Data scientist Explains Why The US Won’t See A Violent Political Revolution Anytime Soon

BI ^ | 4-22-2017 | Sam Harris, Quora

[blam]

This post from Sam Harris, an entrepreneur, engineer, and former data scientist at the U.S. Air Force, originally appeared on Quora as an answer to the question, "Is the United States on the brink of a political revolution?"

No. We don't have enough teenagers.

When I was an officer in the Air Force, I was a data scientist, and at one point we were tasked with determining what level of violence in Iraq could be considered "normal" so that we could declare victory and leave with dignity.

Obviously, the base level of violence in Iraq would be higher than in Sweden, but precisely how much higher and why? These were the questions.

We did analysis on hundreds of factors across centuries worth of data from hundreds of countries to determine what drove the levels of violence in a society. The worst violence levels are obviously during civil wars and government collapse.

We looked at wealth inequality, famine, disease, number of children per woman, infant mortality, median GDP, average GDP … literally hundreds of factors and their cross-dependencies that numbered in the quadrillions — think average GDP combined with median life expectancy combined with infant mortality combined with … you get the idea.

What we found was that the most significant factor was the number of individuals aged 13–19 relative to the number of individuals aged over 35. If the teenage group ever exceeded the over 35 group, violence increased to the point there was a very high chance of civil war. Furthermore, the opposite was true. If the 35+ year-olds outnumbered the teenagers, there was no chance of civil war.

(snip)

[alexander_busek]

Another factor that might be overlooked: as a man gets older he has less to lose.

At 18, I thought that I had nothing to lose. 18-year-olds think that they are immortal.

50-year-olds know that they are mortal. They have less (remaining) lifetime to lose, but they have more (wife and children) to lose.

Consequently, younguns are more reckless.

Regards,

[Covenantor]

....The only time in history that young men "had it made" was in the 1960s: Conservative values were still in place, so older men were unable to "take advantage" of the explosion of female Baby Boomers "coming onto the market." Eligible men (say, in their late 20s) were vastly outnumbered by eligible women (between 18 and 30) - and there were suddenly no social constraints against leveraging that advantage....

Interesting observation that...

[GingisK]

I agree. Young people of today are still living with their parents even though they are well past their teen years. Those snowflakes have immature brains and have succumbed to communist preaching in the schools. There is significant mass to precipitate wide-spread violence.

[GingisK]

They work with “community organizers”.

[Vinnie]

I can see the MSM headline now...
‘Planned Parenthood Prevents Revolutions’

[Paladin2]

"Data Scientist" is apparently in wide spread PC usage. I just heard it mentioned on NPR.

Sounds like a self-assigned promotion though....

[zeestephen]

Re: “The reason the past life expectancies were so low was because of infant mortality & childhood diseases.”

Agree - and that does impact “average” life expectancy, but I was trying to keep my Comment simple.

Re: “If you made it to your teens back then you pretty much had the same chance to live into your 70s as you do today.”

Sorry, that is not correct.

Before 1800, and before antibiotics and antivirals, the leading causes of death struck every age group:

(1) Infectious diseases

(2) Malnutrition

(3) Hypothermia

(4) Traumatic injuries.

In 1918, the year of the great influenza epidemic, the average age of death in the USA was 36.

Before that, Pneumonia and Tuberculosis wiped out hundreds of millions of previously healthy adults.

[Titan Magroyne]

bmfl