This academic text examines how climatic shifts have influenced human migration and societal change throughout history, moving beyond simple environmental determinism. It emphasizes that climate acts as a "threat multiplier," exacerbating pre-existing social, economic, and political vulnerabilities rather than being a sole cause of collapse. The document highlights the necessity of "data fusion," integrating information from paleoclimatological, archaeological, and humanistic archives to reconstruct past human-climate interactions accurately. This interdisciplinary approach is illustrated through three case studies: the collapse of Norse settlements in Greenland, the varied impacts of the Little Ice Age, and the American Dust Bowl of the 1930s. Ultimately, the analysis aims to draw lessons from historical patterns of vulnerability, adaptation, and resilience to inform responses to contemporary climate challenges, stressing that societal choices and structures are key in determining outcomes.

Research done with the help of artificial intelligence, and presented by two AI-generated hosts.