Will the US experience a violent upheaval in 2020? (2012) • Hacker News Board

Re: Will the US experience a violent upheaval in 2020? (2012)

#51

Post by JPLeRouzic » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 2:24 PM UTC

wombatmobile wrote: post #36

JPLeRouzic wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In describing how he built his database Turchin says [0] it is about lethal events: "Instability events vary in scale from intense and pro- longed civil wars claiming thousands (and sometimes even millions) of human lives to a one-day urban riot in which several people are killed, or even a violent demonstration in which no lives are lost. In constructing the database I chose to include only lethal events." [0] https…

Does the model predict or account for the Oklahoma Federal building bombing (1996, 168 people killed)?

It seems to be taken in account. From the article:

"Thus, although the most common fatality rate per event was 1 (48% of cases), in rare cases the ‘butcher bill’ could run into hundreds (less than 1% of events had a fatality rate of 100 or more). As a result, the rare but bloody events have a disproportionate effect on the trajectory. A good example of this effect is the latest ‘peak’ in the trajectory (during the 1990s) – it is entirely due to 168 deaths associated with a single event, the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing."

Re: Will the US experience a violent upheaval in 2020? (2012)

#52

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 2:55 PM UTC

inglor_cz wrote: post #44

paganel wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>at the 25+ crowd with fresh degrees, tons of debt and not-precisely-excellent earning opportunities There are numerous studies and theories saying that late 19th-early 20th century revolutions wouldn't have happened if they hadn't been coordinated by educated people who hadn't found a stable job (mostly as government employees, not that many private white-collar jobs back then). The Russian revolution definitely wou…

Hello fellow Central European :-) In interwar Czechoslovakia, we had quite a few intellectuals who were openly Stalinist.

[deleted]

Re: Will the US experience a violent upheaval in 2020? (2012)

#53

Post by gnusty_gnurc » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 3:02 PM UTC

jsmcgd wrote: post #41

inglor_cz wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"That's why education is the most important pillar of democracy. Education is everything. " The kind of people who get into positions of power - well, my impression is that they think they know better. Even if they are aware of the fact that in 1930 someone fucked up, they will not entertain the fact that they themselves might do the same. Also, some events are really complex. You can educate people about the 1929 or…

I think that's why an education has to be broad. A selective education can be tantamount to brainwashing/propaganda. Give the students as many perspectives and hope that they will do something sensible as they process the information; knowing that not all will, but most. I believe that the more perspectives you are aware of, the less likely you are to be dogmatic and extreme in your beliefs and actions. You will be r…

> Give the students as many perspectives and hope that they will do something sensible as they process the information

I don’t know if you’ve gone to college recently but that was not my impression. It’s a woke monoculture. Discourse is gone.

Re: Will the US experience a violent upheaval in 2020? (2012)

#54

Post by throw0101a » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 3:54 PM UTC

Re: Will the US experience a violent upheaval in 2020? (2012)

#55

Post by throw0101a » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 3:56 PM UTC

inglor_cz wrote: post #2

Turchin's two main ideas are intriguing. a) 50 years is enough for "institutional memory" to go out of the window. This may change with longevity breakthroughs, but 50 years is currently enough for a complete generation exchange, so the new leaders have no memory of the previous upheaval and will make the same mistakes again. Or at least the same kind of mistakes, details are always different. b) elite overproduction…

Samuel Huntington observed 'convulsions' every 60 years in American history:

> American history is driven by periodic moments of moral convulsion. The late Harvard political scientist Samuel P. Huntington noticed that these convulsions seem to hit the United States every 60 years or so: the Revolutionary period of the 1760s and ’70s; the Jacksonian uprising of the 1820s and ’30s; the Progressive Era, which began in the 1890s; and the social-protest movements of the 1960s and early ’70s.

* https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/10/collapsing...

The 2020s was about when the US was 'due' for something to happen, so the next decade or so will apparently be a bit of a ride.

Re: Will the US experience a violent upheaval in 2020? (2012)

#56

Post by johngalt » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 4:53 PM UTC

onethought wrote: post #15

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taking b) and running with it, education is, in my opinion, the silver bullet for a number of societies ills. It's very interesting to note how higher education in the US has such a high barrier to entry that it actively discourages outsiders. It feels as if the Australian Government wants to move in the same direction, and / or have already been doing so for a few years. Education has its own benefits to society as…

True, if you are on the right (political spectrum) you do not want to encourage higher education, it shifts people to the left, as analytical thinking starts undoing idealism. US is a good example of this, with most universities having more left communities around them. Perhaps it is an intentional long play by the Right in Australia to pursue this kind of minimisation of education

"education, it shifts people to the left, as analytical thinking starts undoing idealism."

True; college students are noted for their lack of idealism.

Conversely right leaning occupations such as veterans, oil rig workers and farmers always have their head in the clouds with high minded idealistic notions that don't work in the real world.

Re: Will the US experience a violent upheaval in 2020? (2012)

#57

Post by jeffbee » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 6:16 PM UTC

leereeves wrote: post #31

flybrand wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Technically he would have counted deaths, if I recall correctly. I agree w your idea though.

I think 2020 might also qualify on that count. Massive 1-Year Rise In Homicide Rates...in 2020 > New Orleans-based data consultant Jeff Asher studied crime rates in more than 50 cities and says the crime spikes aren't just happening in big cities. With the numbers of homicides spiking in many places, Asher expects the final statistics for 2020 to tell a startlingly grim story. > "We're going to see, historically, the…

Is that really unprecedented? In 2016 Chicago had 60% more homicides than in 2015. Short-term spikes in statistics with small denominators can be expected. In 2015 Baltimore had 63% more homicides than in 2014.

Re: Will the US experience a violent upheaval in 2020? (2012)

#58

Post by Spinnaker_ » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 6:18 PM UTC

leereeves wrote: post #11

wombatmobile wrote: post #3

What is a “violent upheaval”? Without a specific definition, such as “civil war resulting in 620,000 deaths”, they’re fairly easy to predict.

I think what happened in 2020 qualifies. While tame compared to the Civil War, it was comparable to the upheaval that happened about 50 years ago, and certainly not easy to predict. > between 15 million and 26 million people participated at some point in the demonstrations > arson, vandalism and looting caused about $1–2 billion in insured damage between May 26 and June 8, > By early June, at least 200 American citie…

To put that in perspective, the 1992 Los Angeles riots had similar damage and arrest numbers, and were significantly more violent (63 killed). And that was a single city.

Re: Will the US experience a violent upheaval in 2020? (2012)

#59

Post by wwweston » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 6:19 PM UTC

throw0101a wrote: post #55

inglor_cz wrote: post #2

Turchin's two main ideas are intriguing. a) 50 years is enough for "institutional memory" to go out of the window. This may change with longevity breakthroughs, but 50 years is currently enough for a complete generation exchange, so the new leaders have no memory of the previous upheaval and will make the same mistakes again. Or at least the same kind of mistakes, details are always different. b) elite overproduction…

Samuel Huntington observed 'convulsions' every 60 years in American history: > American history is driven by periodic moments of moral convulsion. The late Harvard political scientist Samuel P. Huntington noticed that these convulsions seem to hit the United States every 60 years or so: the Revolutionary period of the 1760s and ’70s; the Jacksonian uprising of the 1820s and ’30s; the Progressive Era, which began in t…

I feel like there's an important data point overlooked in the 1860s?

Re: Will the US experience a violent upheaval in 2020? (2012)

#60

Post by mcshicks » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 6:27 PM UTC

inglor_cz wrote: post #2

Turchin's two main ideas are intriguing. a) 50 years is enough for "institutional memory" to go out of the window. This may change with longevity breakthroughs, but 50 years is currently enough for a complete generation exchange, so the new leaders have no memory of the previous upheaval and will make the same mistakes again. Or at least the same kind of mistakes, details are always different. b) elite overproduction…

I read Turchin's Secular Cycle where he goes over the data sets he uses to draw these conclusions on earlier societies. While the things he's trying to measure are not easy (for instance he uses the number and dates of found coin hoards as a relative measure of instability in England), the amount of data is pretty impressive. I actually gave up after he did all the data on England and skipped France, the Islamic Empires and I think there was one other society, and went to the conclusion. I haven't read "Age of Discord" yet, but it looks like he has a pretty detailed summary here.

http://peterturchin.com/age-of-discord/