From The Earth Transformed: An Untold History. Peter Frankopan. 2023. Section 1.
From introduction:
Global warming is one of the greatest dangers mankind faces today.
Even as temperatures increase, sea levels rise, and natural disasters escalate, our current environmental crisis feels difficult to predict and understand.
But climate change and its effects on us are not new.
In a bold narrative that spans centuries and continents, Peter Frankopan argues NATURE HAS ALWAYS PLAYED A FUNDAMENTAL ROLE IN THE WRITING OF HISTORY.
From the fall of the Moche civilization in South America that came about because of the cyclical pressures of El Niño to volcanic eruptions in Iceland that affected Egypt and helped bring the Ottoman empire to its knees, climate change and its influences have always been with us.
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Frankopan explains how the Vikings emerged thanks to catastrophic crop failure, why the roots of regime change in eleventh-century Baghdad lay in the collapse of cotton prices resulting from unusual climate patterns, and why THE WESTERN EXPANSION OF THE FRONTIERS IN NORTH AMERICA WAS DIRECTLY AFFECTED BY SOLAR FLARE ACTIVITY in the eighteenth century.
Again and again, Frankopan shows when past empires have failed to act sustainably, they have been met with catastrophe.
Blending brilliant historical writing and cutting-edge scientific research, The Earth Transformed will radically reframe the way we look at the world and our future.
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From book sample:
We should all be grateful for dramatic changes to global climate.
Were it not for billions of years of intense celestial and solar activity, repeated asteroid strikes, epic volcanic eruptions, extraordinary atmospheric change, spectacular tectonic shifts and constant biotic adaptation, we would not be alive today.
Astrophysicists talk of habitable regions around stars that are not too hot and not too cold as being in the ‘goldilocks zone’.
The earth is one of many such examples.
But conditions have changed constantly and sometimes catastrophically since the creation of our planet around 4.6 billion years ago.
FOR ALMOST ALL THE TIME THE EARTH HAS EXISTED, OUR SPECIES WOULD NOT AND COULD NOT HAVE SURVIVED.
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In today’s world, we think of humans as architects of dangerous environmental and climate change.
But we are prime beneficiaries of such transformations in the past.
Our role on this planet has been an exceptionally modest one.
The first hominins appeared only a few million years ago, and THE FIRST ANATOMICALLY MODERN HUMANS (INCLUDING NEANDERTHALS) AROUND 500,000 YEARS AGO.
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What we know of the period since then is patchy, difficult to interpret and often highly speculative.
As we get closer to the modern day, archaeology helps us understand more reliably how people lived.
But to know what they did, thought and believed we have to wait till the DEVELOPMENT OF FULL-WRITING SYSTEMS AROUND 5,000 YEARS AGO.
To put that into context, accounts, documents and texts that allow us to reconstruct the past with nuance and detail cover around 0.000001 per cent of the world’s past.
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We are not just fortunate to exist as a species, but in the grand scheme of history we are new and very late arrivals.
Like rude guests who arrive at the last minute, cause havoc and set about destroying the house to which they have been invited, human impact on the natural environment has been substantial and is accelerating to the point that many scientists question the long-term viability of human life.
That in itself is not unusual, however.
For one thing, our species is not alone in transforming the world around us, for other species of biota – that is to say, FLORA, FAUNA AND MICROORGANISMS – ARE NOT PASSIVE PARTICIPANTS IN OR SIMPLE BYSTANDERS to a relationship that exists solely or even primarily between humans and nature.
Each is actively involved in processes of change, adaptation and evolution – sometimes with devastating consequences.
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This is one reason why some scholars have criticized the idea and the name of the ‘Anthropocene’, which prioritizes humans into ‘a distinguished species’ that has claimed the right to identify what is and is not wild, to classify ‘resources’ as ones that can be used – sustainably or otherwise.
Such, argue some, is the ‘arrogance that greatly overestimates human contributions while downplaying those of other life forms almost to the point of nonexistence’.
FOR AROUND HALF THE EARTH’S EXISTENCE, THERE WAS LITTLE OR NO OXYGEN IN THE ATMOSPHERE.
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Our planet was formed through a long period of accretion, or gradual accumulation of layers, followed by A MAJOR COLLISION WITH A MARS-SIZED IMPACTOR – which released enough energy to melt the earth’s mantle and create the earliest atmosphere from the resultant exchange between a magma ocean and vapor that was anoxic, that is to say, lacking in oxygen.
The earth’s biogeochemical cycles eventually resulted in a radical transformation.
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Although there is considerable debate about how, when and why oxygenic photosynthesis occurred, evidence from organic biomarkers, fossils and genome-scale data suggests cyanobacteria evolved to absorb and take energy from sunlight, using it to make sugars out of water and carbon dioxide, releasing oxygen as a by-product.
New models suggest 1 TO 5 BILLION LIGHTNING FLASHES THAT OCCURRED PER YEAR ON EARLY EARTH MAY HAVE BEEN THE SOURCE OF LARGE VOLUMES OF PREBIOTIC REACTIVE PHOSPHORUS that played an important role in the emergence of terrestrial life.
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Around 3 billion years ago – if not earlier – enough oxygen was being produced to create ‘oases’ in protected nutrient-rich shallow marine habitats.
Whether because of chemical reaction, evolutionary development, sudden superabundance of cyanobacteria, volcanic eruptions or a slowdown in the earth’s rotation (or a combination of all five), ATMOSPHERIC OXYGEN LEVELS ACCUMULATED RAPIDLY AROUND 2.5–2.3 BILLION YEARS AGO, resulting in an episode known as the Great Oxidation Event.
This was a key moment that paved the way for the emergence of complex life as we know it.
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It also led to dramatic changes in climate, as rapidly increasing oxygen reacted with methane, producing water vapor and carbon dioxide.
Alongside the effects of a supercontinent being formed from the collisions of landmasses, THE EARTH’S GREENHOUSE WAS WEAKENED, LEADING TO THE PLANET BEING COVERED COMPLETELY IN ICE AND SNOW.
Changes in the earth’s orbit around the sun, known as the Milankovitch cycle, may also have played a role in this process.
So too might giant meteorite impacts which not only threw up debris into the atmosphere that blocked the sun’s light and heat but also played an important role in the formation of the continents.
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The glacial episodes may have been weaker or stronger over the course of several hundred million years, but in general THE EFFECT OF ‘SNOWBALL EARTH’ WAS SO DRAMATIC SOME SCIENTISTS REFER TO THIS PERIOD AS A WHOLE AS A ‘CLIMATE DISASTER’.
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This process was precarious and complex, and is the subject of considerable advances in current research.
As with later glaciations it resulted in profound changes for the planet’s plant and animal life.
One outcome appears to have been the evolution of small organisms into larger sizes, capable of moving at faster speeds to compensate for the high viscosity of cold seawater.
It has recently been suggested the formation of 8,000-kilometer-long belts of ‘SUPERMOUNTAINS’ MAY HAVE PLAYED A ROLE IN THE RISE OF ATMOSPHERIC OXYGEN and in stimulating biological evolution as a result of phosphorus, iron and nutrients being deposited into oceans as mountains eroded over the course of hundreds of millions of years.
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The fossil record of complex, macroscopic organisms begins with the Ediacara Biota period which started 570 million years ago and which saw at least forty recognized SPECIES DEVELOPING INTO MULTICELLULAR ANIMALS THAT WERE SYMMETRICAL – presumably helpful for functions such as mobility.
It marked a period of extraordinary diversification in the variety of animals living in the oceans and in their evolution, development and adaptation, with some creatures like trilobites developing respiratory organs on their upper limbs.
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Near the end of the Ordovician period, AROUND 444 MILLION YEARS AGO, A SUDDEN COOLING, PERHAPS TRIGGERED BY TECTONIC SHIFTS that produced the Appalachian mountains, led to sharp falls in temperature and initiated shifts in deep ocean currents, as well as declines in sea level that shrank habitats for marine planktonic and nektonic species.
That cooling produced one pulse of extinction.
Another came when temperatures moderated, sea levels rose and ocean current patterns stagnated, with a resultant sharp fall in oxygen levels.
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Traces of mercury and indications of significant acidification suggest volcanic activity was a key factor in the second stage of a process that ultimately brought about the extinction of 85 per cent of all species.
THIS WAS JUST ONE OF SEVERAL SPECTACULAR EPISODES THAT WIPED OUT LIFE FOR ALL BUT A SMALL PROPORTION OF LIVING ORGANISMS.
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The moon may have played a part in the changes in the millions of years that followed.
Formed from debris thrown into space at the time of the impact that created the earth, the moon has a gravitational pull that plays a major role in ocean tides.
As such, THE MOON IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE FLOWS THAT HELP TRANSPORT HEAT AWAY FROM THE EQUATOR AND TOWARDS THE POLES, FUNDAMENTALLY SHAPING EARTH’S CLIMATE.
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As the moon used to be much closer to the earth – perhaps half the distance away it is today.
These forces were considerably stronger and therefore had a greater impact on the earth’s climate and also perhaps on its wildlife.
RECENT MODELLING SUGGESTS BIG TIDAL RANGES MAY HAVE BEEN RESPONSIBLE FOR FORCING BONY FISH INTO SHALLOW POOLS ON LAND, thereby prompting the evolution of weight-bearing limbs and air-breathing organs.
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Lunar phases and moonlight seem to be closely connected to the annual migrations of billions of seasonal animal species, especially birds, whose fuelling opportunities are heavily light-dependent.
Indeed, THERE SEEM TO BE IMPORTANT LINKS BETWEEN HUMAN BEHAVIOR, ACTIVITY AND EVEN FERTILITY AND LUNAR RHYTHMS.
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Studies of indigenous communities in Argentina that do not have access to electricity show that sleep starts later and is shorter on nights before the full moon, when moonlight is available in the hours following dusk.
Long-term DATA FROM WOMEN’S MENSTRUAL CYCLES SHOWS A CORRELATION WITH LUNAR LIGHT AND LUNAR GRAVITY, with some scholars arguing human reproductive behavior was originally synchronous with the moon, but has been modified more recently by modern lifestyles.
The moon plays an important role in ocean currents, global temperatures and climate, as well as in reproductive cycles, and life on earth in general.
(end of section 1)
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