End Times (2023) is a study by a historian with expertise in mathematical modelling
Updates: A June 29, 2023 Tyee article is entitled: “Are These the End Times? Historian Peter Turchin Says Yes: His new book crunches numbers and says our plutocracies are poised to implode. Is his science sound?”
A July 23, 2023 New York Times article is entitled: “Big Histories for the Big Future: In “The Fourth Turning Is Here” and “End Times,” the historian Neil Howe and the social scientist Peter Turchin use generational analysis and Big Data to predict the crises to come.”
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A May 28, 2023 Guardian article is entitled: “End Times by Peter Turchin review – can we predict the collapse of societies? By examining history through complex mathematics, the ‘collapsologist’ aims to show – somewhat persuasively – that there are cyclical trends in the narratives of human hope and failure.”
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End Times (2023) is a book of interest.
An excerpt (p. 41) reads:
It is said that [George R. R.] Martin, when he watched the first season of Game of Thrones, was shocked by the graphic brutality, betrayal, and murder that the characters he created inflicted on each other. But the historical Wars of the Roses were just as brutal. Three kings were deposed and killed, and numerous magnates were executed, often without trial. Lords who ended up on the losing side of a battle were made to kneel in the mud and beheaded on the spot. Furthermore, the battles between the Lancastrians and the Yorkists were just the tip of an iceberg. In parallel with this dynastic conflict over the throne, there were numerous private wars between rival elites at the regional and local levels. In The End of the House of Lancaster, British historian R. L. Storey describes at least eight such conflicts plaguing the west, the·north, and the east of England. Common people suffered greatly from this intraelite infighting because each faction often targeted the tenants of the opposing faction for extortion, robbery, and murder.
It’s important to remember that, although medieval England was generally a much more violent country than the UK is today, the levels of violence characterizing the Wars of the Roses were way above the norm. During the integrative phase, every other generation saw a baronial rebellion against the crown, but compared to the Wars of the Roses, those rebellions were more like armed demonstrations intended to impress baronial demands on the king. The rebellion of 1215-1217, for example, was resolved by the king signing the Magna Carta to satisfy the mutinous elites. In the Wars of the Roses, the goal of each side was the extermination of the enemy.
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