The Next Decade Could Be Even Worse

[Perknose]

A historian believes he has discovered iron laws that predict the rise and fall of societies. He has bad news.

^^^ A thought provoking exegesis based on statistical modeling of the last 10,000 years of human history that predicts our rise and fall.

"He [Peter Turchin] has been warning for a decade that a few key social and political trends portend an “age of discord,” civil unrest and carnage worse than most Americans have experienced. In 2010, he predicted that the unrest would get serious around 2020, and that it wouldn’t let up until those social and political trends reversed. Havoc at the level of the late 1960s and early ’70s is the best-case scenario; all-out civil war is the worst.

The fundamental problems, he says, are a dark triad of social maladies: a bloated elite class, with too few elite jobs to go around; declining living standards among the general population; and a government that can’t cover its financial positions. His models, which track these factors in other societies across history, are too complicated to explain in a nontechnical publication."

Read it and see what you think. You don't have to be 100% persuaded to see the predictive power in his model. Large scale statistical modeling of this sort is perforce reductive, and always depends heavily on huge assumptions masquerading as iron clad categories of fact. Still, models of this sort have the power to let us see trends inherent within the morass of otherwise uncategorized data. At the very least, it's food for thought, eh?

 

[Moonbeam]

Competition is hate. Hate is fear, the fear of losing, of being left out, socially shunned, excluded. We create what we fear.

We are born selfish. When the needs of the self are met and there is security and love, the self interest of the ego self expands to include the universe.

 

[interchange]

There are those who argue that ant colonies themselves should be considered organisms of their own. Colonies have a life cycle with different phases where the makeup of individuals is distinctly different over time. Although a colony lasts 20-30 generations of individuals, ants show some form of social learning, and the collective organization of the colony has a form of memory which dictates what comes next regardless of the "choices" of the individual. Of course, all colonies come to an end at a natural point in their evolution. Evolution itself does not care. So long as new ant colonies arise to take their stead, the tragic end of a colony matters not.

Ants, of course, are not self-aware. People are not so different.

 

[hal2kilo]

There are those who argue that ant colonies themselves should be considered organisms of their own. Colonies have a life cycle with different phases where the makeup of individuals is distinctly different over time. Although a colony lasts 20-30 generations of individuals, ants show some form of social learning, and the collective organization of the colony has a form of memory which dictates what comes next regardless of the "choices" of the individual. Of course, all colonies come to an end at a natural point in their evolution. Evolution itself does not care. So long as new ant colonies arise to take their stead, the tragic end of a colony matters not.

Ants, of course, are not self-aware. People are not so different.

We can go back even further into more cooperative lifeforms.

Secret Mind of Slime

Meet slime molds: the brainless blobs that can learn, make decisions, and navigate mazes.

www.pbs.org

 

[Ajay]

Effing Perknose making me read again. Can't the Atlantic make YouTube videos so that I can absorb some of this info while in a vegetative state?

 

[Greenman]

The next decade could be even worse, or it could be even better. It's my belief that it will be whatever we make it.

 

[Perknose]

The next decade could be even worse, or it could be even better.

Thanks for nailing that down.

It's my belief that it will be whatever we make it.

You are so out of your depth in this thread, it would be an exercise in futility for me to try to highlight the ridiculous vapidity of this statement of yours to you. It would be like trying to explain string theory to a toddler.

 

[interchange]

You are so out of your depth in this thread, it would be an exercise in futility for me to try to highlight the ridiculous vapidity of this statement of yours to you. It would be like trying to explain string theory to a toddler.

You gotta start em with the basics young:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08BJ7NM24?ref_=dbs_m_mng_rwt_calw_tkin_3&storeType=ebooks
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08BJ6QSZ1?ref_=dbs_m_mng_rwt_calw_tkin_5&storeType=ebooks

 

[Greenman]

Thanks for nailing that down.

You are so out of your depth in this thread, it would be an exercise in futility for me to try to highlight the ridiculous vapidity of this statement of yours to you. It would be like trying to explain string theory to a toddler.

Such wasted anger over an opinion.
This is what comes of reading doom and gloom predictions, never ending despair, a firm belief in failure. Sorry, I choose a different approach. Mine might not be any more valid than yours, but it will keep me smiling until the meteor strike takes us all out.

 

[Perknose]

Such wasted anger over an opinion.

I'm not angry. Your "opinion," the sum total ofyour contribution to this thread, is based entirely on your "feels" and is not contributory in any meaningful way to the topic at hand. That you think my pointing out the vacuous shallowness of your intellectual deficit is "anger" is just, again, your feels.

I get it, though. You feeling uncomfortable at being exposed, much like a baby who soils his diaper feels uncomfortable and starts to cry. Apparently, neither you nor the baby have the requisite ability to understand that you caused your own discomfort. The baby is a baby. Hopefully he will grow into adult awareness. What might be your excuse?

This is what comes of reading doom and gloom predictions, never ending despair, a firm belief in failure.

Let's put aside the fact that being open to a rigorously researched prediction DOES NOT EQUAL any "firm belief" in said prediction. I wish to congratulate you on your forced and fear-based "optimism." It is reminiscent of Chamberlin's after Munich.

Not being willing to look into even the possibility of something happening because it might upset you just makes you a flightless bird with his head in the sand. It's an approach, just not a good one:

Mine might not be any more valid than yours...

Ah yes, the time tested gambit of employing unsupported "whataboutism" to deny a possibility that makes you uncomfortable. Possibilities don't go away simply because you refuse to entertain them.

...but it will keep me smiling...

Who will be able to tell with your head so stuck in the sand?

 

[iRONic]

Bonus points for using 'exegesis' in a sentence.

 

[pmv]

Such wasted anger over an opinion.

It's not wasted. Anger is a renewable resource. And with Anger-Capture-Technology (aka The internet) it can be easily recycled and re-used indefinitely.

Anyway, I am very skeptical as to whether one can mathematically 'model' this kind of thing, with any kind of 'scientific' precision, even if, qualitatively, the conclusion seems entirely plausible.

 

[Moonbeam]

It's not wasted. Anger is a renewable resource. And with Anger-Capture-Technology (aka The internet) it can be easily recycled and re-used indefinitely.

Anyway, I am very skeptical as to whether one can mathematically 'model' this kind of thing, with any kind of 'scientific' precision, even if, qualitatively, the conclusion seems entirely plausible.

What I see here is diagnosis by symptoms. The historian has identified 3: a bloated elite class, with too few elite jobs to go around; declining living standards among the general population; and a government that can’t cover its financial positions.

What I look for is something deeper that can cause just such symptoms and to the way I see things that is simply self hate as I described in post #2. Anybody can see there are two few jobs to go around and that earnings aren't proportional to societal benefits and the inevitable decline in wages this represents as bean counters squeeze every last penny and governments, to get elected promise to to fill empty cups. And we know too that humanity is capable of greatness. Why not today. I think your skepticism comes from the fact that there is a light within you that was never fully extinguished. I think the same is true of @Greenman. he looks for a reason to believe but he doesn't really need one.

But it is reason and knowledge guided by intuition, not one or the other, that is required to change the system. The intuitive leap is the result of focused need. The dawning realization of our impending extinction should awaken a few.

 

[pmv]

Reminds me of the Marxist academic who built a mathematical model to calculate the 'falling rate of profit' in order to work out exactly when capitalism would collapse. Even other Marxists were scornful of such claims to scientistic precision.

On a more mundane, qualitative level, even leaving economics and sociology out of it, it seems to me the US political system is too inflexible and hard to change to allow it to adapt to changing circumstances. Hence it seems more likely than not to eventually fail catastrophically.

 

[pmv]

Also, I've apparently seen my share of Atlantic articles this month, and I'm not allowed to see that one!

 

[Greenman]

It's not wasted. Anger is a renewable resource. And with Anger-Capture-Technology (aka The internet) it can be easily recycled and re-used indefinitely.

Anyway, I am very skeptical as to whether one can mathematically 'model' this kind of thing, with any kind of 'scientific' precision, even if, qualitatively, the conclusion seems entirely plausible.

I don't see it as the dire straights presented. What I see are a lot of people that believe a degree is a purchased ticket to success. And a whole bunch of people that seem to think there is a finite amount of money to go around. Neither is true.
I said it a few posts up and I'll say it again, the future will be exactly what we make it. If we choose a future of recycled anger, then that's what we'll get. Make no mistake about though, it is a choice.

 

[Greenman]

Reminds me of the Marxist academic who built a mathematical model to calculate the 'falling rate of profit' in order to work out exactly when capitalism would collapse. Even other Marxists were scornful of such claims to scientistic precision.

On a more mundane, qualitative level, even leaving economics and sociology out of it, it seems to me the US political system is too inflexible and hard to change to allow it to adapt to changing circumstances. Hence it seems more likely than not to eventually fail catastrophically.

I'd be interested to here more of your thoughts on the systems inflexibility, as that's what I always thought of as one of it's strengths. Perhaps I've been mistaken.

 

[Fenixgoon]

I'd be interested to here more of your thoughts on the systems inflexibility, as that's what I always thought of as one of it's strengths. Perhaps I've been mistaken.

one need only look at how a single person can hold up the operation of the entire government (mitch mcconnell)

 

[Jaskalas]

The next decade could be even worse, or it could be even better. It's my belief that it will be whatever we make it.

Do you imagine the Titanic had a choice after it ran afoul of the Iceberg?
Or a train a hundred feet from the cliff?

That is what The Gap is.... our Iceberg, or proverbial cliff. Without a peaceful reckoning to resolve our nation's economic malfeasance, the reckoning will occur through blood and fire. One way or another the culmination of our failures is drawing closer every the second, hour, and year that passes. One does not avoid the consequences of THIS. Trickle down has wrought us a harvest.

Yes, technically it is possible that we'd suddenly grow intelligent enough to realize Capitalism cannot survive without Consumers. And we would somehow organize around a guiding principle of protecting Capitalism from itself. But that would require an economic education that Americans simply do not have. It would require a political party hell bent on looting us dry to cease before it kills the golden goose.

It is simply not plausible (read: realistic) to imagine Americans suddenly becoming educated or altruistic enough to see the forest from the trees. Why live tomorrow when you can profit today? That is our unspoken creed. Well, eventually tomorrow arrives and the bill comes due. We are marching headlong into French Revolution.

 

[pmv]

I'd be interested to here more of your thoughts on the systems inflexibility, as that's what I always thought of as one of it's strengths. Perhaps I've been mistaken.

Well, for one thing, the US system has more 'veto points' than that of any other advanced industrial nation. Most have 2 or 3, the US has about 7. It's been found that there's a strong correlation between number of veto points in a political system, and the level of economic inequality in that country.

Everything in the system interlocks to ensure that it is very hard to change. The Senate is elected by a highly-skewed electorate, that senate in turn is a gate-keeper for appointments to the Supreme Court, which in turn has a huge amount of power to prevent anything changing in the system. Then there's the electoral college that is designed to prevent minorities from having much influence over the election of the executive. Finally there's the way that day-to-day control over that electoral process - whether districting or the mechanics of elections - is, unusually for a democracy, under the control of politically-partisan players in the system.

It's a system designed to be as rigid and hard-to-change as possible, to protect existing hierarchies for as long as possible. With something so rigid, when it does break, it won't be pretty.

 

[nickqt]

The more things change, the more things stay the same.

Marx wrote about this 180 years ago.

I've always enjoyed the "Four Futures" article from Jacobin.

Four Futures

One thing we can be certain of is that capitalism will end.

jacobinmag.com

One of the problems is that the "economy" has become the state religion, and even talking about its inherent flaws, and other systems to make it work better, is instantaneously considered blasphemy and gets shouted down...typically by people who have the simplest understanding of society as a whole.

 

[cytg111]

Who will be able to tell with your head so stuck in the sand?

I think he just told himself?... without actually grasping the reach of what he said ... as paradoxes go... well done.

 

[Perknose]

The more things change, the more things stay the same.

In the original French, "Plus ca change, plus la meme chose!"

One of the problems is that the "economy" has become the state religion, and even talking about its inherent flaws, and other systems to make it work better, is instantaneously considered blasphemy and gets shouted down...typically by people who have the simplest understanding of society as a whole.

Yes, yes, yes! The fear based parochial boosterism (@Moonbeam) is depressing and gets in the way of addressing clear flaws.

The other sacred cow is our bloated defense budget. If there were only enough political "breathing room" to see how this wildy disproportinate misallocation of state resources leaves us LESS strong and safe, we could easily cut a full third (or more!) from it and use this to simulataneously pay down our budget deficit while also addressing a myriad of our domestic needs.

 

[dawp]

reminds me of psychohistory from Asimov's Foundation series with trump as the mule.

 

[Racan]

reminds me of psychohistory from Asimov's Foundation series with trump as the mule.

Yup, sounds like real life Hari Seldon and psychohistory, except the rise of a Trump like figure was not totally unexpected.