded fuel played a huge chunk of the problem.

[@HelenaOfDetroit]

@@rightsideup6304 Me: "To blame all the lead poisoning on one guy is a false narrative." You: "But not necessarily a wrong one." I can see you understand lead poisoning from first hand experience.

[@fanciopantsio8645]

@@HelenaOfDetroit Goddamn Helena

[@vibewithsri8064]

@@HelenaOfDetroit bruhhh💀💀💀 good one though

[@spiderdude2099]

The worst part? His chemistry is extremely sound, and even today anti-knocking agents that can compete with tetraethyl lead are hard to come by. Also, Freon is an incredibly efficient gas to use as a refrigerant. A similar thing happens in gold refining, where cyanide and mercury are STILL the undefeated kings of efficient chemical refining of gold as they can pick up NANOGRAMS of gold in solution efficiently, and many alternative processes struggle to reach this level of recovery. Just goes to show that sometimes the most ideal chemical solutions have the worst side effects.

[@jeddaniels2283]

Indeed. Midgley had a team of scientists working under Kettering. They were the one's who actually found and isolated Tetraethyllead after going through the periodic table The discovery was made when midgley was on a break seeing his father. CFC discovery was made by Albert Leon Henne and Robert McNary, Midgley. They observed that the refrigerants then in use comprised relatively few chemical elements, many of which were clustered in an intersecting row and column of the periodic table of elements. The element at the intersection was fluorine, known to be toxic by itself. Midgley and his collaborators felt, however, that compounds containing fluorine could be both nontoxic and nonflammable.

[@spiderdude2099]

@@jeddaniels2283 yeah the Freon thing was especially unfortunate because that was before a lot was understood about radical chemistry. If CFCs didn’t have such a detrimental effect due to radical generation, they’d actually be a perfect inert chemical solution to a lot of refrigerant problems.

[@jeddaniels2283]

@@spiderdude2099 Without knowing the detrimental effect. The three of them must of thought they had found a near perfect solution to the problem. I wonder if there were any awards handed out to the trio. Thankfully the Ozone layer has a natural cycle triggered via the Chapman cycle. With high energy UV lb protection via the Hartley cycle.

[@ragingdemon3127]

Don’t forget asbestos insulation.

[@AntwanIzMetal]

They spent so much time wondering whether or not they could that they forgot to ask if they should

[@ivangrof8918]

really good ending, love your videos

[@Ryn0_333]

Holy smokes, thats insane. Thank you for the history lesson.

[@terkfranks1538]

I wonder how much "lead in paint" also contributed to these problems. Wasn't this an issue in house paint until the 80's.... (and houses built before)

[@DocSineBell]

Nice question. I guess it is a less relevant source, as you are not actively making breathable aerosols out of it, but the powder that comes out of it is likely harmful.

[@DocSineBell]

Also, lead is what makes crystal glass so nice and shiny in respect to regular glass. And yes, lead slowly dissolves in water. So grandma's precious crystal glasses might have contributed too.

[@paperburn]

It was kids eating chips of paint containing lead in ghetto environments. (lead tastes sweet)

[@corin164]

Lead in its solid form is not the problem. Parents who don't feed their children is the problem.

[@DocSineBell]

@Internet Guidance lead was heavily used to make water pipes in the past. Having old lead pipes still in place today is beyond unacceptable.

[@PermianExtinction]

My lead story: I am went from being an extremely skilled student in middle school to getting less and less able to focus on work in high school until I eked by with low grades in my senior year. I'm still considered a very "smart" person by those who know me, but my mental disability has kept me from finishing college or finding work, because I just can't focus for long periods of time and my working memory ranges from amazingly good in areas I'm interested in to staggeringly poor when I'm less motivated. I'm now 26. It turned out that my high school's water supply was extremely lead-poisoned, worse than Flint, Michigan. Some of the worst lead levels were in the water pipes for the gym, where I'd be super active and get very very thirsty. If I had a time machine and could send a message back saying "please please please don't drink the water at school!"... thinking about it makes my heart hurt.

[@isolvechess1941]

I am extremely sorry

[@Hoaxe72]

Are you not able to collect money from the school?

[@PAGAN19]

Bless your heart! I'm so sorry! I was brilliant in school also but when they threw me into all Advanced classes in High School I began flunking them, but I think it was because I hadn't learned to study when everything before had come so easily to me, you know? My father was a brilliant man and I inherited his IQ. Like you, I HAVE to be interested in something to pursue it and that makes perfect sense! If only schools and especially COLLEGES would pay attention to that! Thank you for your comment and the reminder of how that all went down when I was a teen. I dearly hope you're doing better now.

[@Runescape.]

who cares. move on. other people got it worse like harlequin syndrome. you're not special.

[@JLZero]

@@Runescape. This isn't a contest of who is the most miserable. Only because someone has it worse, doesn't mean his problem isn't relevant to at least him.

[@FerRaviola]

Currently reading "A short history of nearly everything" and I vividly remembered having watched this video. Coincidentally, you tube decided to show it to me again

[@EphemeralProductions]

I just want to say, you truly do remind me of Carl Sagan, in the way you present and narrate. :). Truly! Love your channel sir! Big hugs.

[@lucasburford7881]

The fact that ice is literally a physical time capsule for humanity (and the Earth) is absolutely fascinating, the fact that you can see the rise and fall of nations and major events in the ice is mind blowing, thanks for sharing!

[@OxygenOS]

Indeed, I was also fascinated by it!

[@shashwatsharma2596]

@@OxygenOS your username deserves a like, PS : you can use KZbin Vanced

[@sourabhuwusingh]

@@shashwatsharma2596 now you cant

[@blackfrost273industries4]

Be wary. I have heard of some people dispute the accuracy of ice coring. And to be transparent, I do not know the level of truthfulness of this as...tertiary sourced information. But it is a thought I think wise to keep in mind. Just like the quote I just heard him say around 23:00 minutes.

[@vaisakhkm783]

@@shashwatsharma2596 it already baned.... which means you are not using and telling others to use:) You can use pipewire....

[@anthonykeller5120]

My best friend died due to lead poisoning. It took doctors six years to figure it out. David was an electronics engineer who spent years in an electronics lab intermittently bent over bread boards soldering connections. David inadvertently ended up breathing the lead in the solder in very small quantities, and the build up in his body finally caught up to him.

[@arthurmorgan1593]

Sorry for your loss.

[@tomp7835]

While I am sorry your friend suffered and died he was partly to blame. I solder everyday and use a HEPA fume extractor to pull the solder fumes away. In addition, I wash my hands frequently to reduce the amount of lead absorbed. Part of my education was how to work safely with solder.

[@nephthysbastet4809]

@@tomp7835 "David inadvertently ended up breathing the lead in the solder in very small quantities, " From above. What makes you think that Anthony's best friend didn't do the same precautions as you do? Nowhere does it say that he didn't.

[@tomp7835]

@@nephthysbastet4809 because I see it everyday, many people know what they should do, but don't. Many have the attitude that it won't hurt them; others just don't care. Much like the inventors of leaded gas.

[@tomp7835]

@@nephthysbastet4809 by the way, one doesn't inadvertently breathe the solder fumes.

[@marks3440]

Completely mind blowing. Really also makes you think about all the things we live with today which we are told/assume to be benign.