Originally Posted by Croakmore

It will take us a while to choke down all of this, Sean, but I certainly admire your efforts. I have one immediate reaction: you may be trying to resolve more here than such a macro-historical theory will allow. From my perspective, the beauty of S&H's generational theory is its seasonality. My need to bring Princess Summerfall Winterspring to the table is nicely satisfied by their theory. The affairs of all living things (with the possible exception of Gold's "deep hot biosphere") are fundamentally influenced by macro-associations among the sun, the moon, and of course planet Earth. Together, they impose a four-part seasonality. Cycles of a three-part kind, to me, leave the sine curve longing to complete itself. But that might even be consistent with your proposed modifications. More later.

--Croaker

Ah, my dear Batrachoid,

Seasonality is decidely not a casualty of my musings. There are still four turnings and four archetypes. It is only the number of life phases that drops to three. If this still bothers your tetralogical sensibilities, think of a
Mediterranean climate: Rainy Season, Dry Season, In-Between Season. In California this is easy to conceptualize.

Please elaborate on the forlorn sine curve and it's implications.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

Statistically, it is as if the authors took a sizeable, yet decidedly partial, subset of history, found a pattern (and even then one that only performed excellently in yet a smaller subset), and declared the discovery of a fundamental historiographical paradigm. As a result, one could argue (and some critics have stated) that what Strauss & Howe discovered was not much more than (what statisticians would call) an ?accidental correlation?, at least before the last century is concerned.

I don't think this is quite accurate. In exactly what, did S&H discover a pattern? The pattern they describe is a series of four repeated generational archetypes. But generational archetypes themselves have no objective existence. They are an interpretive tool or model. What is it that they are interpreting?

As a concrete example, consider the list of wars and casualties I provided to Bob Butler. Now this is simply a list of millions of events (soliders dying in war). Using this date Bob (and I) have constructed frequency profiles of "death events" as a function of time and shown that a repeating pattern is observable. This apparent cycle is just part of the data that underlies Modelski and Thompson's "saeculum" for foreign policy. The "M&T" saeculum is given below the *** line at the bottom of the post.

When you are thinking about the S&H saeculum and use the turning dates to concretize your thinking, you must keep in mind that the S&H turning dates are not data, or historical facts, they are an idealization of underlying facts. The M&T saeculum is another such idealization. Both are descriptive models of some underlying reality. Bob Butler has shown one piece of the reality that the M&T saeculum is trying to describe.

What underlying reality does the S&H saeculum attempt to describe?

************************************************** ************************************************** ****
Modeski and Thomson's "saeculum":

A 1430-1460 1540-1560 1640-1660 1740-1763 1850-1873 1973-2000
U 1460-1494 1560-1580 1660-1688 1763-1792 1873-1914 2000-
C 1494-1516 1580-1609 1688-1714 1792-1815 1914-1945
H 1516-1540 1609-1640 1714-1740 1815-1850 1945-1973
sec. length 110 . . . 100 . . . . 100 . . . . 110 . . . . 123

M&T's cycle is similar to S&H's in that they have a "Crisis" turning that they call "Global War where the great powers slug it out and a "hegemon" arises. They have a "High" that they call "World Power" in which that hegemon is at maximum power and influence. They have an "Awakening" in which the hegemon's orderly world is first challenged by others that is called "Delegitimation" (from the pov of the hegemon) or "Agenda Setting" (from the pov of the other powers). Finally they have an "Unraveling" call "Deconcentration" or "Coalition Building", depending on the pov. This time shows the decline of the old hegemon and the alliance-building of the other powers in preparation for the next Global War. I have labeled each of M&T's "turnings" using the S&H terminology (H, A, U, C) because it is more familar to T4T enthusiasts.

The lengths of M&T's turnings are much like those of S&H. Up to 1850, M&T turnings average 26.0 years and range from 20 to 35 years. Up to 1844 S&H turnings average 25.6 years and range from 18 to 30 years. After 1844, S&H turnings fall to an average length of 18.3 years, and range from 5 to 22 years. After 1850, M&T turnings average 30.2 years and ranged from 23 to 41 years. Both show "anomalies" in the mid-19th century that lead to a change in turning length.

Point taken. I was just being intellectually lazy for time and convenience sake (and will probably continue to be). I know that S&H's model is just that: A model. But it is easier sometimes for explanatory purposes to just assume it's something more tangible.

My point was just that the model work extremely well for the 20th century but begin to lose efficacy as you go backwards in time. This bothered me since I believe they are on to some fundamentally "correct" notions. I am just trying to rectify the dissonance in my own mind and putting it on display for all to see.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

Statistically, it is as if the authors took a sizeable, yet decidedly partial, subset of history, found a pattern (and even then one that only performed excellently in yet a smaller subset), and declared the discovery of a fundamental historiographical paradigm. As a result, one could argue (and some critics have stated) that what Strauss & Howe discovered was not much more than (what statisticians would call) an ?accidental correlation?, at least before the last century is concerned.

I don't think this is quite accurate. In exactly what, did S&H discover a pattern? The pattern they describe is a series of four repeated generational archetypes. But generational archetypes themselves have no objective existence. They are an interpretive tool or model. What is it that they are interpreting?

As a concrete example, consider the list of wars and casualties I provided to Bob Butler. Now this is simply a list of millions of events (soliders dying in war). Using this date Bob (and I) have constructed frequency profiles of "death events" as a function of time and shown that a repeating pattern is observable. This apparent cycle is just part of the data that underlies Modelski and Thompson's "saeculum" for foreign policy. The "M&T" saeculum is given below the *** line at the bottom of the post.

When you are thinking about the S&H saeculum and use the turning dates to concretize your thinking, you must keep in mind that the S&H turning dates are not data, or historical facts, they are an idealization of underlying facts. The M&T saeculum is another such idealization. Both are descriptive models of some underlying reality. Bob Butler has shown one piece of the reality that the M&T saeculum is trying to describe.

What underlying reality does the S&H saeculum attempt to describe?

************************************************** ************************************************** ****
Modeski and Thomson's "saeculum":

A 1430-1460 1540-1560 1640-1660 1740-1763 1850-1873 1973-2000
U 1460-1494 1560-1580 1660-1688 1763-1792 1873-1914 2000-
C 1494-1516 1580-1609 1688-1714 1792-1815 1914-1945
H 1516-1540 1609-1640 1714-1740 1815-1850 1945-1973
sec. length 110 . . . 100 . . . . 100 . . . . 110 . . . . 123

M&T's cycle is similar to S&H's in that they have a "Crisis" turning that they call "Global War where the great powers slug it out and a "hegemon" arises. They have a "High" that they call "World Power" in which that hegemon is at maximum power and influence. They have an "Awakening" in which the hegemon's orderly world is first challenged by others that is called "Delegitimation" (from the pov of the hegemon) or "Agenda Setting" (from the pov of the other powers). Finally they have an "Unraveling" call "Deconcentration" or "Coalition Building", depending on the pov. This time shows the decline of the old hegemon and the alliance-building of the other powers in preparation for the next Global War. I have labeled each of M&T's "turnings" using the S&H terminology (H, A, U, C) because it is more familar to T4T enthusiasts.

The lengths of M&T's turnings are much like those of S&H. Up to 1850, M&T turnings average 26.0 years and range from 20 to 35 years. Up to 1844 S&H turnings average 25.6 years and range from 18 to 30 years. After 1844, S&H turnings fall to an average length of 18.3 years, and range from 5 to 22 years. After 1850, M&T turnings average 30.2 years and ranged from 23 to 41 years. Both show "anomalies" in the mid-19th century that lead to a change in turning length.

Point taken. I was just being intellectually lazy for time and convenience sake (and will probably continue to be). I know that S&H's model is just that: A model. But it is easier sometimes for explanatory purposes to just assume it's something more tangible.

My point was just that the model work extremely well for the 20th century but begin to lose efficacy as you go backwards in time. This bothered me since I believe they are on to some fundamentally "correct" notions. I am just trying to rectify the dissonance in my own mind and putting it on display for all to see.

Originally Posted by Marc S Lamb

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

What if a 27-year ?youth? phase could
actually make sense? I propose that in pre-modern society this actually
did work, if we define ?youth? as pre-autonomy.

Child nuture, I submit, is the most important feature of the
S&H model. It is precisely the reason why S&H were tempted to
use 1964 (a mere 3 years following a shortened Boom's coming of age)
vs. 1929 (a long ten years following a "24 year monster" GI generation).

Forget going back to the Roman era, or even 1860 for that matter. The
apparent contradiction in a very long (post Civil War anomaly) generation
waiting ten years for the spark vs the very shortened Boom's NOW!
spark is enough to give me intellectual hives.

Still, the premise of the child nuturing pendulum swinging between
tightening and loosening, between over-protection and kinderfeindlichkeit
is too obvious to be ignored.

Agreed on all points.

The length of the GI generation, to my mind, has to do with a combination of saecular-settling (the modal transition I propose) and the extraordinarily-large cohort called upon in the draft in WWII.

Also, please not that my triological model does not forbid a Child Nuture cycle.

Originally Posted by Marc S Lamb

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

What if a 27-year ?youth? phase could
actually make sense? I propose that in pre-modern society this actually
did work, if we define ?youth? as pre-autonomy.

Child nuture, I submit, is the most important feature of the
S&H model. It is precisely the reason why S&H were tempted to
use 1964 (a mere 3 years following a shortened Boom's coming of age)
vs. 1929 (a long ten years following a "24 year monster" GI generation).

Forget going back to the Roman era, or even 1860 for that matter. The
apparent contradiction in a very long (post Civil War anomaly) generation
waiting ten years for the spark vs the very shortened Boom's NOW!
spark is enough to give me intellectual hives.

Still, the premise of the child nuturing pendulum swinging between
tightening and loosening, between over-protection and kinderfeindlichkeit
is too obvious to be ignored.

Agreed on all points.

The length of the GI generation, to my mind, has to do with a combination of saecular-settling (the modal transition I propose) and the extraordinarily-large cohort called upon in the draft in WWII.

Also, please not that my triological model does not forbid a Child Nuture cycle.

Originally Posted by Tim Walker

Being the target of Awakening fury, Civic elders are tempted to take their community with them. Though some of their politicians were in the White House, the G.I.s did. Recall that Strauss & Howe speculated about the G.I.s helping to raise the Millenials-this appears not to have come to pass.

The Adaptive archetype is the one most likely to try to stay involved. These are relatively small, recessive generations. When society is gripped by Crisis urgency I would expect the next junior Prophets to shove them aside.

It will indeed be interesting to see if the Silent "stay involved" and what effect that will have.

Originally Posted by Tim Walker

Being the target of Awakening fury, Civic elders are tempted to take their community with them. Though some of their politicians were in the White House, the G.I.s did. Recall that Strauss & Howe speculated about the G.I.s helping to raise the Millenials-this appears not to have come to pass.

The Adaptive archetype is the one most likely to try to stay involved. These are relatively small, recessive generations. When society is gripped by Crisis urgency I would expect the next junior Prophets to shove them aside.

It will indeed be interesting to see if the Silent "stay involved" and what effect that will have.

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

Point taken. I was just being intellectually lazy for time and convenience sake (and will probably continue to be). I know that S&H's model is just that: A model. But it is easier sometimes for explanatory purposes to just assume it's something more tangible.

I'm not sure. I wasn't cautioning you. I was asking a question. What is the underlying cyclical reality that the saeculum attempts to desribe? Cycles in what? What is repeating?

My point was just that the model work extremely well for the 20th century but begin to lose efficacy as you go backwards in time.

How do you know it has worked well? "Worked" in what way?

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

Point taken. I was just being intellectually lazy for time and convenience sake (and will probably continue to be). I know that S&H's model is just that: A model. But it is easier sometimes for explanatory purposes to just assume it's something more tangible.

I'm not sure. I wasn't cautioning you. I was asking a question. What is the underlying cyclical reality that the saeculum attempts to desribe? Cycles in what? What is repeating?

My point was just that the model work extremely well for the 20th century but begin to lose efficacy as you go backwards in time.

How do you know it has worked well? "Worked" in what way?

Undernutrition is one potential method of extending the human lifespan that could be praciticed today.

Quoting from Secrets Of Life Extension by John A. Mann (copyright 1980):

Underfeeding

"...Curiously, the two most effective life-extension techniques-those which have doubled or tripled the normal lifespan-have been known for the longest time. Caloric restriction was discovered in the early- 1930s and hypothermia (cooling the body temperature) in 1917. The only approaches that have surpassed these are variations, amplifications, or combinations of the two.

"...Severe restriction of calories, protein, or certain amino acids can literally keep you a perennial child. But they are rough ordeals and may kill you first..."

As I understand it, undernutrition extends lifespan by delaying maturation, and subsequently the aging process. Undernutrition is not to be confused with malnutrition. Plenty of vitamins and minerals-no scurvy here-are to be provided.

Further quoting Mann:

"...During the late 1920s and early 1930s, Clive M. McCay at Cornell University observed that trout whose growth had been retarded by underfeeding lived longer than usual. Following this, he raised a group of newly weaned rats on a diet that was adequate in most respects, but contained only 30 per cent of the normal caloric requirement. Ordinarily, the mean lifespan of rats is about 600 days, and the average maximum liifespan is about 950 days. After 700 days, McCay's rats not only were still alive, but had not even reached puberty. He then put them on a normal caloric diet. They soon attained maturity, and from then on lived out typical adult lifespans. Most of the animals lived for a total of about 1,000 days, the longest lifespan being 1465 days. This represents about a 66 per cent increase over the controls."

More about McCay's rats-quoting Maximum Lifespan by Roy Walford, copyright 1983:

"...the animals growth rate was greatly retarded although in other ways they were super healthy. They could be held in a growth-retarded state for up to 1,000 days, by which time all the normally fed had died. When the retarded rats were allowed a full diet, they began to grow again. They were also sexually active and could reproduce at a far more advanced age than normally fed rats."

Further quoting Walford:

"...In terms of potential human application, it is critical to know whether severe caloric undernutrition affects mental development or activity...even though the rate of general growth...may be much reduced, the brain weight increases at the same rate as in fully fed animals...pilot experiments from my own laboratory and ongoing collaborative work with Dr. Raymond Bartus of Lederle Laboratories involving intelligence testing (so-called passive avoidance tests as well as others) suggest that the smaller, restricted mice are just as smart as the big, fully fed fellows. And thirty-eight-month old restricted mice tested as highly as twenty-four-month-old regular mice, so the rate of brain aging itself seems less on a proper restrictive regime."

Imagine, early in the last High, children being put on a rigidly controlled diet like that of a diabetic. With the above information we can assume that intellectual maturation proceeded at the same rate as it actually did. If emotional maturation is due to life experiences we may assume that it also proceeded as it actually did.

Now, imagine the early years of the Boom Awakening. Featured are Flower Children, who in size and general appearance, really do resemble children. Perhaps the term "youth" would have come into vogue to describe such physiologically retarded people.

This phenomenon may serve as an "existence proof"-indicating that it would be possible to put off aging and extend the life span. But I find it difficult to imagine that anyone will ever try this on children.

Undernutrition is one potential method of extending the human lifespan that could be praciticed today.

Quoting from Secrets Of Life Extension by John A. Mann (copyright 1980):

Underfeeding

"...Curiously, the two most effective life-extension techniques-those which have doubled or tripled the normal lifespan-have been known for the longest time. Caloric restriction was discovered in the early- 1930s and hypothermia (cooling the body temperature) in 1917. The only approaches that have surpassed these are variations, amplifications, or combinations of the two.

"...Severe restriction of calories, protein, or certain amino acids can literally keep you a perennial child. But they are rough ordeals and may kill you first..."

As I understand it, undernutrition extends lifespan by delaying maturation, and subsequently the aging process. Undernutrition is not to be confused with malnutrition. Plenty of vitamins and minerals-no scurvy here-are to be provided.

Further quoting Mann:

"...During the late 1920s and early 1930s, Clive M. McCay at Cornell University observed that trout whose growth had been retarded by underfeeding lived longer than usual. Following this, he raised a group of newly weaned rats on a diet that was adequate in most respects, but contained only 30 per cent of the normal caloric requirement. Ordinarily, the mean lifespan of rats is about 600 days, and the average maximum liifespan is about 950 days. After 700 days, McCay's rats not only were still alive, but had not even reached puberty. He then put them on a normal caloric diet. They soon attained maturity, and from then on lived out typical adult lifespans. Most of the animals lived for a total of about 1,000 days, the longest lifespan being 1465 days. This represents about a 66 per cent increase over the controls."

More about McCay's rats-quoting Maximum Lifespan by Roy Walford, copyright 1983:

"...the animals growth rate was greatly retarded although in other ways they were super healthy. They could be held in a growth-retarded state for up to 1,000 days, by which time all the normally fed had died. When the retarded rats were allowed a full diet, they began to grow again. They were also sexually active and could reproduce at a far more advanced age than normally fed rats."

Further quoting Walford:

"...In terms of potential human application, it is critical to know whether severe caloric undernutrition affects mental development or activity...even though the rate of general growth...may be much reduced, the brain weight increases at the same rate as in fully fed animals...pilot experiments from my own laboratory and ongoing collaborative work with Dr. Raymond Bartus of Lederle Laboratories involving intelligence testing (so-called passive avoidance tests as well as others) suggest that the smaller, restricted mice are just as smart as the big, fully fed fellows. And thirty-eight-month old restricted mice tested as highly as twenty-four-month-old regular mice, so the rate of brain aging itself seems less on a proper restrictive regime."

Imagine, early in the last High, children being put on a rigidly controlled diet like that of a diabetic. With the above information we can assume that intellectual maturation proceeded at the same rate as it actually did. If emotional maturation is due to life experiences we may assume that it also proceeded as it actually did.

Now, imagine the early years of the Boom Awakening. Featured are Flower Children, who in size and general appearance, really do resemble children. Perhaps the term "youth" would have come into vogue to describe such physiologically retarded people.

This phenomenon may serve as an "existence proof"-indicating that it would be possible to put off aging and extend the life span. But I find it difficult to imagine that anyone will ever try this on children.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

Point taken. I was just being intellectually lazy for time and convenience sake (and will probably continue to be). I know that S&H's model is just that: A model. But it is easier sometimes for explanatory purposes to just assume it's something more tangible.

I'm not sure. I wasn't cautioning you. I was asking a question. What is the underlying cyclical reality that the saeculum attempts to desribe? Cycles in what? What is repeating?

Though there may a deeper reality at work (i.e., underlying cycles), it is measuring the generations as they alternate between archetypal forms. From another angle it is also describing the four turnings and how a trilogical interaction of generations (Saeculum I) perpetuates them.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

My point was just that the model work extremely well for the 20th century but begin to lose efficacy as you go backwards in time.

How do you know it has worked well? "Worked" in what way?

"Worked" in the sense that the three items troubling the saeculum that I noted in the beginning of my original post are NOT problems for the saeculum in the 20th century.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

Point taken. I was just being intellectually lazy for time and convenience sake (and will probably continue to be). I know that S&H's model is just that: A model. But it is easier sometimes for explanatory purposes to just assume it's something more tangible.

I'm not sure. I wasn't cautioning you. I was asking a question. What is the underlying cyclical reality that the saeculum attempts to desribe? Cycles in what? What is repeating?

Though there may a deeper reality at work (i.e., underlying cycles), it is measuring the generations as they alternate between archetypal forms. From another angle it is also describing the four turnings and how a trilogical interaction of generations (Saeculum I) perpetuates them.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

My point was just that the model work extremely well for the 20th century but begin to lose efficacy as you go backwards in time.

How do you know it has worked well? "Worked" in what way?

"Worked" in the sense that the three items troubling the saeculum that I noted in the beginning of my original post are NOT problems for the saeculum in the 20th century.

Saeculum II is exactly the same in every aspect as Strauss & Howe's "Standard Model".

But S&H's model doesn't work for the recent period. According to their model, the Civic generation is conspicuous by its absence during the Unraveling. A GI still sits as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. If he's still there next year he will have lapped the cycle. And we had a GI running for President 12 years into the unraveling.

During the recent awakening only 29% of the people involved with events on my spiritual events timeline were prophets. 48% were artists. Yet looking at the four awakenings between the Reformation and Transcendental Awakening, 84% of the people are prophets and only 14% are artists. According to the S&H model, it's the prophets who are supposed to be doing the preaching during the awakening. This was the case for the first four Awakenings, but not for the most recent one.

Saeculum II is exactly the same in every aspect as Strauss & Howe's "Standard Model".

But S&H's model doesn't work for the recent period. According to their model, the Civic generation is conspicuous by its absence during the Unraveling. A GI still sits as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. If he's still there next year he will have lapped the cycle. And we had a GI running for President 12 years into the unraveling.

During the recent awakening only 29% of the people involved with events on my spiritual events timeline were prophets. 48% were artists. Yet looking at the four awakenings between the Reformation and Transcendental Awakening, 84% of the people are prophets and only 14% are artists. According to the S&H model, it's the prophets who are supposed to be doing the preaching during the awakening. This was the case for the first four Awakenings, but not for the most recent one.

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

In Strauss & Howe's tetralogical mechanism (Saeculum II), both the generations in the Midlife phase and in the Rising Adulthood phase biologically and familially raise the generation in the Youth phase. Yet it is exclusively the generation in Midlife that sociologically "raises" the Youth cohort. This Midlife group creates it's archetypal opposite. This is the essence of the "Shadow" phenomenon.

There is much more to the S&H mechanism than just the shadowing phenomenon. S&H's mechanism involves the interaction of people with history (turnings) to produce the generations. That is, history creates generations. What molds generations is the experience of the events of the day (which is constant for the population at the time) as modified through one's phase of life. Each phase of life then produces its own effect of history, creating a different kind of generation. History thus creates four kinds of generations, one for each phase of life. This is the fundamental mechanism that produces generations. Child rearing is only part of how history creates generations--generations are created out of adults too. S&H use the example of "cohortia" in which an eventful period (a Crisis) impinges upon a pre-saecular population and produces a set of generations. Examples include the Exodus and the Trojan War.

However, unless this event repeats every four generations, the cycle dies out like the Exodus and Trojan War generations did. How does it repeat?

Here is where the child nurture comes in and the shadow effect. As a result of the child nurture produced by a society run by hubristic (dominant) Heroes and compliant (recessive) Artists with lasseiz faire Nomads in the elder role, you create anti-Heroes, or Prophets as the next generation after the crisis. When they come of age they challenge the Heroes legacy and the recessive Artists are split between allegiance to their elder?s legacy and attraction to their junior?s new ways. This is the awakening, and it is created by the generational interaction: generations create history.

As an eventful period (social moment) the awakening also impinges upon the population and produces a set of four generations, one for each phase of life. The type of generation imprinted is the same for the older generations. Prophets are imprinted into Prophets, Artists into Artists, and Heroes into Heroes. Thus the experience of this social moment reinforces the existing generations, helping to keep the cycle on track.

The Awakening serves to keep the generations originally produced in the first crisis still a cohesive group. Going into the Unraveling there are well-defined Artists, Prophets and Nomads. The nurture cycle is now tightening up child rearing and we start to produce "nurtured Nomads". These are what we can call "proto Heroes". They have had the type of childhood typical of Heroes, but they aren't heroes yet. The unraveling drags on until a random event causes a Crisis (the Crisis trigger). What makes a Crisis a Crisis is Prophets past the age of (young) child raising. Now they can raise hell like they did before they had kids. But now they are at the time of maximum power and when they raise hell they make history instead of just making noise. The history they make isn't nice, in fact it?s a Crisis and we are back to the beginning.

So what this says is if you impose a Crisis on a nontraditional population (one that can "hold" its generations long enough to have an Awakening) you spawn a swarm of prophets afterward who when they get old (two phases of life later) are going to create a Crisis. Hence any nontraditional population will start to show a saeculum once it been kicked by a severe event.

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

In Strauss & Howe's tetralogical mechanism (Saeculum II), both the generations in the Midlife phase and in the Rising Adulthood phase biologically and familially raise the generation in the Youth phase. Yet it is exclusively the generation in Midlife that sociologically "raises" the Youth cohort. This Midlife group creates it's archetypal opposite. This is the essence of the "Shadow" phenomenon.

There is much more to the S&H mechanism than just the shadowing phenomenon. S&H's mechanism involves the interaction of people with history (turnings) to produce the generations. That is, history creates generations. What molds generations is the experience of the events of the day (which is constant for the population at the time) as modified through one's phase of life. Each phase of life then produces its own effect of history, creating a different kind of generation. History thus creates four kinds of generations, one for each phase of life. This is the fundamental mechanism that produces generations. Child rearing is only part of how history creates generations--generations are created out of adults too. S&H use the example of "cohortia" in which an eventful period (a Crisis) impinges upon a pre-saecular population and produces a set of generations. Examples include the Exodus and the Trojan War.

However, unless this event repeats every four generations, the cycle dies out like the Exodus and Trojan War generations did. How does it repeat?

Here is where the child nurture comes in and the shadow effect. As a result of the child nurture produced by a society run by hubristic (dominant) Heroes and compliant (recessive) Artists with lasseiz faire Nomads in the elder role, you create anti-Heroes, or Prophets as the next generation after the crisis. When they come of age they challenge the Heroes legacy and the recessive Artists are split between allegiance to their elder?s legacy and attraction to their junior?s new ways. This is the awakening, and it is created by the generational interaction: generations create history.

As an eventful period (social moment) the awakening also impinges upon the population and produces a set of four generations, one for each phase of life. The type of generation imprinted is the same for the older generations. Prophets are imprinted into Prophets, Artists into Artists, and Heroes into Heroes. Thus the experience of this social moment reinforces the existing generations, helping to keep the cycle on track.

The Awakening serves to keep the generations originally produced in the first crisis still a cohesive group. Going into the Unraveling there are well-defined Artists, Prophets and Nomads. The nurture cycle is now tightening up child rearing and we start to produce "nurtured Nomads". These are what we can call "proto Heroes". They have had the type of childhood typical of Heroes, but they aren't heroes yet. The unraveling drags on until a random event causes a Crisis (the Crisis trigger). What makes a Crisis a Crisis is Prophets past the age of (young) child raising. Now they can raise hell like they did before they had kids. But now they are at the time of maximum power and when they raise hell they make history instead of just making noise. The history they make isn't nice, in fact it?s a Crisis and we are back to the beginning.

So what this says is if you impose a Crisis on a nontraditional population (one that can "hold" its generations long enough to have an Awakening) you spawn a swarm of prophets afterward who when they get old (two phases of life later) are going to create a Crisis. Hence any nontraditional population will start to show a saeculum once it been kicked by a severe event.

It is possible to imagine adults imposing caloric restriction on their children. (Perhaps an incentive would be to postpone puberty till the kids are out of the house?). Once the restricted individuals are on their own, it is easy to imagine a rapid break down in dietary discipline.

Still, a rare individual might try caloric restriction as an adult. Quoting Walford:

"...voluntarily chosen a lifelong nutritionally restricted existence. Luigi Cornaro, who we recall wrote one of the four most famous autobiographies of the Renaissance, The Art of Living Long, was born in Venice in the year 1464 and died in 1567. A member of the minor Italian nobility, he followed a dissolute, gluttonous life leading to dangerous ill-health by the age of 37, at which time he voluntarily adopted a rigidly temperate, dietarily restrictive regime. This he stuck to for the rest of his life. Despite his unrestrained earlier years, he lived to be 103. As serious fasters know quite well, long-term restriction gives you an energetic clear-minded 'high.' It's obvious from reading Cornaro's exemplary autobiographical treatise that he was 'high' from the age of 37 on, or for sixty-six years...undernutrition may augment the enjoyment of life, particularly those joys which the alert mind enhances."

It is possible to imagine adults imposing caloric restriction on their children. (Perhaps an incentive would be to postpone puberty till the kids are out of the house?). Once the restricted individuals are on their own, it is easy to imagine a rapid break down in dietary discipline.

Still, a rare individual might try caloric restriction as an adult. Quoting Walford:

"...voluntarily chosen a lifelong nutritionally restricted existence. Luigi Cornaro, who we recall wrote one of the four most famous autobiographies of the Renaissance, The Art of Living Long, was born in Venice in the year 1464 and died in 1567. A member of the minor Italian nobility, he followed a dissolute, gluttonous life leading to dangerous ill-health by the age of 37, at which time he voluntarily adopted a rigidly temperate, dietarily restrictive regime. This he stuck to for the rest of his life. Despite his unrestrained earlier years, he lived to be 103. As serious fasters know quite well, long-term restriction gives you an energetic clear-minded 'high.' It's obvious from reading Cornaro's exemplary autobiographical treatise that he was 'high' from the age of 37 on, or for sixty-six years...undernutrition may augment the enjoyment of life, particularly those joys which the alert mind enhances."

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

Originally Posted by Croakmore

It will take us a while to choke down all of this, Sean, but I certainly admire your efforts. I have one immediate reaction: you may be trying to resolve more here than such a macro-historical theory will allow. From my perspective, the beauty of S&H's generational theory is its seasonality. My need to bring Princess Summerfall Winterspring to the table is nicely satisfied by their theory. The affairs of all living things (with the possible exception of Gold's "deep hot biosphere") are fundamentally influenced by macro-associations among the sun, the moon, and of course planet Earth. Together, they impose a four-part seasonality. Cycles of a three-part kind, to me, leave the sine curve longing to complete itself. But that might even be consistent with your proposed modifications. More later.

--Croaker

Ah, my dear Batrachoid,

Seasonality is decidely not a casualty of my musings. There are still four turnings and four archetypes. It is only the number of life phases that drops to three. If this still bothers your tetralogical sensibilities, think of a
Mediterranean climate: Rainy Season, Dry Season, In-Between Season. In California this is easy to conceptualize.

Please elaborate on the forlorn sine curve and it's implications.

Well, Mr. Commoner, seasonality as metaphor was not so strange to S&H. Check out Chapter 2 of T4T: "Seasons of Time" Moreover, was not the Civil War Saeculum a truncated sine curve, leaving it wanting for a final stroke of the temporal piston? But I would agree that this was more of an effect than it was a cause. Or was it?

BTW: A sine curve can be viewed as a curvilinear projection of a circle.

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

Originally Posted by Croakmore

It will take us a while to choke down all of this, Sean, but I certainly admire your efforts. I have one immediate reaction: you may be trying to resolve more here than such a macro-historical theory will allow. From my perspective, the beauty of S&H's generational theory is its seasonality. My need to bring Princess Summerfall Winterspring to the table is nicely satisfied by their theory. The affairs of all living things (with the possible exception of Gold's "deep hot biosphere") are fundamentally influenced by macro-associations among the sun, the moon, and of course planet Earth. Together, they impose a four-part seasonality. Cycles of a three-part kind, to me, leave the sine curve longing to complete itself. But that might even be consistent with your proposed modifications. More later.

--Croaker

Ah, my dear Batrachoid,

Seasonality is decidely not a casualty of my musings. There are still four turnings and four archetypes. It is only the number of life phases that drops to three. If this still bothers your tetralogical sensibilities, think of a
Mediterranean climate: Rainy Season, Dry Season, In-Between Season. In California this is easy to conceptualize.

Please elaborate on the forlorn sine curve and it's implications.

Well, Mr. Commoner, seasonality as metaphor was not so strange to S&H. Check out Chapter 2 of T4T: "Seasons of Time" Moreover, was not the Civil War Saeculum a truncated sine curve, leaving it wanting for a final stroke of the temporal piston? But I would agree that this was more of an effect than it was a cause. Or was it?

BTW: A sine curve can be viewed as a curvilinear projection of a circle.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Saeculum II is exactly the same in every aspect as Strauss & Howe's "Standard Model".

But S&H's model doesn't work for the recent period. According to their model, the Civic generation is conspicuous by its absence during the Unraveling. A GI still sits as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. If he's still there next year he will have lapped the cycle. And we had a GI running for President 12 years into the unraveling.

As stated in my original post, just as stress was added to Saeculum I with a drop in the age of social autonomy, stress is being added now to Saeculum II with the lengthening of life span. As both the fourth and (especially!) fifth phases grow in influence we'll be in for a new era of saecular dissonance awaiting a shift to a new equilibrium (Saeculum III).

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

During the recent awakening only 29% of the people involved with events on my spiritual events timeline were prophets. 48% were artists. Yet looking at the four awakenings between the Reformation and Transcendental Awakening, 84% of the people are prophets and only 14% are artists. According to the S&H model, it's the prophets who are supposed to be doing the preaching during the awakening. This was the case for the first four Awakenings, but not for the most recent one.

Interesting problem. Yet have you considered that the bulk of (at least) initial adherents to these various movement were very likely Boomers?

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Saeculum II is exactly the same in every aspect as Strauss & Howe's "Standard Model".

But S&H's model doesn't work for the recent period. According to their model, the Civic generation is conspicuous by its absence during the Unraveling. A GI still sits as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. If he's still there next year he will have lapped the cycle. And we had a GI running for President 12 years into the unraveling.

As stated in my original post, just as stress was added to Saeculum I with a drop in the age of social autonomy, stress is being added now to Saeculum II with the lengthening of life span. As both the fourth and (especially!) fifth phases grow in influence we'll be in for a new era of saecular dissonance awaiting a shift to a new equilibrium (Saeculum III).

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

During the recent awakening only 29% of the people involved with events on my spiritual events timeline were prophets. 48% were artists. Yet looking at the four awakenings between the Reformation and Transcendental Awakening, 84% of the people are prophets and only 14% are artists. According to the S&H model, it's the prophets who are supposed to be doing the preaching during the awakening. This was the case for the first four Awakenings, but not for the most recent one.

Interesting problem. Yet have you considered that the bulk of (at least) initial adherents to these various movement were very likely Boomers?

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

In Strauss & Howe's tetralogical mechanism (Saeculum II), both the generations in the Midlife phase and in the Rising Adulthood phase biologically and familially raise the generation in the Youth phase. Yet it is exclusively the generation in Midlife that sociologically "raises" the Youth cohort. This Midlife group creates it's archetypal opposite. This is the essence of the "Shadow" phenomenon.

There is much more to the S&H mechanism than just the shadowing phenomenon. S&H's mechanism involves the interaction of people with history (turnings) to produce the generations. That is, history creates generations. What molds generations is the experience of the events of the day (which is constant for the population at the time) as modified through one's phase of life. Each phase of life then produces its own effect of history, creating a different kind of generation. History thus creates four kinds of generations, one for each phase of life. This is the fundamental mechanism that produces generations. Child rearing is only part of how history creates generations--generations are created out of adults too. S&H use the example of "cohortia" in which an eventful period (a Crisis) impinges upon a pre-saecular population and produces a set of generations. Examples include the Exodus and the Trojan War.

However, unless this event repeats every four generations, the cycle dies out like the Exodus and Trojan War generations did. How does it repeat?

Here is where the child nurture comes in and the shadow effect. As a result of the child nurture produced by a society run by hubristic (dominant) Heroes and compliant (recessive) Artists with lasseiz faire Nomads in the elder role, you create anti-Heroes, or Prophets as the next generation after the crisis. When they come of age they challenge the Heroes legacy and the recessive Artists are split between allegiance to their elder?s legacy and attraction to their junior?s new ways. This is the awakening, and it is created by the generational interaction: generations create history.

As an eventful period (social moment) the awakening also impinges upon the population and produces a set of four generations, one for each phase of life. The type of generation imprinted is the same for the older generations. Prophets are imprinted into Prophets, Artists into Artists, and Heroes into Heroes. Thus the experience of this social moment reinforces the existing generations, helping to keep the cycle on track.

The Awakening serves to keep the generations originally produced in the first crisis still a cohesive group. Going into the Unraveling there are well-defined Artists, Prophets and Nomads. The nurture cycle is now tightening up child rearing and we start to produce "nurtured Nomads". These are what we can call "proto Heroes". They have had the type of childhood typical of Heroes, but they aren't heroes yet. The unraveling drags on until a random event causes a Crisis (the Crisis trigger). What makes a Crisis a Crisis is Prophets past the age of (young) child raising. Now they can raise hell like they did before they had kids. But now they are at the time of maximum power and when they raise hell they make history instead of just making noise. The history they make isn't nice, in fact it?s a Crisis and we are back to the beginning.

So what this says is if you impose a Crisis on a nontraditional population (one that can "hold" its generations long enough to have an Awakening) you spawn a swarm of prophets afterward who when they get old (two phases of life later) are going to create a Crisis. Hence any nontraditional population will start to show a saeculum once it been kicked by a severe event.

Mike, I understand all of this and agree that this tetralogical dynamic is (most likely) the mechanism that is at work now and has been for some time. However, I don't see how the (proposed) trilogical dynamic is inherently non-perpetuating, as I believe you are implying.

One thing I would point out is that the three phase form is not as tight and not as intense as the Standard Model. The four phase form is certainly stronger in it's reinforcement. That is one reason why I propose the Saeculum (with it's archetypes) is stronger in advanced societies (see my criteria for the reasons for the shift to Saeculum II in my original post). That is also why I believe Strauss and Howe don't see saecular activity before the 15th century (when my thesis would have structural saecular distress beginning on Saeculum I initiating the intensification).

However, the triological dynamic of Saeculum I is self-reinforcing as stated in how I adapted your premodern explanations of the archetypes to the three-phase model. Generations are still shaping history and history is still shaping generations. It's just happening more slowly over longer stretches and only reinforced three ways instead of four.

I obviously had you in mind more than anyone else when this "Multi-Modal Saeculum" popped into my head. I wanted to square your observations with the archetypes and the saeculum. Since I admire your work and since you are the inspiration for all of this I have two requests.

One, please use your critical skills to show why a triological generational dynamic CANNOT produce a self-reinforcing saeculum of four archetypes and four turnings. Please re-read the mechanism I outlined in the previous post whereby I adapted your premodern archetype formation to the three phase model.

Two, even if you are highly skeptical (which is quite fine -- this whole three phase thing is something of a lark) please employ your imagination as to how this would/did work in premodernity. Assume that the saeculum was in action, did interact with history, yet had 27 year generations.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Originally Posted by William Jennings Bryan

In Strauss & Howe's tetralogical mechanism (Saeculum II), both the generations in the Midlife phase and in the Rising Adulthood phase biologically and familially raise the generation in the Youth phase. Yet it is exclusively the generation in Midlife that sociologically "raises" the Youth cohort. This Midlife group creates it's archetypal opposite. This is the essence of the "Shadow" phenomenon.

There is much more to the S&H mechanism than just the shadowing phenomenon. S&H's mechanism involves the interaction of people with history (turnings) to produce the generations. That is, history creates generations. What molds generations is the experience of the events of the day (which is constant for the population at the time) as modified through one's phase of life. Each phase of life then produces its own effect of history, creating a different kind of generation. History thus creates four kinds of generations, one for each phase of life. This is the fundamental mechanism that produces generations. Child rearing is only part of how history creates generations--generations are created out of adults too. S&H use the example of "cohortia" in which an eventful period (a Crisis) impinges upon a pre-saecular population and produces a set of generations. Examples include the Exodus and the Trojan War.

However, unless this event repeats every four generations, the cycle dies out like the Exodus and Trojan War generations did. How does it repeat?

Here is where the child nurture comes in and the shadow effect. As a result of the child nurture produced by a society run by hubristic (dominant) Heroes and compliant (recessive) Artists with lasseiz faire Nomads in the elder role, you create anti-Heroes, or Prophets as the next generation after the crisis. When they come of age they challenge the Heroes legacy and the recessive Artists are split between allegiance to their elder?s legacy and attraction to their junior?s new ways. This is the awakening, and it is created by the generational interaction: generations create history.

As an eventful period (social moment) the awakening also impinges upon the population and produces a set of four generations, one for each phase of life. The type of generation imprinted is the same for the older generations. Prophets are imprinted into Prophets, Artists into Artists, and Heroes into Heroes. Thus the experience of this social moment reinforces the existing generations, helping to keep the cycle on track.

The Awakening serves to keep the generations originally produced in the first crisis still a cohesive group. Going into the Unraveling there are well-defined Artists, Prophets and Nomads. The nurture cycle is now tightening up child rearing and we start to produce "nurtured Nomads". These are what we can call "proto Heroes". They have had the type of childhood typical of Heroes, but they aren't heroes yet. The unraveling drags on until a random event causes a Crisis (the Crisis trigger). What makes a Crisis a Crisis is Prophets past the age of (young) child raising. Now they can raise hell like they did before they had kids. But now they are at the time of maximum power and when they raise hell they make history instead of just making noise. The history they make isn't nice, in fact it?s a Crisis and we are back to the beginning.

So what this says is if you impose a Crisis on a nontraditional population (one that can "hold" its generations long enough to have an Awakening) you spawn a swarm of prophets afterward who when they get old (two phases of life later) are going to create a Crisis. Hence any nontraditional population will start to show a saeculum once it been kicked by a severe event.

Mike, I understand all of this and agree that this tetralogical dynamic is (most likely) the mechanism that is at work now and has been for some time. However, I don't see how the (proposed) trilogical dynamic is inherently non-perpetuating, as I believe you are implying.

One thing I would point out is that the three phase form is not as tight and not as intense as the Standard Model. The four phase form is certainly stronger in it's reinforcement. That is one reason why I propose the Saeculum (with it's archetypes) is stronger in advanced societies (see my criteria for the reasons for the shift to Saeculum II in my original post). That is also why I believe Strauss and Howe don't see saecular activity before the 15th century (when my thesis would have structural saecular distress beginning on Saeculum I initiating the intensification).

However, the triological dynamic of Saeculum I is self-reinforcing as stated in how I adapted your premodern explanations of the archetypes to the three-phase model. Generations are still shaping history and history is still shaping generations. It's just happening more slowly over longer stretches and only reinforced three ways instead of four.

I obviously had you in mind more than anyone else when this "Multi-Modal Saeculum" popped into my head. I wanted to square your observations with the archetypes and the saeculum. Since I admire your work and since you are the inspiration for all of this I have two requests.

One, please use your critical skills to show why a triological generational dynamic CANNOT produce a self-reinforcing saeculum of four archetypes and four turnings. Please re-read the mechanism I outlined in the previous post whereby I adapted your premodern archetype formation to the three phase model.

Two, even if you are highly skeptical (which is quite fine -- this whole three phase thing is something of a lark) please employ your imagination as to how this would/did work in premodernity. Assume that the saeculum was in action, did interact with history, yet had 27 year generations.