this is Crash Course World History

and today we’re going to discuss the series of events

that made it possible for you to watch

Crash Course.

And also made this studio possible.

And made the warehouse containing the studio possible.

A warehouse, by the way,

that houses stuff for warehouses.

That’s right, it’s time to talk about

the industrial revolution.

Although it occurred around the same time as

the French, American, Latin American, and Haitian Revolutions—

between, say, 1750 and 1850—

the industrial revolution was really

the most revolutionary of the bunch.

No way, dude.

All those other revolutions resulted in,

like,

new borders and flags and stuff.

We’ve studied 15,000 years of history here at Crash Course,

Me from the Past.

And borders and flags have changed plenty,

and they’re going to keep changing. [that's a twofer: awesome + ominous]

But in all that time,

nothing much changed about

the way we disposed of waste [g'luck with toilet teching, Bill Gates!]

or located drinking water or acquired clothing.

Most people lived on or very close to the land that provided their food.

[like above an Eata Pita?]

Except for a few exceptions,

life expectancy never rose above 35 or below 25.

Education was a privilege not a right.

In all those millennia,

we never developed a weapon

that could kill more than a couple dozen people at once,

or a way to travel faster than horseback.

For 15,000 years,

most humans never owned or used a single item

made outside of their communities.

Simon Bolivar didn’t change that

and neither did the American Declaration of Independence.

You have electricity?

Industrial revolution.

Blueberries in February?

Industrial revolution.

You live somewhere other than a farm?

Industrial revolution.

You drive a car?

Industrial revolution.

You get twelve years of free, formal education?

[peep the creepy teacher in the back]

Industrial revolution.

Your bed,

your antibiotics,

your toilet,

your contraception,

your tap water,

your every waking and sleeping second:

[mongol-tage footage!]

Industrial revolution.

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Here’s one simple statistic that sums it up:

Before the industrial revolution,

about 80% of the world’s population was engaged in farming

to keep itself and the other 20% of people from starving.

Today, in the United States,

less than 1% of people list their occupation as farming.

I mean,

we’ve come so far that we don’t even have to farm flowers anymore.

Stan,

are these real, by the way?

I can’t tell if they’re made out of foam or digital.

So what happened?

TECHNOLOGY!

Here’s my definition:

The industrial revolution was an increase in production

brought about by the use of machines [get ready to man-suit up, Skynet]

and characterized by the use of new energy sources.

Although this will soon get more complicated,

for our purposes today,

industrialization is NOT capitalism—

although, as we will see next week,

it is connected to modern capitalism.

And,

the industrial revolution began around 1750 and

it occurred across most of the earth,

but it started in Europe, especially Britain.

What happened?

Well, let’s go to the Thought Bubble.

The innovations of the Industrial Revolution

were intimately interconnected.

Like,

look, for instance, at the British textile industry:

The invention of the flying shuttle by John Kay in 1733

dramatically increased the speed of weaving,

which in turn created demand for yarn,

which led to inventions like the Spinning Jenny

and the waterframe. [& later, Princess Leia bun sock hats]

Soon these processes were mechanized using water power,

until the steam engine came along to make flying shuttles really fly

in these huge cotton mills.

The most successful steam engine was built by

Thomas “They Didn’t Name Anything After Me” Newcomen

[is that Dutch?]

to clear water out of mines.

And because water was cleared out of those mines,

there was more coal to power more steam engines,

which eventually led to

the fancying up of the Newcomen Steam Engine by

James “I Got a Unit of Power and a University Named After Me” Watt,

[Farnsworth's raw deal tops, even still]

whose engine made possible not only railroads and steamboats but

also ever-more efficient cotton mills. [the touch, the feel… of technology]

And, for the first time,

chemicals other than stale urine, [you must be kidding]

I wish I was kidding,

were being used to bleach the cloth that people wore—

the first of which was sulfuric acid, [sounds super chafey]

which was created in large quantities only thanks to lead-lined chambers,

which would’ve been impossible without lead production

rising dramatically right around 1750 in Britain,

thanks to lead foundries powered by coal.

And all these factors came together to make more yarn

that could be spun and bleached faster and cheaper than ever before,

a process that would eventually culminate in

$18 Crash Course Mongols shirts.

[no exceptions!&$%# ] [ha]

Available now at DFTBA.com.

Thanks, Thought Bubble,

for that shameless promotion of our beautiful, high-quality t-shirts available

now at DFTBA.com. [TeamCrashCourse: lousy with subtlty]

So, the problem here

is that with industrialization being so deeply interconnected,

it’s really difficult to figure out why it happened in Europe,

especially Britain.

And that question of why

turns out to be one of the more contentious discussions

in world history today.

For instance, here are some Eurocentric reasons

why industrialization might have happened first in Europe:

There’s the cultural superiority argument that basically holds

that Europeans are just better and smarter than other people.

[somebody explain Mr. Bean then]

Sometimes this is formulated as Europeans possessing

superior rationality.

By the way, you’ll never guess

where the people who make this argument tend to come from—

unless you guessed that they come from Europe.

And then, others argue

that only Europe had the culture of science and invention

that made the creation of these revolutionary technologies possible.

Another argument is that freer political institutions encouraged innovation

and strong property rights created incentives for inventors.

And, finally, people often cite Europe’s small population

because small populations require labor-saving inventions.

Oh,

it’s time for the Open Letter?

[it's not the yellow chair he's rolling over to so I just can't bear to look.]

An Open Letter to the Steam Engine.

But first,

let’s see what’s in the secret compartment today.

Oh, it’s a Tardis. [you're welcome, Whovians]

Truly the apex of British industrialization.

Dear Steam Engine,

You know what’s crazy?

You’ve really never been improved upon.

Like this thing,

which facilitates time travel,

probably runs on a steam engine. [Eye of Harmony > steam engine, ftr]

Almost all electricity around the world,

whether it’s from coal or nuclear power,

is just a steam engine.

It’s all still just water and heat,

and it speaks to how truly revolutionary

the Industrial Revolution was that since then,

it’s really just been evolution.

Best Wishes, John Green

So, you may have heard any of those rationales for

European industrialization,

or you may have heard others.

The problem with all of them,

is that each time you think you’re at the root cause

it turns out there’s a cause of the root cause.

[not unlike the show LOST]

To quote Leonardo diCaprio, James Cameron,

and coal mine operators,

“We have to go deeper.” ["Context is everything." -John Green]

But, anyway, the problem with these Eurocentric why answers,

is that they all apply to either China or India or both.

And it’s really important to note that in 1800,

it was not clear that Europe was going to become

the world’s dominant manufacturing power in the next hundred years.

At the time,

China, India, and Europe were all roughly at the same place

in terms of industrial production.

First, let’s look at China.

It’s hard to make the European cultural superiority argument

because China had been recording its history since before Confucius,

and plus there was all that bronze and painting and poetry.

It’s also kind of difficult to make a blanket statement that

China was economically inferior to Europe,

since they invented paper money

and led the world in exports of everything from silk to china.

I mean, pre-Industrial Revolution,

population growth was the surest sign of economic success,

and China had the biggest population in the world.

[were my flowers just assaulted by educational exuberance?]

I guess that answers the question of whether they’re digital.

[better be in stock at thinkgeek.com, mr. green. just saying...]

It’s also difficult to say that China lacked a culture of invention

when they invented gunpowder, and printing, and paper,

and arguably compasses.

And China had more free enterprise during the Song dynasty

than anywhere in the world.

Some argue that China couldn’t have free enterprise

because they had a long history of trying to impose monopolies

on items like salt and iron.

And that’s true,

but when it comes to enforcing those monopolies,

they also had a long history of failure.

So really, in a lot of ways,

China was at least as primed for an Industrial Revolution as Britain was.

So, why didn’t it happen?

Well, Europeans—

specifically the British—

had two huge advantages:

First, Coal.

When you trace the story of improved transportation, or communication,

or industrial efficiency,

or better chemical manufacturing,

it always comes back to coal,

because the Industrial Revolution was all about using different forms

of energy to automate production.

And,

England had large supplies of coal that were near the surface,

which meant that it was cheap to mine,

so it quickly replaced wood for heating and cooking and stuff.

So, that encouraged the British to look for more coal.

The only problem with coal mining,

aside from it being,

you know, like,

deadly and everything,

is that the coal mines flooded all the time.

I guess coal mining is also a little problematic for, like,

the health of,

you know, like, the planet.

["Nudge, nudge, wink, wink. Know what I mean?"]

But,

because there was all this incentive to get more coal out of the ground,

steam engines were invented to pump water out of the mines.

And because those early steam engines were super inefficient,

they needed a cheap and abundant source of fuel in order to work—