SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Easter Island society did not collapse prior to European contact, new research shows:
Easter Island society did not collapse prior to European contact and its people continued to build its iconic moai statues for much longer than previously believed, according to a team of researchers including faculty at Binghamton University, State University of New York.
The island of Rapa Nui is well-known for its elaborate ritual architecture, particularly its numerous statues (moai) and the monumental platforms that supported them (ahu). A widely-held narrative posits that construction of these monuments ceased sometime around 1600, following a major societal collapse.
"Our research flies in the face of this narrative," said Carl Lipo, an anthropologist at Binghamton University. "We know, of course, that if we are right, we really need to challenge ourselves (and the archaeological record) to validate our arguments. In this case, we thought to look carefully at the tempo of construction events associated with large platforms."
The researchers, led by the University of Oregon's Robert J. DiNapoli, examined radiocarbon dates, relative architectural stratigraphy and ethnohistoric accounts to quantify the onset, rate and end of monument construction as a means of testing the collapse
[...] "What we found is that once people started to build monuments shortly after arrival to the island, they continued this construction well into the period after Europeans arrived," said Lipo. "This would not have been the case had there been some pre-contact "collapse"— indeed, we should have seen all construction stop well before 1722. The lack of such a pattern supports our claims and directly falsifies those who continue to support the 'collapse' account.
"Once Europeans arrive on the island, there are many documented tragic events due to disease, murder, slave raiding and other conflicts," he added. "These events are entirely extrinsic to the islanders and have, undoubtedly, devastating effects. Yet, the Rapa Nui people — following practices that provided them great stability and success over hundreds of years — continued their traditions in the face of tremendous odds. The degree to which their cultural heritage was passed on – and is still present today through language, arts and cultural practices — is quite notable and impressive. I think this degree of resilience has been overlooked due to the "collapse" narrative, and deserves recognition."
Journal Reference:
Robert J. DiNapoli, Timothy M. Rieth, Carl P. Lipo, Terry L. Hunt. A model-based approach to the tempo of "collapse": The case of Rapa Nui (Easter Island), Journal of Archaeological Science (DOI: 10.1016/j.jas.2020.105094)
(Score: 2, Troll) by Coward, Anonymous on Monday February 10 2020, @10:32PM (21 children)
The self-hatred runs deep. I remember when the Easter Islands were example A [discovermagazine.com] for how people cause their own demise through ecological collapse.
(Score: 4, Informative) by fadrian on Monday February 10 2020, @10:49PM (2 children)
I remember when the Easter Islands were example A [discovermagazine.com] for how people cause their own demise through ecological collapse.
Well, it turns out people were wrong about that. It's a shame you can't acknowledge that as things get studied more we actually do know more.
That is all.
(Score: 4, Touché) by Coward, Anonymous on Tuesday February 11 2020, @12:08AM
I agree that human understanding overall progresses. But I don't think progress is uniform and monotonic across all domains. And it doesn't happen without counter arguments.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 11 2020, @01:03AM
There was never any good reason to believe this, except that people like to try to make Easter Island into some sort of morality play that means what they want it to mean.
Contemporary accounts by European explorers in the late 18th century - well after the so-called collapse was supposed to have happened - found the society to be quite healthy. Although they did clear-cut all the forests and wipe out most of the biodiversity. But they didn't collapse, they just did less fishing and more farming.
All that said, radiocarbon studies of the moai (and the ahu, the platforms) have already been done [google.com] and found no evidence of any construction after the 17th century. This study needs to explain why they're better than the existing data, and "ethnohistoric accounts" (race memory from 400 years later, apparently) aren't going to cut it.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 10 2020, @11:23PM (15 children)
I don't hate myself or any other white person who isn't racist. I do regret and acknowledge the genocides committed by my ancestors and western society in general. I do hate any on-going genocide or oppression and think western societies do owe the world and should be working hard to bring our planetary siblings up along with us.
Why do you think this is some massive self-hatred thing? Are you just triggered by the concept of reparations? Are you so selfish and un-Jesus-like that you get angry about any feelings of obligation? Is some minority oppressing your statues of confederate traitors?
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 11 2020, @12:18AM
We need neither your self hatred no reparations. Just stop coming to us with your arms and rotten ideology. Drown your aircraft carriers yourself or we will. Keep your social manipulators withing your borders or we will. Basically, fuck off.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Coward, Anonymous on Tuesday February 11 2020, @12:54AM (5 children)
Who is "We" in "We killed them" ? People who have the same skin color as the first European (Dutch) visitors? In my book, taking responsibility for crimes you didn't commit amounts to self hatred.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 11 2020, @06:05AM
Isnt' this your precious white culture that is disappearing in the invasion of muslim, mexican and misc. brown types?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 11 2020, @05:03PM (3 children)
I refer you to the Germans who still have some pretty strong ideas about genocide and limiting hate speech. It sounds like you are fine with reaping the benefits of mass murder as long as you take none of the responsibility. Typical.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 11 2020, @07:17PM (2 children)
you're a brainwashed slave just like the devastated Germans who have been taught defending themselves against the aggressor Jew slave states of the UK, US, Russia and Poland was "hatred". Questioning the Jew lies of WW2 is hatred too.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 11 2020, @07:30PM
And you're a blithering idiot. Next?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 12 2020, @09:20PM
So Germany was "defending itself" against Poland?
Where did you learn history?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 11 2020, @03:39PM (6 children)
Oh what a load of virtue signaling hogwash. Yes, everybody just loves some good old genocide and oppression. Being against it something unique. Or not. Want me to explain history to you? And why you're the oppressor? It's real simple.
I believe people have every right to the fruits of their labor. And this includes the right to, for instance, pass such fruits onto their children. If they want to share it with other people, that's great. If they don't want to, that's also their choice. In essence - I believe in freedom above all. You have quite overtly stated you believe that people who do well "owe" those who do not do well. Now let's say it comes to decide and either my ideology or yours will win the day. What are you going to do if I don't budge an inch? What if I don't want to give you what I've earned and created?
History has the answer here. The issues involved may differ, but the outcome is always the same - war.
This has applied everywhere in the world at all levels. The natives in America, whom I count as one of my ancestors, were not sitting around smoking peace pipes and living in a beautiful harmony with mother nature until evil Europeans showed up. No, they were engaged in their own petty conflicts with war, slavery, rape, and all the pleasantries we see throughout the world. And in America that was especially pathetic since the natives were relatively few in number and America is incredibly bountiful. They *could* have indeed sat around singing Kumbaya if they wanted to, but alas - that is not the nature of mankind.
Nobody, well let's the vast majority, do not like war or its direct consequences. But when ideologies, ideals, and values come into mutually exclusive conflict - it's generally the only way things can be resolved. And it's amazing how often it's the virtue signalers that are the ones to throw the first punch. Stalin and Mao were saying what nearly all far-left types think is some new progressive ideal, a century ago. Them having to murder or indirectly kill tens of millions to achieve their ends? It's okay, it's all for a greater good.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday February 11 2020, @04:26PM (1 child)
War also happens, because of greed and pride. It doesn't have to be due to a difference in ideology. Could simply be, because you've got that thing that I want and I'm going to take it. There's a very popular example, if the story of Troy had much truth in it.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 11 2020, @05:02PM
Obviously his has happened, but I think the motivations are generally more complex. The main reason is that war is extremely expensive, and so the warmonger generally already has immense wealth. For instance I would call the story of Troy one of passion and revenge, rather than simple greed. Even my example has similar fundamental underpinnings of greed. "What are you going to do if I don't budge an inch? What if I don't want to give you what I've earned and created?" Well, then you're going to try to take it by force. The rationalization will of the aggressor there would be that by taking my property, they will create a better good for the whole world. But in the end it's the exact same core as greed - 'I can do better stuff with what you have than you can. Give it to me.'
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 11 2020, @09:19PM (3 children)
Ah I see, you sweep it all away with "virtue signaling."
So all the remaining systemic problems that African Americans and Native Americans face should be ignored? Sorry our grandparents fucked you over, not our problem that you're still suffering from those actions?
You're a sociopath, in good company with the other white-genocide AC dummy below.
I guess the concept of making up for national crimes is beyond you. Destroying other countries, murdering massive populations, yes these are debts the US should address.
Sociopathic cunt is what you are.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 12 2020, @07:21AM (2 children)
People are not failing because of what happened a hundred, let alone hundreds of years ago. They're failing because of what they do, or do not do, today.
Many people are born into poverty. What happens from there is not decided by your grandfather, but by you. If you do at all decent in school (and frankly even if you don't in modern times) that opens the door to college. Get a real degree, and you're set for life. And this system is already substantially weighted in favor of e.g. blacks and natives, since most admissions systems for colleges are racist and will give you a much higher admissions eval, compared to an identical person in an identical situation, if your skin happens to be black and theirs is not. Even if the college path is not for you, there are a ton of skilled trades people can get involved in. There's a never-ending need for plumbers, electricians, AC guys, and so on. And even better there - these generally work on apprenticeship systems and instead of going into debt during your education, you're actually getting paid to learn!
The past was not pretty and the future's not looking like it'll be much better. But on a personal level, we live in the present. And the decisions you make today are the primary factor deciding what your future will hold for you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 12 2020, @06:36PM (1 child)
Incorrect, at least here in the US there are many cities where minority communities are oppressed, legislation crafted to target and disenfranchise them, zoning rules to make things harder.
For example, freeway off/on ramps are frequently not built for specific communities. Voter ID laws end up targeting specific demographics. The War on Drugs was to incarcerate minorities and thus strip their voting rights. Kids that grew up with parents in jail have less chances of succeeding.
This typical "personal responsibility" trope is so asinine and arrogant. How does that square up with a child who is malnourished because they grew up in poverty? The child didn't have a choice and paid in their physiological well being which in turn impacts their success in life.
Go back to Atlas Shrugged, then revel in the fact that Ayn Rand required welfare at the end of her life. She is a stain on human history.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 18 2020, @07:08PM
No there are not. You're simply making stuff up at this point. There are some things that affect groups of people differently because of the behavior of people, however. For instance blacks tend to default on loans at a vastly higher rate than other groups, and thus tend to be undesirable to lend to. And so you can look at the data and see 'banks not lending to blacks'. No, banks are not lending to people who they don't think will default. And similarly, the rate of of malnutrition for lack of food availability in the US is practically zero. You're engaging in a typical fallacy and taking a near non-existent group, and arguing as if they make up some relevant chunk of society. They don't.
And Ayn Rand was nothing more than a useful idiot elevated for purposes of propaganda. I base my views on reality and facts, not on ideology. The difference between the two being that I subscribe to no ideology. Ideologies are the AIDS of the mind.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 11 2020, @08:13PM
Yes you do, you brainwashed fuck. The term "racist" is Bolshevik Jew anti-white propaganda meant to make you feel guilty for being proud of and protective of your race. Ever notice how being "racist" only exists if you are White? If you weren't so guilty you would see it everywhere, but you're too busy being sorry for "your" past transgressions. As if all war is not genocide when one side won't give up. Killing is the whole fucking point of war. The "native americans" were migrants who eventually killed, bred out or displaced ancient white men living in America too. but you don't know about that, b/c you believe the Jew-controlled, science, media and schools. Almost all borders are decided by war, and the ones that weren't, were probably bought by more modern white men trying to do it in a more peaceful way. Slavery? Boo fucking hooo. Whites were already so brainwashed they gave the Africans in America their freedom and let them stay in this previously White country. They were too pitiful to regain their own freedom. Yet, they still call white people "crackers" as if it's all our fault they allowed themselves to be slaves to the 1-2% richest people. Your freedom is your own responsibility. Reparations? I'm saving them up now. I'll be ready to deliver them from projects to projects when the time comes. Confederate traitors? You would be a self righteous Yankee, wouldn't you.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday February 11 2020, @12:04AM
Didn't even read the summary then?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday February 11 2020, @02:39AM
Well, duh... who wrote that history?
Are the French sheep herding gentry going to allow publication of a work naming them as the instrument of genocide? Are they even going to allow people who _think_ like that to stay on the island long enough to gather any kind of evidence? And, people being what people are, most of them would never even entertain the thought of something that might cast their Lord in an ill light.
🌻🌻 [google.com]