Talk:Historic recurrence

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What is this article about? Piet 09:42, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
 * It appears to be a well-written personal essay historiography. I say Keep. --Ancheta Wis 10:58, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
 * obviously, this article is a one-sided personal essay. the author is laughing all the way to the left. 98.97.58.218 (talk) 22:06, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

I agree it's well written and almost interesting, but what is it about? Is it about a Mark Twain quote? Then I think the name should be the full quote. But it doesn't seem to be about the quote but about some principle or theory or view about history. Is this theory or view called "History rhymes"? That doesn't seem very scientific. I propose we find a better name. I was reading an article about Hernán Cortés and out of the blue I find a link to History rhymes, showing me a Mark Twain quote. My first reaction was wtf, throw this out please, nothing to do with Hernan Cortes. If this would be called "Resonance in History" or "Converging histories" it would make more sense and be a bit more encyclopedic. Further remarks: Piet 12:41, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
 * It seems like a personal essay, like your first remark said, and I don't think it's a historiography. This can be fixed.
 * Wikipedia is not a publisher of original thought. This article gives references on the particular stories, but there seems to be no reference indicating that the "History rhymes" view is something that has ever been published before. If this is not the case, the article is a candidate for deletion.
 * Style: see lead section, but first we have to make sure what the article is about.
 * I think I read in one of the guidelines (I don't find it now) that an article should not begin with a quote. Regardless, I don't think it's encyclopedic; any article should begin with a clear definition of the subject.

If nobody reacts, I will propose deletion because of No original research. Piet 11:09, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

Well, I see you all stoppoed debating this... But, really - why is this page here? The first paragraph is wroth keeping, but the rest sounds like a bad undergraduate book report on Jared Diamond... This is worth making a personal project, so... I'll revisit in a few days and if there's no objection, I'm giving like 90% of it the axe and doing some rewriting. 66.41.65.237 (talk) 00:48, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

This article should be deleted. Its obviously not encyclopedic and is merely a bunch of nonsense.24.250.242.46 (talk) 20:16, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

Original research
Seems that there's already a lot of "original research" being done on Wikipedia--for example, every time somebody adds another item to any of the "lists" that have multiplied here. In fact, if an article doesn't involve "original research" (the recombining of information) then it's plagiarism.

False or clearly useless material needs to be purged. But working on Wikipedia surely doesn't require the mere uncritical copying of information.


 * Adding a Bolivian writer to the list of Bolivian writers can hardly be called original research. And the lists link to articles which should contain references. Writing a short section on whichever topic from the head without having a reference, I have no problem with. We have to move on. But introducing theories that have never been published is a no-go. Anyway I am much more happy after the changes. Piet 07:53, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Article revised
This article has been revised and retitled to address foregoing critiques and achieve greater clarity and focus. logologist|Talk 07:40, 3 April 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the changes, logologist. Sorry to be a nuisance, I hope you agree it has led to an improvement. Piet 07:53, 3 April 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your constructive criticisms. I think they have improved the article.  logologist|Talk 09:14, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

What is this article?
I have read both "Maps of Time" and "Guns, Germs an Steel" and I don't remember coming across anything called "Historic recurrence", and I don't see it in the index's of those books either. Is "Historic recurrence" a made-up term, who uses that term? Also, this is not a historiography article, because it never mentions any historians! It seems like original research, piecing together various concepts and ideas from new approaches to history (World History, Big History, etc..) and then coming up with the idea that history has repeating patterns. -- Stbalbach 16:12, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Still need a category
While I still don't see how this fits within the WP:NOR policy, it still needs to fit within some category. If you don't want to call it historiography (the original author removed that category in one of the latest edits), then what is it? Lack of categorization implies original research IMHO. —Wknight94 (talk) 02:13, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

Gods return is bad interpretation
The idea that Aztecs in general and Moctezuma in particular should have thought that Cortes and the spaniards were deities is one of the seven myths exposed and refuted by Matthew Restall in his book "Seven myths about the spanish conquest". It also holds a critique of Jared Diamonds interpretations of Aztec weaknesses that lead to their fall. Unable to critizie the other parts of this article I can only say that this is a porr example of historic recurrence if there is indeed such a thing, because the thing supposed to have recurred is in fact myths based on after rationalisation.

Annales, and Distorted Importance
I'm a bit wary of this article - for a start, the article claims that looking at "events, widely separated in time and geography" only came about in the 1980s, yet this comparative approach was a key concept of the Annales school of history which was the most influential historical school of the mid-twentieth century, even if its ideas took longer to catch on in the UK and USA than they did in Europe.

Also, the 3 examples given seem abitrary, and give the impression of a distorted level of historical importance being placed on them and the notion of historical recurrence itself which there isn't any argument to provide.

This should be deleted immediately. I'm incredibly surprised it has lasted so long. It is a personal essay and has nothing to do with modern historiography. It is also not encyclopedic in the least.24.250.242.46 (talk) 04:59, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Original research redux
I've started a discussion at WP:NORN. Dougweller (talk) 18:39, 15 August 2012 (UTC)

Garbage
This page is garbage, personal essay, personal philosophy. It should have been deleted a dozen times over. I don't know what is wrong with you people. It was created and maintained by one person. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.1.254.205 (talk) 17:13, 22 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Unfortunately I didn't follow up on the NORN discussion at . Time to do so I guess. Dougweller (talk) 21:17, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

On a related point, am I the only one who thinks that the relatively large space given here to an intellectual lightweight like Amis is inappropriate in the company of the other more noteworthy authors? ...the personal opinion of one contributor, perhaps? 76.88.1.215 (talk) 19:12, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

The level of English is at times rather poor and chaotic, especially in the 'similarities' section. Aside from that sections's other myriad problems of relevance, if it is to remain, it needs rewriting for the sake of readability and precision. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.171.180.178 (talk) 15:50, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

Recent edit on Tromp now makes no sense
I changed a recent edit explaining why in my edit summary - it was attributing something to Wikipedia that was actually the author's view. That now reads:

He also notes [t]he view proceeding from a belief in the uniformity of human nature [Trompf's emphasis]. It holds that because human nature does not change, the same sort of events can recur at any time."[12]

Sorry, but I don't understand this. Where does the quote start? And isn't there something missing? Dougweller (talk) 10:07, 25 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Sorry. There should have been a quotation mark between "He also notes" and "[t]he view..."  I've corrected this.  Thanks.  Nihil novi (talk) 10:56, 25 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks. I think I understand it now. Dougweller (talk) 11:14, 25 August 2013 (UTC)

"Historic recurrence in popular culture" section?
I think there are books/movies/whatever with this (eg. Battlestar Galactica?). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.253.172.7 (talk) 19:55, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

Quotations section.
I laboured long to include several relevant quotations, with detailed references, but now the entire section appears to have been deleted. Does anyone know why? Crawiki (talk) 14:47, 30 September 2017 (UTC)
 * It was deleted in accordance with WP:LONGQUOTE. The quotations now appear at WikiQuote, which can be seen by clicking the link near the bottom of the article.  NewYorkActuary (talk) 14:55, 30 September 2017 (UTC)

"Cosmological rather than historic recurrence"?
In the first section, it's mentioned that "Prior to the theory of historic recurrence that was offered by Polybius [...] ancient western thinkers who had thought about recurrence had largely been concerned with cosmological rather than historic recurrence". This "cosmological recurrence", seems like the sort of thing readers would want to know more about (I certainly do), and I understand that this particular article probably isn't really the place to be elaborating on that idea, but does that concept have its own article that we could be linking to there? BrokenEye3 (talk) 11:52, 24 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your interest.
 * The concept of cosmological recurrence, in various of its iterations, is discussed in the Wikipedia article on "Eternal return", which is also known as the "Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence" (mentioned in the lead).
 * Nihil novi (talk) 12:24, 24 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh, thanks. I saw that link in the the "See Also" section, but it wasn't clear from the limited context that it was the same concept referred to earlier. If you don't mind, I'd like to add a link to the paragraph in question. I'm thinking something like "(See: Eternal return)" to avoid displacing the link to cosmology.BrokenEye3 (talk) 22:25, 24 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Clicking on "Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence" in the lead takes the reader to "Eternal return". But please feel free to try adding other links elsewhere that you think may be of help.
 * Thanks.
 * Nihil novi (talk) 03:22, 25 February 2019 (UTC)

List of recurring themes
Perhaps this article can be improved by including a list of (likely or allegedly) recurring (similar) themes. This list might include the rise and fall of empires, the rise and collapse of civilizations, war and peace, cycles of prosperity or inequality, etc. Thanks! --Lbeaumont (talk) 18:40, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Interesting idea. The article's "See also" section links to some articles that touch in various ways on the article's theme; more links could probably be added.
 * Specific recurrences of similar events and phenomena could be summarized in appropriate main sections of the article as they are found in published reliable sources.
 * By the way, I notice that you work with software and systems. Something that I've been thinking about for some years is a unitary, world-wide medical-record system covering individuals from conception to postmortem; listing, first of all, the individual's current medical diagnoses, principal signs and symptoms, and medicines and treatments; at the touch of another button, accessing a succinct prior health history, including currently inactive problems, immunizations administered, adverse medication effects, and allergies; and, at the press of another button, a record of laboratory and specialized-studies results. The present proliferation of non-intercommunicating medical-record systems poses a safety risk – and not only if an individual is found unconscious away from his hometown or in a foreign country.
 * Best,
 * Nihil novi (talk) 01:54, 27 March 2020 (UTC)