Today we're going to be talking about a man whose name has become synonymous with his ability

to see the future. If a major catastrophic global event happens, you can pretty much bet that

within 24 hours, someone on the internet will claim that this guy predicted it hundreds of years

ago. We're talking about major events like the Great Fire of London, the rise of Adolf Hitler, the assassination

of JFK, the September 11th attacks on the US. According to this man's believers, he forsaw

it all. He is the ultimate historic conspiracy theorist dream. The 16th century French astrologer, philosopher, physician, and reputed

seer, Michel de Nostradarmes, better known to us all as Nostradamus. He became huge effort in the

1980s. I think as we were living in an age of anxiety and the worry about global war and famine and disaster.

So he is one of those people who's suddenly gone and got a cult following a few hundred years later.

So I don't know whether Notre Dame is playing a role when you were growing up,

but he's popped up as being the only guy who can see the future from the past.

I don't know whether he has a resonance

in your childhood adolescence or beyond. Well, he's always just been there. What I didn't

realize until we started researching for this was that that hasn't always been the case. He was a

big deal in his lifetime, not uncontroversial. But you're right, it's this age of anxiety and uncertainty

that seems to have given him new life. And he wasn't just staring into crystal balls. He was

a medical professional navigating one of the most dangerous periods in European history.

Never trust someone who's a doctor who hasn't got a PhD in the humanities as well.

That's what I like to think.

But behind the myth of this mystical prophet is a man who's deeply embedded in the very real,

also terrifying realities of the racons.

He wasn't just staring at crystal balls.

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