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Climate Change and Conflict (2nd Millennium Europe)

Open Science project repository.

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Description

This repository contains the files and data necessary to replicate the analyses described in the following paper:

*A reassessment of the impact of temperature change on European conflict during the second millennium CE using a bespoke Bayesian time-series model *

In this study, we re-evaluated previously published results regarding the impact of long-term temperature change on conflict in Europe during the 2nd millennium CE. In that previous study, the authors identified a negative relationship between temperature and 2nd millennium European conflict levels (see the study here). Those results were based on a statistical model that wasn’t optimal given the data at hand, however. So, we developed a new Bayesian time-series (state-space) model that better accounts for the nature and structure of the historical conflict record. Our findings indicate that there was no long-term relationship between changing temperatures and conflict levels contrary to the previously published findings.

Repository DOI

DOI

Replication

To replicate the analysis described in the paper, click the download link above. Then, start an R session with the working directory set to ./Src in the downloaded repository. Next, run source("start.R").

Assuming you have the required libraries installed, the scripts will build the appropriate model and run the MCMC using Nimble. To produce plots, uncomment the plot commands in ./Src/NimblePoisTS_change.R and/or explore the plotting scripts in the ./Src/Plotting/ folder.

Contact

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License

Shield: CC BY 4.0

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

CC BY 4.0