1. What do you think caused the collapse of the Mayan civilization?
2. How could this scenario have been avoided? Does this hold lessons for current environmental management?
Monday, August 27, 2012
Mayan Civilization
1. What do you think caused the collapse of the Mayan civilization?
2. How could this scenario have been avoided? Does this hold lessons for current environmental management?
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1. I think that the collapse of the Mayan civilization was caused by the extreme changes they made to their environment. They cleared away so much trees that the changes made the land unable to sustain their population, and they didn't have the technology needed to sustain life on a different source of water, such as underground water.
ReplyDelete2. I think that this scenario could have been avoided if they had thought forward and had a sustainable backup of water, other than the reservoirs they had, that didn't depend on rain. This could happen someday in the current environment if we continue destroying trees at the current rate. I think the only thing that has kept this from happening in our society is the technology that allows us to use alternative sources of water or to transport water from one location to another.
1. I believe that the collapse of the Mayan civilization was caused by their want for more crops,and more space for people and their city to grow and industrialize. Yet by cutting down trees they caused droughts which then took away water supply. Without water they couldn't grow crops crops, and the lack of trees caused them to not be able to produce lime plaster and other materials needed to live. By trying to make their city thrive they ended up causing a chain reaction and losing sources of survival.
ReplyDelete2.This scenario could have been avoided if they had planned ahead and had back up resources such as the underground water reserves, or a stockpile of materials needed for building purposes. Yes it does hold lessons because it shows that we must use all the resources we have that they didn't such as technology.By using our tools we can look ahead and try to plan accordingly so that we don't cause a chain reaction like the Mayans did.
1. I think the collapse of the Mayan civilization was caused by overpopulation since more than 19 million people were scattered across the Mayan empire. An increase in population means disease, war, the need for more food, and the need for more shelter. To fulfill these needs, they take down trees therefore changing their environment.
ReplyDeleteThe deforestation of the environment has caused erosion problems therefore when it rains, the quality of the soil is less inferior (less nutrient rich) causing drought increase that are worse than the previous years. For the small amount of plants that survive, they are harvested right away since they are more visible. This allowed the Mayans to survive long enough with a depleting resource. Additionally, the lack of technological advance limited their water supply to what was at the surface.
2. To avoid this scenario, I think that the Mayans should have maintained their population where supply can meet demand. More trees were used to support a growing population. They needed to consider a system in which how long plants needed until they were balanced with a sustainable ecosystem. Mayans were fierce warriors and have greatly contributed to their demise by engaging in warfare in order to take control of the limited natural resources.
Mayans are greatly dependent of their environment just as we are today. The only difference is that we are doing this at a grandeur scale. Even though the Mayans may not have been fully aware of the cause of their actions, we have the technology to embrace other resources and maintain a plentiful supply.
1. I believe that the collapse of the Mayan Civilization was due to deforestation which lead to a drought. "As crops like corn replace a forest’s dark canopy, more sunlight bounces back into space, said Cook". I like this quote from the article, because it shows that through deforestation the Mayan's collapsed their own Civilization. Also, with a drought and only a bit of food being salvaged for their communities and with overpopulation becoming a problem food would have been a huge problem and would have turned them on each other.
ReplyDelete2. The scenario of collapse of the Mayan Civilization could have been avoided if they had been more conservative with their resources. For example if they had grown their crops elsewhere it would have slowed the process of the deforestation. Also, if they had been more conservative of the usage of the trees they would have had more.
I do think that the collapse of the Mayan Civilization hold a lesson for us in environmental management, because we need to see that it is in fact possible for us to collapse as a nation and internationally. If we were to use up resources that we heavily depend on, like oil, then we wouldn't know what to do. We would have a delay in growth, it would set us back many years. I think we need to get a control on our problem of using up our natural resources or we're next to collapse.
1. The Mayans were a very advanced civilization (for their time period) and because of this, they were able to create their fluorishing cities. Unfortunately, in order to create their grand and elaborate cities, the Mayans needed to cut down many trees at a time. The deforestation resulted in a long and trecherous drought. Already, the location of the Mayan Civilization (Southern Mexico and the tip of South America)was situated in a place prone to have droughts. But because of their constant deforestation, "the ground absorb[ed] less energy from the sun, less water evaporat[ed] from the surface, releasing less moisture into the air to form rain-making clouds". Because of the droughts, harvests proved to be unsuccessful and not profitable. This eventually led to the collapse of the Mayan Civilization.
ReplyDelete2. Obviously, if the Mayans didn't deforestate their lands, therefore making the environment more dry, this outcome may have possibly been avoided. Although the Mayans were a very advanced civilization, they were blind to the fact that creating their grand cities and tearing down forests would lead to the fall of their ciilization. From this moment in history we can learn that environment plays a huge role in determining the survival of an era/empire/civilization. Therefore we must learn not to take advantage of our environment. This includes emissions from factories but also any other kind of pollution.
1.The downfall of the Mayan Civilization, similar to that of the Islanders of Easter Island, was their society's inability to recognize the effects of cutting down so many trees. Since the civilization was already in a dry environment, they had to conserve whatever resources (in this case trees)that they had to preserve the land, but instead they chose to chop all of them down and use them for building construction. Without the proper irrigation required to sustain mass deforestation, their crops died and that eventually led to the overall demise of their advanced civilization due to severe drought.
ReplyDelete2.This catastrophic event for the Mayan civilization could have been avoided if they maintained their continuous deforestation with better irrigation that could have sustained their crops, animals, people, and even regrow the cut down trees. Another possibility would have been to find a more effective and efficient way of constructing their buildings. In fact, they could have not even constructed as many massive buildings as they did.From this event, current civilizations, societies, and governments can see the importance of preservation, proper irrigation, and societal cooperation are required so as to not have an event like this ever occur again. This event then teaches the human population that our resources will run out eventually and we need to conserve them, find better ways to maintain them, and maybe even create new ones.
1. I think that the Mayan Civilization collapsed because of an increase in population, therefore, an increase in using the resources that they needed. The Mayans started cutting down trees to make room for crops (more food for larger population) and they also cut down trees to make plaster for shelters (more people, more buildings and shelters). This was done to accommodate a large number of people but, the Mayans didn't address their problem for irrigation and drinking water.
ReplyDelete2. This could have been avoided if the Mayans didn't cut down their trees. For this to have been a viable solution, the Mayans needed underground water systems, less population, and different food sources. Our society in the present day should use the Mayan civilization as an example of the future, if we don't start to think critically and use our resources intelligently, we can end up like the Mayans, trying to find food, water, and energy for an overpopulated planet.
I think that the collapse of the Mayan civilization was a result of the inability to find sustainable resources, and the fact that the population kept growing and growing. between lack of water, and lack of burnable wood, and a growing population, the mayan civilization had very few options.
ReplyDeletethis situation could have been avoided if the mayans had the ability to access the water holes underneath their lands, and new how to better build their stuctures, their ways were unsustainable. however, this can be used as a warning sign to anyone living in that area, that something must change to continue life in that region in the future.
1. It would appear that the collapse of the Mayan civilization was the result of a multitude of factors; the main two being conflict between humans, and the over-exhaustion of natural resources, leading to an inhospitable environment. In this case, the Mayans began a cycle of positive feedback, stemming from a large increase in population, leading to an increased need for natural resources, and resulting in periods of increased drought.
ReplyDelete2. The scenario may have been preventable if efforts had been made to conserve resources, and limit the amount of forrest being cut down, or being replaced with crops. However, even a decrease in deforestation may not have prevented the droughts that the civilization suffered. There were also other factors besides the environment that contributed to the downfall of the Mayans, such as conflict between humans. Today, we can certainly learn from the failures of past civilizations. In the cases of both the Mayan Empire and the inhabitants of Easter Island, the two largest contributing factors to the civilizations' downfalls were, as mentioned in the previous paragraph, human conflict, especially conflict over scarce resources, and the environment becoming uninhabitable due to destructive human activity. One can see both of these threats manifested in our society today. We are beginning to witness more and more conflict over resources that have become more and more valuable as they have become scarce. Resources such as oil are highly coveted, and lead to disorder and chaos within our society. And of course, we are creating an environment that is nowhere near suitable for life, with deforestation on a massive scale, increased carbon emissions, and many other careless actions.
1. The Mayans was greatly impacted by drought. The act of cutting down trees and deforesting their surroundings likely made the drought worse. A number of scientists have done studies that indicate rainfall is reduced when areas are deforested. This was a worst case scenario in that population was growing, forests were being cleared for crops and to build cities, and over time there was less rain to support the population.
ReplyDelete2. If the Mayans had understood the relationship between rainfall and the forests they could have managed their resources more wisely. If they wanted to support such a large population they should have considered planting more trees or some other way of regrowing their resources for the next generation instead of slowly dwindling it. Mayans could have also used a system to collect and store water. Also, the already widespread population could expand their territory so there wouldn't be such a rapid usage of resources and, at very least, they could have somewhere to go if their cities did fall.
I think this does hold a lesson about how quickly we consume without restoring any resources that we'll need for the future. The very fact that we are trying to conserve resources and produce more resources ensures us to have a longer and more likely chance of survival, but the planet still may have too many people and too little resources to sustain our population.
1.The Mayans were impacted by a bad environmental system. It hardly rained on the Island and the cutting down of the trees in the ended caused the drought to worsen.As resources dropped and the population grew, the Mayans had no chance in being able to continue.
ReplyDelete2. The Mayans were unable to realize that as they cut down the natural resources in order to create their civilization on the island, that they would most likely not replenish quick enough in order to sustain their growing population. Had the been able to make a connection to the rain fall, the forest, and their growing population, My belief is that they would have been able to conserve what they did have. Another thing that could have helped was applying more agriculture and less religion so that they may have been able to add to what they already had. The lesson that this holds is that you a, population should pay attention to the environment and how it cycles so that they are able to live successfully in that environments conditions
1- Because of a growing population, the Mayans started using more of their natural resources than they did before. Because of a deforestation they created by cutting down a majority of their trees to make room for shelters for the increasing population, the water sources and irrigation problems were not adressed. This eventually lead to the downfall of their civilization.
ReplyDelete2- This definitely could have been avoided if the Mayans had planned ahead and not chopped off all of their trees, aggravating their irrigation problems. For an advanced civilization, the Mayans could have been able to minimize the impacts, but eventually, at this rate, the collapse was inevitable.
I think this definitely holds lessons for current environmental management considering the fact that we are a more advanced civilization and that using natural resources we do not really need, could lead to an eventual downfall or collapse like them a few thousand years before.
1. I think growing population caused the Mayan civilization to colapse. The land could not support increasing demand for supplies.This in turn destroued thier land because the soil and trees could not return back to equalibrium in time.
ReplyDelete2. The Mayans could have rationed their resources, and limited the use of the forest. They also could have found different matireal to build their cities. With rationed resources they the trees could have grown back and they could have had a sustainable enviorment. We are currently running out of forest and fossil fuels. The result of maya civilization should steer us away from using up or resources.