Feb 25 2024 40 mins
In Third Turnings we can expect to see
- Less powerful societal structures
- More freedom for individuals to do what they consider worthwhile
- Exciting (if bubbly) economies as individuals explore new opportunities
- Names we still recognize as some individuals make themselves known
1543 - Nicolaus Copernicus publishes "On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres"
As we draw the final side of our map - the Third Turning, or Unraveling - we'll be looking at people like Nicolaus Copernicus, who suggested that the Earth rotates around the Sun. The Unraveling is a time of individual freedom, when people make discoveries, inventions, or achievements - generally without the assistance of governments, in a way that attaches their own names to what they've done.
1666 - Isaac Newton's Miraculous Year
Stuck at home during the plague year of 1666, young Isaac Newton considered important scientific issues of the day, and quickly made amazing advances in mathematics, astronomy, physics, and general understanding of the universe.
1752 - Benjamin Franklin Flies a Kite
Benjamin Franklin was well known for a number of reasons, but even today "flying a kite in a thunderstorm" is one of the first that comes to mind.
This is a landmark that everyone knows about, and one reason for having it here is to give a specific date to it (1752, that is). There’s also the concern over how authentic to consider it - the descriptions here are definitely from Franklin and in that year, even if he was neither to first to try it nor confirmed to have actually done it.
1852 - Uncle Tom's Cabin published by Harriet Beecher Stowe
Viewing slavery as a moral or economic issue makes it easier to talk about, since it removes people from the conversation, allowing opportunities for compromise, ways to get along, ways to talk past the difficult conccept of people being used. That was often how such discussions of slavery in the Uniited States had gone for a while.
Harriet Beecheer Stowe's story of enslaved people in the South moved the conversation in a less comfortable direction, by making the suffering of slaves personal and specific.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncle_Tom%27s_Cabin
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomon_Northup
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Douglass
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narrative_of_the_Life_of_Frederick_Douglass,_an_American_Slave
1927 - Charles Lindbergh Crosses the Atlantic
It's the Roaring '20s, and there are new ways of making money, new technologies, new ways of becoming famous. Charles Lindbergh had learned to fly airplanes, and would use his understanding of this new technology to become rich and one of the most famous people on the planet.
1990 - Tim Berners-Lee Invents the World Wide Web
The dot-com era happened when it did because of the invention of the World Wide Web, which made it easier to use the connected network of computer networks we call The Internet.