I'm not saying they were referring to Columbus as the person who conquered Central America. I was amused by GP's insinuation that the Aztecs had somehow collapsed before Columbus.

> Maya, Toltec, and Aztec societies deforested Central America quite significantly before collapsing (and before Columbus).

On a second reading it seems that GP had most likely meant that they were deforesting before Columbus, not that they had collpased before Columbus, but it's still strange to refer to getting conquered as a "collapse".