A Princeton Economics Professor but I do believe that I have found an error in Armstrongs work. I am quite serious, just a little excited and can prove it by numerous means. But can I just say that I cometh not to destroy his work but to enhance and complete the circle that thou may haveth knowledge eternal......In short my discovery is that the number 72 in his workings is indeed in error. The exact number should be 71 and 3/7.
From the beginning : In Armstrongs last work he uses several numbers 8.6 from his confidence model, 37.33 and 3.11 from the financial crisis cycle and 224 and 72 from the political change cycle. Armstrong demonstrates using days weeks months and years that all these numbers are fractals of each other except for 72 which is the odd man out. This idea didn't quite sit right with me so with a bit of lateral thinking........71 and 3/7 it is
I can prove this in 3 ways
1. mathematically 2. Real stockmarket application 3. Historical political events
1. Mathematical
Rewind back to when 9 lives first arrives on the XJO thread. Volt is constantly referring to Armstrong and his cycles so I did a bit of research and his work totally captures my imagination......the fact that Pi is related to the economic cycle.....
1 Armstrong cycle = 3141 days = Pi x 1000days
The first thing that jumps into my head at that time is that if this is a cycle, I mean like a circle, and if it is a function of Pi then why can't it have a radius....diameter of a cycle = 2 x Pi x R......therefore I concluded the radius of an Armstrong cycle is 500 days......I'm not sure what that means because in everyday terms we think of time as a linear function but I know that there is maths above my grasp in the fields of Relativity and Quantum Mechanics that says otherwise. In Armstrongs latest work even he refers to the more Asian concept of time being a circle rather than linear.
But back to 72. If we consider 72 weeks expressed as days
72 x 7 = 504 days.....that's neaaaaarly a 500 day radius but not quite. Armstrong starts his reference to 72 as "an approximate 72 year period of political decline"....well 71 and 3/7 is approximately 72 but now it also relates mathematically to the other Armstrong numbers.
But wait.... there is so much more.
Bear in mind that the other numbers are harmonically related and 71 and 3/7 is related by a factor of Pi. As Pi has an undefined number of decimal places it is not and cannot be harmonically related but this next trick has a touch of fibonacci about it. If we were to convert an armstrong cycle into weeks and an Armstrong radius into weeks we have....
The armstrong cycle 3141/7 = 448.7142857428574285742857 (at this point my calculator runs out of decimal places)
the radius 500/7 = 71.42857428574285742857
Now note that the digits on the left hand side of the cycle's decimal place is 448, or 2 x 224....224 is one of armstrongs related numbers AND the digit sequence to the right of the decimal place is exactly the same as the digit sequence in the radius number.
(twilight zone music plays)
2. Market application.
back when I first arrived on XJO and discovered all this I went into a month long Armstrong rant not unlike this one. I had a little knowledge and a lot of enthusiasm. I did not receive a lot of feedback on the XJO thread at the time so I reached 3 possible conclusions :
1. I was a raving Lunatic. I was way off the mark and had no idea what I was talking about.
2. I was indeed onto something but nobody really gave a rats.
3. That I was just a cycle newbie and everyone else was already so in the know about this kind of stuff that they were all like "yaaa 9 lives, like get over it dude. that stuff is soooo 1990s....If you wanna be retro then why don't you just grow a mullet and stuff and be done with it....Go listen to your Billy Ray Cyrus Cds and junk...."
So being a little deflated.....I just sorta......ummm.....stopped ranting.
But Billy Ray is now back in town and ready to revisit those early concepts.....
Basically I noted 500 days had a very strong correlation through recent history. there were 3 big lows as the DOW sagged down into the 2002 low that related to the lows of this crash
low on 17/10/00 add 2500 days (5 x 500) = 22/7/2007.....major capitulation 6 days earlier on 16/8/07
low on 21/3/01 add 2500 days = 24/1/08.....major capitulation 2 days earlier 22/1/08
low 21/9/01 (low from 911) add 2000 days = 14/3/07.....low of march 07 correction EXACTLY.
it was now early July and I was pretty excited about my finding and I was predicting a low at 21/9/2001 plus 2500 days = 26/7/2008....which was a saturday. There was a higher low from 15/7/2008 on monday 28/7/08....2502 days after the 911 low. How the hell did a group of raving terrorists who flew planes into buildings on 911 know that almost exactly 2500 days later a shadow of their actions would be echoed in the market in the form of a financial crisis ??
The point is though using 5 x factor here any error would also be a 5x factor.....so a 500 day period seems to fit better than Armstrongs 504 days as this would be 2520 days using the 5x factor.
3. Political history example.
This is where Armstrong started. He refers in his work to a phase differential. Usually a major political shift is caused by a number of events, not just one.....Rome wasn't built in a day so therefore neither did it decline in a day. This makes it difficult to therefore decide exactly what dates to pick to verify the numbers.....but I think maybe post WWI Germany may fit nearly perfectly.....
Although it was 11/11/1918 when the Armistice occurred this was only a ceasefire....nothing was concrete. Peace was declared when the Treaty of Versailles was signed on June 28 1919...at this point Germany formally agreed to financial payments, loss of territory etc. The years that follow for Germany certainly were what Armstrong descibes as a catastrophy.
71 and 3/7 years, using a 365.25 day year to account for leap years = 71 years and 157 days (rounded to the nearest day)...... 71 years 157 days after the treaty of Versailles was 2/12/1990......reunification was officially on 3/10/1990.....but a united free Germany voted in fair and free elections for the the first time since 1932 on 2/12/1990. That is to say the first democratically voted government of modern Germany was elected EXACTLY TO THE DAY 71 and 3/7 years after the treaty of Versailles.
So there you go 9 Lives now has his very own God number....71 and 3/7....proven mathematically, by market application and by political history.
.......I now await my Noble prize for economics. I just hope I don't have to share it with that Armstrong Newbie.
(20min delay)