warning: longpost
You know, I've thought about this for a while, and I really do think I've got it.
When events occur in history, the way a society reacts is far more important than the nature of the event itself. S&H are a broken record about this, for good reason.
A turning, therefore, begins when enough of a new generation has entered society, and the living generations have aged (and therefore changed) enough, that society's reaction is substantially different from what has come before.
So, the reason the 4T didn't begin with 9/11 is that there were not enough Millennials in society yet (the oldest of them being only 19) and not enough members of the older generations had reached the stage of life in which they react in the Crisis manner. Because of this, the reaction to that event was very similar to what it likely would have been if it had happened in 1995 (though it was still different - I have no memory of it, but my subjective impression is that it seems almost like society jumped into a 4T mood very briefly and then "snapped out of it." Perhaps this is part of the reason for the sort of "3.5T" that occurred from 2001 to 2020**).
When each generation is larger than the one born before it, its members accumulate in society more rapidly and are more impactful and influential, earlier. A large generation hits adulthood with a big wave, rather than slowly trickling in - that is, society goes from having no adult members of that generation to having millions of them, extremely quickly.
Doing some very sloppy estimation here: using the 1982 start date, when 9/11 occurred, there were likely about 7 million adult Millennials. That was 2% of the population.
When the 2008 financial crash occurred, their numbers were likely close to 40 million. That was 13% of the total population...which makes 2007 the likely tipping-point year in which adult Millennials began to outnumber Silents (actually, all over-65s, including the remaining GIs at that point), switching the "missing" archetype from Hero to Artist and forming the Crisis generational stack. All that was needed after that point was the spark.
If the Millennial generation had been smaller - that is, roughly equal in size to the Silent generation rather than larger - this likely would have happened several years later.
So, the way society reacts to something can change quickly and suddenly, and can do so after relatively short periods of time. 15-20 years seems like it must be the "hard limit" - the fastest a turning can go - because that's how long it takes for a new younger generation to become influential enough to change society's reactions enough to begin a new turning. Therefore, "history itself" has accelerated to the point of being unable to accelerate any more, having literally run up against the limits of human biology.
I've also just realized that this math can probably point us to a likely range of dates for the end of this turning, which is, uh...2024 to 2032. So that's not actually very helpful. Never mind.
**Just realized that Millennials overtook Boomers as the nation's largest generation in 2019. I guess that's where the transition from "3.5T" to "true 4T" in 2020 comes from.
I guess I'd describe it, by the way, as:
1984-2001: 3
2001-2008: 3.5, more 3 than 4
2008-2020: 3.5, more 4 than 3
2020-present: 4
So it took three sparks, three big events, to fully reach the turning. As life expectancy continues to increase, I wonder if gradual and "multi-step" turning transitions will become the new norm, instead of a deceleration of the saeculum (which I theorized earlier and suggested looking to Japan and its declining population for indications).
(08-09-2021, 11:04 AM)galaxy Wrote:(08-09-2021, 09:28 AM)David Horn Wrote: Have at it!
Well, how about population growth? The apparent shortening of the saeculum corresponds pretty well to the start of the huge population spike of the last 200 years. Perhaps when each successive generation is larger than the one before it, the generations find it easier to sweep their predecessors out of the way as they enter the next phase of life. The best thing to point to as an example of this is probably how the small size of the Lost Generation allowed the Missionary Generation to remain "in power" unusually long, though this didn't seem to affect the boundaries of the relevant turnings much.
Every generation, influenced by its own lived experience, believes itself to be "the best" or "the one that's got it right," so it stands to reason that every generation would hold on to what power it has as long as possible and would "rule" either until becoming simply too old to do so or until being forced out by the following generation in a large cultural shift. Seemingly because of population growth, being forced out has (with a single exception) been the norm for two saecula now, and it seems like 15-20 years is about the fastest that that can happen.
The question then becomes this: as countries finish the demographic transition and return to stable or even declining populations, will the saeculum lengthen again? Or has forced replacement become the norm, which will be held in place by the fast pace of modern society and the memory of those living currently? I don't know, but Japan seems like the place to watch in the coming decades for any hints.
You know, I've thought about this for a while, and I really do think I've got it.
When events occur in history, the way a society reacts is far more important than the nature of the event itself. S&H are a broken record about this, for good reason.
A turning, therefore, begins when enough of a new generation has entered society, and the living generations have aged (and therefore changed) enough, that society's reaction is substantially different from what has come before.
So, the reason the 4T didn't begin with 9/11 is that there were not enough Millennials in society yet (the oldest of them being only 19) and not enough members of the older generations had reached the stage of life in which they react in the Crisis manner. Because of this, the reaction to that event was very similar to what it likely would have been if it had happened in 1995 (though it was still different - I have no memory of it, but my subjective impression is that it seems almost like society jumped into a 4T mood very briefly and then "snapped out of it." Perhaps this is part of the reason for the sort of "3.5T" that occurred from 2001 to 2020**).
When each generation is larger than the one born before it, its members accumulate in society more rapidly and are more impactful and influential, earlier. A large generation hits adulthood with a big wave, rather than slowly trickling in - that is, society goes from having no adult members of that generation to having millions of them, extremely quickly.
Doing some very sloppy estimation here: using the 1982 start date, when 9/11 occurred, there were likely about 7 million adult Millennials. That was 2% of the population.
When the 2008 financial crash occurred, their numbers were likely close to 40 million. That was 13% of the total population...which makes 2007 the likely tipping-point year in which adult Millennials began to outnumber Silents (actually, all over-65s, including the remaining GIs at that point), switching the "missing" archetype from Hero to Artist and forming the Crisis generational stack. All that was needed after that point was the spark.
If the Millennial generation had been smaller - that is, roughly equal in size to the Silent generation rather than larger - this likely would have happened several years later.
So, the way society reacts to something can change quickly and suddenly, and can do so after relatively short periods of time. 15-20 years seems like it must be the "hard limit" - the fastest a turning can go - because that's how long it takes for a new younger generation to become influential enough to change society's reactions enough to begin a new turning. Therefore, "history itself" has accelerated to the point of being unable to accelerate any more, having literally run up against the limits of human biology.
I've also just realized that this math can probably point us to a likely range of dates for the end of this turning, which is, uh...2024 to 2032. So that's not actually very helpful. Never mind.
**Just realized that Millennials overtook Boomers as the nation's largest generation in 2019. I guess that's where the transition from "3.5T" to "true 4T" in 2020 comes from.
I guess I'd describe it, by the way, as:
1984-2001: 3
2001-2008: 3.5, more 3 than 4
2008-2020: 3.5, more 4 than 3
2020-present: 4
So it took three sparks, three big events, to fully reach the turning. As life expectancy continues to increase, I wonder if gradual and "multi-step" turning transitions will become the new norm, instead of a deceleration of the saeculum (which I theorized earlier and suggested looking to Japan and its declining population for indications).
2001, a very artistic hero and/or a very heroic artist