Quote:
Originally Posted by renormalised
Yes we have.....ever since the beginning of the late Neolithic to Bronze Age (depending on where you are...it's different for different regions on the planet) and the beginnings of widespread agriculture and deforestation, we have been effecting the climate. Much of Europe had already been deforested from it's previous biome type by about 4000BC. What you see there now, except in some parts, has been completely altered from what was there when the population was mainly hunter gatherers. And, that alteration occurred a lot earlier than most people know or realise, hence your response. The UK, for example, had been almost completely cleared of it's virgin forests by the last Bronze Age, except for some patches here and there. Along with the natural changes in climate, our own interference has contributed quite markedly to what we see now. You change the local regional microclimate, and any changes globally will impact on them rather differently than what they would normally otherwise have. And, that's precisely what we see.
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Indeed, I was brought up by the Pennines in England and for a long time it was thought that the peat bogs were the climax vegetation there, until peat mining got to a big scale and they found that underneath the peat were preserved tree stumps where you could still see the marks from the bronze age axes....