The 4th Turning’s Cosmic Comedy of History

Man has an innate capacity for pattern recognition.

This capacity has been largely advantageous for our survival as a species.

Early man grasped that certain animals exhibited certain behaviors in certain seasons, for example.

This allowed him to develop hunting strategies that were optimized for caloric harvesting.

Later, early farmers saw the connection between crop cycles and seasons, allowing them to plant the crops most suited to a particular region and time.

In the modern era, low-level office employees know that if they arrive at the office past 9 AM, their boss will yell at them.

For as important as pattern recognition is for our survival and prosperity, it can also go off the rails.

Humans sometimes grasp for meaning in random data.

The data set that all early humans had access to no matter where they went was the stars.

Invariably, across cultures, humans looked for correlation between celestial events and terrestrial events.

The earliest record we have of an organized astrological system dates to ~1800 BC with the ancient Babylonians.

The Babylonians used the movement of the stars to predict everything from weather to political events.

Since then, astrological systems for interpreting the future have existed in many cultures.

In the West, astrology was questioned first by Christianity, and later by Enlightenment era thinkers and fell out of favor.

Modern Western astrology has its roots in the 18th century with a renewed interest in the occult, and even King Edward VII had his fortune told.

Luckily, nowadays, most people understand that the cosmos is indifferent and astrology has been relegated to the likes of tabloid horoscopes and young people grasping for any sign that their crush is destined to be their true love.

Even though astrology has been ruled out as an area of scientific inquiry, that doesn't mean that man's capacity for seeking meaning in randomness has gone away.

We even see this in hard sciences, with academics torturing data until some pattern is forced to reveal itself at gunpoint.

I see the symptoms of seeking meaning from indifferent chaos in the book "The Fourth Turning" by William Strauss and Neil Howe.

Strauss and Howe looked back through the annals of history to identify some system of coherence that both explains the past and helps predict the future.

A noble, if flawed, endeavor.

You see, Strauss and Howe conceptualize of history in "blocks" of 80 years, roughly the length of a human life, and subdivide "blocks" into 4 "turnings" each lasting approximately 20 years.

Each 80-year "block" of history contains "high," "awakening," "unraveling," and "crisis" turnings.

Strauss and Howe meticulously comb through the history of Western culture detailing specific events in each period that correspond to their model.

They then use correlation between historical facts and their model to argue they can ascertain what the future will hold.

The problem?

For every detail in history explaining why a particular period was a "high turning," for example, there are a plethora of other historical facts that are contradictory to their interpretation.

To their credit, Strauss and Howe recognize this problem in their framework, so they argue then that the facts themselves aren't so important, but instead how those facts were interpreted by the culture of the time as important.

So even though chaotic events reminiscent of a "crisis" turning occurred during a "high" turning, they argue that the cultural interpretation of those events at the time downplayed their significance.

At this point their analytical framework turns into a gooey kind of zeitgeist argument that lacks any teeth.

Another form of flawed historical/predictive thinking is what I call "Michael Burry syndrome."

People who made a bold prediction that no one else believed and were proven right tend to make additional bold predictions that end up being wrong.

How many times has Michael Burry predicted the downfall of the US economy since 2008, only to delete his X account when it did not come to pass?

Supporters may say things like "He's right, he was just too early."

To which I say "being early is the same as being wrong."

If you hired a fortune teller who told you "one day, you will die" you would ask for a refund!

Everyone knows that one day a lot of things will happen, but the timeline for inevitable events is the meaningful prediction, not the occurrence of events.

Unlike true randomness, there is some kind of order to history.

We can see on a probabilistic basis that some events do eventually lead to certain outcomes.

The flaw in Strauss and Howe's thinking, along with Burry's, though is that these patterns occur in such a way that they can be neatly categorized and used to predict the future with any amount of precision.

Bold predictions lead to bold strategies to prepare for things that we are sure will come to pass.

A rational actor with deep conviction that the apocalypse is tomorrow will sell his financial assets in favor of beans and bullets.

When that apocalypse does not manifest, he is left without any exposure to a market that chugs along producing value for those who held their positions.

Instead, we should think of history as a broad data set for what can be.

Of possibilities to be aware of on an indeterminate timeline.

Not a precise template for what will be.

Be aware of what may come in the future so you can prepare in a rational way.

But, beware the trap of predicting the future, especially when it comes to important personal matters like you health and finances. ~ West

We must be always vigilant to keep astrology from creeping into our thinking.

Now, I know what you're thinking: "Astrology? Me? Nah, I’m a rational thinker!"

Not so fast.

While tabloid horoscopes might be idle divination for the low-information plebs, let’s not kid ourselves…

Irrationality and its cousin, post-rationalization, are always lurking, threatening to creep into our thought processes.

It’s human nature.

Let’s take a moment to think about American history since the Civil War.

What would you say were the key developments that shaped our modern world?

🔎 Maybe the fact that we managed to industrialize, digitize, and globalize in just a few generations?

🔎 Maybe the impact of WWII, Bretton Woods, and the birth of the petrodollar that defined the global financial system?

🔎 Perhaps you’d point to Reconstruction, the Civil Rights Era, and the recent BLM protests as the defining moments in our ongoing struggle with race relations?

🔎 What about the “mass formation psychosis” of the Cold War, War on Terror, and, you know, other hysterias… like… the Satanic Panic?

Kidding aside, are seismic shifts that have left an indelible mark on the trajectory of history.

Let’s face it, a lot’s happened.

It’s wild to think we went from steamboats and oxen-drawn carts to planes, trains, and automobiles—even putting a man on the moon—all within the span of a human lifetime.

In fact, I grew up with my great, great aunt, who lived well into her 90s. She didn’t see her first car until her early teens, yet by the time she passed, right around the dawn of the 21st century, I already owned my first internet-connected computer. It’s crazy to think about!

So, all that said, how would you characterize the past 150 years?

While you’re giving that some thought…

Let me tell you how you absolutely wouldn’t punctuate this technological “axial age”…

As two "Saeculums" comprising four generations of "Prophets," "Nomads," "Heroes," and "Artists."

Yeah, according to this interpretation, Boomers are our "Prophets," Gen X are our "Nomads," and—wait for it—Millennials are our "Heroes," who will somehow create a new era of trusted social institutions, while Gen Z will become the the "Artists" who will shape the next grand societal "Awakening."

I mean, it’s not even a stretch to call this astrology.

Jungian archetypal generations shaping societal progression, in an infinitely circular fashion?

Please.

History isn’t some cosmic, preordained script. It’s far messier than that, which is why we can’t predict the future (but lie to ourselves constantly about that not being the case).

Sure, it’s helpful to have the heuristic that “weak men create hard times,” but let’s face it, everyone who predicts a major crash or hard reset will be "right"… eventually.

However, if you’re off by decades (like all the doomsayers and perma-bears who’ve been saying the exact same sh*t since the 70s), well, you’ve got to seriously question the utility of those prognostications.

They’re right, in a way, but also very wrong.

Getting back to cyclical thinking…

Take the abandonment of the gold standard, for example.

Richard Nixon's 1971 decision to sever the dollar from gold wasn’t some mystical turning point foreseen by the prophets of old.

Yes, it helps to know that empires always debase their currencies.

But considering how short the human lifespan is, if you’re off by 50 years (and counting) on what will eventually be the destruction of economic order as we know it, well, you missed out on a lot of opportunity in the meantime.

And guess what? You didn’t need a crystal ball or a generational cycle to see the consequences of that one coming.

The thing is, we just don’t know when.

Here’s another example…

One might have thought (and many did) the reckless monetary policy of the Great Financial Crisis, or the costly wars in the Middle East would topple the world order, but they haven’t… yet.

And who knows how long the system can survive on life support or what will replace it? Yeah, no one knows.

So here’s the thing…

The GFC wasn’t about generational hand-offs or cyclical inevitabilities—it was about garden-variety greed, mismanagement, and the Fed’s response of unleashing a tidal wave of quantitative easing, further debasing the dollar and laying the groundwork for the ever increasing inflation we see today.

And what about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? These weren’t the fulfillment of some grand historical cycle; they were costly, drawn-out conflicts driven by flawed intelligence (if I’m being generous) and political hubris. You know, empire sh*t.

And the perfect cover for even more money printing, greed, and mismanagement.

Oh, did you see the parade?

The cost of these wars, both in human lives and taxpayer dollars, was astronomical.

And despite those conflicts being over, our printing continues to accelerate, adding nearly a trillion to the deficit yearly. It’s unfathomable, really. And that’s not hyperbole. I literally cannot fathom a deficit that large and where all that money is going.

Returning to the cycles of history…

As most in our space argue, there's perhaps nothing more pivotal in shaping the eventual destiny of the U.S. than the shift to fiat currency.

Austrian Business Cycle Theory lays this out with brutal clarity:

When governments mess with money, bad things happen. Sic semper debitoribus.

But no, it doesn’t take a prophesied "Hero" generation to fix it—

Just a return to sound money principles. ~ Zach