Posted on 03/12/2014 6:56:57 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Humanity’s greatest land empire was made possible by non-human climate change.
Many phenomena, real and imagined, have been attributed to global warming. From rising ocean levels to increased agricultural yields to tornadoes to polar vortices to droughts to rapes to car thefts, global warming now stands as the cause of just about anything. And because of current political dogma, man is ultimately blamed for all these evils (and occasional goods).
Now a recent study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences argues that there is a correlation between increasing global temperatures and the rise of the Mongolian empire. According to “Pluvials, droughts, the Mongol Empire, and modern Mongolia,” the “dramatic increase in temperature and precipitation in the 13th century” increased grassland production, favoring the formation of Mongolian power, which was predominantly reliant on horses.
For global-warming alarmists, there’s one problem: The Mongolian empire, fueled by a “dramatic increase in temperatures,” grew to power in the early 1200s, over 500 years before the first Industrial Revolution, when man began pumping large amounts of carbon into the atmosphere.
The scientific facts of the study are clear, even if the researcher’s sociopolitical conclusions are debatable. Annual tree-ring records show a warming period through the 12th and 13th centuries, which yielded “persistent moisture unprecedented in the last 1,000 years” correlating with the rise of the Mongolian empire. Much like the Medieval Warm Period of the 10th to 13th centuries, which warmed the North Atlantic region, this hot spell contradicts those few who contend that global warming is purely man-made. Furthermore, according to the study, this pre-industrial global warming was significant enough to cause the rise of the largest land empire in the history of mankind.
This alone does not prove whether anthropogenic global warming (AGW) exists, or to what degree, but it does cast doubt on the multiplicity of evils alarmists claim AGW causes. After all, this study asserts that a major climatic change happened, resulting in one of the grandest accomplishments in human history, long before man traded his horse in for an SUV, or his hand loom for a mechanical one.
Ultimately, global warming may not have actually promoted the rise of the Mongolian empire. While scientists contend that it did cause wetter weather, it is for historians to determine the degree to which weather and climate affected human events.
But if global warming was behind the rise of the Mongolian empire, it was surely natural, not man-made. Likewise, when alarmists claim that global warming will cause extreme weather, that may or may not be true. But in determining whether man is to be blamed or not, it is worth looking back to the Mongolians.
— Alec Torres is a William F. Buckley Fellow at the National Review Institute.
The Medieval Warming, which was eventually followed by a Solar Maunder Minimum and Little Ice Age, is well known. And the Mongols weren’t the only band of murderous (in the best sense) barbarians who expanded their reach during that centuries long age. There are plenty of Irish folks with “son” at the ends of their family names whose ancestral roots go back to some formerly frozen hovels on the coasts of Norway and Sweden. Dublin itself was a Viking outpost.
correlation versus causation
Given any two time series X (for example, as mean global temperature) and Y (extent of the Mongolian Empire), there will almost certainly be a correlation if they are both slow-moving and we only look at a relatively short period of time.
Let’s say global temperature has a phase that is a few hundred years long, and we look at the expansion of the Mongolian Empire over a period of one hundred years. Unless that one hundred period straddles a turning point in global temperature, the expansion of the Mongolian Empire will appear to be correlated with the global temperature, even if there is no causation.
WORD FOR THE DAY: Ergodic.
Really, there is no excuse for climate science to be so ignorant of statistics.
“the Mongols weren’t the only band of murderous (in the best sense) barbarians who expanded their reach during that centuries long age. There are plenty of Irish folks with “son” at the ends of their family names whose ancestral roots go back to some formerly frozen hovels on the coasts of Norway and Sweden.”
BOL! It wasn’t just the Irish, who had “son” at the end of their surnames. Throw in the Scots, Welsh and a good % of the English.
The funniest story I have heard on this “Soning of the Isles” happened in America in the early 1900’s, two young boys and their sister were visiting their staid old American Aunt from the Isles with no Son at the end of her name.
The Aunt decided to tell the three youngsters with a Son at the end of their names about the evils of their ancestors and how they robbed and raped the good people of the Isles.
After about 15 minutes of a one sided lecture of the evil of the Soning horders from across the ocean, the Aunt asked the three how they felt about that.
The oldest boy said, “Auntie, I’m very glad all of that happened, or the three of us wouldn’t be here or anywhere.
The Auntie glared at him and told the three to go outside and play.
I am constantly amazed at the ability of scientists to discover very old ideas.
I've read in several histories from the 18th and 19th centuries, including Gibbon, that a few decades of good weather and rain on the steppes would lead to expansion of herds and of the human population.
Then the weather goes to drought, the tribes go to war with each other, consolidate into empires and eventually come boiling out of the steppes into Europe, the Middle East, India or China.
Happened dozens of times, with the Mongols being only the most recent and most dramatic of these cycles.
This was of course based on the fact that, when properly used, the mounted archer with the recurve bow was the most effective weapon system on the planet for several thousand years. These cycles would still be going on if technology hadn't created even more effective weapon systems.
Thanks SeekAndFind.
Huh.
And here my ignernt unedumakated self always thought that the Mongol Empire was created because some yahoos assassinated a dude’s dad and got him really really pissed off.
And the really really pissed off dude managed to not only get even, eventually, but also managed to organize some other dudes who were really really pissed off at the Chinese for constantly kicking dirt in their faces.
Never knew it was all just global warming.
That is good on so many levels, not least the poster art.
Wow, that CO2 feedback effect must be really powerful - it can reach back in time and heat up the 1200’s to destroy Baghdad!
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