“Climate change, and the resulting shortage of ecological resources, could be to blame for armed conflicts in the future, according to David Zhang from University of Hong Kong and colleagues.” Zhang’s research found that rises in warfare in eastern China correlated with drops in temperature: “Almost all peaks of warfare and dynastic changes coincided with cold phases.” Zhang’s team theorizes that cold spells reduced agricultural output for the pre-industrial societies of the 1000-1911 era studied, leading to violent conflict for the few remaining resources.

One might assume that given this research, Zhang would be optimistic about the likelihood of peace in a warming future. Maybe even a world peace through increased carbon emissions movement would be in order [/sarcasm]. Such an un-pc conclusion would of course be unacceptable, and the article makes sure to state that:

Looking to the future and applying their findings, Zhang and colleagues suggest shortages of essential resources, such as fresh water, agricultural land, energy sources and minerals may trigger more armed conflicts among human societies.

So despite the fact that the research correlates war with colder periods, and recent temperature trends indicate that average global temperatures are warming, we’re still being warned that we may be in for more misery in the future.

This seems backwards to me. The only actual evidence cited correlated increases in warfare with drops in temperature. The most simplistic extrapolation would assume that this relationship would contiue and predict reduced warfare in a warmer future. Yet Zhang asserts the exact opposite.

The more pessimistic forecast depends on the thesis that scarcer resources lead to more conflict. This thesis really needs to tested directly, because I encounter it often and yet the details often get glossed over. In this case, the forcast ignores the difference between pre-industrial and industrial (to say nothing of post-industrial) soceities and changing population dynamics. Previous population booms may have correlated with bumper harvests due to warmer temperatures which then became unsustainable when resource yields shrank due to cold, leading to war. But current population growth has actually declined as societies have become wealthier.

In order to actually test the resource war thesis, one would need a data set that could one could examine for correlations between the availability of key resources and incidents of warfare.

Of course, all of this could be a simply a poor summary by a journalist. I’ll have to track down the actual article [1] to know. Still, very interesting stuff and an awfully elegant research design. Getting a 911 year dataset with 899 incidents is impressive.

[1] Zhang DD, Zhang J, Lee HF, He Y (2007), “Climate change and war frequency in eastern China over the last millennium”, Human Ecology, Volume 35, Number 4 / August, 2007, Pages 403-414, DOI: 10.1007/s10745-007-9115-8

The intel war between Western intelligence agencies and Iran have escalated to a new level. 14 squirrels have been arrested by Iranian operatives on charges of espionage.

Iranian authorities have recently arrested more than a dozen squirrels for espionage.

“In recent weeks, intelligence operatives have arrested 14 squirrels within Iran’s borders,” state-sponsored news agency IRNA reported. “The squirrels were carrying spy gear of foreign agencies, and were stopped before they could act, thanks to the alertness of our intelligence services.”

Iran claims the rodents were being used by Western powers in an attempt to undermine the Islamic Republic.

Iranian police commander Esmaeil Ahmadi-Moqadam confirmed the report, saying that a number of squirrels had been caught bearing foreign spy gear within Iran’s borders.

The rodents were taken into custody 2 weeks ago but few details have emerged about the incident. “I have heard about it, but I do not have precise information,” said the police commander.

Iran has recently stepped up its anti-espionage efforts against the West. There have been no other documented uses of rodents in the past.

The squirrels were arrested? What did Iran do, put them on a reduced nut ration and threaten them with execution by hawk?

And on a related note, are squirrels afforded due process under Iranian law? How long until this turns into a cause for the global squirrel rights community?