[Straight Vermonter]

Except that regarding Gobekli Tepe there is not a shred of evidence that this happened.

While the site formally belongs to the earliest Neolithic (PPN A), up to now no traces of domesticated plants or animals have been found. The inhabitants were hunters and gatherers. Schmidt speculates that the site played a key function in the transition to agriculture; he assumes that the necessary social organization needed for the creation of these structures went hand-in-hand with the organized exploitation of wild crops.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6bekli_Tepe (emphasis is mine).

Herr Schmidt could be correct but it's a hell of a jump to say that the regional climate was destroyed by farming when there is no evidence farming much less destructive farming.

[EBH]

Actually if the site is about 13,000 years old then the demise of the site may be from our crossing the galactic equator. Something we are going to experience again in a few years, 2012. If all the earth changes speculated about from earthquakes to floods then it would explain the desperate sacrifices to unseen gods.

[Straight Vermonter]

As I looked at pictures online of this site, something was gnawing at the back of my mind. I had seen something similar to this before. Then I remembered:

[Big_Monkey]

"Herr Schmidt could be correct but it's a hell of a jump to say that the regional climate was destroyed by farming when there is no evidence farming much less destructive farming.

I didn't mean to imply that their may have been deforestation for agricultural reason, perhaps the just harvested the wood to use the wood.

I've read similar observations about the area that now is home to Great Pyramids. There's some speculation that when the Sphinx was originally built, the Giza valley was much more fertile and vegetative. But, deforestation for the next 1,000 years or so, coupled with an extended, very rainy period, led to the conditions that are now present today.