Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

The English Civil War restored the monarchy, so it wasn't a crisis.

NO! The English Civil War wasn't a Crisis because it was an Awakening. It was a period particularly rich in religious activity: foundings of religious groups and orders, foundings of religious orientated colonies, lives of Roman Catholic saints, publication of important religious tracts, etc. It was an Awakening because there was a Prophet generation in rising adulthood who was largely responsible for all that religious activity. The Awakening status is INDEPENDENT of how the English Civil war turned out. The monarch could not have been restored and it would STILL be an Awakening and so not a Crisis.

However there is a tendency for Awakening wars to not be as conclusive, or as energetic, as those during Crises. But its only a tendency, it does not DEFINE the difference between an Awakening and a Crisis in the S&H system. This detemination is made by consideration of the generations, not the wars of the time. The proof of this is the Glorious Revolution. There is NO WAY S&H would label the Glorious Revolution as a Crisis if they were classifying wars the way you do. Your observation are perfectly valid--by YOUR war-based criteria, the Glorious Revolution CANNOT be a Crisis. But S&H call it one, so it MUST be that they don't use your war-based criteria.

For you, this tendency DOES define the difference. Thus you would replace the Glorious Revolution with the English Revolution. What you do makes perfect sense within your conception of what constitutes a Crisis. But this is not how S&H concieve of a Crisis or they would have dated things the way you have. This have been my point all along. You and S&H are looking at different things and see slightly different cycles. Why is this so hard to understand?

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

I guess you must believe that the "clash of civilizations" world war is already over - just two little wars. Wow! That wasn't so bad, was it. I guess we'll just have to hope that things won't spiral out of control in Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Kashmir,
Chechnya, China or Korea. Well, Mike, you and I obviously have
diametrically opposite views of what's going on in the world.

Yes we do, I don't think there will be any clash of civilizations world war. I also don't think the Dow is heading for 5000 in the near future.

I'm now asking you for the third time to tell me some wars where
you apply my algorithm and get different answers than I do.

I already told you. I see the War of Spaish Succession and WW I as the same kind of war, either both crisis or both mid-cycle. You see otherwise.

But let me use this as another example of the use of judgment. What do war casualties include? Do they include just military deaths, or
do they also include civilian deaths? Do they include all civilian
deaths, or do they exclude "collateral" damage. Is it possible that
your peaks and valleys are caused not by wars but by changing in
casualty reporting philosophies? How do you deal with multiple
conflicting sources? How do we know how many people were killed?
Maybe in some generations there was a religious decree to kill as many
infidels as possible, so deaths were overreported, while in other
generations the decree was to keep unnecessary deaths down so they
were underreported. Maybe what you're seeing is a reporting
oscillation, rather than a war casualty oscillation

Or maybe not. I'm not arguing about that. I'm just saying that when
all is said in done, it's all a vast amount of judgment and
guesswork. You go to other people's books and you select the series
that make your theories come out right and ignore the series that
don't. You selectively combine collections of data from different
authors in such a way as to make the meaning of "producer prices" that
will make your theories come out right. That's astrology.

If I did this then it will be revealed as soon as someone who is knowledgable about this stuff is exposed to my work. This is how science works and why you publish. I cannot answer any of your questions about the war data graph. I assume that the authors did an honest job, but I can't know if they did. Subsequent workers have not shown that what they did was bogus. The price data were not created by me, either. I make the same assumption about them as I do about the war data.

My OWN work does not yet meet this test; I do NOT assume that it is unbiased. It is entrely possible that it IS unconsciously biased. As for whether I cherry-picked price series, you cannot know whether I did. All a reader need do is check what I did against his own series. Any researcher in the field will have access to the same sorts of data. They will either recognize my sources, probably having copies of many of the papers in their files, or they won't (which would be suspicious, so they will look them up). If I did what you are accusing me of, it will not be hard for one of them to detect it.

Since I will eventually be discovered, what does it profit me to "make my theory work out"? I am not an academic who must "publish or perish". This is a hobby for me, I have a full-time job as a Ph. D. chemical engineer in bioprocess development at Pfizer. None of what I write about here has anything to do with my profession. If my stuff blows up (i.e. the predictions don't work, or it is later shown that I did a sloppy job and my conclusions are junk)--its no big deal--I'll pick another hobby. I can't KNOW whether my stuff holds any water.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Did Germany surrender unconditionally in WW I?

They called for cease-fire on October 4, expecting the German army and
people to rise up and demand victory, and planning to launch a new
attack with replenished strength, once the cease-fire had expired.

A cease-fire is not unconditional surrender. The US secured a cease fire in Vietnam. We certainly did not surrender unconditionally.

So I would think the answer to the unconditional surrender question for WW I would be No.

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

In 1974, the Congress revolted, and threw out the oppressive Nixon administration. At the same time, it forced the new President to accept new restrictions on the Presidency, including restrictions on the FBI, the CIA and the IRS. The War Powers Act would prevent a President from declaring war on his own authority, and there would henceforth be substantial restrictions on the President's ability to
use the FBI, the CIA or the IRS for his own personal gain.

In 1974, the U.S. Government was permanently changed.

And the 1967-1980 social moment would qualify as a secular crisis on this basis if it wasn't already an Awakening. But S&H consider it an Awakening, because the Boomers were in rising adulthood during this period and the Boomers are a prophet generation. This period was richer in religious events of the sort I listed in an earlier post than the adjacent periods of similar length. S&H also point out that awakenings show rising trends in crime and alcohol/drug use, like that seen in the 1960's/1970's, the 1890's/1900's and the 1830's. S&H did not present the data on these trends, but I dug up some and they were right. One of the posters here lived in an ashram in her youth. Care to guess her generation? I'll bet a bigger percentage of Boomers here smoked pot in their teens as did the Gen Yer's. The statistics show this.

This type of behavior was more common in the late 1960's and the 1970's than it is today. And the folks doing it back then were predominantly Boomers. The later wave Xers have not engaged in this sort of "tune in" (spiritually "finding oneself") "turn on" (drug use) and drop out (rise in antisocial behavior like crime) to anywhere near the same extent. This is what makes 1974 an Awakening year--not what happened to Nixon.

Suppose the exact same thing that happened to Nixon happened to Bush in his second term. This would be additional evidence of a social moment, which would be a Crisis because today does not have the same social and cultural trends as the 1970's, and so is not an Awakening. Note, the same events, but different turnings, because of different generations in the rising adult phase of life, giving rise to different kinds of social and cultural trends.

Dear Mike,

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

> Rules and guidelines are the same thing and vague is a value
> judgment on your part. You also use guidelines to determine crisis
> wars. There is an exercise of judgement in determining crisis wars
> and an exercise in judgement in determining generations.

No, the specific rules I laid down are far from the same thing as
vague guidelines, and you've never told me which war(s) you're unable
to get the same results as mine with by my rules.

But actually, when I said The Fourth Turning had "vague
guidelines," I was wrong. S&H provided no guidelines whatsover, even
vague ones, for evaluation either generations or wars, as far as I can
see.

All S&H did is provide their own results as a fait accompli.
They gave no roadmap indicating where they got their results, and why
they selected one event instead of another as a turning, or why they
selected one generation instead of another as being of a particular
type.

So in fact the rules I've defined for crisis wars are the only ones
around, as far as I'm aware.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Dear Mike,

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

> NO! The English Civil War wasn't a Crisis because it was an
> Awakening. It was a period particularly rich in religious
> activity: foundings of religious groups and orders, foundings of
> religious orientated colonies, lives of Roman Catholic saints,
> publication of important religious tracts, etc. It was an
> Awakening because there was a Prophet generation in rising
> adulthood who was largely responsible for all that religious
> activity. The Awakening status is INDEPENDENT of how the English
> Civil war turned out. The monarch could not have been restored and
> it would STILL be an Awakening and so not a Crisis.

> However there is a tendency for Awakening wars to not be as
> conclusive, or as energetic, as those during Crises. But its only
> a tendency, it does not DEFINE the difference between an Awakening
> and a Crisis in the S&H system. This detemination is made by
> consideration of the generations, not the wars of the time. The
> proof of this is the Glorious Revolution. There is NO WAY S&H
> would label the Glorious Revolution as a Crisis if they were
> classifying wars the way you do. Your observation are perfectly
> valid--by YOUR war-based criteria, the Glorious Revolution CANNOT
> be a Crisis. But S&H call it one, so it MUST be that they don't
> use your war-based criteria.

> For you, this tendency DOES define the difference. Thus you would
> replace the Glorious Revolution with the English Revolution. What
> you do makes perfect sense within your conception of what
> constitutes a Crisis. But this is not how S&H concieve of a Crisis
> or they would have dated things the way you have. This have been
> my point all along. You and S&H are looking at different things
> and see slightly different cycles. Why is this so hard to
> understand?

Here's the problem with what you're saying Mike, and it's a BIG
problem.

You say the English Civil War was an awakening because of a Prophet
generation in rising adulthood. OK, well how do you know that? Or
rather, how do S&H know that?

The way you know is because they've defined the previous crisis
period as 1569-94.

This is exactly what "cherry-picking" means in this case. If you
have no absolute way of determining whether the ECW is a crisis or
awakening, then what you're doing is evaluating a period based on
other periods (which is exactly what you're doing in the quoted
section). And that's a big problem, because you're completely open
to the charge that you've the ECB an awakening in order to make your
cycles come out right.

This is exactly the thing I was most suspicious of when I got into
this 2 1/2 years ago. If I had had to accept the kind of reasoning
you're using above, I would have rejected the whole thing. The only
reason that generational dynamics ever worked for me was because I
was able to intuitively see that crisis wars can be defined per
se, without any reliance on other cycle events.

Really, Mike, this is by far the weakest part of S&H's work. It's
perfectly clear what happened. They started from the War of the
Roses, which is clearly a crisis war -- using common sense or
using my criteria. And they decided that it was a crisis war not by
analyzing generations but because it was obviously a crisis war.

Then they looked ahead to the Armada crisis, which is fine except
that they should have ended it in 1588. But they stretched it out by
a few years because they needed some extra time.

They looked ahead again to the American Revolution, and had to fit
something in between the Armada crisis and the Revolution. So they
extended the Armada crisis to 1594, they redefined the English Civil
War from being a crisis (which is absolutely clearly is) to an
awakening so that they could fit the Glorious Revolution in as a
crisis (which it absolutely clearly is not).

There really is no doubt that they did that, and the quoted
paragraphs above confirm that for one part of it.

Sigh. I wish you could appreciate what I've done. By regionalizing
the crisis periods, so that Germany, France and England all have
different crisis periods in the 1500s, and then they all merge in the
1600s and the War of the Spanish Succession, this is now a viable,
credible theory. Each war can be evaluated on its own, without
having to cherry pick to create cycles. It's simple, it's elegant,
it's common sense, and it works. I really don't understand why that
doesn't make sense to you, and I guess I ascribe it to human
perversity.

At any rate, if I believed for one second that the ECW must be an
awakening because of the reasoning that you've given, which
essentially is done to make the cycles come out right, then the
generational paradigm would be truly worthless.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Dear Mike,

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

> Yes we do, I don't think there will be any clash of civilizations
> world war. I also don't think the Dow is heading for 5000 in the
> near future.

This really astounds me, especially in a forum of this type which is
based on a book which essentially predicts both the major war and the
financial crisis. But I guess we disagree on much other stuff, that
this disagreement shouldn't be surprising.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

> I already told you. I see the War of Spaish Succession and WW I as
> the same kind of war, either both crisis or both mid-cycle. You
> see otherwise.

I don't understand this. Are you willing to go either way?

I thought you agreed that WW I was a mid-cycle war, because that's
what S&H say. And I've given the numerous reasons why the WSS is a
crisis war.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

> If I did this then it will be revealed as soon as someone who is
> knowledgable about this stuff is exposed to my work. This is how
> science works and why you publish. I cannot answer any of your
> questions about the war data graph. I assume that the authors did
> an honest job, but I can't know if they did. Subsequent workers
> have not shown that what they did was bogus. The price data were
> not created by me, either. I make the same assumption about them
> as I do about the war data.

> My OWN work does not yet meet this test; I do NOT assume that it
> is unbiased. It is entrely possible that it IS unconsciously
> biased. As for whether I cherry-picked price series, you cannot
> know whether I did. All a reader need do is check what I did
> against his own series. Any researcher in the field will have
> access to the same sorts of data. They will either recognize my
> sources, probably having copies of many of the papers in their
> files, or they won't (which would be suspicious, so they will look
> them up). If I did what you are accusing me of, it will not be
> hard for one of them to detect it.

> Since I will eventually be discovered, what does it profit me to
> "make my theory work out"? I am not an academic who must "publish
> or perish". This is a hobby for me, I have a full-time job as a
> Ph. D. chemical engineer in bioprocess development at Pfizer. None
> of what I write about here has anything to do with my profession.
> If my stuff blows up (i.e. the predictions don't work, or it is
> later shown that I did a sloppy job and my conclusions are
> junk)--its no big deal--I'll pick another hobby. I can't KNOW
> whether my stuff holds any water.

I thank you for telling me this, since it gives me a much better
feeling of where you're coming from.

My philosophy is quite different. I'm 100% open and I publish
everything -- theories, methodologies, results, predictions, etc. --
here and on my web site. This is a very high risk strategy because
I'm completely exposed, but if it seems to me that no other strategy
has any chance at all of success.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

> A cease-fire is not unconditional surrender. The US secured a
> cease fire in Vietnam. We certainly did not surrender
> unconditionally.

> So I would think the answer to the unconditional surrender
> question for WW I would be No.

I don't follow how Vietnam came into this. But I don't understand
why you're saying that Germany's WW I capitulation wasn't an
unconditional surrender. They were forced to accept the reparations
imposed on them. How much more unconditional could it have been?
Incidently, I have no dog in this fight, since my evaluations come
out the same either way.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Dear Mike,

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

> And the 1967-1980 social moment would qualify as a secular crisis
> on this basis if it wasn't already an Awakening. But S&H consider
> it an Awakening, because the Boomers were in rising adulthood
> during this period and the Boomers are a prophet generation. This
> period was richer in religious events of the sort I listed in an
> earlier post than the adjacent periods of similar length. S&H also
> point out that awakenings show rising trends in crime and
> alcohol/drug use, like that seen in the 1960's/1970's, the
> 1890's/1900's and the 1830's. S&H did not present the data on
> these trends, but I dug up some and they were right. One of the
> posters here lived in an ashram in her youth. Care to guess her
> generation? I'll bet a bigger percentage of Boomers here smoked
> pot in their teens as did the Gen Yer's. The statistics show
> this.

> This type of behavior was more common in the late 1960's and the
> 1970's than it is today. And the folks doing it back then were
> predominantly Boomers. The later wave Xers have not engaged in
> this sort of "tune in" (spiritually "finding oneself") "turn on"
> (drug use) and drop out (rise in antisocial behavior like crime)
> to anywhere near the same extent. This is what makes 1974 an
> Awakening year--not what happened to Nixon.

> Suppose the exact same thing that happened to Nixon happened to
> Bush in his second term. This would be additional evidence of a
> social moment, which would be a Crisis because today does not
> have the same social and cultural trends as the 1970's, and so is
> not an Awakening. Note, the same events, but different turnings,
> because of different generations in the rising adult phase of
> life, giving rise to different kinds of social and cultural
> trends.

This gets back to the problem that I stated before. You're saying
that Nixon's resignation would qualify as a crisis, but it can't
because it's an awakening. Why? Because the Boomers were in rising
adulthood. Why? Because WW II was a crisis war.

This whole line of reasoning is total anathema to me. You're
defining things to make the cycles come out right.

It's true that you're providing a fairly complex justification for
why it's OK to pick things so that the cycles come out, but at bottom
that's still what you're doing, and it's just not acceptable.

And I would add, not to any historians either. The reason that
historians scoff at T4T is because they see it as cherry picking
wars. The usual criticism is, "You picked WW II instead of WW I to
make your cycles come out right." No one can consider this credible
unless that criticism is disposed of, and the reasoning that you're
using actually confirms what the critics are saying, because you
would evaluate WW I based on generations following the Civil War.

This is really a critical matter, Mike. It means the difference
between a credible theory and one that isn't.

That's why I keep saying that the work I've done benefits all of us,
by making S&H's original theory more credible. But that means that
it's necessary to drop the insistence on evaluating periods in the
way you've described.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

Dear Mike,

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

> Rules and guidelines are the same thing and vague is a value
> judgment on your part. You also use guidelines to determine crisis
> wars. There is an exercise of judgement in determining crisis wars
> and an exercise in judgement in determining generations.

No, the specific rules I laid down are far from the same thing as
vague guidelines, and you've never told me which war(s) you're unable
to get the same results as mine with by my rules.

But actually, when I said The Fourth Turning had "vague
guidelines," I was wrong. S&H provided no guidelines whatsover, even
vague ones, for evaluation either generations or wars, as far as I can
see.

Are you aware that S&H wrote an earlier book called Generations? That book was much more scholarly, and, as the title suggests, it was based on the generations, not the turnings.

So in fact the rules I've defined for crisis wars are the only ones around, as far as I'm aware.

Well of course, its your concept.

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

Here's the problem with what you're saying Mike, and it's a BIG problem.

You say the English Civil War was an awakening because of a Prophet
generation in rising adulthood. OK, well how do you know that? Or
rather, how do S&H know that?

Because of the religious characteristics of the period.

The way you know is because they've defined the previous crisis
period as 1569-94.

No! The turnings come from the generations. Stop thinking of the Crisis as a special period. It is in YOUR scheme, but not in the S&H scheme (or how I verify turnings). For me the easiest turning to detect is the Awakening. My operational definition for a Crisis is a social moment that is not an Awakening. For S&H it comes from the generations, using cohort biographies. Neither of us focuses on Crises, YOU DO.

The only reason that generational dynamics ever worked for me was because I was able to intuitively see that crisis wars can be defined per se, without any reliance on other cycle events.

Crisis wars are your particular angle on this cycle thing. It isn't the only possible angle.

Really, Mike, this is by far the weakest part of S&H's work. It's
perfectly clear what happened. They started from the War of the
Roses, which is clearly a crisis war -- using common sense or
using my criteria. And they decided that it was a crisis war not by
analyzing generations but because it was obviously a crisis war.

No they didn't. The War of the Roses wasn't even considered in their original work. There original work was Generations. If you haven't read it, then you don't have any understanding of what S&H's cycle is about. The Fourth Turning is not very useful in this regard.

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

I thought you agreed that WW I was a mid-cycle war, because that's
what S&H say. And I've given the numerous reasons why the WSS is a
crisis war.

As I see it the reasons for WSS apply to WW I too.





Germany losses in WW I were not dissimilar to French losses in the WSS.

Consulting an online encyclopedia for a description:

There were two main theaters of the war in Europe: Spain itself and West-Central Europe, especially the Low Countries (although there was also important fighting in Italy and Germany). The latter proved the more important, as Eugene and the English commander, John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough distinguished themselves as military commanders. At first, France was successful in the Alsace, and threatened the Austrian capital, but the two generals managed to link up in Bavaria and won the Battle of Blenheim. France's trans-Rhine ambitions were crushed, and the French were forced into a defensive posture. Bavaria was knocked out of the war, and Portugal and Savoy changed sides.

In Spain, Valencia and Catalonia switched side in favour of the Austrian pretender, Charles. A British fleet, sent to support Catalans, captured Gibraltar, a possession they held throughout the Siege of Gibraltar and hold to this day.

Marlborough and Eugene split forces again, with the former going to the Netherlands, and the latter to Italy. Over the next two years, each drove the French back from those territories, with 1706 seeing both Marlborough's notable victory over the French army of Marshal Villeroi at the Battle of Ramillies, which resulted in the French loss of the Spanish Netherlands, and Eugene's victory at Turin.

In 1707, April 25, Battle of Almansa (Valencian country) Austriacist army was defeated by the Bourbon army. Then the war in Spain settled into indecisive skirmishing from which it would not emerge.

The French fought back, and managed to stall Eugene's invasion into the south of the country, and Marlborough got caught up in an endless succession of fortresses in and around Flanders. In 1708, Eugene and Marlborough once again managed to link up in Flanders, and defeated the French under the Duke of Vend?me at the Battle of Oudenarde. An attempt to march on Paris in 1709 resulted in the Battle of Malplaquet, which was won by the two generals but at such a cost to their forces that this final invasion had to be called off.

Britain began to get cold feet, too, as an over-decisive victory for Austria would be almost as bad for their interests as one for the French and Spanish. Marlborough fell out of grace with the English (or rather, now, British) crown and with the new Tory government and was recalled and replaced by the Duke of Ormonde, who refused to commit his troops to battle. Peace negotiations with France led to the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, in which England, Holland, and France ceased fighting with one another, and Great Britain left the Catalans alone to fight for themselves.

In 1714, September 11, Barcelona surrendered to the Borbonic army after a long siege. The Franco-Austrian hostilities lumbered on until September 1714, before the signing of the Treaty of Baden.

This doesn't seem to be all that energetic. The War sort of fizzled out like WW I did, France was not brought to her knees, but actually was able to emerge relatively unscathed. I don't see how the WSS is all that different (crisis-wise) from WW I.

************************************************** **************

Originally Posted by Tim Walker

Don't overlook lifestyle experimentation-think of communes, psychedelic drugs, etc.-and interest in radical politics by the young.

I do use the drug connection, except I include alcohol. So I note that marijuana use by American high school seniors peaked in 1978 and alcohol use per capita in 1980. I also note that American cocaine and alcohol use showed peaks around 1910. Further back US and British alcohol consumptions peaked in the 1830's and 1840's respectively. There was a British peak in the 1740's too.

Communes would be part of the new religious developments. For example, one of the "spirtiual events" in my list is an organization in whose ashrams Jenny Genser lived in during the Awakening. Some of the Reformation groups lived in communes as did followers of Jan Hus (the original "Bohemians") in the Hussite Awakening (1406-1435). And of course all of the monastic orders in the Middle Ages were communes. Their foundings show up as spirtiual events too.

Radical politics shows up in the unrest events, as indicators of social moments, that is, Crises as well as Awakenings.

Mike - France did not lose anything in the Spanish Succession War; they put a Bourbon on the throne of Spain, got complete title to Alsace and acquired some Flemish border towns and the manufacturing center at Lille.

John - There was no unconditional surrender at the end of World War I. An Armistice was negotiated at Compeigne where the Germans agreed to the terms laid out by Marechal Foch. In unconditional surrenders there are no negotiations, and, in fact, most historians are convinced that the unconditional surrender agreed to by the Allies at Yalta was designed to prevent the Germans from the "stab in the back" whining the Germans engaged in throughout the 1920s. There was going to be no doubt this time.

On a more general note, John, you need to read a whole lot more history than you have in order to convince historians that you have anything plausible to say. You alternate between naivete, ignorance, and arrogance. Most pointedly, you seem to have little respect for the messy nature of human behavior in the past and not much for what historians do, and have done. Otherwise you wouldn't talk about "forgotten" wars and other nonsense, such as an algorithm for defining historical periods . If wars were written about, and the language is known, historians know about them. Assessing their importance is another matter, but relying on surveys, which is what undergraduates would do, would not satisfy any historian. In order to do satisfy us, you would need to read thousands of books to do what you have set out for yourself (or at least that's what Toynbee and Strauss and Howe did). And, even if you do make a convincing case for your Crisis War model, it does not mean that it will coincide with S & H's Crisis Period because they do not define their Crisis Periods by wars (Britain had a mid-19th century Crisis without a war, for example). But, at all events, good luck.

Pax,

Dave Krein '42

Dear David,

You've been around a long time, and I'm sure you've had to listen to
many clumsy comments directed at you by many ignorant morons and
jackasses. I haven't been around as long as you, but almost as long,
and I've had that same experience. And although I've found that I'm
right far more often than I'm wrong, nonetheless I always try to
extract some tiny particle of value and learn something from even such
comments, as I'll try to do from yours. Whether I succeed or fail, I
would be most grateful if you would favor me by fulfilling one
request, namely that you not address me with such comments again; or
if those are the only comments you're capable of, that you not address
me again at all.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Dear Mike,

I spent a few hours today at Border's bookstore reading all that I
could about the War of the Spanish Succession. I learned some
interesting things, and I can assure you this was not a war that
simply fizzled.

One thing that's clear is that the War of the League of Augsburg (WLA)
was a mid-cycle war that led to the crisis War of the Spanish
Succession (WSS) in the same way that WW I was a mid-cycle war leading
to the crisis WW II.

WWS versus WWI

When attempting to compare WSS specifically to WWI (for western
Europe), there are substantial differences. It's probably easiest to
compare England v Germany in WWI and England v France in WSS.

Here are some of the major differences:

(*) Germany invaded France only because Germany had a treaty with
Austria and France had a treaty with Russia. As far as I know,
Germany had no intentions with France except to prevent it from
helping Russia.

However, the WLA ended with the indecisive Treaty of Ryswick, and the
WSS began because France's Louis XIV violated the Treaty of Ryswick,
and tried to gain control of most of western Europe, from Netherlands
to Spain, and even parts of Italy.

(*) Two weeks after entering France, Germany transferred 25% of its
forces to the eastern front, thereby stalling and stalemating the
advance into France.

France never did anything like that in WSS, as far as I know.

(*) The Christmas truce, where English and German sources got
together on the line of battle, drank beer and sang Christmas carols.
This is one of the most compelling facts about WWI. How much energy
can two opponents have against each other if they're able to stop,
drink beer, and sing Christmas carols?

I'm not aware of the English and the French singing Christmas carols
during WSS.

(*) Germany equivocated on the eastern front, not even bothering to
fully coordinate plans with its Austrian ally.

(*) Germany called for a truce because it was bogged down in France.

Louis XIV tried to negotiate a peace with England when he saw he
would lose, but when England demanded too much, Louis rejected the
terms and struck back very violently.

(*) Germany capitulated completely and unnecessarily, even though it
still had troops in France and Belgium, and even though there were no
foreign troops on German soil, resulting in its having to accept
punitive reparations.

Louis XIV didn't stop fighting until he had to.

(*) The Treaty of Versailles which settled WW I was designed to
punish Germany. It was NOT designed to prevent further war, and it
didn't, since it led to WW II.

The Treaty of Utrecht, which settled WSS was designed "to avoid for
as long as possible another conflict such as that which had just
closed." In fact, the treaty divided up Europe in such a way that
Europe almost completely free from war until the French Revolution.

WWS Narrative

The following narrative is mostly taken from Queen Anne by
Edward Gregg, Yale University Press, 1980, 2001

The War of the Spanish Succession came at a time when there was a
succession problem in England as well. When King William died in
1702, Queen Anne succeeded, but her last surviving child had died in
1700. Since Anne was in ill health, the question of her own
succession was a problem. In 1701, the English Parliament had passed
a law passing English Succession over to the Protestant House of
Hanover, and that solved the succession problem for England.

But just as the Glorious Revolution had given additional powers to the
English Parliament, it had also given additional powers
to the Scottish Parliament, including the ability the right to name
its own line of succession. It thus became necessary to convince the
Scottish Parliament to pass the "Hanoverian Succession."

Scotland refused to be convinced.

The War of the Spanish Succession was going very poorly for England
in the summer of 1704. France's Louis XIV was winning one battle
after another against the English forces, who were led by Anne's
friend, John Churchill, the Duke of Marlborough. Marlborough had not
one a single battle. [Gregg p. 186]

If things continued badly for Marlborough, then the Alliance fighting
the war would break down. Louis had plans to ally with Scotland, and
Scotland was willing. If Louis's forces could establish a base in
Scotland, then England would have to divert forces back to England,
giving Louis a freer hand in Europe.

Since this was a Fourth Turning crisis period, this would inevitably
lead to a new English Civil War. (When I started studying
generational dynamics, I was puzzled by why there was never an
American Civil War II and there was never an English Civil War II.
This gives a partial answer to the second question.)

The Scots were determined to use their leverage with Louis to gain
commercial concessions from Anne. In the summer of 1704 the Scottish
Parliament passed the Bill of Security of 1703-04, which not only
separated the Scottish succession from that of England, but also
specified that Scotland was not to be drawn into England's wars. Anne
was forced to sign the bill on August 6, or risk losing Scotland to
France. [p. 185]

So England's entire empire was in grave danger. But four days later,
she received the news that Marlborough had defeated the French army
in the Battle of Blenheim. It was a total defeat for the French
army. Marlborough had saved the English empire, since France could no
longer threaten it. [pp. 186-87]

In 1705-06, Marlborough's victories continued. One Netherlands
battlefield after another fell to the English, forcing France in the
north to retreat within its own borders. In the south, France was
driven from northern Italy. Marlborough's allies had a firm base in
Spain, and a staunch ally in Portugal. [p. 230]

During this period, England negotiated a treaty with Scotland. The
provisions called for Hanoverian Succession for Scotland and
proportional representation for Scotland in the English Parliament.
The treaty was agreed on July 23, 1706, and would be considered by the
Scottish Parliament when it reconvened on Oct 3. The treaty was
ratified on Jan 16, 1707.

The remaining victory that England required was to eject France from
Spain. However, things went badly for Marlborough in 1707, and this
caused raucous political debates in England (just as we're having
raucous political debates today over the Iraq war).

In Spring 1708, Louis XIV launced ships to invade Scotland, hoping
to force England to accept a peace treaty to end the war with no
further losses to France. The invasion was defeated. [p. 262] The
Marlborough won the battle of Oudenarde in July, destroying the last
remnants of French power in the Southern Netherlands, and in August,
Lille, France, surrendered to Marlborough. It was the greatest loss
of French territory that France had sustained in his entire reign.
[p. 279]

By March, 1709, France was on the brink of collapse. The crops had
failed from weather, and Louis was close to bankruptcy. He opened
secret peace negotiations. [p. 285-86]

Here's an interesting generational aside: At this point, Marlborough
asked the Queen to give him the office of captain-general of the army
for his lifetime, a request deeply disturbed the Queen, and led to a
split between them. One of the objections to the request is that
"For the generation that grew up in the shadow of [Oliver] Cromwell,
'no stanidng army' was an asbsolute article of political faith." [p.
286] That generation would, of course, be the Prophets.

The August, 1709, battle of Malplaquet exhibited the violent burst of
energy that can only occur in a crisis war. The Allies responded to
Louis' peace overture by making excessive demands that he found
them offensive.

As you know Mike, I'm experimenting with a particular criterion for
distinguishing between crisis and non-crisis wars: The negotiations
that follow a crisis war should be for the purpose of guaranteeing
that no such war ever happens again (which is what the Treaty at
Utrecht finally did), but the negotiations that follow a non-crisis
war may have the purpose of being punitive. This was the case in the
Gulf War and WW I.

Now in this situation, Louis was looking for a way to settle the war
without being humiliated. The English (and Dutch) could have grabbed
at it, but in the crisis war mentality you want to go in for the
final kill. That was the effect of making the demands excessive.

On Louis' part, his rejection of the excessive demands exhibited a
similar crisis war mentality by being willing to give up, even when
the battle is lost. (Think of Hitler in his bunker.)

To carry this aside one step further, I've been convinced for some
time that America's greatest danger today is hubris. It's amazing to
me that I can't remember even a single television pundit or newspaper
pundit express any doubt that America can win any war any time.
(Senator Kerry, and those who think we're failing in Iraq, blame Bush
for sending in too few troops.)

It's clear that England was in the same state in the summer of 1709.
The Queen and Marlborough were convinced that France was near
total defeat. The next battle would cause France's complete
collapse, permitting Marloborough's army to march through France to
Spain and eject France from there as well. [p. 289]

When Louis rejected the demands, he issued a manifesto to be read
throughout the kingdom, to summon his subjects to give their last
exertions in defense of la patrie. [p. 288]

The battle of Malplaquet was the climax of the war, and the bloodiest
war in Europe for the entire eighteenth century. France and England
lost 25,000 and 20,000 men respectively. The war was technically a
victory for England, but the tremendous losses had political
consequences. The Queen humiliated Marlborough, and England's allies
lost interest in winning Spain. [p. 289, 304]

So there was a great deal of energy in this war, Mike, and there was
a great deal at stake, when you realize how close England came to
renewing its civil war. Nothing like this was true in WW I.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Dear Mike,

I have some additional thoughts about the War of the Spanish
Succession.

One of the confusing things about WSS is that it can be reasonably
argued that neither side won. The war was a "draw."

Is it necessary for one side or the other to have a clear victory for
it to be a crisis war? I guess not.

There's no doubt that there was a lot at stake. If Louis had won the
battle of Blenheim, the entire course of European history would have
been substantially changed.

The battle of Malplaquet seems to be a classic climax battle for a
crisis war. Louis risked his entire monarchy by issuing his
manifesto and fighting the battle. Marlborough threw everything he
had into the same battle.

If either side had scored a clear victory, then history would
probably have treated this as a much more exciting and interesting
war. As it was, I get the impression that historians treat WSS as a
really dull war. Authors like Roberts that spend a lot of time on it
emphasize not the war itself but the outcome from the Peace at
Utrecht, and how it prevented any further European wars for decades.

This situation reminds me of chess: people are rarely interested in
reading about and replaying games that end in a draw, even if the
draw was an exciting and brutally fought game. No matter how tense
everyone is while a game is progress, people later are only
interested in seeing how one player beat the other, not in how
well-played the game was.

Another interesting thing is that after the battle of Malplaquet, the
political situation in England became extremely bitter, nasty and
tumultuous. This is exactly what's happening in America today in the
2004 election campaign. There's something about today's political
atmosphere that's making people extremely coarse and nasty on a
national level and on a personal level. This is exactly what happened
in Queen Anne's government after Malplaquet, and may well be a feature
of all crisis wars.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Originally Posted by David Krein

Mike - France did not lose anything in the Spanish Succession War; they put a Bourbon on the throne of Spain, got complete title to Alsace and acquired some Flemish border towns and the manufacturing center at Lille.

John,

This demonstrates the difficulty of trying to determine cycles by inspection. Unless your knowledge is deep, you will make mistakes, like I did above. I haven't read any detailed histories about these various wars, so my war knowledge is particularly shallow.

Simlarly, I haven't done any of the reasearch S&H did so my generational knowledge is also shallow. But unlike they (and you), in my books I am not not making novel cycle claims from consideration of the raw data. Whenever you do that you have to answer an important question. If the cycle is really there, why wasn't it discovered a long time ago? In my case, all of the cycles I discuss were discovered a long time ago by scholars. I firm up the dating by reanalyzing the data and compare the various cycles for alignment.

For S&H the answer is they used a method, cohort biographies, that is sufficiently laborious and sufficiently novel that it is not hard to believe that nobody had done it before. Since S&H went there first they got to see what was there and found the saeculum.

You consider wars, about which a lot is known. If crisis wars exist, scholars should have noticed them before. Scholars have written about cycles in warfare--scholars who know a lot more about these things than you or I do. It simply makes sense to learn what others who have gone before you have learned before striking out on your own.

I believe that I'm beginning to see how these different mechanism/situations/theories can be combined as to span both a traditionalist society, the multi-modal saeculum, Crisis wars, etc.

But I want to think about it a bit more before I post.

Dear Mike,

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

> You consider wars, about which a lot is known. If crisis wars
> exist, scholars should have noticed them before. Scholars have
> written about cycles in warfare--scholars who know a lot more
> about these things than you or I do. It simply makes sense to
> learn what others who have gone before you have learned before
> striking out on your own.

Don't you think I've asked myself these questions a thousand times
already?

When I gave my presentation at MIT, I joked that historians would be
the most skeptical, because it would be as if I walked into the
physics department and declared that I'd discovered a Fourth Law of
Thermodynamics!

But what do you think I should do, Mike? Do you really believe I
should hibernate for ten years with a room full of history books,
before I dare open my mouth? And why should I do that? Just to keep
the Kreins of the world happy? Is that what you really think? Is
that what you'd do? Is that what you did when you got started?

Anyway, that isn't even practical. For one thing I probably won't
live that long. For another thing, the Kreins of the world would be
just as contemptuous ten years from now as they are today. This has
nothing to do with how many history books I've read. It's just the
way people are. It has nothing to do with facts. It's just like the
OJ case -- 80% of whites think he's guilty and that blacks are
bigoted, and 80% of blacks think he's innocent and that whites are
bigoted -- and those decisions were made before the trial even
started, so they can't possibly be based on facts. Most Democrats
passionately hate Bush, and most Republicans passionately hated
Clinton. People don't reach these kinds of conclusions based on
facts. It's pure visceral gut emotion with ex post facto
rationalization. I have my emotional biases too, but at least I try
to remember something that a manager told me years ago: Be brutally
honest with yourself in understanding your own biases, so that you
can compensate for them when you have to make a decision. I've tried
to do that my whole life, but I don't believe a lot of other people
do.

---

Still, the other question you're asking is the most interesting one:
If crisis wars exist, then why haven't scholars noticed them before?
There's an enormous resistance to accepting the generational
paradigm. I noticed this at the very beginning, when people I spoke
to said that S&H obviously picked WW II rather than WW I to make
their cycles come out right.

Perhaps you could answer your question better than I could. After
all, you reject S&H's prophecy of America's current Fourth Turning
crisis period. Why do you reject S&H's theory?

When I first read S&H's book T4T, the first thing I realized is that
if this book were right, then WW II would have happened with or
without Hitler. What I've found is that people refuse to give up
their belief that Hitler caused WW II. (And when I ask them
why Hitler bombed Pearl Harbor, they either roll their eyes or give
me a blank stare.)

---

So why do scholars reject the generational paradigm out of hand,
whether it's S&H's T4T or my presentation in Generational Dynamics?

I'll give you a fairly melodramatic answer to your question: The
generational paradigm strikes at the very heart of the
Judeo-Christian belief system, as well as the belief system of Islam
and other religions as well.

Almost everyone seems to believe in good and evil at some level, and
believe that evil causes wars. Conservatives believe that wars are
caused by evil people like Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin. Liberals
believe that wars are caused by evil people like Adolf Hitler and
George Bush. (As one tv pundit put it, the difference between
liberals and conservatives is that liberals believe that
conservatives are evil, and conservatives believe that liberals are
stupid.)

But the generational paradigm directly attacks these common basic
beliefs. If T4T is true, or GD is true, then this whole fundamental
belief system that evil people cause wars goes out the window. And
most people simply don't want to believe that. The generational
paradigm destroys an entire system of beliefs that are held by almost
all human beings, and are fundamental tenets of probably every
religion and belief system of the world.

And it also goes against the entire system political beliefs.
According to S&H we're going to enter (or we've already entered) a 4T
crisis period, irrespective of who's elected President. There
is no Republican or Democrat who's willing to accept that.

That's why S&H's work is so brilliant - not just because they figured
out the generational paradigm, which is hard enough, but because they
overcame their own belief systems and the objections of many other
people to put forth T4T book.

But it goes farther than that when you throw in the analysis that
population grows faster than the food supply. It's bizarre to me to
hear people (mostly conservatives) claim that Malthus has been proven
wrong, when there are 20-40 wars going on all the time around the
world. And yet the food vs population analysis is fairly simple and
straightforward.

If you're religious, then the Malthus effect once again strikes at
your fundamental beliefs, because it says that war is caused by an
ever-dwindling per capita food supply, and that's clearly
God's fault, so wars must be God's fault, not man's fault. I get a
lot of scorn for saying things like that, and yet the figures are
undeniable.

And if the listener is not yet convinced that I'm a lunatic,
then all it takes is a mention of computers and the Singularity.

So whether it's T4T or GD or the Malthus Effect or the Singularity,
the results are the same: People will not accept the validity of
something that conflicts with their basic belief systems.

(Note to self: Tie this into theory of cognitive dissonance.)

---

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

> Simlarly, I haven't done any of the reasearch S&H did so my
> generational knowledge is also shallow. But unlike they (and you),
> in my books I am not not making novel cycle claims from
> consideration of the raw data. Whenever you do that you have to
> answer an important question. If the cycle is really there, why
> wasn't it discovered a long time ago? In my case, all of the
> cycles I discuss were discovered a long time ago by scholars. I
> firm up the dating by reanalyzing the data and compare the various
> cycles for alignment.

I think you're being really disingenuous here.

I have your 2000 Stock Cycles book in front of me. It says on
the cover, "Why stocks won't beat money markets over the next twenty
years," with no qualifiers. It says on p. 5, "I predict that an
S&P500 index fund is unlikely to beat a money market return over the
next 20 years." It's true that you present counter-arguments in
chapter 7, but you only do that in order to explain why they're
wrong. I imagine that many people who bought this book in 2000
followed your predictions in their own investment decisions.

Now, I sympathize with the fact that you have to deal with the fact
that your predictions didn't come true. (Actually, I agree with your
prediction in the long run.) I've had to eat a lot of crow because of
my monumentally dumb prediction that stocks would be down to 7000 by
1/1/04. But I'm not running away from it, and it's still on my web
site on the archive page.

I'm not sure what moral obligation you have, but I think it's more
than simply saying, "Well, I can't take responsibility for the data,
because it's someone else's data," or "Well, I can't take
responsibility for cycle claims I've made, because they were all
discovered long ago by other scholars."

I've been looking through the Modelski book you recommended, and it's
clear that there are many, many cycle claims that have been made, and
that they produce contradictory predictions. You selected one
particular cycle claim, and in doing so and writing a whole book
about it and making predictions about it, you've made a de
facto endorsement of that cycle claim. At least, you've done so
in my opinion.

So, quite honestly, there's no difference between what you've done
and what I'm doing (and what S&H did), except that I'm not running
away from my predictions. If it turns out that my predictions are
wrong, and if I can't provide a theoretical explanation for why
they're wrong, then I'll have to admit that the GD theory is flawed.
And if I can't fix the theory, then I'll have to admit it's
completely wrong.

But I just can't see myself going on with something I know is wrong
because it's fun to do as a spare time hobby. If I really thought GD
was wrong, I'd be outta there.

---

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

> This demonstrates the difficulty of trying to determine cycles by
> inspection. Unless your knowledge is deep, you will make
> mistakes, like I did above. I haven't read any detailed histories
> about these various wars, so my war knowledge is particularly
> shallow.

Look, as I've said, I've analyzed hundreds of wars, and the
generational paradigm keeps coming out right, over and over and over.

I've given you other examples. I'll give one more. Early in 2003 I
developed a list of 1000 college history professors, and I sent out
e-mail messages to all of them, asking their opinion on what I was
doing. I got around 40 responses, which is very good for what was
essentially spam. Some responses were encouraging, others were
critical. One in particular was encouraging but skeptical.

So I looked him up and found that he specialized in medieval Spain.
I had never looked at Spain, so I did an analysis, and sure enough,
everything fell right into place (1390s pogroms, 1492, 1580s Armada).
I didn't have to fudge; it just came out. I wrote a few paragraphs
of generational analysis and sent it to him. He wrote back saying
that he was looking at exactly the same thing I was, except that I
was in a balloon at 10,000 feet above the ground, while he was on the
ground. So he essentially endorsed that little piece of analysis.

That's what keeps happening. Many people blow me off in ten seconds.
Some people say, "That's been done before." By whom? They can't
find it. Some people say, "That's wrong." Why? Either they can't
tell me why, or they give an example like WSS or the Roman buried
coin hoards example. At those times I go back and do the analysis,
and so far GD has been proven right every time.

But I'm not claiming I've made an ironclad case. In fact, there are
some theoretical issues that really require further development,
especially around the issue of merging timelines.

But even though I don't have ironclad proof that GD is right, I
have made the case that GD is at least as valid as any of the
two dozen cycle theories in Modelski's book.

So all I'm asking is that GD be tested and evaluated.

And suppose that you or someone else finds some war that comes out
wrong. What happens then? I've produced a large enough body of work
by now to be able to claim that any such exception would be
worthy of serious study as to why it's an exception to a rule that's
followed elsewhere almost universally. If someone found a place on
earth where the law of gravity failed, it wouldn't mean the law of
gravity was necessarily wrong, but it would mean that that particular
place was worthy of a great deal of study.

I've done enough work to be able to claim that GD is sufficiently
credible that it's worthy of study. And because of the "crisis war
criteria" that I've recently developed, it's now a worthwhile
bachelors or masters thesis in history to do an independent
evaluation of GD, and it's worth a PhD thesis to extend GD by
resolving issues like merging timelines, and to extend the theory to
provide some answers about non-crisis wars.

That's why I'm writing up the new crisis war criteria in detail for
my web site, and why I'm tentatively planning to send out another
e-mailing to history professors. I'm not sure exactly what I want to
say, but it'll be along the lines of, "Hey, I'm desperate. Everyone
just blows me off, but this really works. Could somebody please do
an independent evaluation and give me some support?" Maybe it'll
work or maybe it won't, but at this point I have nothing to lose.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com


The odds were a hundred to one against me
The world thought the heights were too high to climb
But people from Missouri never incensed me
Oh, I wasn't a bit concerned
For from hist'ry I had learned
How many, many times the worm had turned

They all laughed at Christopher Columbus
When he said the world was round
They all laughed when Edison recorded sound
They all laughed at Wilbur and his brother
When they said that man could fly
They told Marconi
Wireless was a phony
It's the same old cry

They laughed at me wanting you
Said I was reaching for the moon
But oh, you came through
Now they'll have to change their tune

They all said we never could be happy
They laughed at us and how!
But ho, ho, ho!
Who's got the last laugh now?

They all laughed at Rockefeller Center
Now they're fighting to get in
They all laughed at Whitney and his cotton gin
They all laughed at Fulton and his steamboat
Hershey and his chocolate bar
Ford and his Lizzie
Kept the laughers busy
That's how people are

They laughed at me wanting you
Said it would be, Hello, Goodbye.
But oh, you came through
Now they're eating humble pie

They all said we'd never get together
Darling, let's take a bow
For ho, ho, ho!
Who's got the last laugh?
Hee, hee, hee!
Let's at the past laugh
Ha, ha, ha!
Who's got the last laugh now?
- George Gershwin

[End of message]

Dear Tim,

Originally Posted by Tim Walker

> I believe that I'm beginning to see how these different
> mechanism/situations/theories can be combined as to span both a
> traditionalist society, the multi-modal saeculum, Crisis wars,
> etc.

> But I want to think about it a bit more before I post.

That sounds great, because I've been thinking about a unified field
theory myself. I'll be looking forward to your thoughts.

Sincerely,

John

John J. Xenakis
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

Now, I sympathize with the fact that you have to deal with the fact that your predictions didn't come true.

What are you talking about? The S&P500 has underperformed money markets since 2000. The prediction came true, at least so far. Why do you suppose I've sold 8000+ copies?

But I just can't see myself going on with something I know is wrong
because it's fun to do as a spare time hobby. If I really thought GD
was wrong, I'd be outta there.

When did I say I know it is wrong? What I said is IF I am wrong, I'll get another hobby. I am not so married to my ideas that I will be unable to admit if I am wrong. You should read more carefully.

Originally Posted by Mike Alexander '59

Originally Posted by John J. Xenakis

Now, I sympathize with the fact that you have to deal with the fact that your predictions didn't come true.

What are you talking about? The S&P500 has underperformed money markets since 2000. The prediction came true, at least so far. Why do you suppose I've sold 8000+ copies?

But I just can't see myself going on with something I know is wrong
because it's fun to do as a spare time hobby. If I really thought GD
was wrong, I'd be outta there.

When did I say I know it is wrong? What I said is IF I am wrong, I'll get another hobby. I am not so married to my ideas that I will be unable to admit if I am wrong. You should read more carefully.

Sorry, I must have misunderstood several of your postings.

John

I have been puzzled by Ireland for awhile. Steve Ryan listed Awakenings as occurring mid-century, and Crises as occuring at the turn of the century. He also commented that Ireland lost every Crisis war for 800 years. The obvious question is how the saeculum could continue after-not just one warped saeculum-but defeat after defeat after defeat?

Unless much of the period he described was actually pre-saecular?

I've been wondering if there was a rhythm, a framework, upon which the saeculum later grew upon.

John Xenakis has proposed a mechanism for Crisis wars that, because of its sheer simplicity, implies that it could apply to a traditionalist society which does not experience full fledged generational archetypes. If Crises are spaced a century apart, how many old timers are left with childhood memories of the last conflagaration?

Perhaps a similar mechanism would explain Awakenings being spaced a century apart. Perhaps, in a traditionalist society-now spiritually stale-there comes a time for a renewal of the old time religion. Perhaps that time is when the old timers who remember the last Awakening have died off.

Off course, now we have to explain why Awakenings are spaced mid-way between Crises in this scheme.

Originally Posted by Tim Walker

I have been puzzled by Ireland for awhile. Steve Ryan listed Awakenings as occurring mid-century, and Crises as occuring at the turn of the century. He also commented that Ireland lost every Crisis war for 800 years. The obvious question is how the saeculum could continue after-not just one warped saeculum-but defeat after defeat after defeat?

To ask that question, you must not be Irish.

Unless much of the period he described was actually pre-saecular?

I'm with Dave McGuiness, who seems to think that the saeculum arose with civilization.

I've been wondering if there was a rhythm, a framework, upon which the saeculum later grew upon.

Yes, population booms and busts, particularly those with a generational lag in them.

John Xenakis has proposed a mechanism for Crisis wars that, because of its sheer simplicity, implies that it could apply to a traditionalist society which does not experience full fledged generational archetypes. If Crises are spaced a century apart, how many old timers are left with childhood memories of the last conflagaration?

Nada. But that's part of S&H's theory for the length and driver for the saeculum, too.

Perhaps a similar mechanism would explain Awakenings being spaced a century apart. Perhaps, in a traditionalist society-now spiritually stale-there comes a time for a renewal of the old time religion. Perhaps that time is when the old timers who remember the last Awakening have died off.

Ah, that might work.

Off course, now we have to explain why Awakenings are spaced mid-way between Crises in this scheme.[/quote]

*scratches head*