Bryan Ward-Perkins: The material consequences of the fall of Rome

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Cremieux, a Twitter anon who is regularly retweeted by the likes of Paul Graham, Noah Smith and Elon Musk. A data scientist and statistician, Cremieux specializes in visualizations and analyses that cut to the heart of social and cultural dynamics, from economics to behavior genetics. Cremieux and Razib first discuss the polls and demographic results of the 2024 election, in which Donald Trump seems to have made broad-based gains across all demographics. They also discuss the mirage of the “emerging Democratic majority,” and the possibility that Latinos and Asians shifted so much in the last four years that the racial depolarization predicted by analysts like David Shor since 2012 has finally come to pass. Cremieux also talks about the likely policy outcomes implied by Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon Musk’s slated heavy involvement in the next Trump administration, from the exit of Lina Khan to the reversal of numerous Biden executive orders in areas like employment and civil rights. Cremieux argues that there will be a massive house-cleaning in the civil service. Cremieux has talked to Ramaswamy’s people; if Ramaswamy gets a role like chief of staff, they plan to operationalize insights from Richard Hanania’s book, The Origins of Woke: Civil Rights Law, Corporate America, and the Triumph of Identity Politics.

On this episode of "Unsupervised Learning," Razib talks to Rachel Haywire, who writes at Cultural Futurist. Haywire is the author of Acidexia and began her career in futurism as an event planner for the Singularity Institute. She got her start as part of the "right-brain" faction around the Bay Area transhumanist and futurist scene circa 2010. Currently, she is working on starting an art gallery in New York City that serves as an event space for avant-garde creators who are not encumbered by mainstream or "woke" cultural sensibilities. Haywire recounts her experience as a creator in the early 2010s in the Bay Area and the transition from a socially libertarian milieu where diverse groups mixed freely to one more defined by a progressive cultural script, with the threat of cancel culture beginning to be noticeable. She points to the 2013 cancellation of Pax Dickinson for edgy tweets as a turning point. Razib and Haywire also allude to the role that the reclusive accelerationist philosopher  Nick Land played in seeding certain ideas and influencing movements like the  Dark Enlightenment. Jumping to the present, Haywire now lives in New York City, and she addresses the Dimes Square scene centered around the neighborhood in Manhattan's Lower East Side. Haywire points out that the actual artistic production from Dimes Square luminaries is quite low, with an almost total lack of music and a focus on online personas. Her goal with her salons and soon-to-open gallery is to put the emphasis on art above politics or e-celebrity culture. Finally, Razib discusses the impact of AI on creativity and whether it will abolish the artist. Haywire believes that AI is just another tool and has had mixed success leveraging it for her own artistic works in areas like industrial music. She believes that the real use of AI will be to create drafts and prototypes that artists will have to polish and reshape so that they reflect human creativity rather than just some averaged algorithm.

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Halie May, the host of the Substack The Sequence, and a genetic counselor at Natera. May has a B.S. in chemical biology from Stevens Institute of Technology and a M.S. in human genetics from Sarah Lawrence. Before working at Natera she was a researcher and instructor at Columbia University and designed testing panels at genetics start-up, Tomorrow’s Health. Razib and May discuss how much the field has changed even in her short career, in large part because genetic counseling is a 50-year-old profession that has been transformed in the last decade by the introduction of genome-wide datasets. May highlights the changes in the last ten years, and how they have impacted counselors and end users, in particular the ubiquity of noninvasive prenatal screening tests. Here, she mentions that whole-genome analysis isn’t quite where she had expected when she began studying these issues six years ago, and Razib brings up the fact that it’s already a decade ago he had his son whole-genome sequenced. They discuss the hold-ups in the progress of genetic testing and analysis, and May points out that a major issue is likely the utter lack of federal guidelines, with oversight of genetic healthcare mostly being left to the states. This lack of coordination means that there is no top-down signal, and localities and institutions are left to cobble together frameworks in an ad hoc manner. Razib also asks May about how private companies, like Natera, might fill the gap in what hospitals can provide, and the potential pathways and promise of the democratization of genetic results.

On this episode of Unsuperivsed Learning Razib talks to native Californian, Inez Stepman. Stepman has an undergraduate degree in philosophy from UC San Diego, and obtained her J.D. from University of Virginia. She is a Senior Policy Analyst at the Independent Women’s Forum, a Lincoln Fellow at the Claremont Institute and a contributor to The Federalist. Stepman is also a co-host of the High Noon podcast. Razib and Stepman first talk about her reaction to Marxist author Malcom Harris’ Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism and the World, exemplified by her piece in First Things, Ambitious Nihilism. A native of Palto Alto who went to high school with Harris in the early 21st century, Stepman believes that the left-wing narrative in Palo Alto is misleading. Though Silicon Valley avows fashionable social liberalism and radicalism, Harris argues that it is actually a seedbed for right-wing neo-Neo-Reaganism and capitalism. Stepman disagrees; though it is true that from a Marxist and explicitly socialist perspective Silicon Valley falls short, the overall political tenor was firmly on the left. She recalls even after 9/11 that her Palo Alto milieu took a dim view of American patriotism. For Stepman, Silicon Valley was more a laboratory of fashionable woke shibboleths, about a decade ahead of its time, as well as being the training ground for conformist grinds who were geared toward jumping over the next academic or professional hurdle. Stepman sees this narrow and short-sighted ethos throughout Silicon Valley, and the broader sense in American culture that technology will allow us to transcend our limits to humanity. She argues that wealthy tech entrepreneurs who aim to defeat death, like Bryan Johnson, are fundamentally inhuman in their goals and orientation. Razib and Stepman discuss extensively advances in biotechnology and fertility in particular that American society seems to take for granted, like noninvasive prenatal testing and gene editing, which are rolling out without much discussion.  

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Christina Buttons, who writes at Buttons Lives. A native Californian and erstwhile artist, Buttons switched to journalism two years ago, writing about gender medicine. A contributor to Quillette, The Post-Millennial and The Daily Wire, Buttons is now a freelance journalist living in Nashville, Tennessee. The first part of the conversation breaks down what “gender medicine” entails in its gory details. In April Razib had a conversation with Colin Wright about the relationship between sex and gender, and the broader philosophical issues entailed by the ideas of gender ideology. But in the discussion with Buttons, Razib asks what it means for a child to transition medically. What are the surgeries that transition a boy to a girl and a girl to a boy? They also discuss different hormone regimes, from those that block normal puberty to those that enhance the secondary sexual characteristics of the target gender to which the individual aims to transition. Buttons discusses why she got interested in the topic, the fraught area of medically transitioning children. She distinguishes her circumspect and focused critiques of gender transition from the catchall broadsides of so-called trans-exclusionary radical feminists and religious conservatives. Razib asks Buttons about her departure from The Daily Wire due to ideological differences, and what it feels like to be a moderate between militant factions to both her left and right. Though originally on the Left, and even woke, today Buttons identifies as a centrist classical liberal, which naturally means she tends to offend a great variety of factions with her individualistic viewpoints. Finally, they discuss youth treatment centers, group homes where self-destructive young people are sent to recover and be rehabilitated. Recently these have been in the news, with Paris Hilton claiming that she and others had been subject to abuse at these centers. Buttons herself spent much of her teens in youth treatment centers, and she believes that Hilton’s case is weak, and shutting down these facilities will result in higher rates of self-harm. Buttons plans on moving to this issue as her next project, because she believes people need to know the truth beyond the sensational headlines.

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning, Razib talks to returning guest, Sarah Haider. Haider is the co-host of the podcast A Special Place in Hell and the Substack Hold That Thought. A native of Houston, graduate of the University of Texas in Austin, Haider is the founder and former executive director of Ex Muslims of North America. Today Razib asks her about her move out of the nonprofit world, and into being a full-time public intellectual, speaking and writing on topics of interest to her beyond that of Muslim-born who become secular. And then, more specifically, Razib probes Haider about her thoughts on gender and politics. He asks her how becoming a mother in the last few years and idiosyncratic aspects of her personality may lend themselves to a comfortable home in the heterodox intellectual space. They extensively consider the different dynamics of male and female podcasters, and the comparative surfeit of men versus women willing to offer their opinions on all and sundry topics. Haider also contends that women, by their very nature, are going to be perceived differently than men, resulting in a different way of arguing and engaging with audiences, guests and co-hosts. They also discuss the reality that both their podcast audiences have a male tilt, and whether that is a direct outcome of their communication styles. Outside of the realm of podcasting Razib and Haider explore the implications of there being two ways of speaking and thinking when it comes to men and women, and how that shapes how you talk, think and value issues. Haider also discusses how her pregnancy, and becoming a mother, have changed her politics and social views. When Razib brings up Erik Hoel’s idea of “cultural billionaires,” Haider asks how many women are on the list of such individuals? She argues that becoming a mother is such an all-consuming task that it is no surprise that most of the prominent public women who contribute to opinion and academia are childless; Haider points that Betty Friedan was exceptional among second-wave feminists in having children.   If you have a sibling with autism, your future child’s risk for an autism diagnosis is increased by a factor of 2 to 3.5×. Orchid’s whole genome embryo reports can help mitigate your child’s risk by screening for over 200 genetic variants definitively linked to autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders. Discuss your situation with a genetics expert.

Today Razib talks to Aria Babu, a British think-thank professional who is part of the growing number of young men and women who are taking an interest in population decline and promoting pro-natalism. Babu has a degree in chemistry from University College London, and has long worked in areas related to the study of economic growth and entrepreneurship. Prior to her interest in pro-natalism Babu held conventional views about population growth and its ties to environmental alarmism. But she quickly saw that actually fertility is crashing worldwide, and with that there might be dire economic and social consequences. If that trend is left unchecked, she foresees a worst case scenario of massive economic decline and the replacement of our riotously varied modern civilization by a select few narrow subcultures, like the Amish or Somalis, who continue to favor reproduction as a social value. On the state level, declining populations will likely lead to the rise of culturally stagnant and politically authoritarian societies reminiscent of The Children of Men. Babu and Razib also discuss what it is like living as an urban professional in Britain in 2024. While the fact that the UK has one megacity can lead to disproportionate focus on London, Babu points out that it allows the entire nation’s intellectual and cultural class to be in close proximity, resulting in powerful synergies. She also argues that the problem in the UK is not immigration, but insufficient housing for larger populations and the lack of a system to allow in very skilled and value-add migrants. Rather than integration into the EU or an American-system, Babu favors an approach closer to Singapore, where the UK goes its own way and crafts its policies to take advantage of specific opportunities offered by blindspots in EU or American politics.   If you have a sibling with autism, your future child’s risk for an autism diagnosis is increased by a factor of 2 to 3.5×. Orchid’s whole genome embryo reports can help mitigate your child’s risk by screening for over 200 genetic variants definitively linked to autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders. Discuss your situation with a genetics expert.

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to Louise Perry. A British journalist known for her commentary on feminism and gender issues, Perry is the author of the book The Case Against the Sexual Revolution. She also contributes to The New Statesman, UnHerd, and The Daily Mail, and has a Substack at Maiden Mother Matriarch. Perry is a graduate of University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies, with a degree in anthropology. Perry and Razib first discuss Britain’s current housing crisis, the reasons and possible solutions. Though the Office for National Statistics estimates the UK’s population at 67.1 million, Perry believes that the true number is likely higher because individuals who are present illegally or have a “gray” status are unlikely to respond. But even this population would make the UK over eight times more densely populated than the US, with England being 13 times denser. In fact, England’s population density is similar to India’s. Perry also brings up the reality of massive immigration flows over the last few years; where before 2020 net migration was around ~200,000 per year, since 2021 the figure has been closer to ~500,000. Additionally, many of these immigrants are placed in “social housing,” subsidized or owned by the government. Perry also points out that the legal regulations in Britain stipulate that about 30% of new developments be allocated for social housing, which incentivizes incumbent homeowners to block construction. Additionally, the rate of population growth is much higher than the British construction industry’s capacity to keep up with the theoretical demand. The UK does not produce enough bricks, nor does it have the labor pool of homebuilders. The conversation continues to a broader discussion of the ennui in modern British society. Perry asserts that a major problem driving the housing crisis is that the UK has only one major city, London, and any professional who wants to settle in a more affordable region must also take a major salary cut. Setting aside London, and its economic engines of finance and commerce, Perry characterizes the rest of the UK as more akin to a developing Eastern Europe nation. She also believes that the next decade will see a mass flight of the upper-middle-class, the primary tax base of the state. Perry herself has Australian citizenship through her parents (who immigrated from Australia to the UK), while her husband has an American mother. Her situation is common to many upper-middle-class Britons, who have connections to Canada, the US, New Zealand and Australia. Perry believes this is one reason the British political culture is not reforming itself: so many have in the back of their head that they can jump ship if it starts sinking. Ultimately, her thesis is that British openness and intellectual curiosity make the national character a poor seedbed for nationalism, and it may be inevitable that the UK is caught up and tossed about in a vortex of globalization.   If you have a sibling with autism, your future child’s risk for an autism diagnosis is increased by a factor of 2 to 3.5×. Orchid’s whole genome embryo reports can help mitigate your child’s risk by screening for over 200 genetic variants definitively linked to autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders. Discuss your situation with a genetics expert.

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib talks to archeologist and historian Bryan Ward-Perkins about his 2005 book The Fall of Rome: And the End of Civilization. Ward-Perkins was born and grew up in Rome, a son of architectural historian and archaeologist, John Bryan Ward-Perkins. Educated at Oxford University, Ward-Perkins eventually became a fellow of Trinity College at the same university, from which he has since retired. An archaeologist with a deep interest in economic history, Ward-Perkins’ standout book The Fall of Rome was to a great extent a restatement of traditional understandings of the Roman fall in the wake of academic revisions stimulated by Peter Brown’s 1989 World of Late Antiquity: AD 150-750. Ward-Perkins scholarship focuses on the outputs of economic production: fine pottery, grand public buildings and copious coinage. In contrast, Brown and his fellow travelers tended to focus on religious innovation and creativity in the centuries coincident with Rome's fall. The Fall of Rome documents in crisp, dense prose the material collapse attendant with the dissolution of the Western Empire in the late 5th and 6th centuries, from the vanishing of pottery in Britain to the cessation of the construction of massive buildings across  the Italian peninsula. Razib also asks Ward-Perkins his opinions on his colleague Pete Heather’s book The Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians.  Ward-Perkins sees Heather’s work as complementary; while Ward-Perkins is interested in the material aspects of everyday Roman life, Heather documents and narrates the diplomatic and military affairs of the Roman elite. Ward-Perkins also comments on Chris Wickham’s work in books like The Inheritance of Rome: Illuminating the Dark Ages 400-1000, which outlines how the Roman and post-Roman states differed, in particular, the disappearance in Europe of professional soldiers paid in currency, rather than feudal levies. They also discuss  Walter Scheidel’s Escape from Rome: The Failure of Empire and the Road to Prosperity, and whether Roman citizens were actually materially better  off than their medieval successors. Ward-Perkins also gives his estimation of the time measured in centuries until Western Europe reattained Roman levels of social, technological and political complexity. If you have a sibling with autism, your future child’s risk for an autism diagnosis is increased by a factor of 2 to 3.5×. Orchid’s whole genome embryo reports can help mitigate your child’s risk by screening for over 200 genetic variants definitively linked to autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders. Discuss your situation with a genetics expert.

On this episode of Unsupervised Learning Razib welcomes back a returning guest, J. P. Mallory, to discuss his reaction to the recent preprint The Genetic Origin of the Indo-Europeans. Mallory is the author of In Search of the Indo-Europeans: Language, Archaeology, and Myth, The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World and The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West. He is also a retired professor from Queen’s University Belfast in Northern Ireland. An archaeologist who trained under Marija Gimbutas, Mallory has long used linguistics to complement his disciplinary training in archaeology to understand the origin and location of Indo-European languages. Though Mallory admires The Genetic Origin of the Indo-Europeans, he still thinks more work needs to be done to pinpoint the original homeland of the Yamnaya or their ancestors. The fact is that the preprint remains somewhat vague in its final conclusion, and more work is needed to make sure the populace acquires the same level of community. Mallory also discusses the challenges inherent in interdisciplinary work, synthesizing archaeology, linguistics and now genetics. He believes that a key to grasping the emergence of pre/proto-Indo-European is tracing lineage groups through their Y chromosomes, as the genetics, mythology and anthropology indicate that pre/proto-Indo-Europeans were quite patriarchal and patrilineal. Though Mallory is hopeful that we are making progress on the topic of Indo-Europeans he worries that the fraught situation of disciplinary rivalries will retard synergy, where archaeogenetics engages in excessive imperialism vis-a-vis archaeology and linguistics.