Threadban - Rule 2C + 2H Violation
Please stop going along with his obvious and deliberate attempts to derail this thread. It's clearly what he wants. Better to ignore outright.
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The 40K discussion is, of course, far more benign-- but at this point has also strayed a bit beyond the confines of this thread, so I'll refrain from adding to it here. (We can happily carry it on in the 40K thread. )
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More on-topic: a vague consideration that I've been thinking about recently is that the civilisational cycle is actually more resilient than you'd think. There have been comments here, from time to time, about random events, climate changes, or modern technology being "game changers". I think that, at least for the most part, this is not really the case. Some observations:
-- When civiliational cycles are disrupted, it's almost invariably the result of human action on a massive scale. Mostly, we're talking about complete conquest of a civilisation by another. In some case, this terminates the conquered civilisation; in other cases, it transforms that civilisation, affecting its historical cycle. (Examples of the latter include China and Russia, both at the hands of the Mongols.)
-- Even significant changes in climate and such external factors don't seem to have a very direct effect on the cycle. It certainly affacts the specifics, but not so much the overall pattern. For instance, the civilisations hardest-hit by the Late Bronze Age Collapse were already going into a recessive phase, and the civilisations that came out on top were already on the up-swing anyway. At most, the wider context accentuated the existing trends; but it didn't disrupt them.
-- A potential reason for this is that the kind of human action that can distort the cycle is typically fast and overwhelming, like a tsunami. Changes in climate are slower, more like rising sea levels. Civilisations may definitely suffer from those, but they can typically still adapt.
-- Climate factors (and other external pressures) can and do shape how a culture develops, so while not alterning the underlying civilisational mechanics, it can alter their application. I'd tentatively point out Meso-America as the most extreme example of this. In that civilisation, the familiar cycle is oberved, but ever single period is drawn-out. It's like they were playing out their history in slow-motion. My own suspicion is that environmental pressures (that shaped the civilisation from the start) played a rol in that.
-- An interesting (potential) outlier is the case of India, where the equivalent of Alexander and Napoleon (namely Chandragupta Maurya) actually triumphed. To my knowledge, this is the only case in history where that happened. A potential reason is that Alexander's invasion of India was just disruptive enough to the Nanda Empire to give Chandragupta a critical leg up later on. This is, in any event, a case where a "low probability outcome" actually happened. And without evidence of truly massive/overwhelming action by another civilisation!
-- This, overall, does not bode well for the notion of such "low probability outcomes" actually happening in our future. We've discussed some of these as speculation, bt I do think they'll remaing purely speculative. Things like the Gracchi winning, or Marius winning, or Caesarism being defeated, et cetera-- those haven't been observed to happen. Ever. That's not to say that they can't happen, but rather that it's not really what I'd put my money on.
-- In summation: by far the best prediction of the future is still attained by observing the analogous events from previous civilisations, and applying the common trends to our civilisation. They shout of "this time it's different!" is becoming more shrill and panicked with each passing day.
1.Agree about our pet troll
2.Agree about cycles - but:
2.1 now all things happen faster.So,i think that EU would fall till 2030,and we would have new Europe about 2040 - only question what it would be,Caliphate,China province,green gulag,or,highly unlikely, return to normal states.
2.2 We now gulag possibility - so,except return of new cycle we would get neo commies ruling til remnants of people would live in caves.
The same goeas for USA - we would have either Ceasar or green gulag about 2050.Well,small chances for Return of Republic,too.
So little imagination. You can't see outside your box any more than Skalligrim can. So you hide behind delusions of a the dark horrors of your dreams. It would be funny if it wasn't so tragic.