anyway: post a comment
Ben Lehman: P.S. I also want to talk about your "what makes a character a protagonist" bit. I think you're missing something. First I remind us what's a protagonist: a protagonist is a passionate character locked into conflict across a moral line with fit opposition. A protagonist begins at a turning point (creating a dynamic, unstable situation) proceeds as the situation escalates to crisis and resolution (through the opposed actions of the protagonist and the opposition), and ends when the situation resolves at last to stability.
Now, there are three ways to relate to a character.
Way one: as player. The character is yours, your creation. You dedicate yourself to getting the character, in order to best have her do what she'd do, in order to show her best to your fellow players, in order to say what you have to say.
Way two: as fellow player. You're a fan of the character but you don't own her. You groove on the character and dig her and hold your breath when she comes on screen because she's SO COOL. You want to get her but you rely on the player to show you what's what.
Way three: as GM. Like the player, you're dedicated to getting the character, but your goal is totally different. You want to make her face everything she doesn't want to face. You want to test her, provoke her, push her as far as she'll go.
The player is dedicated to her integrity as a character. The GM depends on her integrity as a character. They both have the same desire - to see her shine - which is only possible when they work together. (The fellow players have the same desire too, and serve as backup and cheering section for both sides.)
The GM is the person who identifies what decisions the character needs - needs! - to confront, and who puts them in her way. The player is the person who decides what the character does. A player and a GM, working together, create a protagonist. If either fails to do the job, the character's just a made-up person, not a protagonist at all.
This can be quite subtly arranged! What I'm suggesting is that you look at your gaming group and say to yourself, "who's really my character's GM?" Maybe it's you yourself.
The Czege Principle says that when one person is the author of both the character's adversity and its resolution, play isn't fun. My experience concurs. I'd go so far as to say that the GM/player split (in this new narrow sense) is the reason I roleplay instead of writing fiction.
On 2-3-05, Vincent wrote:
Allow me one followup first:
This is totally not to say that the GM of your character must be, for instance, the person who always says what's in a room when you come into it, or the person who always makes you roll for things, or the person who says the weather, or the person who plays all the supporting cast, or the person who sets and cuts from all the scenes.
There are, I think, good reasons to give the GM of your character some power over the world, pacing, and supporting cast. Other than that, wide open, as far as I can tell.
Are there good reasons to set one player apart as the GM to all the other players' characters, and to play no character herself? Could be. Wide open!
On 2-3-05, Vincent wrote:
...Or, come to think of it, that it must be only one person. Maybe everybody you play with is your character's GM at one time or another! Wide open too.
On 2-3-05, Chris wrote:
"The Czege Principle says that when one person is the author of both the character's adversity and its resolution, play isn't fun. My experience concurs. I'd go so far as to say that the GM/player split (in this new narrow sense) is the reason I roleplay instead of writing fiction"
I have to agree with you on that.
In terms of group dynamics, I think it is possible to have temporary or partial authorship of both adversity and resolution, but not complete and unchanging authorship and have interesting play.
Universalis is a good example of this in action.
On 2-3-05, Ben Lehman wrote:
Okay, now that you've outlined this, I'm going to offer up what I had to say on the topic.
I think we're saying the same thing, it's just that mine outlines an important point.
There is a story by Rosemary Sutcliff, can't remember the title off the top of my head, where these Anglo warriors are totally surrounded by Saxons, stuck in a city.
They're doomed, and they know it, and they are preparing for their last stand.
Their leader turns to one of them, who is a poet, and says "You: go."
The poet says: "No, you are like my brothers.
I swore to die together with you, and there is nothing more I want in the world."
The leader says: "If you do not go, who will know what we have done here?
Who will make us heroes?"
The poet goes.
There is something that is really really important about the act of witnessing, the act of being an audience.
Since, in most modern media consumption, we are the audience and since, in the modern world, we are taught that our contribution to art is meaningless and worthless, it is really easy to overlook these when we are talking about what makes a character a protagonist.
i.e. what makes a game good.
So the requisites for a protagonist:
1) There is an intense conflict
2) She makes a decision, and acts on it
3) A witness must see and understand
When you said to me, in the Forge PM, that the GM was "What makes your character a protagonist," I was confused, because I thought that the most important part was #2, and the #1 was pretty easy.
But, really, there isn't a "most important part."
All of these things are necessary for a protagonist.
Without any one of them, there will not be a story.
Interestingly, the first time I thought about audience wasn't about Narrativist play at all, but rather about Comedy play.
Because, you see, in a comedy game, it isn't enough to do something that makes you laugh.
You need to make the other players laugh.
The other players are totally the key to that.
I keep bringing things back to Polaris, but here is something I wrote as part of a larger essay called "Judge your character:"
[i]In Polaris, you must see the Ice Maiden as prosecuting lawyer and executioner, the Moons as judge and council, and the Heart as both the jury and the accused.[/i]
I didn't realize what the heck I was saying at the time.
But now I do.
All of these roles are vital.
Without them, blah.
I think we're just saying the same thing, here.
On 2-3-05, Vincent wrote:
Hm, that's interesting, a witness. I bet that's right.
On 2-3-05, Ben Lehman wrote:
This begs the question: Can the player who is the Antagonist also be the witness?
Can the player who is the Actor also be the witness?
The answer to 1, I think, is yes, but only for a very particular type of tragedy.
The answer to 2 is no, definitely.
On 2-3-05, LordSmerf wrote:
This raises a very interesting question in my mind.
Is the role of audience fluid?
Can a third (not Actor, not Antagonist) player be audience sometimes and other times not?
I guess what I'm asking is: what, precisely, does it mean to be the audience?
On 2-3-05, Ben Lehman wrote:
Thomas, those are good questions.
On 2-3-05, Ninja Hunter J wrote:
I'm not sure I see where this is important. Are you saying that this is an aspect to add to role-playing, or are you saying that it's something that's there already, and you're recognizing it?
I know that my concern when I'm playing is rarely what others will think of my actions. It seems like a violation of character, and when it happens, I if I'm brilliant and discussion-worthy, great, but I'm probably not, and trying to add performance to my character development will only make it less so.
On 2-3-05, Matt wrote:
I sort of assumed that in Primetime Adventures, the other players at the table are always playing the part of the audience (or witnesses), and that's why they give out fan mail.
I'm thinking that the easier you make it for the GM to find those conflict hooks, the easier you make it for the audience players to be the audience.
In PTA, if I have "guilt" as my issue, the GM knows what to do, and the other players know when to lean forward in their seats. Same thing in Dogs if I have a 2d8 relationship with Brother Jackson.
I think those big red flags are at the heart of it. A game's gotta have that stuff nice and visible for everyone at the table to see, player, other players, and GM. I sorta took the easy way out and made it like the only thing on the char sheet, but Vincent and Clinton, to name a couple, are doing it in cool but still highly visible ways.
On 2-3-05, Phil Levis wrote:
Ben -- with regards to question 2, I agree the player cannot be the audience, but would argue the GM certainly can.
pal@cs.berkeley.edu
On 2-4-05, Vincent wrote:
Under what circumstances - what social circumstances, right, what must their relationship be - under what circumstances is one-on-one play good?
It seems likely to me that having a different person play each role is most reliable, but that having one person double up roles can work ... sometimes. If the relationships are right for it.
On 2-4-05, Brennan wrote:
Vincent: Under what circumstances - what social circumstances, right, what must their relationship be - under what circumstances is one-on-one play good?
The few times this has really worked for me, the relationship has always been very close outside of the game: wife, cousin, and best friend, respectively. Most of the time this fails. I think there is an element of deep trust that exists in these close relationships which is required for the one-on-one interaction to be truly meaningful in context of the game. The GM is the audience in this situation, the Actor cannot be his own audience.
On 2-4-05, Emily Care wrote:
Great points, Ben. Beautiful.
Minority opinion here. Whoever is applying adversity is always witnessing. Think about playing puppies at cons, Vincent. Witnessing the players' reviling acts and showing how sqicked you were by them was _part of_ your protagonization of them. It's completely possible.
Whether it occurs in all situations is another thing.
In every situation, what is the witnessing that is required? In a comedy, someone to laugh. In a sick fest like puppies, someone to be grossed out. In a tragedy, someone to gasp.
And further, there are different places for the attention/witnessing to manifest: through fictional channels (character/world reaction), through social channels (player saying "Eeew!! That's so gross!").
Oog points in Great Ork Gods formalizes the player witnessing into mechanical cues.
Fan mail does the same. Hey--trust too? Has Ben lit on what these types of mechanics are doing?
: ) Feedback.
And as for the actor being hir own audience, it depends on what's needed. I think.
Reading your own tarot cards can be a solo act of narration, experiencing/catharsis and witnessing.
And one on one: Psychotherapy is powerful dyad play. High levels of trust. Brennan, it sounds like depth in one-on-one play may take the place of the social frission in multi party play.
Anyway. Minority here. You know.
On 2-4-05, Ben Lehman wrote:
Em -- Like I said, I think "yes, in rarified circumstances."
The reasons that it is hard for the Antagonist to also be the Witness/Judge are plentiful, but it doesn't mean that they can't be overcome.
I think that the "standard" GM role of "being the world" doesn't work for this, though.
The world is, by definitely, non-judgmental.
It cannot see, it certainly cannot understand, and it cannot sympathetically judge.
I'm thinking about those times in literature where we get the Antagonist also being the witness require a few things:
1) The antagonist wins.
2) The antagonist and the protagonist have enough shared cultural mores that the antagonist can recognize the nobility of their protagonist opponent.
3) The antagonist tells someone else about this moment of intimacy.
Now, in the context of an RPG, things are different.
I don't know if this can be directly mapped.
But, oddly, this type of story is not something you often come across in an RPG.
I think that, maybe, the antagonist here is more likely to be a player, who might tell a story of, say, "the greatest orc they've ever fought."
Come to think of it, look at how we talk about good rolls in RPGs.
"I rolled two natural 20s in a row!
On 2-4-05, Vincent wrote:
Ben, let's nail down players and characters. Does the protagonist (a character) need a player to witness, or a character to witness?
On 2-4-05, Paul Czege wrote:
The Czege Principle says that when one person is the author of both the character's adversity and its resolution, play isn't fun.
That is not the Czege Principle. That is "The Lesson of Chalk Outlines." The Czege Principle is that all principles other than the Czege Principle are named after Lumpley or one of his games or play experiences.
On 2-4-05, Ben Lehman wrote:
Vincent --
The player of the protagonist needs another live human being to witness.
The reason I go off about stories is that a lot of stories are, in fact, about telling and making stories, and so they are a really good source when we are looking at what stories are about.
I am still convinced that the GM in an impartial role cannot do this.
I think that a witness needs to be sympathetic.
Hence the "See and understand."
I think that, if the GM does do it, it might be through the mechanism of an NPC character.
I think that, when this is fulfulled in normal gaming, it is fulfilled by the fellow players.
I also think that it is not always fulfilled, which can result in really cool play that is nonetheless deeply unsatisfying at some level.
On 2-4-05, Eric Finley wrote:
Hang on, here.
I think we have a subtle textual disconnect going on, which we should try to catch before it propagates.
Ben - excellent points, dude - is, I think, actually talking about in-character witnessing, at least with some of his points.
This last post in particular makes me suspect this.
I don't have a lot to say on the topic of IC I agree that in a lot of cases it's important, but I think it's genre-dependent and expectation-driven, such that I'm not sure how much we can generalize.
On the other hand I'm pretty sure others above are taking the issue to be one of player-to-player witnessing, typically showing up as actor stance feedback mechanisms.
Those rock, and I think we've got a lot of room to pump those for drama juice.
This is, I think, part of why Polaris excites me as a design.
The topic of player-to-player witnessing brings us back to Vincent's original notes about asking who's the character's GM.
I think we have to all agree, per the above, that one of the tasks of the "GM" - I use the term loosely - is that of witness, validating the protagonism by appreciating it, and showing the player that appreciation.
Think MLwM's, or Sorcerer's, bonus dice rules... those are cases where it is, actually, the GM doing this job.
Think PTA, and you get a case where everybody's sharing this job, via fan-mail dice.
Certes that's not the only job being done, though.
And it's in the redistribution of those GM tasks that I think we're on the verge of something really amazing.
More on this on my blog, I I'll post the link when I'm done writing the content.
On 2-4-05, Eric Finley wrote:
(The above should be considered crossposted with ALL THREE of the preceding comments.
On 2-4-05, Vincent wrote:
Hey Paul. We don't get to name our own principles! So there.
On 2-4-05, Emily Care wrote:
[quote]I am still convinced that the GM in an impartial role cannot do this. I think that a witness needs to be sympathetic. Hence the "See and understand."
I think that, if the GM does do it, it might be through the mechanism of an NPC character.[/quote]
Fascinating.
So, it's not that the GM is unable to do it, but if the antagonizing agent (a character, perceived as the gm) observes sympathetically, it then undermines the protagonization.
Yet if a second agent of witnessing is created by the same person--that could fulfill the need at hand.
So, I think we agree, Ben.
The way I'm looking at it is that, of course the gm can and is sympathetic. That's why, in fact, we antagonize eachother. To help eachother express what the character was created to express. It busts up a whole lot of unspoken social contract stuff to have a co-player do that. But it's part of the package deal of the GM role.
Good call about Sorcerer & MLwM bonus dice.
There it's coming through mechanical elements again. (This is really getting to the "taking off the kid gloves" thang.) Another channel to use.
As I see it, we shift back and forth between stances all the time, there's no reason why we wouldn't also shift between roles of providing adversity and witnessing. As long as the channel the adversity is coming from remains constant.
Bonus dice from the gm in sorcerer support a players' response to adversity provided by the gm.
Simultaneous and compatible.
That's the challenge.
Making it all line up.
On 2-4-05, anon. wrote:
grrr. Vincent can you fix that quote?
On 2-4-05, Vincent wrote:
Nope! Too much work, plus I think it's cute when people use Forge markup here. (In the future, if you want to deny me the bunny-heart cuteness feeling, you can use &blockquote& and &/blockquote&.)
I'm ready to take this topic to actual play for testing. Who's with me?
On 2-4-05, Emily Care wrote:
actual play
Whatcha got in mind?
On 2-4-05, Ben Lehman wrote:
I'm with you!
Give me a couple of weeks (and forgive me the essay I
On 2-4-05, Eric Finley wrote:
I'll echo Emily.
I'm there... what/how?
On 2-4-05, Vincent wrote:
Eric, if you can be in Western Mass a couple weekends from now, or ever really, email me ("a Penny for Your Thoughts") and let's play games.
Otherwise, all I'm really saying is to watch closely what happens in your regular play and if you spot anything interesting, report it back here.
On 2-4-05, Eric Finley wrote:
Pity - I thought you were proposing something electronic.
Must remember that some of those here are actually local to you.
No, it's really not likely I'll be able to make anywhere in the States (I'm up in Edmonton) before GenCon, not randomly like that.
I'm a daddy too.
On my own stuff, I'll be watching for this effect in my own gaming.
I think I already see it in past tense, clearly.
On-topic, though, my followup to this is on my own blog, and I invite y'all to come check it out .
On 3-9-05, online poker wrote:Guest essay by Andy May
This is an updated timeline of climatic events and human history for the last 18,000 years. The original
was posted in 2013. The updated full size (Ansi E size or 34×44 inches) Adobe Reader version 8 PDF can be downloaded
or by clicking on Figure 1. It prints pretty well on 11×17 inch paper and very well on 17×22 inch paper or larger. To see the timeline in full resolution or to print it, you must download it. It is not copyrighted, but please acknowledge the author if you use it.
Figure 1 -click for a much larger, printable poster (PDF)
References to the images and data are given in this essay as hyperlinks. I’ve done my best to verify the accuracy of the content by checking multiple sources. When references had different dates for the same event, I chose the most commonly cited date or the most prestigious source. All dates (except some in the modern era) are given as “BP” or before the year 2000 for simplicity, using 1950 (the
zero) was too cumbersome.
The heart of the poster is the timeline of historical and climatic events. The BP, the illustrations on the lower left of the poster illustrate what the world was like then. Much of the land area of the world was under ice or desert at the time and the exposed land had . The history of civilization shows that cooler periods have less precipitation than warmer times. It seems counter-intuitive, but warm air has a higher water carrying capacity and this leads to more rain. For example, the Sahara is now becoming
as Carbon Dioxide and air temperature go up. If there were any organized human civilizations during the last glacial period we have not found any evidence of it, other than some , dated to 20,000 BP. At this time people lived in small communities of a few families and hunted for animals and edible natural vegetation. Domesticated animals (with the exception of dogs) and sedentary agriculture would not appear for another 6,000 to 7,000 years, around .
Dogs were probably domesticated by man by 14,000 BP and perhaps more than . The
collected wild grains, fruits and vegetables and probably cultivated small gardens as early as 14,000 BP. But, this early, large scale organized farming was unlikely.
The central part of the poster shows two ice core records. The top chart is the most recent portion of the Antarctic ice core record. The entire Vostok 400,000 year
is shown in the upper left of the poster with the time scale reversed, this chart also includes the Carbon Dioxide concentration (in green) and the dust concentration (in red). The roughly
cycles are very apparent in the Vostok record. These cycles are composed of a dominant period of 413,000 years and lesser periods that fall between
years. The tilt of the Earth’s axis is what produces our seasons and it varies about 3° on a 41,000 year cycle. Finally, the Earth’s axis wobbles (the precession cycle) on a cycle that should be . Due to modifications in the precession cycle predominantly by the Moon, , the dominant precession period is roughly 19,000 years with a secondary peak periodicity of around 23,000 years. The 25,772 year cycle is in theory only.
The precession cycle determines when orbital perihelion occurs, or the time of year when the Earth is closest to the Sun (see Figure 2). Currently, perihelion occurs in January. This means that in the Northern Hemisphere we currently receive 6.5% more solar radiation ( in the middle of winter than we do in the summer. This makes the seasonal variation in air temperature less than normal which . It is the opposite in the Southern Hemisphere. Thus, now their winters are colder than normal and the summers hotter, increasing their weather extremes. When this flips, as it will approximately 10,000 years from now, the North will have extreme summers and extreme winters and the Southern Hemisphere will be quieter. The last Northern Hemisphere maximum effect was between 12,000 BP and 10,000 BP around the end of the Younger Dryas cold period. The Holocene Thermal Optimum (roughly 9,500 BP to 5,000 BP) occurred as the Earth moved from the lower position in Figure 2 to the left position. The long cooling period from then to the present day occurred as the Earth moved from the left position to its present position with perihelion in January. The dates in the figure are approximate.
Figure 2 (click to see at source)
It is interesting that , concludes that
“Solar radiation is thus the driving force for terrestrial climatic change during the last 1-2 Myr, as suggested by
and supported by
but it is the planetary gravitational influences on the Sun itself that causes the dominant 100 Kyr periodicity in the Earth’s climate during the last 1-2 Myr. “
Changing the ellipticity of the Earth’s orbit changes the minimum and maximum amounts of solar radiation reaching the Earth. Changing the time of year that perihelion occurs through the precession cycle doesn’t change TSI (total solar irradiance) but it does change the extremes of summer and winter. This so-called “latitudinal change” in insolation can have a huge effect on hemispherical climate, some believe that the total radiation reaching the Earth at
is critical to the growth and decay of glacial ice sheets.
In the plot of the full Vostok ice core record in the upper left, you might just be able to see that the middle graph (Carbon Dioxide concentration, green line) slightly lags the temperature by about 800 years on average. This suggests that the changes in temperature might cause the Carbon Dioxide changes rather than the other way around. The airborne dust concentration (red line) increases when the world is cooler because in the cool periods it is also dryer. One of the primary reasons colder periods are a problem is that they are accompanied by drought.
Next to the complete Vostok record is a reconstruction of the
for the last 600 million years. Temperatures, today, are lower than they have been for over 250,000,000 years according to this data. The bottom large chart is the actual central Greenland temperature, calculated by the .
More recently, both the Vostok record and the
by Alley, et al, show a decreasing temperature trend since the
about 3400 BP. The trend is more subtle in the Antarctic record than in the Greenland record. Shorter term changes in the temperature records do not correlate well. But, warming from the Younger Dryas, a long flat warm period until about 3400 BP () and then cooling to the present day is clear in both records. The start and end dates for the Holocene Thermal Optimum marked on the timeline are my best guess. There are no agreed dates. Many start and end dates are seen in the literature, for example, , , , and . Long term trends that correlate between the Arctic and Antarctic are likely due to external events, such as changes in total solar irradiance (TSI) or certain orbital changes.
Bond Events
Just below the Central Greenland ice core record some of the “” cooling events are noted. The Bond cooling events average
years +-500 years apart and some are more dramatic than others. The 8.2, 5.9, 4.2 and 2.8 Kiloyear events were , with dramatic cooling and they disrupted civilization around the world. Some major climate events, such as the
climatic event that ended the Bronze Age in the Mediterranean, are slightly off of the Bond Event, but appear related. Timing of climate changes is fuzzy. Some researchers believe that the
was a Bond event.
During the last glaciation, the Greenland ice core record shows climatic change events called events or “D-O events.” These are very rapid warming events, followed by slower cooling, that occur in a cycle of roughly 1,470 years +- 12%. These events are probably the glacial period equivalent of the Bond events. They have a similar timing but the climate effect is different or, maybe, the events are the same but the record shows warming easier during a glaciation. Because the timing of these events stays about the same during glaciations and interglacials, is the probable cause. Internal oscillations due to ocean circulation patterns, etc. are unlikely to stay stable in their period as the Earth goes from the glacial state to the interglacial state.
In modern times, cooling is more noticeable than warming. Cooling and droughts are simply more disruptive than warming. This is particularly true in the Sahara. About 10,000 years ago the perihelion (Earth closest to the Sun) occurred in the Northern Hemisphere summer and the summers were warmer and more humid than we see today. This was the beginning of the aforementioned Holocene Thermal Optimum. During this period the Sahara became a savannah. This is called the African Humid Period (). The AHP ended between 5900 to 4000 BP when the Sahara turned back into a desert as the climate began to cool. Towards the end of the period the progressive desiccation of the region led to widespread migrations and the abandonment of many North African villages. This exodus was coincident with the rise of sedentary life and the pharaonic culture along the Nile River.
Moving just to the right of the Last Glacial Maximum map on the lower left of the poster, you can see an artist’s (Robert Rohde) rendition of the rise in global eustatic sea level after the glaciers started melting. The data used to make the graph is from numerous sources listed in this . The earliest well documented evidence of human civilization dates to the middle of the most rapid rise in sea level in this period, roughly 12,000 BP at . From 11,500 BP to 11,000 BP sea level rose an astonishing
(Meltwater Pulse 1B) or 6 cm/year on average. This is over 18 feet per 100 years! According to the University Of Colorado Sea Level Research Group, the current rate of sea level rise is about 13 inches per 100 years or
per year, much less dramatic.
Earliest evidence of civilization
Gobekli Tepe is near Urfa in southern Turkey. This site is roughly 300 meters by 300 meters and contains intricately carved stones. It predates Stonehenge and the earliest Egyptian pyramids by 7,400 years. Construction at Gobekli Tepe began during the
“Big Freeze.” The Younger Dryas was a sudden and short lived (geologically speaking, it lasted over 1,000 years) return of very cold and dry weather, similar to the cold that existed in the Last Glacial Maximum. The Gobekli Tepe site is composed of multiple circular stone monuments. The tallest pillars in these monuments are 16 feet high and weigh over seven tons. The rings are 65 feet across and probably have religious significance. Construction of the site appears to have occurred during a hiatus in the sea level rise between 11,000 and 12,000 BP. Then the site was mysteriously and deliberately buried around 10,000 BP, during a period of rapid sea level rise. The reasons for its construction and later burial are not known. But, one can probably safely speculate that it was buried to protect and preserve it. This task was accomplished, it is remarkably well preserved.
It is interesting that the wild wheat that grows in the area around Gobekli Tepe is a close relative, genetically, to modern domestic wheat. One can speculate that the early religious fervor that caused Gobekli Tepe to be built, may have inspired farming. After all, the construction of the religious monument would have required a number of people to live in one spot for a long time and they could not migrate in search of food.
The earliest evidence of large scale organized
is seen in the Levant region of the Middle East in present day Syria and Israel. This occurred about
BP. There are some preserved pottery fragments from
BP in Japan and perhaps even older. Others have reported that pottery existed in China
BP. However, there is no evidence that the Japanese or Chinese pottery came from sedentary farmers. It is possible that rice was farmed to some extent in China
BP. It disappears from the record during the Younger Dryas cold period and reappears after 10,000 BP. The type of rice we eat today was originally farmed in China’s Yangtze Valley around .
Between 13,000 and 14,000 BP a lot seemed to happen at various archaeological sites in the Middle East. Buildings improved, villages got larger and were more advanced. But, they were mostly abandoned as temperatures cooled during the Younger Dryas. This cool period was very dry. According to
few advances in human civilization happened in the period, people were just trying to survive. This is evident as the late Natufians, who lived during the Younger Dryas period, were in much poorer health (fewer teeth, often with caries) and smaller than the earlier Natufians from the Late Glacial Interstadial period. Further, the animal bones in their garbage dumps held bones of smaller animals than the earlier period.
When the Natufians began to build small villages the climate in the Levant was ideal, with abundant precipitation and lots of wild grain to harvest. The Younger Dryas cold and dry weather caused some of the Natufians to give up village life. Others began to cultivate the grain more intensely by watering it, saving the best seed for the next crop and so on. They also invented better farming tools and silos for grain storage. We know this from archaeological digs in the area around Jericho, Israel.
Larger Cities
The Middle Eastern
(PPNB) culture began around
BP. It is a significant period in the history of human civilization because at this time man became more dependent upon domesticated animals and organized large scale (beyond single family) farming. It has also been found that the earliest Indian agriculture appears to have started in the Indus valley and in Pakistan around
BP. As noted by , climate influenced the onset of man’s agricultural revolution.
As large scale agriculture took hold and the climate improved, man began building larger settlements in the Levant. Rectangular buildings appeared and larger more organized communities. Plaster and pottery are first seen in Middle East at this time, although they had existed for many thousands of years in China and Japan. It has been suggested by
that many people from many cultures gathered around the modern day Black Sea (which was a fresh water lake at the time) during the Younger Dryas since it was a reliable source of water. They exchanged technology and when the climate warmed and precipitation increased they returned to their historic homes bringing what they had learned with them. Thus, the new PPNB technology may have begun as people migrated back to the Levant from the Black Sea area. Other researchers believe that pottery, new domesticated crops and animal technology spread to the Levant from modern day Iran. Either way it seems likely that the new technology typical of the PPNB came from the East.
The PPNB ended with the 8,200 year BP event or Bond event 5, this was another sudden cold period that affected civilization and caused massive migrations of people in search of food and water. This period was undoubtedly another period of technology exchange between cultures. Over a period of 20 years, temperatures cooled roughly in Greenland. It was not as severe as the Younger Dryas, but still significant. It lasted 200 to 400 years. The fact that the Black Sea became connected to the Mediterranean at about this time is not in dispute. But exactly when (8400 BP or 7600 BP or in several episodes between these dates) is a subject of . If the Black Sea was filled catastrophically, it may have created the Great Flood legend. For example, Noah’s Flood or the older .
During the PPNB period evidence of relatively large settlements is found. , a city of 8,000, existed near present day Cumra in Konya Province, Turkey. This is a large, relatively modern “city” that existed 9,400 BP.
Jericho, in Israeli occupied Palestine, is often considered the world’s
continually occupied city, but Aleppo and Damascus, Syria may be . Remains of early settlements, villages of 500 people or so, in Jericho have been dated to 11,600 BP. The first woven cloth known was found in
cave in Israel. It is around 10,000 years old, it was found with bone shuttles that were used to weave the cloth. The cloth was a type of linen and not cotton, cotton was developed later in India.
Simple writing appears in Jiahu, China around
ago and in Tartaria, Romania before . Whether either is true writing or not is a subject of debate, the symbols on the Tartaria tablets have not been translated and may be a “picture” story. The Chinese writing has some symbols that are similar to modern Chinese writing. Because Chinese writing is not phonetic, it is hard to tell where “picture writing” stops and true modern writing begins.
True writing has been discovered from
BP in Syria in the . By this time very large cities existed and the city of Uruk had over
in it. The Uruk period was characterized by large scale urbanization, irrigation, roads and canals. It may have begun as early as 6,200 BP. The end of the Sumer Uruk period and the sacking of Uruk by Sargon of Akkad formed the Akkadian Empire, which may have been the world’s first multinational empire. The end of the Akkadian empire 100 to 200 years later, coincides with the third Bond event roughly 4,174 BP. Some believe that climate change, cooler temperatures and more arid conditions, played a role in the collapse of the Akkadian empire. The 4.2 Kiloyear Bond event is highlighted in yellow on the timeline.
5.9 Kiloyear Bond Event
About 5,900 BP the Sahara became a desert. This is the 5.9 Kiloyear event or Bond event 4. This cooling event ended the and caused a huge migration of people from the Sahara region in search of food and water. Many migrated to the Nile Valley in Egypt, in order to be close to a reliable water supply.
has suggested that this drought was caused by a severe cooling event that occurred at the same time. He concludes that warmer temperatures cause more evaporation and more precipitation. The Sahara never recovers from this event. But, since the drought forces people into river valleys, larger cities are built and societies become more complex.
Following the end of the 5.9 Kiloyear event and the end of the Holocene Thermal Optimum the earliest
are built,
is constructed in present day England and the first large cities appear in . The earliest Mayan cities appear around
BP. Recently, some evidence has been uncovered that India may have had a large city as long ago as . If this is true it would rival Catalhoyuk in age.
4.2 Kiloyear Bond Event
The 4.2 Kiloyear event was a very cool period in the Arctic (Bond Event 3) and it caused a severe drought in the Middle East. This probably caused the sudden collapse of the , famines and social disorder. Similar disruptions occurred in the Akkadian Empire as noted above, the
and in . It is interesting that the Monsoons in India, which are critical to farming in the Indus Valley,
between 4,200 BP and 4,000 BP.
Around 3,200 BP, the great Bronze Age civilizations in the Middle East
or were disrupted. These included the Minoan, Mycenaean, Hittite and the Egyptian New Kingdom. This sudden collapse was probably caused by “climatological cataclysms that affected the entire eastern Mediterranean” in the words of Itamar Singer, as described by Eric Cline in “” One could say this drought and famine was of Biblical proportions as the Exodus of Hebrews and the 10 famous plagues of Egypt took place at this time. As Cline notes in the afterword of “1177 B.C.” there was a century [actually 100 to 400 years] long drought at this time and it caused famine, upheaval, rebellion and war. The onset of this drought coincides with a sudden and extended cooling period in the Central Greenland ice core data. In general, most large scale droughts in the last 18,000 years appear to be associated with cooling in the Arctic. This drought and cold period marks the end of the .
Greek Dark Age
After the collapse of the Bronze Age cultures the Mediterranean entered into a period called the Greek Dark Ages. This is a hiatus in the development of Middle Eastern civilization and not much happens until after 2,800 BP. The first phonetic alphabet was probably created just before this period by the Phoenicians. Little is seen of writing or the alphabet during the Dark Age, but it flowers in several forms as the Roman Warm Period unfolds. This alphabet was used, with alterations, by the Greeks and the Romans. It was the beginning of modern writing in the West.
describes this period well:
“A sharp increase in Northern Hemisphere temperatures preceded the collapse of [the ] Palatial centers, a sharp decrease occurred during their abandonment. Mediterranean Sea surface temperatures cooled rapidly during the Late Bronze Age, limiting freshwater flux into the atmosphere and thus reducing precipitation over land. These climatic changes could have affected Palatial centers that were dependent upon high levels of agricultural productivity. Declines in agricultural production would have made higher-density populations in Palatial centers unsustainable. The ‘Greek Dark Ages’ that followed occurred during prolonged arid conditions that lasted until the Roman Warm Period.”
This is the time of the
in China, 4,070 to 3,600 BP. This part of Chinese history is poorly documented, but canals and crop irrigation existed at the time. It is followed by the
which existed from 3,600 to about 3,050 BP. True Chinese writing began during the Shang Dynasty. It is the first dynasty with a written record. They also had an accurate calendar. The Shang Dynasty utilized
extensively. There is some speculation that both volcanism and climate change hurried the end of the Shang Dynasty, but no firm evidence has been found to support this. More likely the final Shang King, who was quite corrupt and very unpopular, was overthrown with the help of the Zhou provincial army.
More seems to have happened on the Indian subcontinent during this period. Little is known about the Indus Valley kingdoms and city-states prior to 3,200 BP. But after this, much happened during the rise of the
(3,200 to 2,850 BP), which marked the beginning of the Iron Age in India. Iron artifacts and furnaces in India have been dated to between . The earliest iron artifacts in the Middle East are some Egyptian iron beads that have been dated to 5,200 BP, but these appear to have been made from an . Actual iron smelting in the Middle East probably did not begin until , so it probably began there at roughly the same time as in India.
Mayan settlements begin to appear about 4,700 BP in Belize. The first well established Mayan cities (or large settlements) are dated to
BP in Soconusco, Mexico. This is near the beginning of the cold period in the Iron Age. However, evidence of a true Mayan civilization does not appear until 2,900 BP. The first written Maya history dates to 2,350 BP. This is also the time of the first large scale cities and significant intellectual and artistic development. The rise of the Mayan civilization is roughly the same time as the rise of Rome in the Mediterranean. The Mayan Golden Age was from 1700 BP to 1200 BP. Mayan civilization suddenly collapsed around 1100 BP during a in Central America.
provides evidence of a 200 year long severe drought between 800 AD and 1000 AD in the Mexican Yucatan Peninsula. The Mayan collapses are a few hundred years out of sync with those in the Mediterranean, suggesting that big climatic changes did not happen at the same time in North America as in the Middle East.
Roman Warm Period
Once we enter the Roman Warm Period, roughly 2,400 BP, robust civilizations have developed in the Americas, around the Mediterranean, China and India. By the time Alexander invaded India (2,326 BP) they had a very advanced civilization. Major cities existed in India before 4,100 BP, but history is not well established until around 2,400 BP. This warm period truly marks the beginning of modern civilization, written records document all major events over most of the world since this time. Writings at this time suggest that temperatures during the
to temperatures today.
European Dark Age
Normally the end of the Roman Warm Period is given as around 450 AD (1,550 BP) and the Central Greenland temperature cooled by almost 2°C from 1,500 BP to 1,200 BP, the height of the Dark Ages in Europe. It is interesting that the worst megadrought in the California and Nevada area lasted from 832 AD to 1074 AD, right at the end of the Dark Ages according to a recent . , identifies a very cold period from 450-950 AD.
Medieval Warm Period
The Medieval Warm Period is normally given as 950 AD to 1250 AD or 1050 to 750 BP. In the beginning of this period, temperatures in Central Greenland rose by almost 2°C in a little over 200 years. This has been fairly well documented as a . It is uncertain what the global average temperature was during the period and whether the world as a whole was warmer than now. But, certainly in areas where we have records, such as Greenland, the UK, and in China, temperatures were
to today and in some cases warmer.
Little Ice Age
The Little Ice Age was not a true ice age, but the cooler period after the end of the Medieval Warm Period. It is generally considered to have started by
and it ended by 1850 AD. In Central Greenland, temperatures drop about 1.5°C from 964 BP to 597 BP ( AD). It was not cold over the entire period, but the Little Ice Age saw many periods that were very cold, from the famous
(1816) to the great , , the Norse colonies in Greenland starved and were abandoned in the . A recent
notes several droughts in Europe during the Little Ice Age. These occurred in AD , 1626 and 1719, plus an especially intense drought from
AD. Colder times are the worst times.
Modern Warm Period
The Modern Warm Period starts around 1850 AD, which is also the time when people began systematically recording and collecting surface air temperature data from around the world. These temperatures were spotty in the beginning, but by the middle of the 20th Century a fairly good worldwide temperature database was developing. Finally, in 1979, satellites were launched that could give us a reasonably accurate and complete lower Troposphere temperature record over nearly the entire . A discussion of the accuracy of the satellite temperature measurements can be found. In the poster, on the lower right, both datasets are shown. The satellite dataset is from
and the surface temperature data shown is from the . The satellite temperatures show warming of 0.35°C from 1979 to the present. This is not particularly significant by historical standards.
The period from 1850 to 1979 is
globally and the records used to construct the global surface temperature average have been significantly edited, thus raising doubts about their accuracy. They show a warming of just under 1°C in a period of 165 years. This is not unusual by historical standards. Over this length of time warming of over 13°C was seen at the end of the Younger Dryas in the Central Greenland ice core. In the same core, the beginning of the Holocene Thermal Optimum saw a warming of 5°C in less than 800 years.
Conclusions
Correlation is not causation, but many, if not all, of man’s worst times since the last glacial maximum occur during colder and dryer periods.
Often these times were made worse by warfare as in the Greek Dark Ages, the sacking of Rome, the collapse of the Akkadian Empire, etc.
The colder and more arid climate could have been part of the cause of the wars. We go to war when we are starving and thirsty. More importantly, I was unable to find evidence of a crisis that was due to warming.
Given that man-made Carbon Dioxide is a very recent phenomenon, the radical climatic changes before 200 years ago cannot be attributed to man’s influence. They must be natural. The recent warming of
is pretty small compared to other temperature changes in the Holocene. It is clear from history that natural forces can cause significant climate changes. It is also clear that droughts are usually associated with colder periods, not warmer periods. Some climate changes are probably due to variations in the Earth’s orbit, but some might be due to
(total solar irradiance) or other solar influences. How much is due to nature and how much is due to man is .
Much of the last 18,000 years is characterized by more rapid sea-level rise than we see today. The current rise of sea level is very slow relative to the past and we are arguably more adaptable due to modern technology.
In the words of Professor
(page 507)
“The next century of human-made global warming is predicted to be far less extreme than that which occurred at 9600 BC [11,600 BP]. At the end of the Younger Dryas, mean global temperature had risen by 7°C in fifty years, whereas the predicted rise for the next hundred years is less than 3°C. The end of the last ice age led to a 120 meter increase in sea level, whereas that predicted for the next fifty years is a paltry 32 centimeters at most,…”
Rate this:Share this:Like this:Like Loading...
Related posts
Site stats
284,556,128 views
"...the world's most viewed climate website"
- Fred Pearce
"...invaluable" - Steven F. Hayward,
"...changed the world and is one of the most influential resources on global warming. -
"...flashy (apparently widely distributed)"
BUY THIS BOOK!
Shameless Plug
Donations accepted:
to help keep the
project going.
Follow WUWT via Email
Enter your email address to follow WUWT and receive notifications of new posts by email.
Join 38,158 other followers
Recent Posts
Top Posts & Pages
November 2015
Select Month
September 2016 &(53)
August 2016 &(142)
July 2016 &(138)
June 2016 &(156)
May 2016 &(160)
April 2016 &(163)
March 2016 &(172)
February 2016 &(137)
January 2016 &(133)
December 2015 &(158)
November 2015 &(136)
October 2015 &(123)
September 2015 &(129)
August 2015 &(130)
July 2015 &(146)
June 2015 &(144)
May 2015 &(157)
April 2015 &(125)
March 2015 &(126)
February 2015 &(115)
January 2015 &(106)
December 2014 &(130)
November 2014 &(136)
October 2014 &(163)
September 2014 &(185)
August 2014 &(190)
July 2014 &(173)
June 2014 &(195)
May 2014 &(216)
April 2014 &(182)
March 2014 &(185)
February 2014 &(164)
January 2014 &(202)
December 2013 &(144)
November 2013 &(147)
October 2013 &(147)
September 2013 &(148)
August 2013 &(165)
July 2013 &(174)
June 2013 &(164)
May 2013 &(193)
April 2013 &(171)
March 2013 &(164)
February 2013 &(165)
January 2013 &(172)
December 2012 &(126)
November 2012 &(139)
October 2012 &(176)
September 2012 &(151)
August 2012 &(144)
July 2012 &(175)
June 2012 &(179)
May 2012 &(177)
April 2012 &(178)
March 2012 &(190)
February 2012 &(161)
January 2012 &(142)
December 2011 &(161)
November 2011 &(168)
October 2011 &(180)
September 2011 &(189)
August 2011 &(190)
July 2011 &(170)
June 2011 &(187)
May 2011 &(177)
April 2011 &(177)
March 2011 &(172)
February 2011 &(183)
January 2011 &(193)
December 2010 &(183)
November 2010 &(168)
October 2010 &(191)
September 2010 &(179)
August 2010 &(200)
July 2010 &(188)
June 2010 &(140)
May 2010 &(124)
April 2010 &(122)
March 2010 &(136)
February 2010 &(142)
January 2010 &(157)
December 2009 &(168)
November 2009 &(163)
October 2009 &(132)
September 2009 &(106)
August 2009 &(92)
July 2009 &(96)
June 2009 &(94)
May 2009 &(89)
April 2009 &(99)
March 2009 &(99)
February 2009 &(60)
January 2009 &(60)
December 2008 &(58)
November 2008 &(45)
October 2008 &(63)
September 2008 &(75)
August 2008 &(77)
July 2008 &(68)
June 2008 &(72)
May 2008 &(54)
April 2008 &(54)
March 2008 &(39)
February 2008 &(40)
January 2008 &(31)
December 2007 &(27)
November 2007 &(37)
October 2007 &(29)
September 2007 &(17)
August 2007 &(31)
July 2007 &(20)
June 2007 &(25)
May 2007 &(31)
April 2007 &(31)
March 2007 &(27)
February 2007 &(24)
January 2007 &(25)
December 2006 &(22)
November 2006 &(11)
CategoriesCategories
Select Category
<option class="level-0" value="0.org connect the dots
97% consensus
99% certainty
Adjustments/Corrections
Agriculture
Air pollution
Announcements
Anthropogenic Ocean Warming
Attribution
Bad science
Bad science journalism
Bengtsson Climate McCarthyism scandal
Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature
Book Review
Cancun Climate Conference
Cap-and-trade
Carbon credits
Carbon dioxide
Carbon footprint
Carbon sequestration
Carbon soot
carbon tax
Celebrities on AGW
censorship
CFC&#8217;s
Chaos and Climate
Citizen science
Climate cash
Climate Communications
Climate Craziness of the Week
Climate data
Climate FAIL
Climate Models
Climate Myths
Climate News
Climate News Roundup
Climate reconciliation
Climate Reference Network
climate refugees
Climate sensitivity
Climate ugliness
Climategate
Climategate 3.0
Climate_change
COP conferences
Copenhagen Climate Conference
Cosmic rays
Cowtan & Way
Curious things
Current News
Desertification
disinvitation
Durban Climate Conference
dust storms
Earthquakes
Economy-health
Educational opportunity
El Nino Basics
Emergent Climate Phenomena
Environment
Experiments
Extinction
extreme weather
Forecasting
Freeman Dyson
Fusion power
Gavin Schmidt
Geoengineering
geothermal energy
Gergis et al
Global cooling
Global Temperature Update
Global warming
Global Warming Optimism
Gore-a-thon 2011
Gore-a-thon 2012
Gorefest11
Government funding of science
Government idiocy
Green Blob
Green Mafia
Green tech
Greenland ice sheet
Hiatus in Global Warming
Hits and Misses
hurricanes
hydroclimatology
Hydropower
IPCC AR5 leak
IPCC AR5 Report
James Hansen
Karl et al. 2015
Land Surface Air Temperature Data
Land use land cover change
Letters To The Editor
Lewis and Crok
Little Ice Age
Local_issues
Lower Troposphere Temperature
Marcott et al proxy paper
measurement
MedievalWarmPeriod
Michael E. Mann
modification
More On Series
National Climate Assessment Report
Natural CO2 sources
natural gas
Natural Warming
NOAA 2 year FOIA documents
NOAA ERSST.v4 Pauses Buster
Noble Cause Corruption
nuclear power
Obama Climate Plan
Obamas War on Energy
Obvious science
Ocean acidification
Ocean Heat Content
Ocean Temperatures
Open Thread
Optical phenonmena
Paleoclimatology
Papal Climate Encyclical
Peer review
Personal note
Plankton and other critters
Polar Vortex
Polarbeargate
Positive effects of CO2
Post-normal science
Presentations
Puzzling things
Quote of The Month
Quote of the Week
Radiative Imbalance
RCP 8.5 Science Fiction
Reference Pages
reproducibility
Sea Ice News
Sea Surface Temperature
solar flare
solar power
Southern Annular Mode
Spaceweather
Specific Humidity
Spencer-Braswell and Dessler
statistics
Stephan Lewandowsky
Stern Review
Stratospheric water vapor
Surfacestations paper
Sustainability
Tabloid Climatology
TAO/TRITON Buoys
Technology
Temperature
The &#8220;Clitanic&#8221; aka Spirit of Mawson
The Rat-hole problem
The Skeptic&#8217;s Case
The Weather Channel
The WUWT Hot Sheet
The Yamal Deception
thorium power
Throwback Thursday Predictions
thunderstorms
Trenberth&#8217;s missing heats
UKMO HADCRUT4
Uncategorized
Uncertainty
United Nations
Waste heat
Watts et al 2012
Weather_stations
Willis Autobiography
wind power
Humor/Satire
Lukewarmers
Political Climate
Pro AGW Views
Skeptical Views
Transcendent Rant and way out there theory
Unreliable*
* Due to (1) deletion, extension and amending of user comments, and (2) undated post-publication revisions of article contents after significant user commenting.
Click for the:
Sea Ice Page
Solar Images &#038; Data Page
Atmospheric Maps Page
ENSO/SST Page
ENSO Meter
Sponsored links
IT Certifications:
Copyright Notice
Material on this website is copyright (C) , by Anthony Watts, and may not be stored or archived separately, rebroadcast, or republished without written permission. (Miriam O'Brien aka slandering "Sou" from Hotwhopper, that means you)
For permission, contact us. See the About&Contact menu under the header.
All rights reserved worldwide.
Some material from contributors may contain additional copyrights of their respective company or organization.
Send to Email Address
Your Email Address
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.
%d bloggers like this:}