Climate Change Has Helped Bring Down Cultures 气候变化导致文化衰落

Epidemiologist Anthony McMichael of Australian National University surveyed how human societies survived extreme weather brought on by climate shifts. The big threat is changes to food production. And we’ve never weathered a climate change so big， so rapid and so widespread as the one we are now busily creating by burning fossil fuels， notes McMichael.

澳大利亚国立大学的流行病理学家安东尼·麦克迈克尔调查了在气候变化造成的极端天气情况下，人类社会是如何生存的。他认为，食物生产的变化是一个极大的威胁。他还指出，我们使用矿物燃料对气候造成的影响，规模之大、速度之快、传播之广，是前所未有的。

Long-running climate changes have often brought about the downfall of cultures， including foiling the earliest human attempts at settled farming nearly 13，000 years ago. Around that time， a major millennia-long climate cooling event known as the “Younger Dryas” coincides with the end of most settlements along the Nile Delta and in modern-day Syria. Skeletons from the era evince “an unusually high proportion of violent deaths， many accompanied by remnants of weapons，” McMichael noted. More recently， three back-to-back decades-long droughts afflicted Mayan society in Central America between roughly 760 AD and 920 AD， and marked the end of that culture’s regional dominance.

长期的气候变化常常導致文化的衰落，包括粉碎了大约1.3万年前早期人类想要安顿下来务农的打算。大约在那个时候，一个被称为“新仙女木”的千年气候变冷的重大事件，与大多数定居点（位于尼罗河三角洲和现在的叙利亚）的终结恰好同时发生。麦克迈克尔指出，那个时期的人类骨骼显示出“极高的暴力死亡率，并伴有大量的武器残骸”。再后来，大约在公元760年到920年之间，连续三次长达几十年的旱情对中美洲的玛雅社会造成了巨大的打击，标志着玛雅文明对该地区的统治结束。

Culture destruction caused by shorter-term climate changes have proven equally devastating. Decade-long drought in 17th century China led to starvation， internal migration and， ultimately， one factor of the collapse of the Ming Dynasty.

短期的气候变化已被证明对文化具有同样的破坏性。17世纪中国发生的一场长达十年的旱情，导致饥荒和境内迁移，并最终使其成为明朝衰落的一个原因。

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