Welcome to the British History Podcast.

My name is Jimmy and this is Episode 364.

Reconciliation.

This show is ad-free due to member support and is a way of thanking members for keeping

the show independent I offer members only content, including extra episodes and rough transcripts

and you can get instant access to all the members extras by signing up for membership at

the British History Podcast.com for about the price halate per month.

And thank you very much to Anna, Mike and Robert for signing up already.

Complex societies are able to do incredible things.

By having an interconnected civilization with people from all over the place contributing

to it, people are able to specialize and that specialization allows for entire classes

of people who can do things that would be impossible if they had to meet their own basic needs

by themselves.

Experts, engineers, artists, even podcasters, we are all possible thanks to living in a complex

society.

Furthermore, the things we have in our homes, the flavors that we take for granted, the

books we read, even the ideas that drive our conversations at the kitchen table.

All of them are made possible by and therefore impacted by the complexity and interconnectedness

of our civilization.

It really is amazing when you sit down and think about it.

And that degree of specialization and interconnectedness can have downsides too.

Often those efficiencies that are built into the system will also lead to widespread exploitation.

...