It is a familiar tale of greed, stupidity and self-destruction. For hundreds of years the inhabitants of one of the most remote islands on Earth vied with each other to build ever more impressive statues, pillaging their resources to feed their obsession. Ecological disaster was inevitable. As the island's last tree was felled, the society collapsed into a holocaust of internecine warfare, starvation and cannibalism. Rival clans toppled each other's statues. Armed with deadly obsidian-tipped spears, the workers rose up against their rulers. The vanquished were either enslaved or eaten.This version of events on Easter Island has become not onlyreceived wisdom, but a dark warning about a possible fate for our entire planet.
"The parallels between Easter Island and the whole modern world are chillingly obvious," writes Jared Diamond of the University of California, Los Angeles, in Collapse. "Easter's isolation makes it the clearest example of a society that destroyed itself by overexploiting its own resources." Here is the perfect illustration of the idea that humanity contains the seeds of its own destruction. But is it true or, in our eagerness to think the worst of our species, have we been seduced by mythologies?That is the question now being asked. Researchers point to mounting evidence that prehistoric occupants of Rapa Nui, as it is known by locals, made asuccess of life on the island. What's more, it seems the theory of self-destruction might conceal an even less palatable truth about what caused the ultimate toppling of this society. At the very least, there is painfully little archaeological evidence for the fundamental claims that underpin the self-destruction theory. "Much of what has been written about Easter Island is little more than speculation," says Terry Hunt of the University of Hawaii. "When you start to search for the actual evidence for some of these claims, often it just isn't there."It is easy to see how the tiny, remote island has captured imaginations. Created by three volcanic eruptions and with an area of just 170 square kilometres, Rapa Nui'snearest. ...