The
Sekhmet Hypothesis
is the idea that pop-culture upheavals follow sunspot patterns. Every 11 years the sunspots hit a peak, and so there’s a culture shift. If you squint really hard you can kind of see it. Warren Ellis:
1955 — the dawn of rock’n’roll. 1966 00 is when the Sixties happened. 1977 — punk epxlodes. 1988 — aciiiid. 1999 — fucking nothing.
So, we’re now in a cultural rut which even bizarre sunspot theories can’t extricate us from. Ellis again:
here in the Zero Years of the 21, even those most reliable engines of creation of the last half of C20, Britain and Japan (both islands, both post-imperialist, both post-major and incredibly damaged economic shell games, both finding their stations as makers of art) are coming up empty. Coldplay and Fruits Basket? Give me strength.
It’s a chilling thought, but maybe worth considering, even only as a Threat Condition to be armed against: maybe we’re stuck here.
[compare: the post-temporality Bruce Sterling has been turning into a theme, e.g. in his transmediale keynote last year]