Breaking the Code of History by David Paul Murrin

by David Murrin

The rise and fall of empires and civilisations

Genres: History

Paperback

First published January 1, 2010

Reviews

[Sam Romilly · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a really odd book. Very ambitious and has a lot of research. Also gives the big picture of the rise and fall of empires which is always interesting. Then it looks at the ways our current civilisation and more specifically our western liberal nations could collapse. However there are several problems. the first is that it tries to present the thesis as an obvious logical train of events with non'stop use of powerpoint type charts and graphs that are so high level they actually illustrate little and prove nothing and end up being a distraction. What specifically annoyed me was with all this grand overview of all the civilisations somehow the Thatcher Falklands War was felt to be of historic importance rather than a completely minor blip in history.

Basically we are doomed due to over population, or climate change, or pandemic, and if any empire survives it will be China.

I notice nobody seems to have read this book which is probably as good an indication as any that it is not really worth searching out.