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Speaker 1: Pushkin. Hello, dear listeners, it is Tim Harford here with

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Speaker 1: an exciting idea up my sleeve. I want to know

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Speaker 1: if you'd be interested in joining a cautionary club with

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Speaker 1: additional member only content. And with that in mind, the

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Speaker 1: Cautionary Tales team and I have put together a survey.

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Speaker 1: We'd like to find out exactly what kind of content

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Speaker 1: you're keen to get your hands on. Would you like

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Speaker 1: a cautionary newsletter, perhaps some extra conversations like my last

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Speaker 1: one with Adam Grant, or maybe you have another idea

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Speaker 1: for us altogether. The link is in the episode description

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Speaker 1: and it will take you just a few short minutes

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Speaker 1: to answer, so please do take a moment to fill

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Speaker 1: it out and let us know your thoughts. We are

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Speaker 1: really keen to hear from you. Thank you. Hello. I

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Speaker 1: have a frighteningly good episode of Cautionary Tales for you

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Speaker 1: this Halloween. It was recorded in front of a live

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Speaker 1: audience at the podcast show in London, and I shared

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Speaker 1: the stage with actors and our sound supremo, Pascal Wise,

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Speaker 1: who not only created grizzly sound effects by hand, but

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Speaker 1: played the trombone two. I hope you enjoy this nightmarish

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Speaker 1: marriage of true crime and economics. October thirty, first Halloween

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Speaker 1: in Edinburgh, Scotland, eighteen twenty eight. A short, middle aged

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Speaker 1: woman walks into a bar where a man sits drinking.

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Speaker 1: She asks the barkeeper, can you help me?

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Speaker 2: I've come to Edinburgh to see my son. He's working here.

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Speaker 2: But when I went to the last the dress he

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Speaker 2: gave me the landlady said he left three days ago.

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Speaker 2: I don't know where he is, and he doesn't know

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Speaker 2: him here. I've no money and no place to stay.

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Speaker 1: The man who's drinking at the bar looks up.

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Speaker 3: Wait a minute, you're from Ireland. I can tell by

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Speaker 3: your accent.

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Speaker 2: Yes, I'm from Donegal. My name's Maggie Doherty Away.

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Speaker 3: I'm a doughty too, and I'm family in Donegal. Sure

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Speaker 3: we must be related. Let me buy you a weed drink.

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Speaker 3: What an amazing coincidence. Hey, Maggie, you must stay the

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Speaker 3: night with me and my wife.

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Speaker 1: The man takes Maggie Doherty back to a room in

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Speaker 1: a shared house sixteen feet by seven. In the room

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Speaker 1: is a wooden bed with straw for a mattress and

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Speaker 1: a pile of straw to the side. He gives her

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Speaker 1: a drink and some food and another drink. Then he says,

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Speaker 1: right enough, I need to pop out. Now I'll be back,

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Speaker 1: Maggie doctor. He goes in search of someone to talk to.

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Speaker 1: She pokes her head around the door of the neighboring room,

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Speaker 1: introduces herself to the woman there, and tells her sad story.

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Speaker 2: You know, I really should be looking for my son.

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Speaker 2: I'll go searching.

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Speaker 1: Now, leave it till tomorrow, says the neighbor. Halloween's a

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Speaker 1: busy night. You don't know the city and obviously had

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Speaker 1: a lot to drink. You may not easily find your

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Speaker 1: way back here.

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Speaker 2: Ah, you're right, I'll just wait till mister Doherty gets in.

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Speaker 1: Mister Dartey, says the neighbor.

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Speaker 2: Mister Doherty, my relative, your neighbor. He lives in that

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Speaker 2: room there.

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Speaker 1: He's not called Doughty, says the neighbor. He's called Burke.

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Speaker 1: The two women look at each other confused. Does Maggie

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Speaker 1: start to sense that something is wrong? Perhaps not, She

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Speaker 1: is very very drunk. Mister Dotty, or rather mister Burke,

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Speaker 1: comes back. He's with a friend and both their wives.

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Speaker 1: The four of them take Maggie Dotty back to Burke's room.

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Speaker 1: Then they shove Maggie Dotty down to the bed. Burke

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Speaker 1: pins her down well. The other man clamps his hands

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Speaker 1: over her nose and mouth. She can't move, she can't

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Speaker 1: call for help, she can't breathe. I'm Tim Harford and

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Speaker 1: you're listening to Cautionary Tales Live in London. November eighteen

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Speaker 1: twenty seven, a year before Maggie Dotty's fateful Halloween. William

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Speaker 1: Hare the problem. Hair runs a cramped and cruddy boarding

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Speaker 1: house in a slum part of Edinburgh's Old Town, where

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Speaker 1: the buildings are packed tightly together and the smells from

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Speaker 1: the nearby tanneries compete with those from sewage hurled from

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Speaker 1: windows into the street. One of Hare's lodgers has just died,

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Speaker 1: and the dead man seems to have no relatives or

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Speaker 1: friends to take the body away. Hair tells the local

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Speaker 1: authority and they say we'll get it and bury it

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Speaker 1: in a pauper's grave. But a full day passes and

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Speaker 1: nobody comes. That body's taking up space I could be

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Speaker 1: renting out, Hair complains to his friend William Burke. Burke

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Speaker 1: and Hare have both heard rumors that it's possible to

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Speaker 1: sell human bodies to medical schools. Could they sell Hair's

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Speaker 1: dead lodger. Neither has any idea how to go about it,

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Speaker 1: so they take their way to another more prosperous part

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Speaker 1: of Edinburgh, where the medical schools have their quarters. They

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Speaker 1: ask around, but nervously assume that what they're doing must

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Speaker 1: be against the law. Are you a student. We've heard

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Speaker 1: that medical schools are sometimes in need of human bodies.

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Speaker 3: You'll want to see doctor Knox number ten, Sorogeant Square.

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Speaker 1: Burke and Hare make their way to Surgeon Square and

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Speaker 1: find number ten. One of the doctor's assistants opens the door.

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Speaker 2: The Doctor's not here now, Ah, you have a subject,

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Speaker 2: bring it. After dark.

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Speaker 1: Back at Hare's boarding house, someone from the local authority

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Speaker 1: has been round with a coffin and put the body

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Speaker 1: in it. Soon a porter will come to take the

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Speaker 1: coffin away. Burke and Hare have no time to live

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Speaker 1: if they want to get some cash for their dead lodger.

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Speaker 1: They gently pry up the nails on the coffin lid,

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Speaker 1: haul the body out and stuff it in a sack.

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Speaker 1: And when the porter comes, he's bound to notice If

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Speaker 1: the coffin's empty, they'd better put something heavy in it.

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Speaker 1: They go to a nearby tannery where piles of barker

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Speaker 1: crushed for the tannin used to make leather hides. Burke

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Speaker 1: and Hair take a load of the bark They tip

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Speaker 1: it into the coffin, nail down the lid again. Then

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Speaker 1: they wait for dark to fall. The two friends heave

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Speaker 1: the sack with the lodger's body through the streets of

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Speaker 1: Edinburgh back to the doctor's place.

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Speaker 2: Come on in, then you're new. I take it well

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Speaker 2: up the stairs and lay the subject out on that

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Speaker 2: table there for the doctor. Oh, and you'll have to

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Speaker 2: take the night shirt off it.

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Speaker 1: Burke and Hare take the night shirt off the body

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Speaker 1: into the room. Come doctor Knox, a striking figure in

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Speaker 1: his mid thirties, prematurely baled with just one eye smallpox

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Speaker 1: took the other, and always flamboyantly dressed with his gold

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Speaker 1: chains and embroidered waistcoat. Doctor Knox glances of the naked body,

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Speaker 1: nods his head and says, let's say.

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Speaker 3: Seven pounds and ten shillings.

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Speaker 1: Seven pounds and ten shillings, that's about what you'd earned

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Speaker 1: for three months of hard manual labor. Merk and Hair

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Speaker 1: can hardly believe their luck. The assistant gives them the

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Speaker 1: money and escorts them back to the door. Is nobody

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Speaker 1: going to ask them where they got the body, or

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Speaker 1: who it was, or what gives them the right to

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Speaker 1: sell it? Apparently not? Can it really be that easy? Apparently?

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Speaker 2: So we'll be glad to see you again when you

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Speaker 2: have an the body to dispose of.

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Speaker 1: Burke and Hare had assumed that what they were doing

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Speaker 1: must be illegal. It was not. The law said a

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Speaker 1: dead person's possessions pass on to the next of kin.

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Speaker 1: That's why Dror Knox's assistant insisted on the night shirt

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Speaker 1: being taken off the body. Legally, that night shirt must

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Speaker 1: belong to someone, even if it wasn't clear who. Dr

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Speaker 1: Knox could get in trouble if he bought it. But

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Speaker 1: the body itself was a different matter. When a person died,

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Speaker 1: their next of kin didn't own the body. In the

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Speaker 1: eyes of the law, a human body was not a

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Speaker 1: thing that could be owned at all, and if it

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Speaker 1: couldn't be owned, then logically speaking, it couldn't be stolen.

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Speaker 1: Burke and Hair had broken no law by taking the

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Speaker 1: lodger's body. Dr Knox broken no law in buying it.

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Speaker 1: Lecturers like doctor k Ox needed bodies to teach their students.

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Speaker 1: For years, the law had given medical schools the bodies

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Speaker 1: of criminals had been hanged. Indeed, knowing you'd be publicly

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Speaker 1: dissected was seen as part of the punishment. But more

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Speaker 1: and more people were training as doctors, and nowhere near

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Speaker 1: enough criminals were being sentenced to death. By the eighteen twenties,

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Speaker 1: a black market had sprung up to meet the demand

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Speaker 1: for bodies. Some, like Hare's Lodger, were taken straight from

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Speaker 1: their death beds to the medical school, but most were

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Speaker 1: supplied by grave robbers or resurrectionists. They'd sneak into graveyards

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Speaker 1: and the dead of night and dig up a recently

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Speaker 1: buried corpse. As nobody owned those bodies, it wasn't stealing

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Speaker 1: as long as they took the clothes off the body

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Speaker 1: and put them back in the coffin. There was one

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Speaker 1: law the resurrectionists were breaking. It was illegal to violate

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Speaker 1: a sepulcher, but the punishments weren't severe and prosecutions were rare.

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Speaker 1: The authorities mostly looked the other way. No one wanted

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Speaker 1: to put the medical schools out of business. Still, perhaps

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Speaker 1: there was a better way. Some people floated ideas to

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Speaker 1: create a legal supply of cadavers, as the author Lisa

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Speaker 1: Rosna describes in her book on birken Hair. One proposal

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Speaker 1: was to let universities have the bodies of people who

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Speaker 1: died in poorhouses. These people had relied on handouts from

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Speaker 1: the public purse. The argument went, surely we could dissect

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Speaker 1: them when they died, instead of spending yet more on

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Speaker 1: a pauper's burial. Great idea, said the radical politician Henry Hunt.

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Speaker 1: How about we start with the people who've benefited most

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Speaker 1: from public money during their lives.

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Speaker 4: Yes, now, I would recommend no, listen, listen, I would

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Speaker 4: recommend in the first place, that the bodies of all

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Speaker 4: our kings be dissected, instead of expending seven or eight,

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Speaker 4: seven or eight hundred thousand pounds of the public money

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Speaker 4: for their internment. Next, I would dissect all our hereditary legislators.

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Speaker 1: Hunt's objections struck a chord with the public. Poor people

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Speaker 1: couldn't afford to get treated by doctors, so why should

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Speaker 1: their bodies be the ones doctors trained on that? What

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Speaker 1: were the alternatives? Another more imaginative proposal came from the

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Speaker 1: Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh creator fully legalized, regulated

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Speaker 1: market let living people sell to medical schools the right

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Speaker 1: to use their body after they die. It wouldn't be wise,

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Speaker 1: they added, for such a market to let relatives sell

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Speaker 1: bodies after death. That might create a legally sanctioned incentive

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Speaker 1: for murder. But of course there already was a legally

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Speaker 1: murky market, and the incentive for murder that created was

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Speaker 1: all too clear. A few weeks have passed since Burke

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Speaker 1: and Hare received their seven pounds and ten shillings, and

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Speaker 1: they sense the possibility of another payday because another of

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Speaker 1: William Hare's lodgers has fallen gravely ill, an old man

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Speaker 1: with no known relatives. He's delirious with fever, too weak

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Speaker 1: to speak. He is going to die, isn't he hopefully soon?

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Speaker 1: What's taking him so long? Is there any way he

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Speaker 1: might be encouraged to hurry up? Burke presses a pillow

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Speaker 1: onto the man's face while hair pins him down to

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Speaker 1: stop him struggling. It doesn't take long. Cautionary tales will

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Speaker 1: be back after the break.

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Speaker 5: Welcome, gentlemen, take your seats. Today we will consider on

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Speaker 5: the causes and treatment of lateral curlature of the human spine.

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Speaker 1: Doctor Robert Knox ran the most popular medical school in Edinburgh.

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Speaker 1: In the winter of eighteen twenty seven, he had two

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Speaker 1: hundred and forty seven students, almost twice as many as

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Speaker 1: his nearest competitor. That's partly because Knox was such a

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Speaker 1: brilliant teacher. As one writer put.

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Speaker 2: It in Gifts a speech, he was unequaled his harmonious voice,

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Speaker 2: his clearness, his logical precision, the enormous amount of information

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Speaker 2: which flowed without effort from his lips.

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Speaker 1: Knox was also snooty, even cruel when he described his rivals.

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Speaker 1: He mocked them when they didn't have enough cadavers to

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Speaker 1: teach with and had to use illustrations instead.

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Speaker 3: Gentlemen, would you pay to study at their school of

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Speaker 3: pictoral anatomy?

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Speaker 1: That's the other reason Knox's school was so successful. He

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Speaker 1: ensured his students had a steady supply of corpses. Knox

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Speaker 1: would assign six students to each body. They'd rotate around,

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Speaker 1: taking turns to practice with a scalpel, forceps and saw,

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Speaker 1: peeling back the skin and fat to examine the muscles

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Speaker 1: and ligaments on the limbs, cutting through the ribs to

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Speaker 1: explore the lungs and the heart, trying out specific surgeries

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Speaker 1: such as extracting bladder stones. As another eminent surgeon put.

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Speaker 3: It, there's only when we have acquired dexterity on the

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Speaker 3: dead subject, so we can be justified in interfering with

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Speaker 3: the loving.

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Speaker 1: Students knew they could rely on doctor Knox to give

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Speaker 1: them that chance to acquire dexterity, and grave robbers knew

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Speaker 1: that when they brought a body to Knox, he wouldn't

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Speaker 1: haggle too hard orb you off with a credit note.

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Speaker 1: He could give you a fair price and prompt payment

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Speaker 1: in cash. By April eighteen twenty eight, William Burke and

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Speaker 1: William Hare were becoming regulars at doctor Knox's place on

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Speaker 1: Surgeon's Square. After the old man that brought the doctor

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Speaker 1: an old woman and a middle aged man who clearly

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Speaker 1: had jaundice and could plausibly have died from that. They

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Speaker 1: knew the routine now that'd bring the body naked in

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Speaker 1: a tea chest. They'd follow the doctor's assistant up the stairs,

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Speaker 1: lay the body out on the dissection table the doctor

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Speaker 1: to examine. But the latest body was quite unlike the

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Speaker 1: others they had brought so far. This naked corpse was

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Speaker 1: that of a young girl, maybe eighteen years old, young

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Speaker 1: and beautiful. The doctor's assistant took one look at her,

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Speaker 1: and I know that girl.

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Speaker 2: She's called Mary. She lives in Canongate. I saw her

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Speaker 2: a couple of weeks ago, and she looked in perfect health.

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Speaker 1: The body was cool, but not yet stiff. Clearly the

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Speaker 1: girl had not been dead for more than a few hours.

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Speaker 2: Where did you get that body?

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Speaker 1: Burke and Hair must have felt the panic rising in

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Speaker 1: their chests. Up to now, they'd actually been pretty smart.

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Speaker 1: They'd killed people who nobody would notice were missing, who

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Speaker 1: were old or obviously diseased. But perhaps they'd been smart

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Speaker 1: only by accident, because now they'd got and murdered a healthy,

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Speaker 1: young woman whose face was known around town. Standing in

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Speaker 1: front of the doctor and his assistant, they must suddenly

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Speaker 1: have realized how reckless that was. Burke tried to think

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Speaker 1: on his feet.

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Speaker 3: And we bought it, Yeah, that we bought the body

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Speaker 3: from an old woman on the cannon gid.

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Speaker 1: Doctor Knox looked at them. Perhaps he believed them, perhaps

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Speaker 1: he didn't. Either way.

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Speaker 3: Hmmm, well it's fine, gentlemen. Shall we see it?

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Speaker 1: Pounds in the nineteen nineties, the economist Alvin Roth became

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Speaker 1: fascinated by kidneys. When a person has kidney failure, their

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Speaker 1: life can sometimes be saved by a transplant, but that

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Speaker 1: requires not only a donor, but a donor whose kidney

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Speaker 1: matches in terms of blood type and tissue type. It's

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Speaker 1: possible for a living person to donate a kidney. We

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Speaker 1: have two, and most of the time we can function

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Speaker 1: just as well with only one. Sometimes a family member

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Speaker 1: will offer to donate a kidney to save their loved

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Speaker 1: one's life, but often, frustratingly, the would be donor isn't

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Speaker 1: a match. Sometimes a patient will get lucky. A total

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Speaker 1: stranger will make the offer, motivated by pure altruism. But

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Speaker 1: there's one thing a patient can't do, pay someone to

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Speaker 1: give them a kidney. Thinking as an economist, Roth wondered,

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Speaker 1: why not you have a sick, wealthy person who needs

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Speaker 1: a kidney. You have a poor, healthy person who's willing

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Speaker 1: to lose a kidney for the right price, two consenting

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Speaker 1: adults who want to engage in a transaction that will

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Speaker 1: benefit them both. Why should we stop them? And yet

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Speaker 1: we do stop them. Selling kidneys is against the law

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Speaker 1: in almost every country In the world. Rath is curious,

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Speaker 1: what exactly is it we object to about a legally

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Speaker 1: sanctioned market in kidneys. Perhaps we're concerned that sellers wouldn't

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Speaker 1: fully understand the risks, but could regulate the market to

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Speaker 1: make sure consent was informed. Maybe we worry that people

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Speaker 1: might be coerced into selling their kidney, but we already

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Speaker 1: have safeguards to ensure that family members who come forward

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Speaker 1: are not under duress. Or maybe the concern is about

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Speaker 1: where it could lead. Legalize kidney sales, and before you

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00:21:31,970 --> 00:21:35,570
Speaker 1: know it, you might have mortgage lenders requiring your kidney

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Speaker 1: as extra collateral. Again, says Roth, you could write laws

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Speaker 1: to guard against that. But even if you imagine laws

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Speaker 1: and regulations that are completely watertight, Roth found people still

294
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Speaker 1: don't want it to be legal for others to sell

295
00:21:52,650 --> 00:21:58,690
Speaker 1: their kidneys, even if they can't articulate exactly why. Roth

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00:21:58,730 --> 00:22:01,330
Speaker 1: realized he had stumbled on an idea that didn't have

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00:22:01,370 --> 00:22:04,730
Speaker 1: a name in the economic literature. In two thousand and seven,

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00:22:05,050 --> 00:22:09,090
Speaker 1: he published a paper that gave it a name, repugnant marks.

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Speaker 1: These are markets we ban because we just don't like

300
00:22:13,930 --> 00:22:16,410
Speaker 1: the idea of their being a market makes us go

301
00:22:16,570 --> 00:22:21,690
Speaker 1: yuck Roth pointed to other markets that people find repugnant.

302
00:22:22,330 --> 00:22:26,770
Speaker 1: In many countries, sex is like donating a kidney. It's

303
00:22:26,770 --> 00:22:29,410
Speaker 1: fine to do it for love, but against the law

304
00:22:29,450 --> 00:22:32,690
Speaker 1: to do it for money. Often, though, when we ban

305
00:22:32,810 --> 00:22:37,050
Speaker 1: a repugnant market, we force it underground. There's a global

306
00:22:37,090 --> 00:22:40,850
Speaker 1: trade in kidneys, and banning prostitution doesn't tend to stop

307
00:22:40,890 --> 00:22:46,090
Speaker 1: it happening. Societies must then decide how hard to actually

308
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Speaker 1: try to stamp the market out. Sometimes the answer is

309
00:22:50,210 --> 00:22:53,770
Speaker 1: not very hard at all. Paying for sex in many

310
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Speaker 1: places is technically illegal, but tacitly tolerated. The same could

311
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Speaker 1: be said of that more literally underground activity robbing graves

312
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Speaker 1: for bodies. In eighteen twenties Edinburgh, nobody he wanted to

313
00:23:10,290 --> 00:23:15,570
Speaker 1: mount a serious crackdown on violating sepulchers, but nor was

314
00:23:15,610 --> 00:23:18,410
Speaker 1: there any appetite for setting up the kind of legalized

315
00:23:18,450 --> 00:23:22,210
Speaker 1: market in cadavers suggested by the Royal College of Physicians.

316
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Speaker 1: The thought was far too repugnant. Faced with a hard choice,

317
00:23:28,970 --> 00:23:33,970
Speaker 1: the authorities tried to ignore it. But Burke and Hare

318
00:23:34,730 --> 00:23:47,410
Speaker 1: were about to make it impossible to look the other way.

319
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Speaker 1: On the streets of Edinburgh's Old Town, one of the

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Speaker 1: best known characters was a teenage boy whom the locals

321
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Speaker 1: called Daft Jamie. He spent his days wandering barefoot, singing,

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Speaker 1: gabbling nonsense, and telling jokes and riddles. Sometimes other boys

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Speaker 1: made fun of him, and Jamie got tearful, but fight them,

324
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Speaker 1: because only bad boys fight. People liked Daft Jamie. They

325
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Speaker 1: gave him little gifts of money, food, or clothes. One day,

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Speaker 1: William Hare's wife came across Jamie looking for his mother.

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Speaker 1: Come with me, she said, back at the boarding house.

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Speaker 1: She left Jamie with hair and a bottle of whiskey

329
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Speaker 1: and went to fetch Burke. She ushered Burke into the

330
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Speaker 1: room and locked the door a surgeon's square. Dr Knox's

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Speaker 1: assistant recognized the body at once.

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Speaker 2: I know who that is. That's daff Jamie.

333
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Speaker 3: No, no, no, I'm sure you must be mistaken. It

334
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Speaker 3: can't possibly be anyone, you know. Still, let's prepare this

335
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Speaker 3: one for these students quickly, A shall I.

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Speaker 1: By the time people started to notice that no one

337
00:25:13,490 --> 00:25:17,410
Speaker 1: had seen Daft Jamie for a while, the evidence of

338
00:25:17,450 --> 00:25:21,210
Speaker 1: the murder had been cut up into tiny pieces and

339
00:25:21,290 --> 00:25:26,250
Speaker 1: disposed of. Burke and Hare had got away with it again.

340
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Speaker 1: They must have thought they could get away with anything.

341
00:25:31,210 --> 00:25:35,570
Speaker 1: Then on Halloween in eighteen twenty eight, they made one

342
00:25:35,610 --> 00:25:41,530
Speaker 1: mistake too many cautionary tales will be back after the break.

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Speaker 1: Like many young couples in Edinburgh's crowded Old Town, Anne

344
00:26:07,250 --> 00:26:10,170
Speaker 1: and James Gray couldn't have fallen to rent a whole room,

345
00:26:10,650 --> 00:26:13,250
Speaker 1: so they sublet space in a room from someone else.

346
00:26:14,130 --> 00:26:18,330
Speaker 1: William Burke and his wife. The Grays and their infant

347
00:26:18,450 --> 00:26:20,770
Speaker 1: son had been lodging with the Burkes for just a

348
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Speaker 1: couple of weeks when on Halloween William Burke came home

349
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Speaker 1: with a guest he'd met at a bar, Madgie Doherty.

350
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Speaker 1: Burke said to Anne, right, I want you Jay to

351
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Speaker 1: hear for the night. I need your bed for me.

352
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Speaker 3: We rull out over here, Margie.

353
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Speaker 2: Where are we supposed to go?

354
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Speaker 3: I don't worry. My friend Harro's got to be lodging house.

355
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Speaker 3: You can sleep ber at the night.

356
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Speaker 1: Anne and James weren't happy, but they left. When they

357
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Speaker 1: returned in the morning, there was no sign of Maggie,

358
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Speaker 1: and Burke seemed strangely flustered. I have a drink. Burke

359
00:26:58,610 --> 00:27:02,810
Speaker 1: poured them glasses of whiskey, and then he started pouring

360
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Speaker 1: whiskey all over the pile of straw in the corner

361
00:27:05,530 --> 00:27:06,130
Speaker 1: of the room.

362
00:27:06,650 --> 00:27:08,730
Speaker 2: What are you doing that for? You'll make the whole

363
00:27:08,770 --> 00:27:10,490
Speaker 2: room stingle whiskey or.

364
00:27:10,490 --> 00:27:13,650
Speaker 3: I just want to empty the Worsky bottles. Saw their

365
00:27:13,690 --> 00:27:16,690
Speaker 3: dagg and you know, Gordon get some more.

366
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Speaker 1: Very odd? Was there perhaps some other smell? Burke was

367
00:27:25,010 --> 00:27:29,810
Speaker 1: anxious to disguise The Grays kept their clothes near that

368
00:27:29,890 --> 00:27:32,970
Speaker 1: pile of straw and crossed the room to get her

369
00:27:32,970 --> 00:27:35,050
Speaker 1: infant son a clean pair of stockings.

370
00:27:35,130 --> 00:27:35,930
Speaker 2: Get away from there.

371
00:27:37,170 --> 00:27:40,930
Speaker 1: Burke's behavior was getting stranger and stranger. For the rest

372
00:27:40,930 --> 00:27:44,010
Speaker 1: of the day, either Burke or his wife sat close

373
00:27:44,050 --> 00:27:48,650
Speaker 1: to the pile of straw, eyeing the Grays suspiciously, and

374
00:27:49,170 --> 00:27:50,890
Speaker 1: later told the police.

375
00:27:50,970 --> 00:27:53,090
Speaker 2: I thought there was something that was not right.

376
00:27:54,050 --> 00:27:59,010
Speaker 1: At last, just before darkfall and got her chance to investigate,

377
00:27:59,650 --> 00:28:02,210
Speaker 1: Burke had left the house to run some kind of

378
00:28:02,370 --> 00:28:06,370
Speaker 1: errand then Burke's wife stepped out for a moment too.

379
00:28:06,930 --> 00:28:09,730
Speaker 2: The first thing I got on lifting up straw was

380
00:28:09,770 --> 00:28:10,890
Speaker 2: the woman's right.

381
00:28:10,770 --> 00:28:15,490
Speaker 1: Arm, and her husband lifted more of the straw to

382
00:28:15,570 --> 00:28:19,690
Speaker 1: reel the head with blood around the mouth. They both

383
00:28:19,770 --> 00:28:26,210
Speaker 1: recognized the woman they'd met briefly the night before, Maggie Doherty,

384
00:28:26,370 --> 00:28:29,290
Speaker 1: Anne and James Gray pack up their belongings, grab their

385
00:28:29,290 --> 00:28:32,130
Speaker 1: infant son, and make for the door. On their way

386
00:28:32,170 --> 00:28:35,050
Speaker 1: out of the house, they meet Burke's wife coming back in.

387
00:28:35,450 --> 00:28:38,530
Speaker 2: What the hell's going on? There's a corpse in the room.

388
00:28:38,810 --> 00:28:43,330
Speaker 1: Burke's wife falls to her knees. Don't tell anyone, she begs,

389
00:28:43,570 --> 00:28:46,650
Speaker 1: We'll give you money God for a bit. The Grays

390
00:28:46,730 --> 00:28:49,370
Speaker 1: push past Burke's wife and go to a police station

391
00:28:49,650 --> 00:28:53,410
Speaker 1: to tell their story. By the time a policeman arrives

392
00:28:53,450 --> 00:28:57,970
Speaker 1: at Burke's room, the body's gone, but there's blood on

393
00:28:58,010 --> 00:29:01,370
Speaker 1: the straw, and the neighbors say they've just seen Burke

394
00:29:01,490 --> 00:29:04,650
Speaker 1: and another man taking out a heavy looking tea chest.

395
00:29:06,050 --> 00:29:10,330
Speaker 1: If that was a body, thinks the policeman, Where might

396
00:29:10,370 --> 00:29:14,490
Speaker 1: they have taken it? The policeman knocks on the door

397
00:29:14,890 --> 00:29:17,530
Speaker 1: at ten Surgeons Square.

398
00:29:18,650 --> 00:29:22,250
Speaker 2: Yes, indeed, I've just taken delivery of a cadaver in

399
00:29:22,330 --> 00:29:26,130
Speaker 2: a tea chest. You'd like to see it, of course,

400
00:29:26,650 --> 00:29:27,170
Speaker 2: come on in.

401
00:29:44,170 --> 00:29:47,970
Speaker 1: As the economist Alvin Roth discovered, people find it easy

402
00:29:48,050 --> 00:29:51,570
Speaker 1: to discuss the potential costs of legalizing a market they

403
00:29:51,610 --> 00:29:55,810
Speaker 1: find repugnant, such as a marketing kidneys. It's harder to

404
00:29:55,810 --> 00:29:58,450
Speaker 1: get them to think about the costs of keeping that

405
00:29:58,530 --> 00:30:05,290
Speaker 1: market banned, but those costs are real. The people who'd

406
00:30:05,290 --> 00:30:07,730
Speaker 1: be willing to sell a kidney have to do without

407
00:30:07,770 --> 00:30:10,890
Speaker 1: the money they could have earned. Of course, we hate

408
00:30:10,930 --> 00:30:13,530
Speaker 1: to think of people selling a kidney only because they're

409
00:30:13,570 --> 00:30:18,210
Speaker 1: poor and desperate, but banning kidney sales doesn't make the

410
00:30:18,250 --> 00:30:22,090
Speaker 1: poverty and desperation go away. Then there are the people

411
00:30:22,090 --> 00:30:25,010
Speaker 1: who'd like to buy a kidney but can't. They end

412
00:30:25,090 --> 00:30:29,450
Speaker 1: up spending countless hours tied to a dialysis machine if

413
00:30:29,450 --> 00:30:36,130
Speaker 1: they're lucky. If they're unlucky, they end up dead. Still,

414
00:30:36,850 --> 00:30:40,250
Speaker 1: that widespread feeling of repugnance isn't something you can just

415
00:30:40,410 --> 00:30:44,970
Speaker 1: wish away. Roth asked himself. Is there a way to

416
00:30:45,130 --> 00:30:48,610
Speaker 1: create a mechanism that works like a market so it

417
00:30:48,650 --> 00:30:53,370
Speaker 1: gets more kidneys to more patients, but that doesn't trigger

418
00:30:53,530 --> 00:31:00,810
Speaker 1: a repugnance response? Roth helped to design kidney exchanges. Imagine

419
00:31:00,850 --> 00:31:04,090
Speaker 1: that you and I both need a kidney, and both

420
00:31:04,090 --> 00:31:07,890
Speaker 1: our partners are willing to donate. My partner's kidney isn't

421
00:31:07,890 --> 00:31:11,250
Speaker 1: a match for me, It is for you and your

422
00:31:11,250 --> 00:31:14,170
Speaker 1: partner's kidney isn't a match for you, but it is

423
00:31:14,210 --> 00:31:19,610
Speaker 1: for me, So we swap donors. Roth's exchanges take this

424
00:31:19,810 --> 00:31:22,450
Speaker 1: simple swap and make it work on a bigger scale.

425
00:31:22,610 --> 00:31:25,770
Speaker 1: They can link dozens of donors in one chain. It's

426
00:31:25,810 --> 00:31:29,450
Speaker 1: like a market for kidneys, but instead of paying with money,

427
00:31:30,090 --> 00:31:34,690
Speaker 1: you pay with a willing donor. Nobody finds it repugnant.

428
00:31:36,210 --> 00:31:39,370
Speaker 1: Roth won a Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics for his

429
00:31:39,490 --> 00:31:44,730
Speaker 1: work in designing new kinds of markets. Perhaps if Alvin

430
00:31:44,810 --> 00:31:48,410
Speaker 1: Roth had been around in eighteen twenties Edinburgh, he could

431
00:31:48,450 --> 00:31:51,330
Speaker 1: have found some equally clever way to get more cadavers

432
00:31:51,370 --> 00:31:54,330
Speaker 1: to more medical schools, something like the idea of the

433
00:31:54,410 --> 00:31:58,770
Speaker 1: Royal College of Physicians to reward the living in exchange

434
00:31:58,850 --> 00:32:03,570
Speaker 1: for their body after death. The absence of such a

435
00:32:03,610 --> 00:32:12,010
Speaker 1: mechanism had costs. Just ask Maggie Doherty. William Burke insists

436
00:32:12,090 --> 00:32:16,370
Speaker 1: to the policeman that he has no idea how Maggie

437
00:32:16,410 --> 00:32:21,610
Speaker 1: Doherty ended up dead, none at all. They were all

438
00:32:22,090 --> 00:32:25,850
Speaker 1: drinking and singing and dancing, he says, with William Hare

439
00:32:25,930 --> 00:32:30,290
Speaker 1: and both their wives, and then they suddenly noticed Maggie

440
00:32:30,290 --> 00:32:31,090
Speaker 1: wasn't there anymore.

441
00:32:31,690 --> 00:32:34,570
Speaker 3: Sure she must have crawled into the palist straw.

442
00:32:34,410 --> 00:32:42,090
Speaker 1: And you know dad a likely story. But could the

443
00:32:42,130 --> 00:32:47,130
Speaker 1: public prosecutor prove beyond reasonable doubt that Burke and Hare

444
00:32:47,450 --> 00:32:52,930
Speaker 1: and their wives were guilty of murder. Forensic science was

445
00:32:53,010 --> 00:32:56,450
Speaker 1: less advanced than today. The doctors said. The states of

446
00:32:56,570 --> 00:33:01,570
Speaker 1: Maggie Dochety's corpse was consistent with her having been forcibly suffocated.

447
00:33:02,130 --> 00:33:05,130
Speaker 1: They couldn't say for certain that she didn't choke to

448
00:33:05,130 --> 00:33:08,930
Speaker 1: death on her own vomit. In Scottish law, it was

449
00:33:09,210 --> 00:33:12,890
Speaker 1: notoriously hard to get a jury to convict for murder.

450
00:33:13,730 --> 00:33:17,210
Speaker 1: Other legal systems offer a jury just two possible verdicts,

451
00:33:17,290 --> 00:33:23,370
Speaker 1: guilty or not guilty. Scottish law adds a third possibility.

452
00:33:23,570 --> 00:33:27,010
Speaker 2: Not proven. It means we think you probably did it,

453
00:33:27,050 --> 00:33:28,970
Speaker 2: but we're not quite sure enough to send you to

454
00:33:29,010 --> 00:33:29,610
Speaker 2: the gallows.

455
00:33:30,690 --> 00:33:33,650
Speaker 1: The only way to guarantee at least one conviction, the

456
00:33:33,690 --> 00:33:37,530
Speaker 1: prosecutor reluctantly decided, was to cut a deal with one

457
00:33:37,570 --> 00:33:43,010
Speaker 1: of the accused. Testify and we'll let you off. William

458
00:33:43,090 --> 00:33:48,250
Speaker 1: Hare jumped at the chance to turn King's evidence. Under

459
00:33:48,250 --> 00:33:52,570
Speaker 1: Scottish law, a man couldn't testify against his wife, so

460
00:33:52,890 --> 00:33:57,090
Speaker 1: Hair's wife was off the hook too. With immunity from prosecution.

461
00:33:57,810 --> 00:34:05,530
Speaker 1: Hair confessed to the murder of Magie Doherty and daft Jamie,

462
00:34:06,130 --> 00:34:09,890
Speaker 1: and young Mary, and that sick old man the lodging house,

463
00:34:10,730 --> 00:34:14,610
Speaker 1: and the old woman, and the jaundiced man, and that

464
00:34:14,690 --> 00:34:22,050
Speaker 1: old grandma and a twelve year old grandchild, and sixteen

465
00:34:22,170 --> 00:34:28,810
Speaker 1: murders in all. The police were astonished, but in fifteen

466
00:34:28,850 --> 00:34:33,330
Speaker 1: of those cases the evidence had long ago been dissected away.

467
00:34:34,490 --> 00:34:38,770
Speaker 1: Only Maggie Doherty's body remained. And so it was for

468
00:34:38,850 --> 00:34:42,850
Speaker 1: the murder of Maggie Doherty that Burke and his wife

469
00:34:43,090 --> 00:34:47,650
Speaker 1: stood trial. Burke's wife the jury found.

470
00:34:48,530 --> 00:34:53,010
Speaker 2: Not proven Burke, though guilty.

471
00:34:54,050 --> 00:34:57,090
Speaker 1: The judge left no doubt about what he thought.

472
00:34:57,570 --> 00:35:01,250
Speaker 3: In the whole history of civilized society, there never has

473
00:35:01,290 --> 00:35:06,130
Speaker 3: been exhibited such a system of barbarous and savage iniquity,

474
00:35:06,410 --> 00:35:11,970
Speaker 3: or anything at all corresponding in a cross, So these cold, hypocritical,

475
00:35:12,450 --> 00:35:17,610
Speaker 3: calculating and bloody murder one of the most monstrous delineations

476
00:35:18,010 --> 00:35:19,250
Speaker 3: of human depravity.

477
00:35:21,050 --> 00:35:27,890
Speaker 1: William Burke was sentenced to hang. Burke and Hare's murders

478
00:35:28,010 --> 00:35:31,770
Speaker 1: focused the minds of politicians. They had to remove the

479
00:35:31,810 --> 00:35:37,010
Speaker 1: incentive for Robin Graves and committing murder. They passed the

480
00:35:37,170 --> 00:35:40,610
Speaker 1: Anatomy Act, which gave medical schools the right to take

481
00:35:40,690 --> 00:35:44,530
Speaker 1: bodies from workhouses, prisons or hospitals if no one had

482
00:35:44,570 --> 00:35:49,210
Speaker 1: claimed them within forty eight hours of death. Campaigning politicians

483
00:35:49,250 --> 00:35:52,650
Speaker 1: continued to object. The law was commandeering the bodies of

484
00:35:52,690 --> 00:35:56,450
Speaker 1: the poor, they said, to train doctors whose services only

485
00:35:56,490 --> 00:36:01,570
Speaker 1: the rich could afford. But was there a better alternative?

486
00:36:03,410 --> 00:36:05,970
Speaker 1: If Alvin Roth had been around in the eighteen twenties

487
00:36:06,010 --> 00:36:10,290
Speaker 1: to think that question through, what might he have suggested?

488
00:36:11,050 --> 00:36:14,450
Speaker 1: Roth gives us a clue in his paper Repugnance as

489
00:36:14,490 --> 00:36:18,290
Speaker 1: a Constraint on Markets. He quotes an editorial from the

490
00:36:18,370 --> 00:36:23,530
Speaker 1: Lancet in eighteen twenty four, four years before the Edinburgh murders,

491
00:36:24,010 --> 00:36:27,810
Speaker 1: which argued for ending the historical practice of giving medical

492
00:36:27,850 --> 00:36:33,610
Speaker 1: schools the bodies of hanged murderers. It only keeps up

493
00:36:33,690 --> 00:36:38,330
Speaker 1: the prejudice against dissection, they wrote. That would have been

494
00:36:38,330 --> 00:36:42,210
Speaker 1: a good start in overcoming repugnance, says Roth, Instead of

495
00:36:42,210 --> 00:36:46,290
Speaker 1: seeing dissection as punishment, you'd try to reframe it as

496
00:36:46,290 --> 00:36:51,570
Speaker 1: an altruistic contribution to advancing medical knowledge. Many people see

497
00:36:51,610 --> 00:36:54,210
Speaker 1: it that way today when they leave their bodies to science.

498
00:36:55,090 --> 00:36:59,610
Speaker 1: The present day University of Edinburgh, for instance, assures potential

499
00:36:59,650 --> 00:37:01,650
Speaker 1: donors that were it not for.

500
00:37:01,650 --> 00:37:05,130
Speaker 2: Such acts of selflessness, it would be impossible to maintain

501
00:37:05,210 --> 00:37:09,890
Speaker 2: Scotland's high educational reputation in the medical profession, and for

502
00:37:09,930 --> 00:37:11,650
Speaker 2: this we are extremely grateful.

503
00:37:13,170 --> 00:37:17,930
Speaker 1: Back in eighteen twenty eight, William Burke was sentenced to

504
00:37:18,130 --> 00:37:25,170
Speaker 1: hang and be dissected. No clever attempt at reframing there.

505
00:37:25,770 --> 00:37:29,970
Speaker 1: Thousands of people queued to see Burke's naked body on

506
00:37:30,010 --> 00:37:33,970
Speaker 1: the dissection table. In museums in Edinburgh. You can still

507
00:37:33,970 --> 00:37:37,970
Speaker 1: see his skeleton and a pocketbook made from his skin.

508
00:37:39,490 --> 00:37:43,570
Speaker 1: In the university's archives is a letter written in Burke's blood.

509
00:37:45,130 --> 00:37:48,690
Speaker 1: But what about William Hare and the wives? People in

510
00:37:48,810 --> 00:37:52,610
Speaker 1: Edinburgh were outraged they'd got off scot free. All were

511
00:37:52,690 --> 00:37:56,610
Speaker 1: chased out of town by angry mobs. A mob gathered

512
00:37:56,610 --> 00:38:01,770
Speaker 1: two outside the home of doctor Knox. They hung his

513
00:38:01,970 --> 00:38:06,410
Speaker 1: effigy from a tree. Why hadn't he asked more questions

514
00:38:06,410 --> 00:38:09,810
Speaker 1: about the bodies? He could have stopped them at an

515
00:38:09,930 --> 00:38:16,770
Speaker 1: earlier stage. Knox was unrepentant. He carried on his lectures

516
00:38:16,810 --> 00:38:20,890
Speaker 1: as usual, talking over the shouts of protesters outside his

517
00:38:21,010 --> 00:38:23,490
Speaker 1: lecture room. Ignore them.

518
00:38:23,530 --> 00:38:27,410
Speaker 3: He told his students, you sealants of our piece, maybe

519
00:38:27,490 --> 00:38:30,650
Speaker 3: begging menace, that they are too cowardly in act to

520
00:38:30,690 --> 00:38:34,730
Speaker 3: confront such a falanced body of gentlemen as they see

521
00:38:34,770 --> 00:38:35,290
Speaker 3: before me.

522
00:38:36,810 --> 00:38:41,730
Speaker 1: Dr Knox eventually moved to London, where his notoriety posed

523
00:38:42,650 --> 00:38:47,250
Speaker 1: less of a nuisance. When he died aged seventy one,

524
00:38:47,890 --> 00:38:52,330
Speaker 1: he left clear instructions about what should happen to his body.

525
00:38:52,850 --> 00:38:57,330
Speaker 1: Knox had always insisted on the importance of cadavers to

526
00:38:57,410 --> 00:39:02,610
Speaker 1: train up doctors. So did he make his own final,

527
00:39:03,850 --> 00:39:09,890
Speaker 1: selfless contribution to advancing medical science. He did not.

528
00:39:12,130 --> 00:39:16,370
Speaker 3: Lay me the rest in the churchyard, where the wildflowers

529
00:39:16,410 --> 00:39:21,090
Speaker 3: bloom and the sun might shine on the green sword

530
00:39:21,970 --> 00:39:23,050
Speaker 3: above my grieve.

531
00:39:32,450 --> 00:39:35,450
Speaker 1: This live edition of Cautionary Tales was written by me

532
00:39:35,890 --> 00:39:40,010
Speaker 1: Tim Harford with Andrew Wright. Tonight you heard the voice

533
00:39:40,010 --> 00:39:45,490
Speaker 1: sounds of Edgham and Stella Harford. Our sound designer, composer

534
00:39:45,530 --> 00:39:51,130
Speaker 1: and live trombonist was Pascal Wise. That additional sound design

535
00:39:51,210 --> 00:39:57,290
Speaker 1: from Tom Berry. Sarah Nix edited the script thanks to

536
00:39:57,650 --> 00:40:03,010
Speaker 1: Ryan Dilley. The show was produced by Alice Fines with

537
00:40:03,210 --> 00:40:08,330
Speaker 1: Marilyn Russ. Thanks to Avril Tucker. The teams at TG

538
00:40:08,530 --> 00:40:13,610
Speaker 1: Live Euree. The podcast show and as se Porschytales is

539
00:40:13,610 --> 00:40:16,610
Speaker 1: a production of Pushkin Industries. If you like the show,

540
00:40:17,010 --> 00:40:20,490
Speaker 1: please remember to rate, share and review. If you want

541
00:40:20,530 --> 00:40:22,890
Speaker 1: to hear the show, ad free sign up on the

542
00:40:22,890 --> 00:41:12,690
Speaker 1: show page of Apple Podcasts or Pushkin dot fm, slash Plus. Hello,

543
00:41:12,770 --> 00:41:16,010
Speaker 1: dear listeners, it is Tim Harford here with an exciting

544
00:41:16,050 --> 00:41:18,730
Speaker 1: idea up my sleeve. I want to know if you'd

545
00:41:18,770 --> 00:41:23,570
Speaker 1: be interested in joining a cautionary club with additional member

546
00:41:23,650 --> 00:41:26,890
Speaker 1: only content. And with that in mind, the Cautionary Tales

547
00:41:26,930 --> 00:41:29,570
Speaker 1: team and I have put together a survey. We'd like

548
00:41:29,610 --> 00:41:32,490
Speaker 1: to find out exactly what kind of content you're keen

549
00:41:32,530 --> 00:41:35,490
Speaker 1: to get your hands on. Would you like a cautionary newsletter,

550
00:41:35,850 --> 00:41:39,850
Speaker 1: perhaps some extra conversations like my last one with Adam Grant,

551
00:41:40,290 --> 00:41:43,050
Speaker 1: or maybe you have another idea for us altogether. The

552
00:41:43,130 --> 00:41:45,650
Speaker 1: link is in the episode description and it will take

553
00:41:45,650 --> 00:41:49,090
Speaker 1: you just a few short minutes to answer, so please

554
00:41:49,130 --> 00:41:51,130
Speaker 1: do take a moment to fill it out and let

555
00:41:51,250 --> 00:41:53,690
Speaker 1: us know your thoughts. We are really keen to hear

556
00:41:53,690 --> 00:41:55,730
Speaker 1: from you. Thank you,