Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Just in time for Christmas: The Story of Easter Island
Continuing on my schizophrenia about environmental issues...
How many of you have heard the shocking true story of the Easter Islands? It's one of my favourites, since it's demonstrates so much about human nature.
So even though you can easily just look up the story elsewhere, I'm going to retell it for you in my own words.
The stuff about the statues being left (or inspired) by UFOs is, of course, crap. The stuff about "a primitive society could never have managed the engineering feat, yada yada" likewise crap. Long before we could write, we humans have been astounding ourselves with our knack for gargantuan engineering feats.
According to the pieced-together bits of oral legend and archeology, the Easter Island big head statues were clan status symbols. Like the Egyptian pyramids, when a clan leader died, his successor would demonstrate the wealth, power and status of the clan by ordering up one of these memorial statues.
They weren't easy to do. The soft volcanic rock used for the statues was found in a quarry in the centre of the island. The statues were carved on site and then slowly, gently rolled upright to their final destinations near the shore using a system of giant rollers made out of tree trunks. Mishaps were frequent, so any given statue project often had to be done over and over again.
That last part was where the entire Easter Island civilization fell apart. Not the rocks, not even the ridiculous expenditure of effort over a useless status symbol. The trees. Trees, or rather the lack of them, finally killed them. And, boy, did it get ugly.
They lived on an island. Their resources were limited. They didn't have good arboriculture and they only had so many trees. The "market" for big head statues grew. By the end of their culture, there was one statue for every 10 residents. The inventory of trees, on the other hand, did not grow nearly fast enough.
What astounds historians to this day is that they would have seen the consequences. Especially in the latter days, when statue building reached a frenzy, it would have been obvious over the course of a single human lifetime that the forests were getting smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller. Finally, some dumb fucker must have been the guy who cut down the last tree on Easter Island.
No trees = no shade for tropical vegetation. No vegetation = no animals. No vegetation + no animals + no material to build fishing boats = No food.
The last oral legends of the great Easter Island civilization tell of a society that descended into total chaos, including cannibalism and endless clan warfare. The final "artistic" legacy (if you can call it that) of the Easter Island civilization is a set of bizarrely grotesque aphorisms about cannibalism e.g. "The meat of your mother sticks to your teeth." Um, good to know, I guess.
We don't know how much of these legends is true. What we do know: biologists tell us the island was once thick with palm trees and that the few now left are quite young. Archaeologists can tell us the population collapsed around the 17th-18th century and that there is physical evidence of famine.
And anyone can tell you that the human capacity for stupidity and self-deception is endless.
These are the facts.
On an unrelated topic, have you heard about the exciting new developments in oilsands recovery?
posted by Mentok @ 12:14 p.m.,
5 Comments:
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At 3:26 p.m.,
Rick said...
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This reminds me of one of the most amusing parts (to me) of The Hitch-hikers Guide to the Galaxy, where the narrative takes an extended sidebar on the topic of humans' fascination with digital watches.
In point of fact, I'm fascinated by my digital watch, some 2+ decades after digital watches first hit the streets and Adams penned his book.
Will the digital watch be our epitaph?
If so, can we set the time to be something funny when you read it backwards and upside down? -
At 9:48 p.m.,
cchang said...
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No trees = no shade for tropical vegetation. No vegetation = no animals. No vegetation + no animals + no material to build fishing boats = No food.
Wow. I actually have not heard this story, but how fascinating...especially the bit about the market for heads getting bigger.
Goes to show the downfall of humanity is most always tied to greed.
Ahhh Hitch-hiker's Guide...is that the one with the cows that are bred to tell you which cut of meat is tastiest on themselves or was that Restaurant at the End of the Universe?
Frankly, when I die, I don't want a marker. I just want to be quietly donated to a medical school where students can gawk as my huge upper arms and lopsided brain. -
At 7:55 p.m.,
Scotsman said...
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I knew most of this story but as I understood it the statues were made for their Gods so that they may watch over them favourably and as the situation of the people got more desperate the need to appease the Gods became greater. Which ultimately only increased the speed in which they brought about their own downfall. Whatever the true story - greed, ego or misplaced hope in the divine intervention of a higher power the end result was the same.
Sadly I suspect there will always be people out there that will say that may happen on an island but could never happen to the whole world but it looks like it happening bit by bit in a fragmented way throughout the ecosystem. -
At 8:55 a.m.,
adam said...
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Jared Diamond has a book, I think called 'Collapse', which talks about dozens of human communities (including a long section on Easter Island) which have at some point cut down the last tree and a handful which seem to be managing things astonishingly well just now - it's a good read, in fact I think he's a good read generally, also 'The Rise and Fall of the Third Chimpanzee' and perhaps especially 'Why Is Sex Fun?'.
On the side of this, of course, an attempt to pool consensual scientific opinion can be found over here -
At 9:43 a.m.,
Mentok said...
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rick - ah, the good old Hitchhikers' Guide. I read that for the first time while actually hitchhiking through Europe, which greatly amplified both the humour and profundity of the book.
cchang - I'm with you, sister, on the "no marker" thing, but I want to get the crispy critter treatment and then scattered.
scotsman - welcome aboard! Your version of the story makes a lot more sense and it's equally (if not more) relevant to modern times. The messes we create with technology we try to fix with technology but that doesn't always work.
crash - I haven't read Diamond's book (only portions of it) but I definitely should.
From reviews I've read, there's some suggestion that Diamond may have partially created the modern legend of Easter Island for propaganda purposes. It is said, for example, that he overlooked some biological data that suggests that the demise of the trees was partially due to natural changes in climate.
But myth and legend are vital to the way we see the world and propaganda is just an extension of myth and legend. The fine, small details do not detract from the fact that the Easter Island people made their problems worse through stubbornness and stupidity.
