(Newswire.net — January 10, 2017) — Professor of ecology and mathematics from the University of Connecticut, Peter Turchin, claims we are living in society’s twilight years.
According to Professor Turchin, the collapse of our society has already begun, but it will pick up the pace through the next decade until it become visible in 2020.
Turchin is known for developing a cross-disciplinary subject known as “cliodynamics”, which treats history like any other science, with predictions and models. One of Turchin’s models mathematically also predicted the political turmoil that would peak in 2020.
Turchin pointed out that Donald Trump’s presidential election neither accelerated nor decelerated the process, however it represents a variable in his prediction model.
Mathematical models that could predict the future are not new. Many financial companies are using models of non-linear prediction to try to predict the stock market.
Famous Russian-born American Science Fiction novelist, Isaac Asimov, the creator of three ultimate laws on robotics, invented a discipline called Psycho-history as a part of his “Foundation” trilogy. Scientists and psycho-historians were using mathematical models with inputs from history combined with the psychology of the society to predict the future.
Professor Turchin’s “cliodynamics” model works on the same principle, combining different variables into a nonlinear mathematical model that produces the outcome of possibility.
With more statistically significant inputs (variables), the greater is the possibility of prediction.
According the Turchin’s prediction model, “the negative trends seem to be accelerating,” and the social instability is unavoidable in the next three years.
Professor Turchin used inputs such as “elite overproduction,” in which the rich grow richer and relate less and less to the poor. He used the 2016 election as a prime example by predicting the fragmentation of the Republican Party to several different streams, amongst which are: hard core republicans, the business-oriented who support Trump and one fraction that is closer to democrats.
The same prediction stands for the Democratic Party, with the divide between Democratic Socialists and Establishment Democrats.
Turchin also noted that the quality of life in US has stagnated and started declining due to the fall of revenues and increase of expenses. “Drastically reducing taxes on wealthy Americans will hardly strengthen the fiscal health of the state,” he wrote.
However, according to Professor Turchin, there is no need to fear as the change would not result in global wars or nothing as dramatic. He explained that the system change “is a science-based forecast, not a ‘prophecy’”.