Jeffrey R. Holland passed away over the weekend. As you know if you’ve read ZD for any length of time, one analysis I’ve done repeatedly is looking at who among the Q15 might become Church president. President Holland’s death looks like it really clears the way for Dieter F. Uchtdorf to reach the top spot. I pointed out when I looked at the question about a decade ago that then-Elder Holland was by far the biggest obstacle to him, as they were very close in age (born about a month apart in 1940), but Uchdorf was two spots lower in the line of succession.
To look at the question more systematically, I updated the analysis I’ve done a number of times, using a mortality table from the Society of Actuaries and a bunch of random number draws to simulate possible orders in which the Q15 members die, and as a result who among them becomes Church president and for how long. If you’re interested in a more detailed description of the method, see my 2023 post, although note that I’m now doing the simulation with monthly steps rather than annual steps.
Here are the predicted probabilities by future year. These are actually straight from calculations on the mortality table, and don’t depend on the simulation.
Uchdorf’s curve is still dwarfed by Bednar’s, but for the first time since I started doing this type of analysis, there’s a period of time when he’s the single most likely member to be holding the top spot. Also, this analysis uses the same mortality table for every quorum member, so it doesn’t account for the evident frailty of both Presidents Oaks and Eyring.
I drew 10,000 sets of random numbers for the simulation, and this table summarizes the results.
As you can see, the simulation actually shows Holland’s death improving Eyring’s chances the most, which makes sense given that Holland was years younger than Eyring and senior to him. Uchdorf’s chances still only stand at 59%, which seem comically underestimated. Setting aside any of the simulation, he is over seven years younger than the two men senior to him, making him seem like a pretty good bet to eventually make the top spot. Further down the table, there isn’t much change, as these men were already very likely to outlive Holland.
Thank you for the calculations!
I plugged in the names of all the Q15 into AI and asked for groupings based on themes emerging across their respective talks (pet projects, personality themes, etc.)
It said:
Hard edges: Oaks, Bednar, Andersen (guarding borders, etc.)
Pastoral softening: Holland, Renlund, Gong, Kearon (softening borders and empathizing, providing pastoral care)
Institutional continuity: Cook, Stevenson, Causse (peacekeepers, resource stewards)
Mobilization & urgency: Rasband
Bridge figures: Christofferson, Soares (peacekeepers, compromisers, harmonizers)
I thought it was really interesting how the output I received echoed (correlated) with your data and Oaks, Bednar, and Andersen being prominent as the likely successors to the presidency and FP, and all in the same category as hard edgers.
AI of course is not scientific . . . but it was an interesting thought experiment.
Mortimer,
It would be more interesting with Uchtdorf and Eyring included.
Extending this categorization backward,have past presidents chosen to ordain apostles who are of the same faction?
Oaks was a nominal Kimball choice,probably really by Hinckley for all the “miracle” talk of a 2:30 AM lucid moment for Kimball
Eyring,Uchtdorf,Bednar,Cook were Hinckley picks
Christofferson,Andersen,Rasband,Stevenson,Renlund from the Monson years
Gong,Soares,Kearon from Nelson
Causse from Oaks.
Holland was Hunter’s only pick,
Nelson from the same “miracle” as Oaks,
Ballard an “I just left President Kimball” announcement by Hinckley to Ballard and his wife the month before Kimball died,though by some accounts Hinckley “called Ballard as an apostle”.
Monson was a McKay choice along with Hunter and Hinckley
Hales was a likely Hinckley choice when Benson was near death but presumably given the credit.
Scott and Wirthlin came from when Benson was still functional
Perry was Kimball’s first Apostle pick followed by Haight & Faust
Maxwell was a Kimball pick as he was in decline
Packer and Ashton were from the JFS Jr. presidency.
Last Lemming,
Good catch!
Eyring and Soares go in a bucket called “Interior Spirituality”.
Uchtdorf goes in the “Pastoral softening” group”
I note from Holland’s funeral that Uchtdorf did not speak,and while all the other speakers were able to get up and go to the lectern in the Tabernacle,Eyring delivered his benediction from his seat (the coverage I saw did not show him getting in or out).
If Eyring dies before Oaks,who might Oaks add to the First Presidency?
The Uchtdorf percentage chances would again rise considerably whether or not he returned to counselorship.
Has anyone plotted Ziff’s curves against the ones at https://prophetpredict.com or https://imgur.com/a/YXbPacR ?
I note that Eyring is now the third-oldest-ever First Counselor after Penrose and Oaks and third-oldest-ever President of the Twelve after JFS Jr. and Nelson (less than a year from breaking both records but note that Ballard was Acting President of the 12 older than anyone has been President of the 12 and Haight and LeGrand Richards were even older as Apostles without either acting or full/nominal presidency of the 12).
Uchtdorf (or whoever comes after Oaks and Eyring) is also likely to be the first president since Brigham Young with less than 30 years as an apostle. I suppose this is a natural consequence of the narrow age range from which the recent apostles have been called.
Interesting to see the other models. They don’t seem to differ too much from Ziff’s. I note that Bednar doesn’t cross 50% at the peak in either of those. The imgur one is curious in that it seems to suggest that there is a 25% chance that Oaks dies this month or something. The curves look wonderfully smooth, but it is difficult to tell what sort of calculation interval they’re using. Prophetpredict lets you hover over the data in 3 month intervals, so that might be what they’re using. I know Ziff calculates on a monthly basis, so Oaks is quite unlikely to die in any particular month of this year, which is why his line starts off at about 98%.
I find comparing the list of apostles called by presidents to be very interesting. I certainly don’t know how it all goes down, and to what extent presidents at the very end of their lives may not have been functioning well enough to be particularly involved. But Gong, Soares and Kearon don’t feel very “Nelsony” to me. (Nor are they very “Oaksy”.) Bednar doesn’t seem very “Hinckley-like” (nor “Monsony”). Christofferson and Anderson as the first two Monson picks (when I’m presuming he was doing better) don’t feel like they fit. So to me it just doesn’t feel like presidents are picking apostles in the same mold as them. Part of this is possibly that I don’t personally know these people, but also, it gives me more hope for the future.
I have noted that the range of post-Brigham-Young presidents’ experience in the Twelve before becoming Church President has ranged from 30 to 60 years,very close to each of those at the extremes (Kimball ordained October 1943,acceded December 1973,and JFS Jr. ordained April 1910,acceded January 1970).Oaks at 51 is the youngest Apostle ordained since Packer but third-oldest ever among church presidents’ age at apostolic ordination after Nelson and Hunter.
With every apostle in line ordained older than Oaks and only Eyring at the 30 or even 22 year experience mark,the old rules of thumb do seem doomed.
The matter analyzed by Ziff represents a milestone of sorts for me. Twenty-one years ago on October 2, 2004 Elders Uchtdorf and Bednar were sustained by the church as new apostles. Prior to 2004 Elder Eyring had been the least senior apostle since his call in 1995. The Times and Seasons web site started up almost a year before Uchtdorf and Bednar’s calls, so this was the first change in the Quorum of the Twelve at the dawn of “blogging.” A very short post at T&S noted the new apostles’ calling, and 94 comments followed. One commenter speculated, “I’d say Bednar has a better than 50% chance of someday being president.” Russell Arben Fox responded, “Someone better at manipulating actuarial tables would have to do the math here, but I don’t know if that’s true.”
That was enough to prod me to calculate and comment. “Since you asked, I ran off a table of the probabilities. The numbers shown are the probability that a white, American male of the age of each of the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve who is alive at the end of 2004 would also be alive at the end of the year heading each column. The last row gives the probability that a man of Elder Bednar’s age would survive a collection of fourteen men whose ages are those of Elder Bednar’s fellow church leaders. Of course, I am not speculating as to the likelihood of Elder Bednar some day being president of the Church. I would never consider that question. Never.”
More comments on my calculations followed, including from me, “At any rate, I wonder if Elder Eyring has noticed the increased curiosity about his future death.” Here we all are 21 years later with that curiosity stronger than ever.
I also commented then, “Now that I remember it, earlier this year in our stake conference, Elder Eyring joked about the implications for him that both his parents died of cancer.” It is a fraught thing taking statistical probabilities and trying to apply them to individuals. A little like what von Neumann said about those using computers to generate random numbers being in a “state of sin.”
URL for the T&S post:
https://archive.timesandseasons.org/2004/10/new-apostles-uchtdorf-bednar/index.html#comment-23428
Wow, John, you have an impressive memory!
And now the “any new member” can be differentiated from Clark Gordon Gilbert,born June 18th 1970,whose curve will presumably be the top one for a period in the 2050s…as he is younger than Causse(May 22nd 1963) by a significantly greater margin than Causse is younger than Kearon(July 18th 1961) I wonder if he’ll pre-empt Causse’s time at the top.
(Oops,I mis-remembered Causse’s birthdate by 2 days…May 20th!)