Monday, September 25, 2006
"collapse " by Jared Diamond
" MOst people would consder the following past societies to have been famous victims of full fledged colapses rather than of just minor declines ;
The Anasazi and Cahokia within the boundaries of the modern US
the Maya cities in Central America
Moche and Tiwanaku societies in South America
Mycenean Greece and Minoan Crete in Eutore
Great Zimbabwe in Africa
Angkor Wat and the Harappan Indus Valley cities in Asia
Easter Island in the Pacific Ocean .
It has long been suspected that many of those mysterious abandonments were at least partly triggered by the ecological problems ; people inadvertently destryoing the environmental resources on which their societies depended. This suspicion of unintended ecological suicide - ecocide - has been confirmed by discoveries made in recent decades by archaeologists, climatologists , historians, paleontologists, and palynologists ( pollen scientists ) .
The processes through which past societies have unddermined themselved by damaging their envirnments fall into eight categories , whose relative improtance differs from case to case : deforestation and habitat destruction,
soil problems ( erosion, salinisation, and soilfertility losses),
Water management problems,
overhunting
overfishing
human population growth
and increased per capita impact onf people.
The risk of such collapsed today is now a matter of increasing concern.
ET Citings 25 sept 2006 mon.
The Anasazi and Cahokia within the boundaries of the modern US
the Maya cities in Central America
Moche and Tiwanaku societies in South America
Mycenean Greece and Minoan Crete in Eutore
Great Zimbabwe in Africa
Angkor Wat and the Harappan Indus Valley cities in Asia
Easter Island in the Pacific Ocean .
It has long been suspected that many of those mysterious abandonments were at least partly triggered by the ecological problems ; people inadvertently destryoing the environmental resources on which their societies depended. This suspicion of unintended ecological suicide - ecocide - has been confirmed by discoveries made in recent decades by archaeologists, climatologists , historians, paleontologists, and palynologists ( pollen scientists ) .
The processes through which past societies have unddermined themselved by damaging their envirnments fall into eight categories , whose relative improtance differs from case to case : deforestation and habitat destruction,
soil problems ( erosion, salinisation, and soilfertility losses),
Water management problems,
overhunting
overfishing
human population growth
and increased per capita impact onf people.
The risk of such collapsed today is now a matter of increasing concern.
ET Citings 25 sept 2006 mon.
