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PaperclipPerfector  13d ago (text post)   2946 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for March 16, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

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What is the longest golden age that we know of? We have the five good emperors of Rome around 80 years. The Pax Britannica was around 50-80 years. Pax americana - 1944-1969 - 25 years and probably something like 1986-2001.

Why 1986?

Well the Soviets were dying and the reaganomics were kicking into gear. And in 1987 Married With Children launched. And that is the peak US possible.

Not OP but that was at least classically held to be the initial softening of the Iron Curtain/major arms treaties plus some economic improvement

You are using the terms in a narrower sense than normal. The Pax Romana is traditionally defined from the ascension Augustus in 27 BC to the death of Marcus Aurelius in 180 AD, 206 years. The Pax Britannica from the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 to the start of World War I in 1914, 99 years. And the Pax Americana from the end of World War II in 1945 until the Current Year, 80 years and counting.

Especially good periods seem to last about a decade; the Roaring Twenties can be dated from the end of World War I in 1918 to the start of the Great Depression in 1929, while the 90s range from the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 to September 11, 2001. Not sure how to date the 50s, though.

The Pax Romana is traditionally defined from the ascension Augustus in 27 BC to the death of Marcus Aurelius in 180 AD, 206 years.

This period includes a major civil war in AD 69. I agree that you could argue for Domitian as a sixth small-g good Emperor on top of the five capital-G Good Emperors.

It's an interesting question to me: where does violence in transition of power become a concern for individual subjects/citizens?

Provided that law and order doesn't break down, it makes no difference to me if the Bidens or Clintons or a few of their followers get the axe.

It's an interesting question to me: where does violence in transition of power become a concern for individual subjects/citizens?

If the violence involves large-scale troop movements, it is generally bad for the civilian population of the areas fought over. The Year of Four Emperors involved two multi-legion battles.

Depends on the political system perhaps. In general I think killing politicians would trickle down to the ordinary citizens via higher stakes for anything political. More cheating, more violence, more social pressure.

The same can also happen in reverse (bottom to top) and arguably is here. You are more able to contemplate the killing of (enemy?) politicians with broad equinamity because citizen-level politics has become more fraught.

I disagree, I actually think the reverse is true: we are all less able to contemplate the killing of politicians with equanimity because of political polarization.

JFK's assassination is, even in most conspiracy theories, only ever alleged to be marginally important to the course of US Government policy. JFK might not have gone into Vietnam quite the way LBJ did, but he still would have fought the Cold War. Kill HW and replace him with Dukakis, or Clinton and replace him with Dole, and the changes expected would be mostly marginal.

Kill Trump, and replace him even with another Republican and we're in a very different place right now.

To put it another way: if all politicians are within a few degrees of agreement on every issue, then the question of who is in charge is mostly a matter of personal ambition, and two politicians killing each other over personal ambition doesn't really impact me, even if I find it horrifying. If party politics is fraught, then who is in charge has policy implications, which will impact the average person's life.

Fair point, well made. I'm not sure if I agree or not but I'll think on it.

I'm not entirely sure if it's true or not either over time. There were lots of very destructive wars of succession throughout the middle ages that featured virtually no political disagreement between the factions. Arguably in WWI, the combatant governments were all closer to each other in politics in August 1914 than they were to any of their successor state governments 20 years later, and certainly it impacted the populace.

But at one end you have some platonic ideal, which would be something like an ideologically-identical VP killing the POTUS and assuming the presidency. As long as the violence is limited to the POTUS, it would have no impact on me, and shouldn't end a golden age.

The 50s began on August 15, 1945, and ended on October 6, 1973. They got an extra 20 years out of that especially good period, and it was not merely "especially good" but exceptional, because the Americans were the only real winner in a major global-but-off-continent conflict (the Second European Civil War).

Calling it “European” is an understatement, but at least it describes a useful subset of the theaters.

“Civil War,” on the other hand, is completely off base. The opponents weren’t a unified state before, during or after the war. I can’t tell if you’re joking or just being contrarian.

To steelman the “European Civil War” concept, the monarchies of Europe involved in WWI were basically cousins from the same elite family.

As for WWII being similar, a case could be made that the onerous restrictions on Germany were basically a continuation of the same war but without bullets.

(Not that I believe either.)

Dynastic relations had long since ceased to matter in European statecraft by the time WWI broke out, and only the tsar had final say in kicking the war off(Britain entered due to parliament and in Germany and Austria powerful generals were pushing for war). The monarchs were also cousins due to recent intermarriage and not because they were part of the same clan.

If I had to draw the lines such that independence wars were separate, I’d look for something like participation in government—“no taxation without representation,” right? Confederates had served in the same military, sent Congressmen to the same assemblies, and otherwise participated in American institutions.

Honestly, I’m willing to class independence wars as civil wars. The American Revolution apparently counts.

I don’t know enough about Korea to speak with confidence. Did either government claim continuity with a previous controlling government? I see one source claiming that the initial border skirmishes counted as civil war. What makes you say that it “doesn’t feel strange”?

What is the significance of October 6, 1973? Googling gives me the Yom Kippur war, which is irrelevant to what was largely a US domestic phenomenon.

I think the "fifties" end with the rise of large-scale resistance to the Vietnam draft, which was somewhat earlier. The "sixties" are generally accepted to have begun in 1968 and continued into the 1970's, and 1968 is also about the right date for the end of the "fifties" by my definition.

What is the significance of October 6, 1973?

This, it was rather big deal at the time.

The New Kingdom of Egypt, which lasted for 500 years, is often considered a golden age. China has also experienced multiple 100-200 year long periods of relative material prosperity and cultural productivity during the Han, Tang, Ming, and Qing dynasties. The Gupta Empire, called the golden age of India, lasted over 300 years, and the Tokugawa Shogunate in Japan lasted 268 years.

I would also add the Joseon Dynasty to that list, seeing that it lasted for 505 years (1392 to 1897) and was probably the most technocratic, bureaucratic state in East Asia with a lot of checks on royal power. Kings were expected to answer to the public whenever a disaster occurred, issuing formal requests for critique, and early on in Joseon history an oral petition system for grievances was established - a drum was placed in front of the royal palace to be struck if someone had a complaint, and this allowed ordinary illiterate citizens to personally appeal to the king once other forms of redress had failed. The lowest class (nobi) were allowed maternity and paternity leave, and there was even a society for the disabled, the myeongtongsi. There was a system of three offices specifically meant to police the kings and the officials for corruption and inefficiency, and often they gained more power than the monarchy itself. A lot of technology and advancement was invented during Joseon as well, the most famous of those being Hangul, but "[i]n the first half of the 15th century, around 62 major accomplishments were made in various scientific fields. Of these, 29 came from Korea alone compared to 5 from China and 28 from the rest of the world". It certainly fits the definition of a Korean golden age.

With regards to China, you're missing out on the obvious Zhou Dynasty, which lasted for a mind-boggling 790 years (1046 BC to 256 BC) with an impressive level of imperial continuity. Though this depends on how you define "golden age" since the Zhou kings had lost much power by the Warring States period.

EDIT: added more

I think the possibly most interesting aspect of Hangul was that it was primarily a product of the King himself, with great opposition from the powerful bureaucracy, and was subsequently discarded for classist reasons and then re-embraced hundreds of years later due to it's value.

It feels like a made up story about a wise benevolent monarch but isn't.

It sort of parallels the Cherokee alphabet, which was invented by a single (illiterate)man who refused to believe his elder’s explanation that the white man’s writing was sorcery- and needed to stage live demonstrations to prove that his system actually worked.

There's a reason why King Sejong is the most beloved monarch in Korea, and he did even more than that - not only did he invent Hangul in an attempt to improve literacy, he also hugely supported and encouraged many other technological advancements. Most notably, he established a royal scientific institute called the Hall of Worthies meant to house Joseon's greatest minds, and offered a series of grants and scholarships to incentivise bright young scholars to attend. At one point he appointed Jang Yeong-sil, a nobi, as court technician. Jang would go on to make one of the world's first standardised rain gauges (the cheugugi), which would get used all over Korea, as well as a self-striking water clock. Upon Sejong's request, he also made a faster and more efficient form of metal movable type called gabinja in 1434, a number of years before Gutenberg developed the technology in the Western world.

Sejong also ordered that one thousand copies of farmers' handbooks be printed so as to improve agricultural output, and he also published the Nongsa jikseol, which was a compilation of farming techniques conducive to Korea's environment that documented the best planting methods and soil treatment and so on for each region. In addition, he was the king who granted the nobi class parental leave, and did strangely democratic things like poll the public on reforms such as new tax systems. It really does sound like fiction about a benevolent monarch, except it's real.

Regarding Hangul's use over the years, Sejong actually did manage to get it into popular culture if I remember correctly. Hangul continued to be used among the peasantry throughout the years in applications such as popular fiction, apart from a short-lived period in 1504 when it was banned by the monarch Yeonsangun of Joseon, an infamous tyrant who did so because people wrote letters in Hangul criticising him. That ban did not last for long, and eventually Yeonsangun was dethroned via coup, exiled to Gangwha Island (where he soon died) and his sons were forced to commit suicide. Later in 1506 King Jungjong abolished the ministry related to Hangul research, but Hangul saw a resurgence in the late 16th century and novels written in the Korean alphabet became a major genre of literature. I'd say Sejong largely accomplished his goal.

Joseon in general was a shockingly scholarly society. I visited South Korea recently and went to the National Museum, and 90% of what I saw from Joseon was just books on top of books on top of books, with the occasional world map and astronomical chart thrown in. They were dedicated record-keepers, and the Annals of the Joseon Dynasty are the longest continuous record of a single dynasty in the world, stretching from 1392 to 1865. This scholarly focus even affected their art to the point that there was an entire genre of folding screens (chaekgeori) which just consisted of still-life paintings of bookshelves - honestly that part of the museum is wild.

EDIT: wording

Woah, do you know how this society got rich enough to afford all of this? Sounds actually quite amazing. Even better in some respects than the modern world.

The Korean Peninsula is rich in resources and difficult to invade.

Depends on definition of "golden age". Time of peace? Time of prosperity for average person? Time of great scientific/literary/art creative genius?

Why do you remove the years 1969-1985 and 2001+? They were good years for many people, peaceful years for most Americans. Vietnam and GWOT were largely minor, political concerns and individual tragedies. Put another way: for my part of Eastern Pennsylvania the last time an invading army got anywhere near threatening was around the 4th of July 1863. The sending of local boys overseas, while occasionally tragic for individual families, never seriously depopulated the young men.

During the Pax Romana or the Five Good Emperors there were border wars, pirates, provincial revolts, etc. But if you lived in certain parts of the empire, things were good and peaceful. Rome wasn't sacked for a long time in between.

So I guess I'm asking how do you define a golden age?

If it's continuous rule without notable wars, I would guess one of the Chinese dynasties had solid staying power.

I would say a golden age is mostly constantly increasing prosperity for the commoner, political stability in the hinterlands and well lack of bad things for big enough parts of the population. A feeling of predictability and security.

I exclude the 70s and early 80s because of the oil embargo, inflation, formation of the rust belt, decay of the urban cores and the start of the cost disease. Not that those processes stopped but the winning the cold war dividends and the IT revolution were so massive that they masked them.

And the USA changed after 9/11. The follies of Iraq and Afghanistan, the Enron and Worldcom scandals, dotcom bust, then the financial crisis - the times were turbulent. In a way after 9/11 the Americans never really felt secure as a whole.

I would argue that ripples like the oil embargo, the rust belt, Vietnam, 9/11 and the GWOT, the great recession, etc. happened in Ming China or the Pax Romana or Victorian England and we mostly don't remember them, we might not even have the written accounts or data to know about them or how important they felt at the time.

I would define a Golden Age, and this might be a values thing, as peace and prosperity combined with high cultural production that has stood the test of time.

Peace can be defined as lack of invasion or the threat of invasion. Sticky point: what level of violence in the transition of power qualifies as a Civil War? And what constitutes core vs periphery? There were probably prosperous provincial cities in Rome that were safe from much of the political violence in the Capital, and were safe enough from invasion for long enough that they had longer safety than Rome itself.

Prosperity can be defined as lack of poverty, Henry IV's "I want there to be no peasant in my realm so poor that he will not have a chicken in his pot every Sunday." [Sticking Point: defining poverty, and the importance of growth vs stagnation and upward or downward mobility]

Cultural Production includes great architecture, literature, philosophy, religion.

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