Conclusion

The story that cultural ecology and environmental and ecological archaeology have to tell about our history is, at one and the same time, inspiring and discouraging. On the one hand, the story is one of human ingenuity, of anatomically modern humans’ ability to persist and even thrive for roughly 100 000 years, facing the challenges of every climactic zone and ecological environment on the face of the Earth - a story of success matched by no other single species. At the same time, it is also the story of how we have achieved this at the expense of the physical environment including its climate, as well as at the expense of a myriad of other species in all ecosystems - terrestrial, freshwater, and marine - to the extent that we ourselves may now be threatened. So what of the future?

Jared Diamond, in his comparative study of the successes and failures of past societies, concluded that there are five contributing factors to societal success and failure. Environmental damage, climate change, hostile neighbors, and friendly trading partners may be significant in any particular case, but a society’s response to its problems, particularly to environmental ones, is always significant. He concluded that some societies have proved sustainable over much longer periods of time than others and that archaeological knowledge, in particular, can allow us to learn from others’ mistakes. It is also possible, however, that the science fiction writer Douglas Adams and the physicist Stephen Hawking are also right. It may be in the very nature of life itself to grow and reproduce beyond the carrying capacity of its environment. Our species may be only unusual in the ecological dominance we have achieved. If so, then while Diamond may be right in the short and intermediate run, the only answer in the very long run may be, as Adams and Hawking have suggested, to eventually continue our long history of expansion, but next off this planet.

See also: Agriculture: Biological impact on Populations; Social Consequences; Animal Domestication; Archae-ozoology; Geoarchaeology; Human-Landscape Interactions; Hunter-Gatherers, Ancient; Paleoethnobotany; Plant Domestication; Political Complexity, Rise of.