Locator: 49972SPANISHFLU.
Locator: 49972KEYNES.
Two books:
- Capitalism and Its Critics, A History: From the Industrial Revolution to AI, John Cassidy, c. 2025. Incredibly good book.
- Chapter 15: John Maynard Keynes's Blueprit for Managed Capitalism, p. 256.
- Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed The World, Laura Spinney, c. 2017. Such a great book on so many levels.
I never understood John Maynard Keynes but now I have a bit more insight. Interestingly enough, it's because I just completed Laura Spinney's incredible book on the Spanish flu. We will connect those dots later. Perhaps.
One magazine article, link here (most likely behind a paywall):
"I, Claudius: no one knows exactly how AI systems work. Teams at Anthropic are trying to decode the machine mind," in the current issue of The New Yorker, February 16 & 23, 2026, p. 52, by Gideon Lewis-Kraus -- an 11-page essay with an additional full page graphic depicting a "black box" of sorts.
Anyone thinking they know something about AI needs to read this article.
You have no idea how much I enjoy conversing with chatbots. With regard to John Maynard Keynes and the Spanish flu I asked Google Gemini a question and was very disappointed. Because of that poor response, I then asked ChatGPT which provided a much, much better answer.
I said that to ChatGPT -- and provided a bit of insight with regard to chatbots. Truly amazing. But I digress.
Again, folks who think they know something about AI, need to read the Lewis-Kraus article in The New Yorker.
********************************
The Book
John Maynard Keynes not once mentioned the Spanish flu in his landmark book despite being written during the world's greatest pandemic ever.
Notably, Laura Spinney, despite name-dropping dozens of famous names, never mentions Keynes in her book. Not once. I've read the book twice, I've checked the index, and to confirm, I asked a chatbot -- the chatbot seemed a bit confused but in the end confirmed what I have just writte.
From Chapter 15 of John Cassidy's book on Keynes:
"The more troublous the times, the worse does a laissez-faire system work."
It's a twenty-page chapter but knowing these few data points below pretty much tells me all I need to know to get started:
- the Spanish flu began in March, 1918
- WWI ended November 18, 1918
- the Paris Peace Conference began exactly two months later, January 18, 1919
- John Maynard Keynes was a British representative but left early in protest
- upset how the Allied Powers were determined to financially destroy Germany
- the Spanish flu was over almost exactly two years after it started, also in March 1920
- the US capitalists became ungodly rich off World War I
- selling and financing armaments during the war; and,
- funding and financing the recovery following the war.
In other words, for the western countries, WWI and the Spanish flu would have been similar to fighting a major war in the Mideast at the same time as the Covid-19 outbreak. I'm not sure it could have been done; certainly the outcome would have been different.
You know, I used to think lawyers were "bad" (devious). I'm beginning to think the bankers weren't far behind. And, in some respects, perhaps worse. But again, I digress.
Now, to get started on Chapter 15.
******************************
Anthropic And Decoding Marchine Language
I've already started a dialogue with ChatGPT with regard to this article.
Based on fairly extensive interaction with both ChatGPT and Google Gemini, I think ChatGPT will be a better fit for me as I do through this article.
