The Phantom Menace

There was an interesting article in yesterday's LA Times about early visitors to South America. According to the latest evidence--carbon-dated chicken bones--it now appears that Polynesians were there before the Spaniards.

Impressive work. Less impressive was the reaction of Terry L. Jones, an archaeologist who didn't even do the research: "...I think maybe [this] makes us recognize the ethnocentrism in our longstanding views of the prehistory of the New World."

Is this really a problem? Sure, if you go back before WWII, you'll find cheerleading for the West among anthropologists, but since then, if anything, they've been in the vanguard of those fighting against ethnocentrism. Scientists have been open to the idea of Polynesians traveling across the Pacific, but they asked for actual evidence, not just theorizing. Now they have it. And what seems to excite Jones most about this new information is it gives him a chance to accuse others of not being as politically correct as he is.