Connections

[describing the recipe for Chicken Marengo, served to Napoleon after the Battle of Marengo:
]

James Burke:
Cut up the chicken and flour it well. Put the chicken parts to brown in oil with just a touch of garlic. While the chicken's browning, prepare the other ingredients for simmer. One or two mushrooms, half a cup fresh tomatoes, add a quarter cup of brandy and water and simmer. Steam a quarter cup of crayfish. Garnish with fried eggs and potatoes to taste. Total cooking time: one hour. Absolutely awful.

[explaining the excesses that led to the demise of Charles The Bold of Burgundy]

James Burke:
The first modern nation ran on tick. Well, in 1470, Portinari got a letter from no less than the president of his bank who also happened to be running Florence at the time - a man called Lorenzo The Magnificent - saying, "Watch it when you're, uh, dealing with Charles of Burgundy, won't you?" 'Course Portinari ignored this advice. And when Charles went off on new military disasters, Portinari would write a letter to his friends who had a bank near the battle, and they would turn up on the spot with bags full of loot. All of which, naturally enough, tended to make Charles an admirer of things Italian - especially their soldiers. He was bringing them in to train his own men in new tactics. And it was the Italian connection that finally blew it for Charles, because in 1476 he decided to strengthen his lines of communication with Italy by moving into an area south of him. Now that was going to bump him up against the Swiss. Still, who were a bunch of mountain louts to stand up against Charles The Bold of Burgundy, the greatest thing since sliced venison? So, off he set - and in doing so triggered off a series of events that was to end, five hundred years later, with the landing on the moon.

[explaining the circumstances stimulating chemistry research in Germany]

James Burke:
This is one of those stories that doesn't make sense even when you've heard it twice. Let me try it on you.

[indicating the machine he's sitting on]

James Burke:
Combine harvester, invented by an American - McCormick - a few years before that German color business. Because of it, by the 1870's, America has got wheat coming out of its ears, so the price drops. They're practically giving bread away. Good idea, no? No. See, in Germany, they eat this - black rye bread - grown in Prussia by a bunch of aristocrats called the Junkers. Very big-deal people, the Junkers. They've got the government in their pocket. So, none of that cheap American wheat gets into Germany where the population is rocketing and they need food. Okay, everybody can eat rye. Uh-uh; the Junkers are exporting it all to make money.

[stands holding two loaves of bread]

James Burke:
Now, let me see if that confuses you as much as it confuses me: You've got lots of rye, but you...

[throws away black rye loaf]

James Burke:
...Export it, so you're short of food. Never mind, foreign wheat is cheap. So you...

[throws away wheat loaf]

James Burke:
...*Don't* import it. That's what I thought I said. But that's what they did! So, in desperation, somebody started trying to boost wheat growing in Germany, and when they did they ran slap-bang into a brick wall: No fertilizer. They had to bring it in from Chile at colossal expense, and they just didn't have that kind of bread. What am I saying? They didn't have *any* kind of bread!

James Burke:
The story of the events and the people who, over centuries, came together to bring us in from the cold and to wrap us in a warm blanket of technology is a matter of vital importance, since more and more of that technology infiltrates every aspect of our lives. It's become a life-support system without which we can't survive. And yet, how much of it do we understand?

[steps into a lift]

James Burke:
Do I bother myself with the reality of what happens when I get in to a big steel box, press a button, and rise into the sky? Of course I don't.

James Burke:
This is one of the more perfect examples of the kind of technological trap that we set for ourselves: The lift. The elevator. I mean, what is it? It's a steel box with some buttons in it and, maybe, a trap door for emergencies, but whoever looks that close? Except, when this happens...

[the power dies]

James Burke:
...Where is it? And even in this situation - closed in, with an escape route that we can't handle - we behave like many of those New Yorkers did. We...

[ignites a small lighter]

James Burke:
...Strike a light, and we look around to see how badly things are. And if we find, in this case, an emergency button... Absolutely great, we sit back and we wait for help to come; we wait for *technology* to come back and save our lives. Because it's inconceivable that it won't, isn't it? I mean, if you admit that, you've got to admit that every single day of your life, in some form or other, you unconsciously walk yourself into a technology trap. Because that's the only way to live in the modern world. So you don't admit it. You say, "Oh, well, in this situation, we'll cope." But what happens when the effects become widespread, irreversible, devastating? What happens when what little resources you have to help you cope...

[the lighter goes out]

James Burke:
...Give up? Then what?