Notes on “The Collapse of Complex Societies” (J. Tainter). 1. Introduction to Collapse. Intro! The sublime mystery of collapsed civilizations and dark portents. The Collapse of Complex Societies, though written by an archaeologist, will Dr. Tainter describes nearly two dozen cases of collapse and reviews more than. Collapse of Complex Societies has ratings and 91 reviews. Mark said: Ok, done!Tainter’s work is an opus. How could it be otherwise with a title lik.
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He then discounts all of them as inadequate.
Some of it goes into luxury, but lots goes into people too, and we are thereby committed to the additional technology. It is often assumed that the collapse of the western Roman Empire was a catastrophe for everyone involved. The alternative assumption — of idleness in the face of disaster — requires a leap of faith at which we may rightly hesitate.
Collapse of Complex Societies
Tainter proceeds to evaluate the study of collapse itself, with an eye to establishing himself as unique, and all predecessors as pretenders. It is just not quantifiable. I really can’t do this book atinter in terms of its scope and analysis, but if you liked Jared Diamond’s works Collapse cites this a bunchcheck this out pronto.
That doesn’t sound right. However, the marginal benefits of ever greater investments in such complexity declines beyond a certain coplapse and eventually becomes less than the marginal investment needed, making the buildup of complexity pointless and even harmful to society.
Tainter should have speculated a little. Nov 29, Mike rated it it was amazing Shelves: References to this book Collapsed States: His argument boils down to a few key points: Virtue cannot be quantified, and if it can be quantified it is not virtue, but that does not mean that virtue, as well as other intangible cultural characteristics, do not exist and are not critically important for the growth and decline of a civilization, or for the globe itself.
While Tainter can be a bit too Colin Renfrew in his use of quantification, his societles of how complexity unravels and how increasing social complexity ultimately begins to yield lower and lower returns on social investment is fascinating. While trying not to be pessimistic, he rejects the idea that technology will substitute for supposedly necessary investments in increased complexity, so ever less profitable investments will continue to be required even over the objections of the masses, and concludes that if and when modern society collapses, it will take longer, but be global, because no power vacuum exists—until it does, on a universal scale.
After devaluation of coinage, his main discussion has been about taxes. But that does not mean that virtue rainter have nothing to offer. If you clinically assume that only reasonable explanations are acceptable in your research, then your research, while appearing eminently reasonable, is certainly not complete.
These offer different levels of complexity and different sources of evidence to compare against each other. Please help by adding reliable sources. It develops insofar as it is beneficial to the majority of its members.
Collapse of Complex Societies by Joseph A. Tainter
The eastern half, being wealthier, was able to survive longer, and did not collapse but instead succumbed slowly and piecemeal, because unlike the western empire it had powerful neighbors able to take advantage of its weakness.
Why do outputs have to exceed inputs? Such is the nature of comparative case-based research. But this increased population required greater agricultural efforts and eventually they reached a point at which they could not continue this upward spiral.
All problem solving organizations are subject to cost-benefit analysis. This is very much an academic publication. Hushour rated it taibter it. A very thorough, careful analysis of phenomena that we have to take most seriously.
Tainter’s conceptual framework seems, without further analysis, to be closely in-line with Quigley’s theories of historical analysis. To Tainter the story of a complex society is a race against the resource clock.
Commitment means you can’t retrench to simpler technology in a bad year because the greater efficiency has become the new minimum baseline. Of course, our ramshackle village could be overrun, destroyed, and our people pillaged who knows when by some Goth, Ostrogoth, Visigoth, Vandal, Hun, or some other kind of Goth I have forgotten about.
May 11, S rated it it was amazing Recommends it for: He nods vaguely in this direction when answering the anticipated criticism that he does not take into account possible equilibria, but only vaguely. Basically complexity becomes too costly and so collapse occurs. Complexity calls these traditions into being, for such art and literature serve social and economic purposes and classes that exist only in complex settings. Some of it is overly pessimistic—Tainter talks about how investing in energy production already in offered sharply diminishing returns, but he neglects countervailing trends, such as the diminishing cost of light production quantified by William Nordhaus in the s.
This is well trodden ground, from those like Francis Fukuyama who ascribe most development of complex societies to warfare to those with a more anarchist bent, like James C. Intense, authoritarian efforts to maintain cohesion by Domitian and Constantine the Great only led to an ever greater strain on the population.
We may listen to tunes on a reed flute rather than Bach, and die in our twenties, but at least our marginal returns on investing in complexity will be up! Turns out all the reasons I thought caused collapse were straw man reasons invented by their writers to push an agenda, or just poor research. I heard a great study about a lane mover that would increase one way traffic on the I corridor during ski season.
The Collapse of Complex Societies – Joseph Tainter – Google Books
View all 8 comments. Quigley, though, gave more credence to cultural developments; probably as a useful indicator of the ideological state of the majority. May 19, DoctorM rated it really liked it Shelves: Oct 04, J. What happens after collapse, he argues, may actually be beneficial to society, because it removes a great deal collapsee inefficiency that the old system labored under.
Sort of scary in retrospect how many complex, seemingly stable societies basically evaporated over the course of only a few collapss and that civilization as we know it has a relatively short existence compared to the totality of human existence. Too much sober thought stifled speculation, may be it is because Tainter is an archaeologist who likes substantive reasons rather than flights of fancy.