AI And The Search For History’s Hidden Laws

AI tools that solved problems in biology, like AlphaFold, are now being applied to historical data to find patterns in societal crises.

Peter Turchin developed cliodynamics and launched Seshat and CrisisDB to compile structured historical data for cycle-based analysis.

Turchin's models link declining real wages, rising inequality, elite overproduction, and weak states to cycles of instability.

Research teams for data-driven history use RAs for data entry, social scientists for verification, and domain experts for advice.