The Collapse of Civilizations
One of the common reasons that past civilizations failed on Earth is because of climate change.
As far as we know, there have been no civilizations on Earth prior to about 7,500 years before present. That means, for all of Earthβs 4.54 billion year history, civilization has only existed 0.000165% of the time. The first city-state, Sumer, formed in Mesopotamia (present day Iraq and surrounding areas) between 7,500 to 5,300 years ago. Since then, in an astoundingly short amount of time, humans have built sprawling cities, conceived of religions, created beautiful art and music, developed languages, mapped the human genome, used science to explain the universe, traveled to the moon, glimpsed into galaxies far, far away, and most recently, designed the iPhone.
I would argue that the iPhone is far superior to the Star Trek Communicator, partly due to the iPhoneβs nifty use of Apps. The Communicator is supposed to be the height of technology in the 23rd century, about 200 years from now. Technically it doesnβt even exist yet, and it appears to be totally outdated! Laughable. The only caveat is that Communicators use subspace transmissions beyond the normal rules of physics, allowing signals to bypass electromagnetic interference and instantaneously traverse vast distances. I guess in that regard, maybe the Star Trek Communicator is better than iPhones after all.
It has been said that communication is everything, and I would argue that language is one of the main reasons why early civilizations thrived. The Sumerians in Mesopotamia used cuneiform script for written communications. They referred to their land as Kengir, the 'country of the noble lords' (π ππ, 'country' + 'lords' + 'noble'), and their language as EmegΜir, the βnative tongueβ (π ΄π , βtongueβ + βlanguageβ). The cuneiform symbols were used to tell stories, create contracts, and praise rulers and gods - all the things that civilizations do. In one example, written on a small clay cone 4,400 years before present, a scribe recounts the beginning of a war between the city-states of LagaΕ‘ and Umma.
πΎπππ ππ» π π’ππ·π π ππΊ
"He ripped out the stele [stone or wooden slab erected as a monument] and marched toward the plain of LagaΕ‘."
π πππ€π²π« π π π² ππ π π―πΊπ ππΎ π ππππ
"At Enlil's command, he threw his great battle net and heaped up burial mounds for it on the plain."
Cone of Enmetena (ππΌπ¨πΎ), King of Lagash, at the Louvre Museum. In some ways, this clay stone could be considered one of the first precursors to the iPhone. [Wikipedia, CC0]
In the movie Arrival, visiting aliens (the heptopods) who can βremember the futureβ offer to help humanity now in exchange for humanityβs help in 3,000 years. The alien language is striking, comprised of inky, circular, and non-geometric symbols. Learning the language alters humans' linear perception of time, allowing them to experience memories of future events. An article in Smithsonian Magazine discusses the linguistic idea behind the film: βKnown as the βSapir-Whorf hypothesis,β this theory states that language doesnβt just give people a way to express their thoughtsβit influences or even determines those thoughts. On the flip side, the evolution of a language is shaped by the culture and environment its speakers live in.β The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis is very controversial. The logogram above means βBefore And Afterβ.
Letβs now shift away from language, which helps civilizations thrive, and think more about why civilizations end. The thing to know about civilizations is that eventually they all fail. And one of the common reasons that past civilizations failed on Earth is because of climate change, in particular the onset of drought. Take these three examples, each of which remains slightly controversial in some regard.
The Akkadian Empire (π³π΅π in the Akkadian language, ππ΅ππ in the Sumerian language) was the first ancient empire of Mesopotamia after the long-lived civilization of Sumer. The Akkadian empire collapsed 4,200 years agoΒ due to drought, as discussed in The Genesis and Collapse of Third Millennium North Mesopotamian Civilization in the journal Science.
β¦a marked increase in aridity and wind circulation, subsequent to a volcanic eruption, induced a considerable degradation of land-use conditions. After four centuries of urban life, this abrupt climatic change evidently caused abandonment of Tell Leilan, regional desertion, and collapse of the Akkadian empire based in southern Mesopotamia. Synchronous collapse in adjacent regions suggests that the impact of the abrupt climatic change was extensive.
The Anu Ziggurat and White Temple at Uruk, a city-state in Mesopotamia (present day Warka, Iraq). The original pyramidal structure, the Anu Ziggurat, dates to around 6,000 years ago, and the White Temple was built on top of it about 5,500 years ago. The design of the ziggurat was probably a precursor to the Egyptian pyramids. [Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 2.0, tobeytravels]
Another example of civilization collapse is the Classic Mayan Civilization, which ended about 1,000 years agoΒ due to drought, and possibly other concurrent causes. In the book, The Great Maya Droughts, the author R. B. Gill mentions, β[Studies of] Yucatecan lake sediment cores ... provide unambiguous evidence for a severe 200-year drought from [C.E.] 800 to 1000 ... the most severe in the last 7,000 years ... precisely at the time of the Maya Collapse.β
Detail of βLintel 26β from Yaxchilan, an ancient Maya city located on the bank of the Usumacinta River in the state of Chiapas, Mexico. A lintel is a support structure above a window or door. [Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0, ProtoplasmaKid]
The last example of collapse relates to a megadrought that struck what is now the American Southwest from 1276β1299 C.E. This drought probably contributed to the collapse of the Ancestral Puebloans, a Native American culture that spanned the present-day Four Corners region of the United States. But just citing drought as the cause of collapse is far too simplistic though, as discussed in the New York Times article, βVanished: A Pueblo Mysteryβ.
Scientists once thought the answer lay in impersonal factors like the onset of a great drought or a little ice age. But as evidence accumulates, those explanations have come to seem too pat and slavishly deterministic.
Looking beyond climate change, some archaeologists are studying the effects of warfare and the increasing complexity of [Ancestral Puebloans] society. They are looking deeper into ancient artifacts and finding hints of an ideological struggle, clues to what was going through the [Ancestral Puebloan] mind.
Cliff Palace used by the Ancestral Puebloans in Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado, U.S. [Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, Bubba73]
Scientific literature is filled with instances of apparent collapse of civilizations due to drought and other climate changes. But clearly, the reasons for collapse must always be complex, based upon societal pressures that played out in ways that we can no longer understand: those stories have vanished with time.
An important question arises about the future: will our current civilization also collapse due (at least in part) to climate change? I think the answer is no at a large-scale because humans are resilient and we have powerful technologies. Unlike civilizations of the past, we are not isolated, but instead globalized and able to rely on collaborative partnerships across the Earth. But I do think our global civilization will be weakened by climate change, perhaps substantially. Decline can happen abruptly, such as widespread degradation of agricultural lands due to heat domes or drought. Decline can also happen slowly, such as the failure of insurance markets - this is happening in California due to recurring wildfires - or widespread forest fire smoke that causes long-term health issues - most recently from Canadian wildfires. There is also the slow rise of sea level that will inundate coastal cities like Miami and New York, causing human migrations. We could discuss these ideas for days, weeks, and years, but I think you get the point. I will end on a positive note: humans already have the technology to slow global warming and eventually reverse it, and I am very hopeful for the future. We just have to be aware of the lessons we have learned from civilizations of the past, and take the required actions to protect ourselves.
I used the Midjourney AI bot on Discord to imagine two comic-book style images of future sea level rise in New York City, with kayaking tourists exploring the city. Here is the first prompt, /imagine prompt: kayakers at sunset in flooded New York City, in the style of Neal Adams, comics, --ar 16:9 --q2 --v5.
And a second image: /imagine prompt: kayakers under blue sky in flooded New York City skyscrapers, in the style of Neal Adams, comics, --ar 9:16 --q2 --v5.
I look forward to sharing more with you next time, and please consider supporting this newsletter.
Sincerely,Β
TRJ, PaleoClimate Scientist