How extensive is the DNA or blood typing research to date on the subject of the Polynesian origin of Easter Island?
A. Quite extensive. In addition to research derived from the examination of bones from burial sites on Easter Island, geneticist Erika Hagelberg s has published numerous studies, involving hundreds of samples from different locations in Asia and the Pacific on mtDNA, y-chromosome, HLA, and phylogenetic analyses with results that consistently substantiate the conclusion that Easter Islanders are descendants of people from eastern Polynesia (which is also borne out in tracing the cultural evolution of their ancestors traveling eastward across the Pacific. Thor Heyerdahl actually did blood-type frequency experiments, but what he either didn t know or didn t care about is the fact that very disparate races may have similar blood-type frequencies, so the results of his experiments weren t very useful. Robert Suggs (in his book Island Civilizations of Polynesia) relates a story about how Heyerdahl attempted to bolster his theory by conducting blood-type analysis on “pure” Polynesians and tho
