The aeroplane might be the world’s most dangerous invention
Is the aeroplane the most dangerous technology we’ve invented? Not because of bombs, climate change or crashes on cities, but because of how quickly a virus can spread around the globe. Daniel Defoe’s A Journal of The Plague Year was published in 1722. Defoe was only five during London’s Great Plague but his verifiable narrative described its transport on Dutch shipping, recording his mathematical analysis predicting the spread of disease. He stated the need for self-isolation and how youths in pubs ignored social distancing. Infected people were confined for 40 days — hence ‘quarantine’. Modern scientists suggest Covid is unique, as people are infectious days before they have symptoms. But
