Jimmy Carr says Jeremy Clarkson began by writing car reviews for a local newspaper, which were later sold to many other papers.
“he used to write reviews for cars in the local paper. He would write these articles”
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Jimmy Carr
1 episodes · 12 quoted claims
Jimmy Carr says Peter Turchin's theory attributes the collapse of societies to inequality and an overproduction of elites.
“It's, uh, one is inequality, uh, and one is the overproduction of elites.”
Jimmy Carr says the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa threw particles into the stratosphere, leaving Europe without a summer the following year.
“So when Krakatoa went off, it was such a big volcanic eruption. There was no summer in Europe the next year”
Jimmy Carr says temperature determined the sex of dinosaur eggs, and that cooling after the asteroid impact left them all female and killed them off.
“the eggs below a certain temperature were male, and above a certain temperature were female dinosaur eggs.”
Jimmy Carr says Pope Gregory ordered chants to be written down so churches sang them identically, which he credits as the origin of musical notation.
“it takes him a couple of hundred years, but musical notation comes from that, that's where musical notation comes from.”
Jimmy Carr says comedy has a natural rhythm of about ninety-two beats a minute, similar to a comfortable walking pace.
“It's about ninety-two beats a minute. It's like a comfortable walking pace.”
Jimmy Carr names Mitch Hedberg as the best joke writer of the last thirty years but says his inconsistent pacing made his shows uneven.
“pound for pound, best joke writer of the last thirty years was Mitch Hedberg, right?”
Jimmy Carr says Neil Howe's 1996 book The Fourth Turning described eras that Carr believes predicted current upheaval.
“this guy Neil Howe wrote this book called The Fourth Turning in, like, 1996, and he predicted everything that's happening in the world right now.”
Jimmy Carr says Neil Postman wrote Amusing Ourselves to Death in 1984, arguing that television turned news into entertainment.
“Neil Postman had, he wrote this brilliant book in, like, 1984, right? Called Amusing Ourselves to Death.”
Jimmy Carr claims the East German Stasi cost around 20% of GDP to run and that AI makes similar surveillance vastly cheaper.
“It used to cost like 20% of your G D P to run the Stasi and keep eyes on everyone.”
Jimmy Carr says about one to two percent of people died violent deaths in the twentieth century, versus ten to twenty percent among hunter-gatherers.
“Between one and two percent of people died violent deaths in that hundred years. When we were hunter-gatherers, it was between ten and twenty percent of people died violent deaths.”
Jimmy Carr says schools still follow the Prussian model, which taught information and discipline to staff the empire.
“So the Prussians taught, cause they needed to, um, staff their empire. So they taught information and discipline, right?”