Many of us think of today’s extraordinarily rapid, human-caused climate change as an existential threat to humanity, one that will inevitably wipe away cities, industries, countries, perhaps even our species – or at least our way of life. Many historians, archaeologists and natural scientists have thought about the modest, natural climate changes that preceded the 20th century in much the same way: as existential threats to past civilisations. In their accounts, communities and societies wedded to old ways of life had little recourse when previously predictable weather patterns abruptly changed. Time and again, they argue, past climate changes provoked civilisational ‘collapse’: a sudden unravelling of social and economic complexity, culminating in a catastrophic decline in population. In popular books and articles, journalists and scientists draw on these ideas to argue that because natural climate changes destroyed past civilisations, anthropogenic warming could well doom ours.
Yet new research is telling us something very different. It is revealing that many – perhaps most – communities successfully endured past climate changes. Some bounced back quickly after severe and previously unusual weather; others avoided disaster entirely. Many adapted to become more resilient to damage, or to exploit new opportunities. Climate change in fact repeatedly altered environments so they better suited how some societies grew food, made money, or waged war.
Even in resilient societies, thousands died amid the most extreme weather unleashed by past climate changes. Yet it is becoming increasingly clear that our ancestors often acted decisively and creatively to make the best out of trying times. Far from an outlier, the story of Dutch whalers in the Arctic is merely one example in a history of ingenuity in the face of past climate change.
If you follow the weather, you will no doubt have heard that a day, month or year is the hottest on record. It might be tempting to assume that this record involves all of natural or at least human history, but it really refers only to the almost century-and-a-half in which weather stations equipped with accurate thermometers gradually spread across the world. For much of that period, human greenhouse gas emissions have been the driving force behind changes in Earth’s average annual temperature.