Photo: Degradation of farmland on the Loess Plateau, north of Xi'an, China. Copyright 2007 Delena Norris-Tull
History: Those who ignore it are doomed to repeat it
Summary and commentary prepared by Dr. Delena Norris-Tull, Professor Emerita of Science Education, University of Montana Western, May, 2022.
I became interested in creating this website for a variety of reasons, but one of them is my concern that, if we don’t figure this out, we may be dooming ourselves for a disastrous future. Unless we pay attention to the many factors that have enabled non-native plants to invade farmlands, we will be continuously wasting many resources on a losing battle, and we may in fact make the problem worse.
The old adage, “Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it,” is pertinent here.
According to the modern oracle known as The Internet, the original source of this adage may be the Spanish philosopher, George Santayana (The Life of Reason, 1905), who stated: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
And in a 1948 speech to the British House of Commons, Winston Churchill said, “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”
No matter the origin, the sentiments are eternal. In my research on management of invasive plants, I found numerous instances where we seem to be ignoring history. For example, when we dub any plant as “weed” or “invasive,” we often ignore the historical reasons that these plants are here in the first place. And we seem to be ignoring the role that all plants, even invasive ones, play in protecting soil and water resources.
And in our management strategies, rather than carrying out carefully researched (and well-funded) strategies, in most locations, the first strategy is often the only strategy – loading fields (and therefore, soils, waters, and ultimately, our foods) with herbicides, insecticides, and other pesticides, with little attention paid to the long-term consequences of such actions. Within this website, refer to the sections on Herbicides, and in particular, the section, “How Research on Pesticides is Funded,” where you will learn that research funding comes from the chemical corporations that produce these pesticides, essentially allowing the fox to guard the henhouse (to use another overused adage).
In the section of this website on “Ecosystems, Economics, and Paradigm Shifts,” and its various subsections, I describe a number of factors that contribute to degradation of ecosystems, which results in degradation of our soil and water resources, which impacts our ability to raise food.
Also refer to the section, "The Dust Bowl Revisited," for the historical context of soil and water degradation in the USA.
The Collapse of Previous Complex Civilizations
In his book, Collapse: How societies choose to fail or succeed (2005), Jared Diamond’s first chapter uses cases in Montana as examples of problems of environmental degradation, climate change, drought, deforestation, population growth, contamination of water and soil from mines, habitat loss, soil loss and degradation, water loss, wildfires, and increases in invasive plants. He chose Montana to start the book for various reasons, partly because he has had many visits there and was able to describe specific examples of these problems, and to point out that if Montana has these problems, then those issues are greatly heightened in other states that have a much higher population density and much more loss of natural habitat. He points out, for example, that the dairy industry in the Bitterroot Valley of southwestern Montana has declined from 400 dairies in 1964 to only nine by the time he published the book.
Several chapters in Diamond’s book describe in detail the collapse of a number of previous societies. These stories are well-worth reading, as they assist the reader in understanding the extent to which we are already “doomed to repeat” our past mistakes. Here is a brief list of the examples Diamond provides:
Easter Island – a once-prosperous society that completely disappeared hundreds of years ago. Recent analysis suggests that the following events occurred relatively rapidly, destroying the local environment and its resources, after humans migrated to the island around 900 AD: agricultural intensification, deforestation, the killing of many wild species of fish, birds, and porpoises for food. Diamond also describes the abandonment of three other Polynesian Islands, Pitcairn, Henderson, and Mangareva.
The large-scale abandonment, hundreds of years ago, of many large dwellings in the Southwestern USA. These buildings today can be visited in Mesa Verde National Park, the Chaco Culture National Historical Park, and several other areas. These massive dwellings were built and inhabited, each by different tribal groups, including the tribes referred to as Anasazi (a Navajo name meaning “the Ancient Ones”), and were lived in for centuries, some beginning around the 7th century AD. For example, the Chaco Canyon civilization survived about 600 years. These sites were abandoned, sometimes very suddenly in the 12th through the 15th centuries. In a harsh environment, always plagued with drought, little water, and marginal soils, it is quite astounding that fairly large populations (a few thousand people at several sites) lived in these sites and produced agriculture for centuries. Ultimately, the local environments could not sustain these populations, which had become dependent on agriculture. Over time, the impact of expanding populations, expanding agriculture, deforestation (in a climate that results in very slow regrowth of trees), frequent droughts, and fragile and eroded soils took its toll. Differing environmental issues plagued different locations. Diamond provides an excellent description of how innovations in farming and water management enabled the largest sites to thrive for centuries, developing complex inter-dependent societies, only to collapse quite suddenly. In a number of locations, survivors within these populations (those who did not die from starvation or conflict) successfully moved on to alternate locations in the Southwest, such as the Zuni and Hopi pueblos. Diamond points out that some of these former populations existed longer than the modern-day European-dominated populations that replaced them in the USA.
The first time I visited Mesa Verde, in the 1950s, I remember that the Anglo-American explanation for the migration of local peoples away from the area was “warring tribes,” which has too often been White-Man’s explanation for what occurs in the histories of Native Americans. The next time I visited Mesa Verde, in the 1980s, the explanation, now informed by the stories of actual descendants of the Anasazi and actual scientific evidence, was environmental degradation caused by agricultural intensification and population growth. Conflicts (including even some cannibalism of enemies killed in battle) also are now known to be a factor, but only as populations outgrew the ability of the local environments to sustain them, and as resources became scarce. Thus, “warring tribes” were not the cause. Conflicts, internal rather than external, were the result of changes in the environmental conditions prevalent in an overtaxed over-populated setting.
Diamond also describes the failures of the following, each of which once had complex societies:
China’s Modern Agricultural Problems
China has had successful agriculture for thousands of years. But during the tumultuous years of the transition from Imperial China to the take-over of Communism, and in particular during the reign of Mao Zedung, changes to the country’s agricultural practices, forced onto the farming regions by the leadership in Beijing in the 1950s and 1960s, resulted in massive soil and water degradation in a very short time. Please read the section of this website, “China: Agricultural Practices, Past & Present,” for details.
Each of these above examples from human history give you an idea of why I am concerned about our failures to pay attention to history in our attempts to manage the land today.
References:
Diamond, J. (2005). Collapse: How societies choose to fail or succeed (2005). London: Penguin Books.
Links to Next Sections:
History: Those who ignore it are doomed to repeat it
Summary and commentary prepared by Dr. Delena Norris-Tull, Professor Emerita of Science Education, University of Montana Western, May, 2022.
I became interested in creating this website for a variety of reasons, but one of them is my concern that, if we don’t figure this out, we may be dooming ourselves for a disastrous future. Unless we pay attention to the many factors that have enabled non-native plants to invade farmlands, we will be continuously wasting many resources on a losing battle, and we may in fact make the problem worse.
The old adage, “Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it,” is pertinent here.
According to the modern oracle known as The Internet, the original source of this adage may be the Spanish philosopher, George Santayana (The Life of Reason, 1905), who stated: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
And in a 1948 speech to the British House of Commons, Winston Churchill said, “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”
No matter the origin, the sentiments are eternal. In my research on management of invasive plants, I found numerous instances where we seem to be ignoring history. For example, when we dub any plant as “weed” or “invasive,” we often ignore the historical reasons that these plants are here in the first place. And we seem to be ignoring the role that all plants, even invasive ones, play in protecting soil and water resources.
And in our management strategies, rather than carrying out carefully researched (and well-funded) strategies, in most locations, the first strategy is often the only strategy – loading fields (and therefore, soils, waters, and ultimately, our foods) with herbicides, insecticides, and other pesticides, with little attention paid to the long-term consequences of such actions. Within this website, refer to the sections on Herbicides, and in particular, the section, “How Research on Pesticides is Funded,” where you will learn that research funding comes from the chemical corporations that produce these pesticides, essentially allowing the fox to guard the henhouse (to use another overused adage).
In the section of this website on “Ecosystems, Economics, and Paradigm Shifts,” and its various subsections, I describe a number of factors that contribute to degradation of ecosystems, which results in degradation of our soil and water resources, which impacts our ability to raise food.
Also refer to the section, "The Dust Bowl Revisited," for the historical context of soil and water degradation in the USA.
The Collapse of Previous Complex Civilizations
In his book, Collapse: How societies choose to fail or succeed (2005), Jared Diamond’s first chapter uses cases in Montana as examples of problems of environmental degradation, climate change, drought, deforestation, population growth, contamination of water and soil from mines, habitat loss, soil loss and degradation, water loss, wildfires, and increases in invasive plants. He chose Montana to start the book for various reasons, partly because he has had many visits there and was able to describe specific examples of these problems, and to point out that if Montana has these problems, then those issues are greatly heightened in other states that have a much higher population density and much more loss of natural habitat. He points out, for example, that the dairy industry in the Bitterroot Valley of southwestern Montana has declined from 400 dairies in 1964 to only nine by the time he published the book.
Several chapters in Diamond’s book describe in detail the collapse of a number of previous societies. These stories are well-worth reading, as they assist the reader in understanding the extent to which we are already “doomed to repeat” our past mistakes. Here is a brief list of the examples Diamond provides:
Easter Island – a once-prosperous society that completely disappeared hundreds of years ago. Recent analysis suggests that the following events occurred relatively rapidly, destroying the local environment and its resources, after humans migrated to the island around 900 AD: agricultural intensification, deforestation, the killing of many wild species of fish, birds, and porpoises for food. Diamond also describes the abandonment of three other Polynesian Islands, Pitcairn, Henderson, and Mangareva.
The large-scale abandonment, hundreds of years ago, of many large dwellings in the Southwestern USA. These buildings today can be visited in Mesa Verde National Park, the Chaco Culture National Historical Park, and several other areas. These massive dwellings were built and inhabited, each by different tribal groups, including the tribes referred to as Anasazi (a Navajo name meaning “the Ancient Ones”), and were lived in for centuries, some beginning around the 7th century AD. For example, the Chaco Canyon civilization survived about 600 years. These sites were abandoned, sometimes very suddenly in the 12th through the 15th centuries. In a harsh environment, always plagued with drought, little water, and marginal soils, it is quite astounding that fairly large populations (a few thousand people at several sites) lived in these sites and produced agriculture for centuries. Ultimately, the local environments could not sustain these populations, which had become dependent on agriculture. Over time, the impact of expanding populations, expanding agriculture, deforestation (in a climate that results in very slow regrowth of trees), frequent droughts, and fragile and eroded soils took its toll. Differing environmental issues plagued different locations. Diamond provides an excellent description of how innovations in farming and water management enabled the largest sites to thrive for centuries, developing complex inter-dependent societies, only to collapse quite suddenly. In a number of locations, survivors within these populations (those who did not die from starvation or conflict) successfully moved on to alternate locations in the Southwest, such as the Zuni and Hopi pueblos. Diamond points out that some of these former populations existed longer than the modern-day European-dominated populations that replaced them in the USA.
The first time I visited Mesa Verde, in the 1950s, I remember that the Anglo-American explanation for the migration of local peoples away from the area was “warring tribes,” which has too often been White-Man’s explanation for what occurs in the histories of Native Americans. The next time I visited Mesa Verde, in the 1980s, the explanation, now informed by the stories of actual descendants of the Anasazi and actual scientific evidence, was environmental degradation caused by agricultural intensification and population growth. Conflicts (including even some cannibalism of enemies killed in battle) also are now known to be a factor, but only as populations outgrew the ability of the local environments to sustain them, and as resources became scarce. Thus, “warring tribes” were not the cause. Conflicts, internal rather than external, were the result of changes in the environmental conditions prevalent in an overtaxed over-populated setting.
Diamond also describes the failures of the following, each of which once had complex societies:
- The Mayan civilization
- Civilizations established by various Viking groups
- The Greenland Norse colony
China’s Modern Agricultural Problems
China has had successful agriculture for thousands of years. But during the tumultuous years of the transition from Imperial China to the take-over of Communism, and in particular during the reign of Mao Zedung, changes to the country’s agricultural practices, forced onto the farming regions by the leadership in Beijing in the 1950s and 1960s, resulted in massive soil and water degradation in a very short time. Please read the section of this website, “China: Agricultural Practices, Past & Present,” for details.
Each of these above examples from human history give you an idea of why I am concerned about our failures to pay attention to history in our attempts to manage the land today.
References:
Diamond, J. (2005). Collapse: How societies choose to fail or succeed (2005). London: Penguin Books.
Links to Next Sections: