Final Reflection

A crucial concept throughout history is the tendency of societies to fall apart completely (Diamond 684). Today, the United States, relying on technology to remedy the ills of the world, is a great deal like the Mayan Society. Diamond explains the dangerous misconceptions that Mayan society and other civilizations did not consider in their early development.

This lack of foresight into protecting their home led to their eventual downfall. Rising soil toxicity from their farming methods, deforestation, and malnutrition from a poor diet all contributed towards their decline. All of which led into a drought, which Diamond links to the rise and fall of civilizations based on the availability of water to the populace. When their population increased, they lost land they could grow on, leaving the Mayans desperate for what few resources they could

Diamond thoroughly examines the history of collapses of civilizations ranging from the Mayan Empire to modern China. Throughout the book Diamond works to answer the question, ‘Why is it that some societies collapsed while others did not collapse?’ The following themes, discussed by Jared Diamond as the main factors in a civilization’s success or failure, are explored and explained in the past to provide a better outlook on the status of our future: environmental damage, climate change, and neighbors including trade partners.

The intrigue of The Mayans has always existed through the telling of their ritualistic practices or their calendar, but the fall of such an advanced civilization is perhaps the most intriguing story of all.To understand what causes great civilizations, it is vital to note the process of collapse in other civilizations, such as the great Roman Empire. Differences in time period, geographical landscapes, and other circumstances mean no direct correlations are possible, but the outstanding point of similarity is that no single factor accounts for a large civilization 's collapse. One similarity between these two civilizations is the process which brought the downfall of other empires. This can be the result of the general disregard of rulers for the resources at their disposal and the long-term welfare of the people they ruled. The period prior to the Maya collapse is often described through extravagant building projects, unproductive wars, and the overexploitation of natural resources, especially land, forests, and water. In the past, historians have concluded that the fall of the Maya civilization was caused by warfare, drought, and disease. Writers of other disciplines. have used the Mayans to write about disasters, civil strife, and even science fiction. With some of these causes holding true, there is still a very fundamental factor missing in the landscape of the ancient Maya which they could not ultimately overcome. The Maya civilization’s downfall ultimately can be

Located in what is known as Meso-America and over 1,000 miles from the equator, the Mayans inhabited what is known as a “seasonal tropical forest.” This area contained dry seasons,unpredictable rain, and low elevation in many places. The question Diamond tries to address and answer in this chapter is, just how did ”the New World 's most advanced Native American civilization before European arrival” come to an end if it was so successful? He uses his 5-Point Framework to try and answer this. To start the Mayans severely damaged their environment through deforestation, slash and burn farming, erosion, and exhausting the soil. The Maya experienced drought after drought combined with continues climate change which had a harsh effect on the beginnings of the Mayan collapse. The society as a whole was divided into smaller kingdoms that were constantly as war which led to increased food shortages as so much food was needed to feed the armies. They didn’t rely much on trade so relations with friendly neighbors didn’t contribute much to their fall. Another contributing factor was the population, it grew so quickly it essentially outgrew its resources. And lastly the fifth point in Diamonds framework, a society 's response to problems. Why did the leaders and kings notice these issues and attempt to solve them? Diamond explains simply that they were to

As population rose, the nobles of the independent city states both intermarried and made war on one another. Ultimately, the system of rule that had served the Maya for centuries had failed. Faced with famine, foreign invasion, chronic warfare, and perhaps disease, an era ended what is generally called the Classic Maya collapse.

The Mayan Civilization at its height was one of the greatest civilization to ever reign on the planet. Their advances in astronomy and mathematics well in advance has helped present civilizations to prosper. But one of the great questions is what happened to the Mayans? Why did they collapse? What caused them to collapse? It is a question that had gone unanswered for decades until some of the worlds great historians and scientist finally concluded to three reasons why the Mayan Civilization collapsed. The Mayans Collapse was fast and occurred due to Deforestation and Climate Change, Overpopulation, and Internal and Exterior Rivalry.

What causes a civilization to die out? Some cultures die out from war, rebellion, or foreign invasion. Others slowly disintegrate as people stray from the rule of the civilization. However, for the Ancient Maya civilization, the collapse was from a combination of environmental factors and hostility, both foreign and domestic. In Jared Diamond’s book, Collapse, he mentions his idea of the five main factors that cause civilization collapse. He states that all civilizations collapse because of either climate change, hostile neighbors, the collapse of alliances and essential trading partners, environmental problems, or failure to adapt. The ancient Maya civilization followed this pattern. The three most instrumental factors in the decline and collapse of the Mayans are Climate Change, Environmental Problems, and Hostility. However, to be able to prove this, we have to set up a bit of background for the Mayans.

After completing clinical simulation laboratory session 5: surgical scrub, I found that entire process of surgical scrub is way too complicated and time consuming: the entire process took me 5 minutes to complete and one wrong move could result in restarting whole process. My tutor emphasized the importance of surgical asepsis and its role in preventing infection but surgical scrub seemed torturous and waste of time to me. Still not fully convinced, I decided to do some research to find out the importance of proper surgical scrub.

The fall of the lowland Maya can be seen as a result of many factors, coming together as a one catastrophe. Many scholars believe that one thing in particular did not lead to the claps of the Mayan civilization, but rather a combination of factors. Increased population, environment degradation led to malnutrition in population, which then led to epidemic diseases.

The most simple explanation for the collapse of the Maya Classic period would be that the series of punctuated droughts led to less food, which ultimately led to political instability and eventually the collapse of their civilization. This, however, ignores the Maya’s own input to their collapse and the other problems created by the droughts. As they would have to grow more food to make up for what was lost to the drought, more land would be cleared. Unfortunately, this only worsened the drought as “cleared land absorbs less solar radiation, less water evaporates from its surface, making clouds and rainfall more scarce” (Stromberg). As such, a vicious cycle was created in which the drought would be worsened by deforestation, meaning more

The question of what factors lead the Mayan’s to their end is arguably history 's most enduring mystery. Every society has its rise, and inevitable fall. However, none have fallen quite like the Classic Maya society. Like many civilizations, the fall of the Classic Maya society hinged on the back of many contributing factors over the time span of 660-900 A.D. There are many contributing factors that contributed to the demise of the society. These factors consisted of climate change, deforestation, warfare, famine, and overpopulation. I am going to tell you why climate change more specifically droughts perhaps to the Mayan’s own doing was the most important factor that leads to the eventual demise of the their society. However first we must understand what predeceased the fall, which was a rather thriving society, arguably the strongest one at the time.

There is no conclusive evidence for what caused the collapse of the Mayan civilization during the Classic Era. There are several historical theories supported by the historical evidence that is available. Two of these claims are climate change based upon deforestation + drought and society’s response to environmental problems producing waves of decline exacerbated by social, political, and warfare issues.

In 1931, a theory was proposed that the collapse of the Southern Mayan Lowlands was due to the erosion of soil, scarcity of land, encroachment of grasses, climate, etcetera …(AOC) This theory more or less deals with the idea that the Mayan collapsed because of agricultural problems and environmental degradation. When the Classic Mayan civilization started it was able to sustain itself, but when the population started to expand there was simply not enough agriculture to support the amount of people living within the community, “Cultural complexity is limited by environmental potential, especially for agriculture.”(AOC) When the society tried to expand and support the larger population they “over shot there limits of the environment”(AOC) and could not support themselves

The example of societal collapse in which I will be making reference to throughout this essay is the Maya civilization. The Maya civilization is, “probably the best known of all early American civilizations.” (Fagan, 1995) It was at its strongest point between AD 300 AND 900. Around AD 900 was the time of its collapse. This civilization was developed in a densely, tropical forest on either highlands or lowlands. Today to visit a Mayan site, people would go to the modern Mexican state, capital city of Merida. This site was once home to the “New World's most advanced Native American civilization before European arrival.” (Diamond, 2009) Over the years there has been many predictions on what had caused the Maya civilization to collapse. At