[Irace86.2.0]

Originally Posted by brzlegend

They should have kept a few instead of executing them all.

I don't really get the joke, but that video was funny, yet the parallel isn't accurate, nor may be his examination of the cause of the witch trials.

Behringer also suggests an increase in witch prosecutions due to socio-political destabilization, stressing the Little Ice Age's effects on food shortages, and the subsequent use of witches as scapegoats for consequences of climatic changes.[72] The Little Ice Age, lasting from about 1300 to 1850,[73] is characterized by temperatures and precipitation levels lower than the 1901–1960 average.[74] Historians such as Wolfgang Behringer, Emily Oster, and Hartmut Lehmann argue that these cooling temperatures brought about crop failure, war, and disease, and that witches were subsequently blamed for this turmoil.[75][76][77] Historical temperature indexes and witch trial data indicate that, generally, as temperature decreased during this period, witch trials increased.[77] Additionally, the peaks of witchcraft persecutions overlap with hunger crises that occurred in 1570 and 1580, the latter lasting a decade.[76] Problematically for these theories, it has been highlighted that, in that region, the witch hunts declined during the 1630s, at a time when the communities living there were facing increased disaster as a result of plague, famine, economic collapse, and the Thirty Years' War.[78] Furthermore, this scenario would clearly not offer a universal explanation, for trials also took place in areas which were free from war, famine, or pestilence.[79] Additionally, these theories—particularly Behringer's —have been labeled as oversimplified.[80] Although there is evidence that the Little Ice Age and subsequent famine and disease was likely a contributing factor to increase in witch persecution, Durrant argues that one cannot make a direct link between these problems and witch persecutions in all contexts.[80]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_...nterpretations


Scientists have explanations for the possible cause of the Little Ice Age, and those explanations include evidence that humans and natural phenomenon could have contributed to the weather changes. Worth noting is that scientists also have analyzed the evidence for what is causing the current warming trends, and they have concluded it is emissions linked to human activity. Even if the temperature was natural causes, the greenhouse gas emissions are off the charts, and their trajectory has profound consequences if they were to continue unchecked.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little...ossible_causes