There are many environmental issues that are occurring in the world today. The problems range from pollution, the addition of harmful substances to the environment, and run-off, chemical running off in to lakes and rivers, to deforestation, the rapid cutting down of forests, and ozone depletion, the degradation of the ozone layer. More and more of the environment is slowly disappearing as the human population is rapidly increasing. Almost any of these issues could be a cause for an island civilization. Desertification is the most justifiable cause for the upbringing of an island civilization.
Desertification is known as the degradation of land, normally in the dry lands. Dry lands are areas that contain low amounts of water within the soil. Desertification can be caused by a number of factors. A few common causes are climate changes and human activities. If the climate rises drastically in a short period of time, it could cause the nature in that area to die because they cannot adapt to the environment quickly enough to ensure survival. What people do not understand is that dryland areas are very fragile and are rarely able to sustain themselves in increased pressures that are the result of an increase in population. The result is that the land essentially dies and becomes a desert, bringing about the name desertification. This would be the call for an island civilization.
An island civilization would then be the perfect reaction since it provides a limit. A population can only be so large on an island because it will eventually run out of space and resources. The island inhabits will seek to preserve their resources seeing as they only have so much to begin with. The population will increase at a much slower rate that the island can handle and, should the population get too high, they can send people out in search of another island to inhabit in addition to their own. They will seek to lower the rate of expansion seeing as they cannot go very far.
http://www.ciesin.columbia.edu/docs/002-193/002-193.html
http://www.ciesin.columbia.edu/docs/002-193/002-193.html
I think you make a great point about the need of an Island Civilization. Desertification is just one of the many things contributing harm to our environment. You make a great point about the isolation of island civilization creating a limit on space and resources.
ReplyDelete