The Environmental Change and the Collapse of Easter Island

In 1835 the Chatham Islands were discovered by a British seal hunting ship approximately 500 miles off the coast of New Zealand. Because of an abundance of fish and food available, there were numerous inhabitants. However, they did not know how to fight and they had no real weapons to use when they tried to hunt the game accessible to them. The Chatham Islands become inhabited in 1,000 AD. However, the climate is too cold for them to grow crops, and they become hunter gatherers of lobster, shellfish, and seal. The island that was inhabited was too small to support a lot of people, so they castrated some men and boys to handle population control. Contrasting with this new generation, the people on the original island specialized in agriculture and therefore gave rise to more dense populations. The cultivation group-type slaughters the other type because their agricultural society made them more bloodthirsty and warlike due to the more complicated features that an agricultural community possess. This leads Diamond to develop six major environmental variations that can apply to all societies: Climate, Geological type, Marine Resources, Area, Terrain fragmentation, and Isolation. Environmental factors and innovation are key sources to the success or demise of a

Jared Diamond is a world renowned scientist, author, Pulitzer Prize winner, and currently a geography professor at UCLA. Of his six books published, we will be looking at the last chapter of his fourth book, Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. In this book Diamond utilizes the comparative method to find resemblance in past societal collapses with our current society. In the chapter entitled, "The World as Polder: What Does it Mean to Us Today," Diamond points out that there are indeed many parallels between past and present societies and that our modern day society is currently on a path of self destruction , through examples such as globalization and the interdependency of each country.

In the article by Jared Diamond, many interesting theories are discussed about Easter Island’s history and decline. Diamond makes connections to the environmental challenges we face today and he compares the catastrophe of Easter Island to our current over consumption of natural resources. While this article makes for an interesting read, much of it is offered from a single perspective and little counter evidence is offered. The author writes in a way that could engage a non-academic audience who may not be interested in counter evidence, or proper referencing. The article lacks credibility due to its narrow scope and conversational diction. At the root of this discussion however, is the notion that the Rapa Nui people were

The Hawaiians were further depicted as "thieves" like the rest of the "people in Polynesia," and plagued with the barbaric accusation of committing infanticide. These so called "facts" were enough for the Euro-American forces to send out missionaries to regulate the Hawaiian people and take over their land and all their practices. (Stannard, 381- 417)

I found this chapter absolutely fascinating. For me the real insights were the role of the political system in the building of the giant stone statues that became Easter Island’s biggest mystery when it was discovered in 1722. There were hundreds of erect statues with no one there. Who built them? As Diamond explains, it was the dozen clans that controlled the island who built them. “The clans competed peacefully by seeking to outdo each other in building

In this essay it will explore and discuss in particular, the key initial drivers, major changes in its structure over its life, the reasons caused its demise, the social impact of its demised including internally and externally, and the lessons learned for all factors mentioned above.

purpose: Highlights the collapse of several historical societies and the factors that caused their collapse.

Beginning with Mark Hendrickson’s argument, he recognizes that the climate is changing. He wrote in his article “Climate Change-Hoax or Crime of the Century” that the Earth has emerged from a Little Ice Age not that long ago, and it would be worrisome if the climate around the globe was not warming

The word “collapse” has a number of connotations associated with it. Some view it exclusively the degradation of societies of the highest order. Others see it as the complete disintegration of economic prospects and commerce. Some even think of it political ruin with the demise of states and ruling factions that maintain order. The most general definition for collapse can includes elements from these three viewpoints. American anthropologist and historian Joseph A. Tainter is best known for his writings on societal collapses. In 1988 he published his most widely recognized work, The Collapse of Complex Societies.

Warming oceans might trigger an eruption of methane now frozen beneath the sea floor, leading to global warming on a catastrophic scale.

     The people of Easter Island came over to their new land, and recognized that it was ideal for them to settle. The land was lush; the sea was providing a bounty of fresh fish, and other seafood. The earth was dark brown, and very rich. Everything was just the way it needed to be to support a growing community of people.

As the island began to suffer from the lack of trees, the society quickly descended into chaos; a chaos that became reality due to the conflicting ideologies of the Polynesian civilization. While structuralist argument may say that the institutions and geography at play on the Easter Island may be the reason for the collapse of the civilization, yet I believe that while the island did have less rainfall than what the Polynesians were accustomed to, the over-deforestation and infighting truly lead to the fall. (Diamond, 2005) Thus, through the readings of Keegan and Diamond, the argument on culture leading to the downfall and collapse of the Easter Island best explains

Lush to barren, bio-diverse to disturbed, blooming beauty to foul crudeness—is a common theme plaguing the natural world at this precise moment in time. Humans are overtaxing the splendor of nature, altering it into an unrecognizable wasteland ravaged by greed and economic lust. Such a modification can even be fatal, extinguishing green eternally in replacement of stark soil that sadly anticipates some form of aid with the capability to maybe replenish it. Within “The Lorax” and the land mass known as Easter Island, both environments are victim to the immoral whims of humanity and the consequent demolition it wreak, the two merely differing in the advancement of technology.

The Great Warming by Brian Fagan claims that environmental changes (most commonly prolonged droughts, El Niños, and La Niñas during the Medieval Warm Period) affect human civilization, including human’s trading abilities, overall movement, and quality of life. He examines the world’s ancient climate warming, known as the Medieval Warming, between the 10th and the 15th centuries, also mentioning the preceding and succeeding centuries. Fagan gathers his research using studies conducted by archaeologists, historians, and paleoclimatologists. Throughout his book, he refers to direct methods to study climate change, such as instrument records and historical documents, and indirect methods, such as ice, deep sea cores, coral records, and tree rings. Fagan digs into the rise and fall of multiple civilizations around the world as an effect of The Medieval Warming Period. As well as examining civilizations across the world, he attempts to connect the climate change patterns during The Medieval Warming Period to the current global warming faced today. The Great Warming discusses positive and negative connections between climate change and human civilizations across the world, starting in Europe and working its way into Asia, North America, South America, Africa, and even covering the arctic ice caps; however, throughout the book, Fagan has a hard time connecting his various ideas back to one main topic and can easily stray from his point about the effects of climate change.

Geologically, Easter Island is one of the youngest inhabited territories on the earth. Its inhabitants, the Rapu Nui, have endured epidemics or disease, famines, slave raids, civil war, cannibalism, and have seen their population crash on more than one occasion. Easter Island is famous for its statues, the Moai. Easter Island is a Chilean territory located in the south eastern Pacific Ocean. It has a population of six thousand and has an area of 163.6 km2 .Easter Island is famous for its 200 stone statues. The Moai as they’re known were made by the local people from basalt stone picks and hard volcano ash. They were made to show remembrance to their gods and ancestors. I will be exploring what caused the downfall of Easter island.