Stagnating Civilizations: Causes & Effects

[Astronuc]

Before anyone dismisses this thread, notice that in post #1 Wolram asked an interesting question and immediately in post #2 Swerve produced a reference to an interesting response:

The earlier book by Jared Diamond, "Guns Germs Steel" turned out to provoke a huge amount of re-thinking and discussion. Whether or not, or how much of the time, Diamond is right is something we probably can't say yet. But it's worth studying his examples and considering what he says.

right now the earlier Print-base Equalitarian Democratic society of the US is dying and gradually becoming a TV-media-base feudal plutocracy.

the barriers between wealth and power are down and corporate wealth effectively equals political power. the barriers protecting the environment and the common heritage and collective infrastructure are going down. widening gap between rich and poor, distribution of wealth changing.

ultimately this means the social contract will be weakened or voided.
probably leading to economic and military weakness. also the educational situation is getting worse. roughly a tenth as many engineer-graduates as China. high tech (high value added) industry shifting overseas
SO WE HAVE A CLEAR CASE OF DECLINE AND POSSIBLE COLLAPSE going on in front of our eyes, so the topic of Wolram's thread is especially relevant and interesting

so I have been reading this thread, waiting for someone to point out some obvious things and waiting for someone to show signs of having read Jared Diamond's book. I don't have any answers.

I have yet to read Diamond's book - it's on my reading list.

Another question would be why some groups are very successful, while others are not. Perhaps motivation or a charismatic leader has much to do with it. Look at the western migrations from eastern Asia (near and in Mongolia) to central Asia and eastern/central Europe, and south into Persia, Iraq and Syria.

Do some (or all) societies become complacent and collapse under external pressure?

 

[Astronuc]

You cannot try to change the tide of history.

Change happens. One cannot change the past. However, one can affect the direction of change and consequently affect the future.

Given the contraints of three spatial dimensions and one temporal dimension, there can only be one outcome.

 

[Mickey]

It's not linear because it's probably exponential.

 

[selfAdjoint]

It's not linear because it's probably exponential.

I think even exponential is too simple. I strongly believe that societies are what thermodymicists call nonlinear open systems far from equilibrium. And the bottom line for such systems is
- every one of them has a one way trip to whatever stability (read death) it has in store. (added in edit) Oh I forgot the KAM theorem that says cycles present in the short term will survive to the long term.
- no such system, short of death, can be in equilibrium; either it is getting farther from stasis or closer to stasis but never, so long as it's still alive and kicking, at stasis.

This has ecological implications too; if an ecology is such a system, then seeking an enforced equilibrium, as naive Greens seek to do, is just a sentence of death. Ditto the economic markets (example; the October 1987 crash is attributed by some to then Treasury Secretary James Baker's pegging of the dollar to the Deutschmark in the Summer of that year), and much else.

 

[Astronuc]

the October 1987 crash is attributed by some to then Treasury Secretary James Baker's pegging of the dollar to the Deutschmark in the Summer of that year

Shows how little he knows. I don't image it could have been the faulty and misguided Reaganomics, now could it?

 

[Mickey]

- every one of them has a one way trip to whatever stability (read death) it has in store. (added in edit) Oh I forgot the KAM theorem that says cycles present in the short term will survive to the long term.

What if those cycles are growth cycles? Instead of absolute stability, can the system tend towards a stable rate of change?

- no such system, short of death, can be in equilibrium; either it is getting farther from stasis or closer to stasis but never, so long as it's still alive and kicking, at stasis.

In Kurzweil's evolutionary model, there's an equilibrium growth rate, similar to economic growth models. In some intervals a system may be growing very fast, and in others it may be growing very slowly, but it hovers around the equilibrium rate in the long run. That rate is exponential.

 

[selfAdjoint]

What if those cycles are growth cycles? Instead of absolute stability, can the system tend towards a stable rate of change?

I don't believe the KAM theory covers those. A dense set of states forming an attractor that changes in detail but not strength through time is more the subject.

In Kurzweil's evolutionary model, there's an equilibrium growth rate, similar to economic growth models. In some intervals a system may be growing very fast, and in others it may be growing very slowly, but it hovers around the equilibrium rate in the long run. That rate is exponential.

With evolutionary changes this may be possible. But I find no evidence that societies evolve, let alone civilizations. The factors that helped Ur III to thrive in -2100, and bought it down in -2000, were the same ones we see operating today.

 

[Mickey]

But I find no evidence that societies evolve, let alone civilizations. The factors that helped Ur III to thrive in -2100, and bought it down in -2000, were the same ones we see operating today.

Kurzweil attempts to bridge biological evolution with technological evolution through humanity. His overarching theme is that someday (soon!) human technology will enhance and largely take over for biological evolution.

He compares it to other evolutionary paradigm shifts, like the shift from single-celled life to multicellular life, and from asexual reproduction to sexual reproduction, as well as the original shift from inorganic matter to organic matter. It sounds like hand-waving until you see his graphs. A couple are available on this wiki page.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity

 

[jim mcnamara]

Andre, can climate change be matched with declines in civilization, is there some graph that shows where weather patterns could cause a decline ?

England, Spain, France etc have all had empires, ok they get to big for their
birches, could some analyst predict when an irreversible decline will start ?

There is a lot of evidence in Europe in the 1300's that the onset of the little Ice Age had major effects on population, as well as did Bubonic Plague decimations. It led to a basic collapse of major political powers, and the decline of Feudal life.

See Barbara Tuchman 'A Distant Mirror'. Since she takes a largely historical/political point of view; but gives solid play to envrionmental impacts, like the little ice age. You get the message that society literally fell apart. And that envionmental factors were the major player. For example, Poland was virtually uninhabited by 1400. In 1250 it was a booming frontier. She discusses generalized the loss of faith in the Catholic Church engendered by the plague years. And it's fall from politcal grace. Pope Innocent III in the 1200's was clearly the most important politcial figure of his time. Then after all of the envionmental upheaval of the 1300's by 1378 you see the papal schism and two popes...