Ancient Mayans destroyed themselves by deforesting their landscape.Byline: ANI Washington, October 8 (ANI): In a new research, NASA NASA: see National Aeronautics and Space Administration. NASA in full National Aeronautics and Space Administration Independent U.S. funded scientists have determined that the ancient Mayans were themselves responsible for the demise of their civilization, by deforesting and destroying their landscape in efforts to eke out eke out Verb [eking, eked] 1. to make (a supply) last for a long time by using as little as possible 2. a living in hard times. For 1200 years, the Years, The the seven decades of Eleanor Pargiter’s life. [Br. Lit.: Benét, 1109] See : Time Maya dominated Central America Central America, narrow, southernmost region (c.202,200 sq mi/523,698 sq km) of North America, linked to South America at Colombia. It separates the Caribbean from the Pacific. . At their peak around 900 A.D., Maya cities teemed with more than 2,000 people per square mile. Even in rural areas, the Maya numbered 200 to 400 people per square mile. But suddenly, all was quiet. The profound silence testified to one of the greatest demographic disasters in human prehistory prehistory, period of human evolution before writing was invented and records kept. The term was coined by Daniel Wilson in 1851. It is followed by protohistory, the period for which we have some records but must still rely largely on archaeological evidence to - the demise of the once vibrant Maya society. As to what may have happened, some NASA-funded researchers think they have a pretty good idea. "They did it to themselves," said veteran archeologist Tom Sever. "The Maya are often depicted as people who lived in complete harmony with their environment," said PhD student Robert Griffin. "But like many other cultures before and after them, they ended up deforesting and destroying their landscape in efforts to eke out a living in hard times," he added. A major drought occurred about the time the Maya began to disappear. At the time of their collapse, the Maya had cut down most of the trees across large swaths of the land to clear fields for growing corn to feed their burgeoning population. They also cut trees for firewood and for making building materials. "They had to burn 20 trees to heat the limestone for making just 1 square meter of the lime plaster they used to build their tremendous temples, reservoirs, and monuments," explained Sever. He and his team used computer simulations to reconstruct how the deforestation deforestation Process of clearing forests. Rates of deforestation are particularly high in the tropics, where the poor quality of the soil has led to the practice of routine clear-cutting to make new soil available for agricultural use. could have played a role in worsening the drought. They isolated the effects of deforestation using a pair of proven computer climate models: the PSU/NCAR mesoscale atmospheric circulation model, known as MM5, and the Community Climate System Model, or CCSM CCSM Community Climate System Model (NCAR) CCSM Command and Control System Module (NSSN) CCSM Catholic Charities of Southern Maryland CCSM Central Computer Systems Management . "We modeled the worst and best case scenarios: 100 percent deforestation in the Maya area and no deforestation," said Sever. "The results were eye opening. Loss of all the trees caused a 3-5 degree rise in temperature and a 20-30 percent decrease in rainfall," he added. "The Maya stripped large areas of their landscape bare by over-farming," said Griffin. "Not only did drought make it difficult to grow enough food, it also would have been harder for the Maya to store enough water to survive the dry season," he added. (ANI) Copyright 2009 Asian News International The Asian News International (ANI) agency provides multimedia news to China and 50 bureaus in India. It covers virtually all of South Asia since its foundation and presently claims, on its official website, to be the leading South Asia-wide news agency. (ANI) - All Rights Reserved. Provided by Syndigate.info an Albawaba.com company |
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