Amazonian civilization had estimated 3M people in 3% of forest area

Did it also change the ecological system of Australia? Some articles said that Aboriginals might have caused the extinction of a lot of larger animals in different ways, arguably superficially similar to how the mammuth was made extinct and how lions were hunted to extinction in Europe. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire-stick_farming#History . Was the plant diversity changed or lowered by the Aboriginals over the years?

Is there a difference in the approaches between "fire-stick burning", and the advanced farming or agricultural practices of for instance the Aztecs? Did Aboriginals and some of the Amerindian peoples north of the Aztecs do "fire-stick farming" by simply burning a region and then move in and simply primarily hunt and also gather from certain plants a bit, slightly organized; or did they have large-scale, high-density farming of crops like the Aztecs? Would Pueblos' farming techniques, and those doing Three Sisters farming techniques, be closer to that of the Aztecs than to fire-stick burning? Was fire-stick burning typically more nomadic, and the Aztecs' and others' techniques more sedentary?

> While this practice is often cited as a way to improve small gardens for individual use, its historical value lay in larger-scale implementations designed to nurture and sustain entire communities.[14]

I think it's very straightforward. Here's a recap of the thread, you can see it in the quote for the first item:

1. khanhnguyen8386 implied that they were "sophisticated ecosystem engineers, shaping the rainforest for centuries without destroying it."

2. smt88 challenged that by pointing that 97% of "the rainforest" was probably untouched by this group, as opposed to shaped deliberately.

3. I (Terr_) chime in to emphasize that we shouldn't assume a region was intentionally left-alone when the much simpler explanation is that it wasn't practical to exploit it.

> Your original claim which GP responded to is unrelated to that.

You have also confused me with some other user.

Homegardens seem much smaller in scale than large-scale chinampas as practiced by the Aztecs, right?

That's the myth. A lot of native populations farmed. Where do you think that farmland came from? It came from tearing down forests and tearing down trees. And yes, ancient peoples could do that with fire, and with older axes.

And not only was that wood cut down, but it was also used for fuel. Fuel for fires, for cooking. Fuel to warm a house at night.

Mines were a thing. Copper and lead and other metals were dug up from mines Surface mines were heavily damaging to the environment, with all sorts of minerals being dug up, and washed into the local water and river.

In fact, the only difference between older civilizations, and our civilization is that we have the technological capability to cause more damage. Native North and South Americans, were not any better, about the environment or living at peace and harmony with nature.

As an aside the same goes for violence, for war. Endless North American and South American civilizations waged war. They enslaved, they enslaved other civilizations, they warred with one another, they fought constantly, and just as today those nations had peaceful entities and warlike aggressive entities. Nothing has changed, nothing is different between the historical colonialistic civilizations of the West, and the new world.

The Aztecs were supremely violent, taking over civilizations all over the place, just as colonial as the West was.

You may wonder why I'm waxing and waning deeply on this topic, but the reason is that there seems to be this predominant thought that somehow, North American civilizations were perfect and pristine, and lived in utter utopian peace with nature and, each other. Nothing could be further from the truth.

And do you know why? Because they were human beings.

None of this says that the colonial behavior was perfect when European nations came here. Many things were done that should not have been done.

However, if you look at the history of the human race, including modern times, colonial behavior has always, I repeat, always been the case. Whether you were the Persian Empire, whether you were what is now India/Pakistan, whether you were China, whether you were any nation on the planet, there has been a history of colonial behavior. This includes all North American and South American peoples.

China was a wide-ranging number of kingdoms, that eventually settled to the Five Kingdoms and then a unified country. This was colonialism. This was subjugation and conquering of other peoples, until a unified country existed.

You can look at the Roman Empire, the Grecian Empire, the Babylonians. You can go and look at any culture, any history. You can look at modern times, and you can see what might be deemed colonialistic behavior.

I cite all of this, because there seems to be recent thought in the last 20 years that somehow, Native Americans and South Americans lived in utter peace and harmony with their environment and each other. Nothing could be further from the truth.

So back to the original point that kicked off this rantish blather, no ancient civilizations did not live in harmony with the environment on purpose, and any that had the technological capability or the framework of a civilization like the Aztecs, raised their local environment, ripped down forests, had open mines, destroyed the local environment, hands down.