An article by Robert Krulwich at NPR offers a relatively new theory on what happened to the Easter Islanders, who allegedly turned an isolated, tree-covered Pacific island into a comparatively desolate wasteland covered in statues. In my opinion, the competing theories of what happened all seem lacking in something. I’ve read that the Easter Islanders (or Rapa Nui) cut down all the trees in order to move the moai statues, or that they nearly drove themselves into extinction through warfare. Thanks to Google, I now know that there is also an alien “theory” (scare quotes intentional), although I don’t know why I’m surprised.

The new theory, from University of Hawaii anthropologists Terry Hunt and Carl Lipo, might make quite a bit more sense, although it is perhaps more discomfiting than the other theories. I won’t spoil it for you, because the article is worth a read and has interesting illustrations. In short, though, they believe that Easter Island was a success, not a failure—meaning that the bedraggled condition in which Europeans found them was the result of their survival. But it’s only one particular view of “success.” As Krulwich puts it:

Humans are a very adaptable species. We’ve seen people grow used to slums, adjust to concentration camps, learn to live with what fate hands them. If our future is to continuously degrade our planet, lose plant after plant, animal after animal, forgetting what we once enjoyed, adjusting to lesser circumstances, never shouting, “That’s It!” — always making do, I wouldn’t call that “success.”

Anyway, go read it.

Photo credit: Aurbina (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.