mystery of rapa nui

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The Mystery of Rapa Nui

An Introduction to the Tragedy of the Commons

Steve Zavestoski

Associate Professor

Sociology and Environmental Studies

[email protected]

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Tuesday, September 20, 2011



Where in the

World isEaster Island?

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How/When was Easter Island settled?

• Linguists estimate Easter Island's first inhabitantsarrived around AD 400

• Today most scholars agreethat they came from EastPolynesia.

• Tahiti and the Marquesashad been reached by AD300; southward, northward

and southeast explorationled Polynesians to Easter Island, Hawaii, and NewZealand.

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“Arrival on Rapa Nui,” by Liesl Clark

April 17, 1998

Nothing can prepare you for a place like this -- a tiny speck of land that sits in themiddle of the South Pacific and is a 5-hour plane ride from anywhere else on

Earth. Green grass volcanic craters rise up from low-lying hills covered withmillions of basalt lava rocks rounded with time. Surf pounds the black rockcoastline and breathtaking views from the hills above inevitably draw your eyetoward the flat infinite horizon.

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What’s so special about Easter Island?

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Moai: The Stone Giants•Called "moai" by islanders

•human heads-on-torsos carvedin the male form from roughhardened volcanic ash

• On average, they stand 13 feethigh and weigh 14 tons

•887 giant moai punctuate Easter Island's barren landscape

• When European explorers first

arrived 1722, 2/3 of island’s moaihad been destroyed

• No written record of their purpose

• Oral history is scant

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What could the Moai mean?

•The moai and ceremonial sites arealong the coast, with a concentrationon Easter Island's southeast coast.

•They stand with their backs to the seaand are believed by mostarchaeologists to represent the spiritsof ancestors, chiefs, or other high-ranking males who held importantpositions in the history of Rapa Nui.

•The moai may also hold a sacred rolein the life of the Rapa Nui, acting asceremonial conduits for communication with the gods.

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Rano Raraku, a volcanic crater that is the

main quarry for Easter Island's statues,looks like a virtual moai graveyard.

Archaeologist Jo Anne Van Tilburgsuggests that the moai production inRano Raraku quarry probably startedand stopped often over the years.

Rano Raraku: The Quarry

The stone-faced giants lie in variousstates of production. Some are half carved, many are broken, and manyseem to have been abandoned inmid-transport.

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Paro is the island's largesttransported moai. Lyingface down, toppled from itsahu, Paro weighs 82 tonsand is 32.45 feet (9.89meters) long.

Paro: Moving the Moai

It is difficult to imaginehow the islanders movedsuch large statues fromthe quarry four miles (sixkilometers) away

Some have theorized thatit could have taken four tofive hundred people to

move Paro.

Paro's pukaoalone is almost

six feet (twometers) across,5.5 feet (1.7meters) high,and weighs 11.5

tons.

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Mystery of the Moai• Total number of moai on Easter Island:

887

• Total number of maoi transported totheir final ahu locations: 288 (32%)

• Total number of moai still in the RanoRaraku quarry: 397 (45%)

• Total number of moai lying 'in transit'

outside of the Rano Raraku quarry: 92(10%)

• Was it due to the inherent difficultiesin transporting them?

•Were the ones that remain in thequarry deemed culturally unworthy of transport?

•Were they originally intended toremain in place on the quarry slopes?

Less than a third of all carvedmoai actually made it to a finalceremonial ahu site. Why?

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Or, did the islanders exhaust the island’s

resources trying to carve and move the moai?•

Rapa Nui's population reached ahigh of 9,000 by 1550.

•Moai carving and transport werein full swing from 1400 to 1600

•Between 1600 and European

contact in 1722, Rapa Nuiunderwent radical change

•Core sampling from the islandhas revealed deforestation, soildepletion, and erosion

•From this devastating ecologicalscenario it is not hard to imaginethe resulting overpopulation,food shortages, and ultimatecollapse of Rapa Nui society.

•

Most scholars point to the culturaldrive to complete the moai as thekey cause of depletion of theisland's resources.

•Palm forests disappeared, cleared

for agriculture as well as for moving moai

•Archaeologist Jo Anne Van Tilburgcomments, "The price they paidfor the way they chose to

articulate their spiritual andpolitical ideas was an island worldwhich came to be, in many ways,but a shadow of its former naturalself."




What can we learn?

If mere thousands of Easter Islanders with only stone tools and

their own muscle power sufficed to destroy their society, how can

billions of people with metal tools and machine power fail to do

worse?

“But there is one crucial difference. The Easter Islanders had no

books and no histories of other doomed societies. Unlike the

Easter Islanders, we have histories of the past-- information that

can save us. My main hope … is that we may now choose to learnfrom the fates of societies like Easter's.”

Jared Diamond, “Easter Island’s End,” Discover, August 1995




The Tragedy of the Commons

“Each man is locked intoa system that compelshim to increase his herdwithout limit—in a worldthat is limited. Ruin is thedestination toward whichall men rush, eachpursuing his own bestinterest in a society thatbelieves in the freedom of

the commons. Freedom ina commons brings ruin toall.”

Garret Hardin, “The

Tragedy of theCommons,” Science,162(1968):1243-1248.




The Prisoner’s Dilemma

Two burglars, Bob and Al, are captured near the scene of a

burglary and are interrogated separately. Each has to

choose whether or not to confess and implicate the other.

If neither man confesses, then both will serve one year ona charge of carrying a concealed weapon. If each

confesses and implicates the other, both will go to prison

for 10 years. However, if one burglar confesses and

implicates the other, and the other burglar does notconfess, the one who has collaborated with the police will

go free, while the other burglar will go to prison for 20

years on the maximum charge.




The Prisoner’s Dilemma

Al

Bob’ssentence

(in years)Al’s

sentence ConfessDon’t

Confess

Confess 10

10

0

20

Don’tConfess

20

0

11




The failure of rational

decisionmaking…The “dilemma” faced by the prisoners here is that, whatever

the other does, each is better off confessing than remaining

silent. But the outcome obtained when both confess is worsefor each than the outcome they would have obtained had

both remained silent. A common view is that the puzzle

illustrates a conflict between individual and group

rationality. A group whose members pursue rational self-interest may all end up worse off than a group whose

members act contrary to rational self-interest.




The Commons DilemmaAl

Catch/yr

X

# yrs left in

common

Observe

Limits

Don’tObserve

Limits

ObserveLimits

1 ton x ∞

1 ton x ∞

1 ton x 10yrs

2 tons

x 10 yrs

Don’tObserve

Limits

2 tons x 10yrs

1 ton

x 10 yrs

2 tonsx 5 yrs

2 tonsx 5 yrs




How Can We Overcome

the Commons Dilemma?

• Sociology: Social solidarity and trust, maintained

by social institutions, protect the commons• Anthropology: Cultural beliefs and values

attached to the commons compel people to protectit

• Political Science: Government regulation of thecommons

• Economics: Privatize the commons, and peoplewill act to protect their privately owned piece of the former common resource

Different answers from different disciplines:


mystery of rapa nui

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