Has global warming wiped previous civilizations out?

Ok this is a stab in the dark. But ive been reading some interesting threads on ancient civilizations, i know recently an entire city was supposed to have been discovered (i forget where but it was only last week, possible under Rome? enlighten me please)

So here is my question. If these previous civilizations were technologically advanced, and im not saying identically as in cars and electricity lines etc...., then what effect did they have on global warming.

Are we to presume that if, for example, a giant comet did wipe these ancient civilizations from existence that the earth has "so to speak" reset itself and all natural substances (i.e Fossil fuels, etc......) will once again be available for the next civilization simply because of the effects of such an impact and whatever residue the comet brings to earth?

As i say its a long shot, but just something im wondering. Im not expecting everyone to reply, and im not saying i believe there were ancient civilizations. Im just imagining that there were..........

I think its an interesting subject given the interest or worries regarding todays global warming and the changes our earth is going through as a result.

reply to post by daxman


Well, to answer your first question, the ancient civilizations that we a know about had very little to no effect on global warming. This is because they emitted little to no carbon into the atmosphere. Because of this, their impact, especially when compared to our impact today, was negligible.

To address your second point. Yes, I assume it is possible there once was a civilization as advanced, or perhaps slightly more advanced, as our own. However, this civilization would have to completely predate the fossil record. In fact, it would have to predate the world as we understand it today. Essentially, if there were an advanced civilization on earth and some global event like say, when the moon collided with the earth, destroyed the earth and all of its inhabitants then yes, it would be possible that the planet could "reset" itself. Today, we believe that the earth is about 4.5 billion years old. If this civilization were to have ever occurred, it would have had to have existed more than 4.5 billion years ago.

reply to post by daxman


Gorbal warming is a farce, co2 is even more of one. Co2 levels follow tempreture by up to 800 years. That means as it gets warmer, then more Co2 is released.

We are actually in a cooling period and have been since 2002, the mean temp is now less than what it was in 1998 the second warmest year since 1933.

4.5 billion years ago the earth was a giant fireball of lava, sorry people were not there then.

Ice ages have killed more humans and animals than anything else on earth and we are due for another one soon.

Originally posted by BluegrassRevolutionary
reply to post by daxman

 

Well, to answer your first question, the ancient civilizations that we a know about had very little to no effect on global warming. This is because they emitted little to no carbon into the atmosphere. Because of this, their impact, especially when compared to our impact today, was negligible.

To address your second point. Yes, I assume it is possible there once was a civilization as advanced, or perhaps slightly more advanced, as our own. However, this civilization would have to completely predate the fossil record. In fact, it would have to predate the world as we understand it today. Essentially, if there were an advanced civilization on earth and some global event like say, when the moon collided with the earth, destroyed the earth and all of its inhabitants then yes, it would be possible that the planet could "reset" itself. Today, we believe that the earth is about 4.5 billion years old. If this civilization were to have ever occurred, it would have had to have existed more than 4.5 billion years ago.

The ancient civilizations that you know of. I would suggest reading some eastern religious texts(hindu I think). Which talks about great wars, and even nukes. They obviously don't call them nukes, but the description of the events fits nukes to a tee. Turning sand to glass, people dieing from radiation poisoning and trying to wash it off in the rivers, etc.

Here's a topic about it on these forums. Also contains more links.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

[edit on 21-10-2008 by badmedia]

i didnt know we were in a cooldown period. So what has all the renet go green hype been all about then? trying to keep it down i suppose>

To the best of my knowledge, No.
On the other hand, global cooling came VERY CLOSE to wiping out humanity:

ABSTRACT ON HOW HUMANS ALMOST BECAME EXTINCT

Ever wonder if humans only left Africa fairly recently why don't we all look more African? Also, when you look at humans from a genetic point of view we are very similar suggesting that some time in the past our numbers and therefore genetic diversity was greatly reduced by some global catastrophe. Professor Stanley Ambrose, an anthropologist working at the University Of Illinois believes that he has the answer.

According to him the largest volcanic eruption occurred about 71 000 - 73 000 years ago in Sumatra, Indonesia (1). It has been called the "Toba eruption" and its end product was a volcanic winter that lasted 6 years (proceeded by a 1000 year long uber-ice age) that almost wiped mankind off the face of the Earth (1, 2). Studies have shown that Toba ejaculated about 1015 g of ash and H2SO4 aerosols that dispersed into the stratosphere and across the globe (2). The aerosol cloud blocked out the Sun, which meant that there was a rapid drop in temperatures (by as much as 15 degrees Celcius regionally and more than 5 degrees globally) (2). It is believed (by those who study human genetics) that the effects that the Toba eruption had on the climate also had dramatic effects on the human population of the time (1, 2). It caused the population to undergo a dramatic decrease in numbers falling to about 10 000 adults (2). These humans survived in small isolated, tropical settlements in Africa and Eurasia (1, 2). The humans living in Europe and China would have been totally wiped out by the drop in temperature (1). This separation and isolation resulted in the surviving humans undergoing genetic drift and local adaptations and thus racial differentiation was born (1, 2). So hypothetically, the Mount Toba eruption may have caused modern races to have formed swiftly (70000 years ago) instead of progressively over one million as previously thought (1). Studies have also shown that many other species also underwent a population bottleneck, which would have also contributed to the drop in human population (no plants + no animals = no food and no clothes). The rapid drop in temperature hit tropical plants the worst as they were use to warm and wet conditions. There were severe droughts in the tropical rainforest and monsoon regions. After the bottleneck there was a rapid increases in numbers as conditions and technology improved (1, 2). This prompted more migrations to occur (2).

For a long time scientists have suspected that the human population had undergone a bottleneck but could not figure out how or why (3). The Toba eruption hypothesis provides an answer. The evidence for these climatic changes can still be found in coral reefs and ice cores (3).

On average the Earth experiences a volcanic winter due to a super-eruption (by super I mean global killer) every 50 000 and since the last one (mount Toba) occurred 73 000 years ago it means that we are 23 000 years overdue (I guess mother Earth didn't get the memo). This figure is an estimate based on past data and geological events so scientists cant say for sure when it will happen but chances are if the Earth continues to function the way it has for 4.5 billion years then its definitely going to happen again and maybe this time we won't be so lucky.

Global warming is much less of a threat to humanity's extinction, than global cooling. In fact, those that have been pushing their "attempts" to slow down what they BELIEVE is global warming, may be hastening the day when global cooling brings mankind to extinction.
That 'a way to go, Al Gore!

Originally posted by BluegrassRevolutionary
reply to post by daxman

 

Well, to answer your first question, the ancient civilizations that we a know about had very little to no effect on global warming. This is because they emitted little to no carbon into the atmosphere. Because of this, their impact, especially when compared to our impact today, was negligible.

To address your second point. Yes, I assume it is possible there once was a civilization as advanced, or perhaps slightly more advanced, as our own. However, this civilization would have to completely predate the fossil record. In fact, it would have to predate the world as we understand it today. Essentially, if there were an advanced civilization on earth and some global event like say, when the moon collided with the earth, destroyed the earth and all of its inhabitants then yes, it would be possible that the planet could "reset" itself. Today, we believe that the earth is about 4.5 billion years old. If this civilization were to have ever occurred, it would have had to have existed more than 4.5 billion years ago.

now that would just be ignoring that there is a possible cycle for earth as the sun changes etc.. there is a recent thread about the heliospere thinning by 25% in the last 50 years, who knows maybe there IS a cycle ?

Originally posted by stinkhorn
reply to post by daxman

 

Gorbal warming is a farce, co2 is even more of one. Co2 levels follow tempreture by up to 800 years. That means as it gets warmer, then more Co2 is released.

Yeh man, you go on believing that. Where did you learn that, church or Rush??? I guess all the scientists who have devoted their lives to climatology are just wrong and you, a nobody in the world of science, are right. In fact, I am looking at a graph from Science Magazine that charts the temperature and CO2 levels going back 600,000 years and you are dead wrong. The peaks and valleys occur at almost identical places, no 800 year lag as you mentioned. As far as us being in a global cooling period, why is it then that 5 of 6 hottest years on record occurred between 2000 and 2005 (looking at a graph that goes to 2005, I am sure the data further supports my assertion with more recent data)? The information you tout, more than likely was funded by the oil companies. I have seen the videos on the internet that tout your "theories" and those videos were funded by the oil and coal industries. Way to go man, you are a scientific simpleton.

[edit on 21-10-2008 by BluegrassRevolutionary]

Global cooling or global warming lol we cant win. Well its interesting to speculate whether or not there was "intelligent life" before us and our timeline. Someone mentioned 4.5billion years ago the earth was a giant lave ball, we can ask what caused this and what happened before it became like this. It can fry your brain thinking about this. Its abit like Space it just goes on and on.