This is actually interesting. Is this some kind of "Communist" thing?
Still, I would like to know how many of the Maori were "real" atheists, and how many had "uncertain unbelief", which seems to be a much softer position, something like the "type 7 atheist" mentioned in a previous blog post ("atheists who are sympathetic to mystical and negative theologies"). Which in this case would be traditional Maori religion.
Now, do Gypsies.
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| No rare whales were harmed when generating this picture |
DNA studies supposedly confirms the new take on Easter Island, a kind of best blend of post-colonial political correctness and crypto-Hancockite pre-Columbian contact.
Or maybe not.
Note the critical remarks hidden away in the two last paragraphs! Did they test the wrong skeletons (all 15 of them)? Something tells me this controversy will continue for another seven decades or so...
Easter Island population never collapsed, but it did have contacts with Native Americans
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| Credit: Takuta - Edward Hyde - FLICKR |
Another utopia exposed?
Hundreds of thousands abused in state and religious facilities in New Zealand
“Easter Island Origins” is a very recent documentary about the mysterious Rapa Nui (Easter Island) in the Pacific Ocean. The island is almost isolated from the rest of the world but famous due to its large stone statues (“moai”), remnants of a vanished high culture. But perhaps Easter Island isn´t really that mysterious. Maybe its people and culture have simply been mystified by outsiders? Judging by this documentary, the answer is “yes”…but some of the new research on the island have led to sensational results anyhow.
Controversially, Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl claimed that Easter Island had been inhabited by migrants from South America. While this is disproven (the earliest settlers on Rapa Nui were certainly from other parts of Polynesia), DNA research suggests that there actually might be a connection between the island and the South American mainland. The documentary is somewhat unclear on this point, but if I understand it correctly, the idea is that the *Polynesians* sailed to South America, rather than the other way around.
Genetic markers typical of the Zenú
people in Colombia have been found among the peoples of the Tuamotu Islands,
the Marquesas Islands, Mangareva and Easter Island. The idea seems to be that
the Polynesians first colonized the two former, then reached the South American
mainland, only to return home (presumably with Zenú wives and/or mixed race children).
Some of these people with mixed descent participated in the somewhat later
discovery and settlement of Mangareva and Easter Island, explaining why the Zenú
marker is found there too. The sculptures in “medieval” Colombia had a strong
resemblance to those found in the Marquesas, the Tuamotus, Mangareva and Rapa Nui
(although the moai at Easter Island are much larger in size).
The usual Western picture of Easter Island is that of a downright irrational population who cut down all trees and used up all rock (which could be used as fertilizer) in a vain and manic pursuit of building larger and larger statues. War and civilizational collapse promptly followed, and when the Europeans arrived, the native Polynesians had already forgot their great traditions, lived in caves and drank sea water.
“Easter Island Origins” contain interviews with archeologists who deny this traditional picture. They believe that the population of the island was always relatively small (and hence couldn´t dramatically “collapse” in the first place), that there is no evidence of warfare, nor of settlements being abandoned by people taking to the hills. There *is* evidence of wide-spread deforestation, but this was due to rats, which lacked natural enemies and hence proliferated en masse, consuming the seeds of the trees in the process.
The real (human) population collapse took place after the arrival
of the European colonists, when various diseases to which the natives lacked
immunity killed off most of the population. *This* led to the great statues
being abandoned or destroyed during the 19th century. Easter Island
was also attacked by slave-raiders from Peru. The handful of survivors who were
able to return to the island carried smallpox with them and infected the rest
of the population. At its lowest, the native population was only 40 people!
Today, it´s back around 3000, approximately the same number as before Western
colonialism. The island has been controlled by Chile since 1888.
It´s a
tragic story of a people that actually reached the American mainland centuries
before Columbus made a landfall in the Caribbean…
And no, no evidence of Lemuria!
Do we finally have evidence that the Polynesians reached the New World long before the conquistadors showed up? Analyses of plant remains from Easter Island (Rapa Nui) suggest that the Polynesian settlers visited South America and took back food plants only found there. Which means they had contacts with some Native people growing them.
I´m not particularly surprised that the Polynesian connection have been proven. Or proven first? The Polynesian landfall was around 1000 AD, hence later than the "Viking" journey to Vinland, but still pre-Columbian. Sure wonder what else lurks out there...
The second link goes to an article arguing that the mysterious rongorongo script was developed independently by the Polynesians at Easter Island.
Polynesians at Rapa Nui had contacts with South America 1000 years ago
Who is Jason Palmer? Some dude who defeated Joe Biden in the Democratic primaries in a territory that doesn´t even vote in POTUS elections and only has 6 delegates at the Dem convention. Three of which went to Biden anyway.
Yes, the territory in question is American Samoa. Only 91 people voted in the Democratic Party primaries. 51 of them for Palmer. Probably because he actually campaigned before the caucus (through zoom), whereas Biden did nothing.
In 2020, American Samoa was the only territory won by Michael Bloomberg in the Democrat primaries, so they certainly have a tendency to vote in unexpected ways. Sure wonder what super-rich Bloomberg promised them back in the day? A new playa?
This news item will be forgotten forever tomorrow morning. Even on Samoa...
Who is Jason Palmer? A previously unknown Democrat beats Biden in American Samoa´s Democratic caucus
An interesting YouTube clip about "Asian eyes". Apart from actual East and Southeast Asians, many other peoples around the world have "Asian eyes" or at least somewhat "Asian looks": Polynesians, American Indians and the Inuit are obvious examples. Here, the explanation seems pretty straightforward: these ethnic groups are distant descendants from East Asians (or somewhat less distant in the Inuit case).
But why do some Europeans (yes, including the Sami - deal with it) have "Asian" eyes and/or looks? In some cases, genetic influx from Asians is the best explanation, in others, it´s something of a mystery. Why do some people in Britain have "Asian" eyes? Why does the Icelandic pop singer Björk look "Asian"? One explanation is that already the ancient Indo-Europeans had an Asiatic admixture, and that this particular lineage ended up among the Celts at the British Isles. Another possibility might be admixture with Americans Indians or Inuit. After the video was posted, Icelandic writer Bergsveinn Birgisson wrote a book about one of his medieval ancestors, a "Black Viking" whose mother may have been Siberian.
More unexpected are "Asian" eyes in Africa - except at Madagascar, where the population is partially descended from long-distance Asian seafarers. But why do Nilotic and Khoi-San people have "Asian" eyes? Perhaps here, we finally have a case of convergent evolution...
Surprisingly interesting for a "nerd video".
This must be the strangest news item this year. I suppose we could call it queer as fuck! Is Andrew Anglin behind this, somehow?
Why are rich people suddenly buying up islands all over the world? Edward Dutton and PJW comments...
I´m sure this isn´t a conspiracy of any kind. I mean, it´s already been exposed, right? :D
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| Credit: Michael Pinczolits |
Nice try, gringos. Maybe you are lying *now* for some reason?
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| Bild från Maui |
Lite turbulens kring Lena Andersson nu igen. Debattartikeln i Expressen får väl in en del poänger...
It´s become something of a gimmick here on the blog to post pics of particularly well-endowed young women everytime a Chinese spy balloon enters US air space or an American bank collapses. However, this has now become so common that the blog might run the risk of looking, shall we say, highly suggestive.
So from now on I will instead post pics of rare birds whenever the events mentioned above take place. I expect this to be something of a weekly feature in the months and years ahead...
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| Credit: Ron Ardis |
Scary shit. No overt relation to the "hula" above! Couldn´t find a pic of the ghosts that wasn´t strictly copyrighted...
Not sure if this is true or not. The evidence so far seems pretty slim, to be honest. Still, an interesting contribution!
"Maoris discovered Antarctica 1,300 years ago"
"Polynesians first to discover Antarctica, not news to Maori"
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"Earth´s Tropical Islands" is a joint BBC-PBS documentary series in three parts about Madagascar, Borneo and Hawaii, respectively. I just watched the last episode. While mostly about the flora and the fauna of the Hawaiian island chain, we also get some insights into the geology of the place (which is quite fascinating). A little anthropology has been thrown in too, but not much.
Featured animals include a "true bug" that lives on a chilly lava plateu and scavenges other dead insects, large fruit flies hunted by a carnivorous caterpillar, the white tern (it nests in the middle of Honolulu), the monk seal, and the world´s oldest bird specimen, the Laysan albatross "Wisdom", which may be about 70 years old. Invasive species plague the island chain, for instance an African species of chameleon.
All three episodes of this series are worth watching, in my opinion.
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| Credit: Impawards |
"Godzilla" is a 2014 US film in the so-called MonsterVerse franchise, which features the two "classical" monstrosities Godzilla (Gojira) and King Kong in various combinations. In this particular flick, the primordial stegosaurid Godzilla is awakened by a deep sea expedition, and the nuclear tests at Bikini Island were supposedly attempts to kill this monster! When this fails, the US government sets up the ultra-secret Project Monarch to study the bizarre creature. Just as well, since even more monstrosities are hiding beneath the Earth surface, including two MUTOs or Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organisms! (Is somebody making fun of the UFO subculture, I wonder?)
The MUTOs, who have an obvious family resemblance to the Devil himself, want to mate and breed some more abominable creatures, destroying a Japanese nuclear power plant, Honolulu and Las Vegas (sic) in the process, before descending on an unsuspecting San Fransisco. Luckily, Gojira turns out to be on our side (more or less), and in the chaos and mayhem following the MUTO mating ritual, the stegosaurid seems to be the only thing that stands between us and a mass extinction event of Homo freakin´ sapiens. Apparently, "the king of the monsters" is Mother Nature´s way of "restoring the balance", sorely upset by the rampage of the trysting gargoyles.
I was going to complain about the major plot holes (one of them involving an encased nuclear device), but after the botched COVID response in the real world, the illogical chaos in "Godzilla" doesn´t seem so unrealistic anymore, I mean, the film almost comes across as a documentary! Must be the first time I get *that* feeling when watching a film where more money was used for the special effects than for the script...
I already reviewed "Kong: Skull Island", but I haven´t seen the later films in this series, one of which apparently pits Gojira against the over-sized gorilla in some kind of ultimate fighting of the ages.
And while it probably doesn´t mean anything at all, I do think it´s funny to see a sci fi production involving hideous creatures from the bowels of our own planet, rather than the (obviously unrealistic) space aliens who litter every other SF flick!
Three stars?
Är det här något slags pik mot Greta Thunberg? Med tanke på vilken sajt som publicerar nyheten, alltså...
