My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer
August 2, 2008
Peter Turchin as Hari Seldon
Razib at GNXP offers a useful summary-review of Peter Turchin's ambitious "War and Peace and War," in which Turchin offers three theories to explain much of human history. I offer my thoughts in the GNXP comments.
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4 comments:
"Yesterday assman recommended Peter Turchin's oeuvre..."
Oh dear God I thank you for everything within one degree of Steve Sailer :-)
The best part? Slightly over my (too big) head; never even heard of cliometrics before. I go read now.
They may not have taught me shit from shinola, baby boomers, but I'm catching up quickly.
The important question is: does Turchin's theoretical framework explain the fall of the Galactic Empire and the rise of the Foundation?
I think it does, to some extent. Seldon puts the encyclopedists (the seed of what will become the Foundation) on a marginal planet near the outskirts of the galaxy, a planet surrounded with less advanced -almost barbaric- systems that pose a constant threat. Meanwhile, the center of the Empire -the city of Trantor- quickly drifts into decadence and irrelevance.
Maybe Seldon read Turchin?
:::sound of crickets:::
good job
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