In his new history of Rome, Kyle Harper recounts how 6th-century Romans reeled before a new pathogen which wiped out 20-30 percent of the population. Edward N. Luttwak, reviewing The Fate of Rome in Tablet, praises Harper, who cites evidence pointing to Yersinia pestis, better known as the bubonic plague in its much later return as the “Black Death.”
At Least He Paid his Losing Bet
Paul Ehrlich, author of the spectacularly incorrect 1968 best-seller The Population Bomb, recently died at 93. Despite his longevity, Ronald Bailey points out in Reason, Ehrlich did not live to see even one of his numerous apocalyptic predictions come true. The world’s population certainly grew, but not merely larger, richer and fatter too. Most famously, Ehrlich once bet economist Julian Simon that the world was approaching economic collapse – but in 1990 had to mail Simon a cheque.
