Commentary on Puleston et al (2018): Commentary: Rain, Sun, Soil, and Sweat: A Consideration of Population Limits on Rapa Nui (Easter Island) before European Contact

Carl P. Lipo1*, Robert J. DiNapoli2, Terry L. Hunt3 1Department of Anthropology, Binghamton University, Binghamton, NY, USA. 2Department of Anthropology, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR, USA. 3Honors College and School of Anthropology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA. Keywords: collapse, demography, Easter Island, model parameterization, open science Constructive criticism is the foundation of sound scientific […]

AN ANNOTATED VERSION OF JARED DIAMOND’S 1995 ARTICLE “EASTER’S END” – PART III

Pollen records show that destruction of Easter’s forests was well under way by the year 800 [there is no evidence were here on the island at this time. The only evidence for humans on Raa Nui comes at 1200AD], just a few centuries after the start of human settlement [also wrong]. Then charcoal from wood […]

AN ANNOTATED VERSION OF JARED DIAMOND’S 1995 ARTICLE “EASTER’S END” – PART II

European visitors throughout the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries estimated Easter’s human population at about 2,000, a modest number considering the island’s fertility [Why is this ‘modest’? It is only that way if you assume there must have been many more people. Given the size of the island, the fraction that is useful for cultivation […]

An annotated version of Jared Diamond’s 1995 article “Easter’s End” – Part I

The content below was written by Jared Diamond and appeared in the August 1, 1995 edition of Discover Magazine (http://discovermagazine.com/1995/aug/eastersend543). The content of the article article been widely copy-and-pasted by others and often serves as the basis for what people think they know about the island. Here, I try to provide comments to help update […]

Some useful info…

I’ve found this description on the logic behind Markov Chain Monte Carlo methods to be quite useful in conceptualizing the approach: https://towardsdatascience.com/a-zero-math-introduction-to-markov-chain-monte-carlo-methods-dcba889e0c50 This summary of data visualization is also quite handy: Plotting the Course Through Charted Waters

Easter Island Talk – Dr. Terry Hunt – Binghamton University. January 22, 2018, @5:15PM

Dr. Terry Hunt (the University of Arizona, Dean of the Honors College, and Professor of Anthropology), will be giving a talk on Easter Island in S1-149 @5:15PM on Monday, Jan 22. The talk will be “Orthogenesis, Evolution, and the Case of Rapa Nui (Easter Island)”. Orthogenesis, Evolution, and the Case of Rapa Nui (Easter Island) […]