Individuals of this age are so rare that each one represents a disproportionate share of what we can know about the people who first settled the Americas.

The loss of access to those remains — through reburial, which effectively ends future analysis — permanently forecloses certain categories of scientific inquiry.

Additional radiocarbon dates to address the freshwater reservoir problem: impossible.

Ancient DNA analysis to place her within the phylogenetic history of Native Americans: impossible.

Future stable isotope techniques that might illuminate aspects of diet or mobility not accessible to current methods: impossible.

But the archaeological objections, however scientifically grounded, faced a more fundamental challenge: the ethical and political framework within which decisions about Indigenous human remains must be made in the United States.