Peter Turchin is not like most historians. For starters, he has an unusual background as an evolutionary biologist studying lemmings and mice. He says that analyzing the complexities of the natural world has allowed him to understand the most complex system of all: human society. He has pioneered a field of history that he calls cliodynamics that applies hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of historical data points to a mathematical model in order to understand the present and to predict future trends.Using these tools, Peter and his team published an article in the journal Nature in 2010 making a bold prediction. They said that economic, social, and political instability in the United States would hit a “peak” in or around the year 2020. Many of Turchin’s critics said he was crazy to make such a speculation, that it’s too hard to predict how history will progress, that the study of history is more art than science. But then came 2020.It turned out to be a massively turbulent year, one that would bring outbreaks of political violence that the U.S. hadn’t experienced in decades. It felt like complete chaos, between Covid lockdowns, mask and vaccine protests, BLM riots, and then, only six days into 2021, the storming of the Capitol in Washington, D.C. What did Peter see that everyone else missed?Peter is the author of over 200 articles and eight books, and his fascinating new one is called End Times: Elites, Counter-Elites, and the Path of Political Disintegration. It argues that societies operate cyclically, going through golden ages and end times. And he says that we’re currently looking at the telltale signs of an imminent revolution. On today’s show, Peter talks to us about how he studies history, what American history can tell us about our current moment, why 2024 is going to be a year to watch, and what individuals can do to change the direction of history. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Peter Turchin, complexity scientist and founder of cliodynamics, discusses societal integration and disintegration, US political instability predictions, predictability of future events, using statistical patterns to predict societal trends, height as an indicator of biological wellbeing, rise of cancel culture due to elite overproduction, and fragility of complex societies.

Jim talks with Peter Turchin about the field he founded, cliodynamics, which applies the scientific method to history. They discuss the meaning & origins of cliodynamics, distinguishing cliodynamics from previous approaches, regularizing historical data, the interface between models & data, average height as a proxy for biological well-being, the Seshat data collection project, observed patterns in collapsing societies, the overproduction of elites, relative vs absolute wage, the wealth pump, relative well-being, a top-heavy social pyramid, defining elites, failed aspirant elites as the raw material for radical movements, why lawyers are the most dangerous profession, the Musk-Zuckerman duel as a sign of increased intra-elite competition, the issue of prediction, the intensification of secessionist sentiment in the U.S., how the British Empire avoided the revolutions of 1848, shutting down the wealth pump, increasing minimum wage, the odds that a revolution would be good for society, and much more. Episode Transcript End Times: Elites, Counter Elites, and the Path of Political Disintegration, by Peter Turchin Historical Dynamics: Why States Rise and Fall, by Peter Turchin War and Peace and War: The Rise and Fall of Empires, by Peter Turchin Ultrasociety: How 10,000 Years of War Made Humans the Greatest Cooperators on Earth, by Peter Turchin The True Believer, by Eric Hoffer Peter Turchin is a complexity scientist who works in the field of historical social science that he and his colleagues call Cliodynamics. His research interests lie at the intersection of social and cultural evolution,  historical macrosociology, economic history and cliometrics, mathematical modeling of long-term social processes, and the construction and analysis of historical databases. Currently his main research effort is directing the Seshat Databank project (and its offshoot, CrisisDB) which builds and analyzes a massive historical database that enables us to empirically test predictions from theories attempting to explain why and how complex human societies evolved, and why they periodically experience political breakdown.

Peter Turchin has continued the work of Ibn Khaldun, by elaborating upon Khaldun's hypotheses and testing them against the wealth of historical data that we now possess. By means of a structural demographic analysis of historical empires, Turchin has worked for years to generate mathematical models in order to explain the trends that seem to recur in every complex society. Now, with the data of 10,000 years of human activity on the group level, it may be possible to finally move beyond the preliminary, pseudo-scientific steps of the discipline of history, and proceed into a truly mathematized phase. This is the discipline that Turchin calls "Cliodynamics", after the Muse of history of Ancient Greece. His intention to leave behind the anthropological and archaeological studies that characterized history in the past, and bring mathematics into the field so that we can begin to make predictions. The reason why many have been so resistant to this development is our belief in free will, and the unpredictability of human action. Turchin thinks that this is a mistake, because while individual decisions are often unpredictable at the individual, granular level, at the level of entire populations or demographics, human beings become rather predictable. Quite in line with the cyclical view of history postulated by Plato, Thucydides, or Nietzsche, Turchin brings the math to demonstrate the truth of their ideas: that, in the realm of human history, all returns eternally. For our sources today, we're primarily using Turchin's books: War and Peace and War, Ultrasociety, and a brief dip at the end into the overall idea of Ages of Discord, as well as some references to Secular Cycles by Turchin and Nefedov. We'll also include a number of quotes from Roman historians Livy, Plutarch and others, as we examine the period of the Roman Republic, the chaos of the Late Republic and the transition to the Principate, as explained by Turchin's structural-demographic theory. This should be fun, given that we've already considered these events somewhat through the eyes of Machiavelli. Now, we can approach the subject with more rigor. In my view, Turchin is following in the traditions of these thinkers, but developing their work further. Episode art is Thomas Cole's now famous "Destruction" piece of his cycle, "The Course of Empire".

Peter Turchin, a professor and author specializing in historical societal cycles, joins Bloomberg's experts to discuss America's political landscape. He highlights anti-incumbency sentiments driven by pandemic impacts and inflation, as well as the limited influence of technology and AI on elections. The conversation probes the challenges for democracy, elite overproduction, and the growing threat of civil unrest. Turchin advocates for a societal reconfiguration akin to New Deal principles to address wealth concentration and restore political balance.