一项新的研究表明全球气候变化的罪魁祸首可能是欧洲殖民者

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When Europeans arrived in the America, they caused so much death and disease that it changed the global climate. European settlers killed 56 million people over about 100 years in South, Central and North America, causing large amounts of farmland to be abandoned and reforested. The increase in trees and vegetation across an area the size of France resulted in a great decrease in carbon dioxide ( CO₂) in the atmosphere.
Carbon levels changed enough to cool the Earth by 1610, researchers found. Columbus arrived in 1492, “CO₂ and climate had been stable until this point,” said Professor Mark Maslin, one of the study’s co-authors. “So, this is the first major change we see in the Earth’s greenhouse gases.”
Before this study, some scientists had argued the temperature change in the 1600s, called the Little Ice Age, was caused only by natural forces. But by combining archaeological evidence, historical data and analysis of carbon found in Antarctic ice, the researchers showed how the reforestation—directly caused by the Europeans’ arrival—was a key factor of the global chill, they said.
Researchers analyzed Antarctic ice, which traps atmospheric gas and can show how much carbon dioxide was in the atmosphere centuries ago. “The ice showed that there was a larger dip in CO₂ (than usual) in 1610, which was caused by the land and not the oceans,” said Alexander Koch, lead author of the study.
The study goes beyond climate science and also contribute to research in geography and history, Maslin said, noting that deaths of Americans directly contributed to the success of the European economy. Natural resources and food shipped from the New World helped Europe’s population to expand. It also allowed people to stop farming and begin working in other industries for spare money. “Strangely, the depopulation of the Americas may have allowed the Europeans to dominate the world,” Maslin said. “It also allowed for the Industrial Revolution.”