Presentations from the AGU Chapman meeting on Climates, Past Landscapes and Civilizations

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Aimers - Drought and the Maya Collapse

Baade - Irragric anthrosols: artifacts of human adjustment to arid conditions - Examples from the Tibetan Himalayas and the costal desert of Peru

Buckley - The societal impact of Southeast Asian hydroclimate variability over the past millennium


Cadzow - Hunter-Gatherers, Horticulturalists, and Climate?

Clift - Evolving Holocene Drainage Geometries and Environmental Conditions in the Indus River Basin

Draut - Climate variation, landscape cover, and aeolian sand mobility on the Navajo Nation, southwestern U.S.

Davis et al. - Can climate change explain the spread of farming during the Neolithic revolution?

Gibson - The potential impact of paleoclimatology and archeology on mankind’s willingness to make sacrifices to mitigate
future climate change


Hong - Chinese Civilization and Climate Change

Hu et al. -  Variation in Holocene East Asian Monsoon Strength Reflected by Deep Sea Sediment in the South China Sea

Jorgensen - Getting into shape: a simple, rapid, and low-cost method to identify Pacific salmonid (Oncorhynchus spp.) vertebrae to species

Lemmen - Are Holocene climate events irrelevant for, or are they  triggers of the Neolithic transition?

Macklin -  When the Nile ran dry: re-thinking people-river environment interactions in Sudanese Nubia 5000 BC – AD 500

Pederson - Neither New York City nor Atlanta are Prepared for a Return to Historical Drought

Raab - Mining as a factor of prehistoric and historic landscape change in Central Europe

Rollet -  Holocene sea-level change and Neolithic cultural response in southeast China

Ruddiman -  Can natural or anthropogenic explanations of late-Holocene CO and CH increases be falsified?

Rushton - Climatic shifts and changes in landscape at the Maya city of Lamanai, Belize, ca. BC 1500–AD 1500

Stahle -  Major Mesoamerican droughts of the past millennium


Old world working group conclusion

New world working group conclusion





Report on the meeting from Science