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Hunting for the neuroscience of heat and violence | Grist

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Six thousand years ago, Egyptian Sahara. The desert is moving. We know this to be true from carbon dating, from archaeological investigations, from satellite imagery; from geographers, climatologists, and anthropologists. For at least 6,000 years, the Sahara Desert — or what would become the Sahara Desert — has been expanding and contracting. Mostly it has been inching southward. For just as long, people scurry in its wake. Dynasties rise and fall. Pastoralists lead their cattle down away from the desert. Populations swell. The sands of time, too, do their inching. Jump. In the last decades of the 20th century, the multi-millennial creep of the desert is accompanied by an increased frequency of drought and heat waves that has little to do with its previous flux. The Saharan expansion of yestercentury is largely thought to have been spurred by slight changes in Earth’s orbit. The new desertification narrative is different. Alarmingly so. Grist thanks its sponsors. Become one. To support

Clayton Aldern Senior Data Reporter Published Feb 17, 2016 Topic Climate + Culture Share/Republish Copy Link Republish Copy Link Email SMS X Facebook Republish Reddit LinkedIn Bluesky Six thousand years ago, Egyptian Sahara. The desert is moving. We know this to be true from carbon dating, from archaeological investigations, from satellite imagery; from geographers, climatologists, and anthropologists. For at least 6,000 years, the Sahara Desert — or what would become the Sahara Desert — has been expanding and contracting. Mostly it has been inching southward. For just as long, peo

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