How Climate Change Drove the Rise of Genghis Khan

TIME ^ | March 10, 2014 | by Bryan Walsh

[Oldeconomybuyer]

The Mongol warlord built the world's largest land-based empire. But he couldn't have done it without a change in climate.

The difference was Genghis Khan, the warlord who united the tribes and launched them on their wave of unstoppable conquest. But the Mongol Empire wasn’t solely the product of Genghis’s will. As a fascinating new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS) demonstrates, the rise of the Mongols may have owed just as much to beneficial changes in the climate that made the grasslands of the Mongol steppes green and verdant, fueling the horses that were the backbone of the empire’s military. Climate change helped make the Mongol Empire possible.

The PNAS study came from research done by the tree-ring scientists Neil Wanker at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and Amy Hessl at West Virginia University.

[Grimmy]

Actually, a series of betrayals and such made ol’ Ghengis the man as he is known today.

Him and his mongol buddies, being very very good at doing that mobile war stuff, and being fearsome as all get out, drove the rise of the Khan.

[peeps36]

It must have been those elephant and buffalo battle tanks of the day. They didn't run on gas but they released a lot into the atmosphere from back firing, or farts. They also left steaming piles of obama all over the battlefield. These damn animals are still releasing gas into our atmosphere today. Didn't Al invent a gas bag for a cows ass and enviro-nazi’s mouth?

[Rocky]

Yes, we must return to the stone age. For the children.

[elpadre]

Climate change has been occurring since creation. It is built into the order of nature, and occasionally influenced by activity on the surface of the Sun.

It gets warm, then it gets cold - and on and on and on.

so what’s the big deal about climate change???

[familyop]

Global warming would be nice—worth putting a guest yurt out in the yard.

[a fool in paradise]

George Bush must’ve had a time machine.

[a fool in paradise]

The trees—some of which were still alive—were ancient, some more than 1,100 years old. Old trees provide a living history book of the climate. During warm, wet years, the trees grow more, and the rings inside the trunk that mark those years are wider. The opposite happens during dry years, when the rings would be narrow.

Note the use of the word "WERE" next to "still alive". Researchers killed old growth trees in the name of SCIENCE!

Sacrificed to Gaia to amend for the sins of Western man.

[Jimmy Valentine]

Somebody needs to ping Vladimir Putin and tell where his real danger lies

[colorado tanker]

I wonder if it occurred to these scientists that by documenting the Medieval Warm Period they are undercutting one of the articles of faith of the climate change alarmists.

Maybe they know that if they connected the dots their funding would dry up.

BTW, this warm period also coincided with the Renaissance of the 12th Century in Western Europe.

[TruthWillWin]

Did not realize there were SUVs that long ago?

[FreedomPoster]

In Eisenhower's farewell address, in which he famously warned of the dangers of the military-industrial complex, he also warned that Big Science could be corrupted by government funding. Ike was incredibly prescient.

Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.

The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present – and is gravely to be regarded.

Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.

Eisenhower's Farewell Address to the Nation
January 17, 1961

[SuziQ]

Are we getting warmer now? [shrug] I think opinions differ -- but the key concept is that Climate does change. It's not our fault, and we can't "fix it". We're just along for the ride.

There is a reason the AGW proponents like to use 150 years ago as the benchmark evidence that we are so much warmer today. That was the end of the last little ice age, so ANYTHING is warmer than that!

[dennisw]

I wonder if it occurred to these scientists that by documenting the Medieval Warm Period they are undercutting one of the articles of faith of the climate change alarmists.

I looked up one of the researchers Neil Wanker at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory_____  I could not find any global warming propaganda from him. Looks like he is fairly honest as far as climate research goes. He might be into pure research minus leftist political agenda