191–200 of 378 posts
http://photoblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/02/01/5965571-newl... This has better photos. According to NBC report in 2008, an agency has been aware of the tribe and have been tracking (and not contacting) them since 1910.
The child in the first picture has very big and modern looking blade on his hand and a metallic pot is on the ground as pointed out by Keyframe in an another comment. Far from uncontacted.
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We should give them access to technology and to our way of life. Our way of life is better. Preserving their backwards culture so they can continue lives of misery and suffering is just as disgusting as the Prime Directive. Help is exactly what I would want from advanced alien visitors. I don't want them to respect my culture just because it is mine; I want something better for myself, not cultural relativism. There…
This response is a joke, right? What constitutes a 'civilized' lifestyle? Your concepts of 'backwards' and 'civilized' are grounded in normative assumptions about what is right and wrong. I am not a post-structuralist, but I expect someone to acknowledge his or her normative stance before degrading a culture different than your own. What do you mean when you say 'There is nothing good?' What do you define as 'good?'…
You're mistaken in your assumption that I am ignorant of philosophy just b/c A) I didn't cite anyone impressive in my initial comment B) we disagree. Yes I am aware of Chomsky (in more detail than New Yorker articles offer). Yes I am aware of what ontology is.
Yes I have studied philosophy. Do you want me to counter-cite philosophers for you to read? You might learn something by reading _The Myth of the Framework_ and _The Open Society And Its Enemies_ by Karl Popper.
If you want to trash freedom, human rights, peaceful cooperation, and other aspects of modern Western civilization, and deny their objective value, don't pretend there is no serious and thoughtful stuff published on the other side and that everyone who disagrees with you is ignorant.
Next time you want to call someone closed minded, try to do it without ad hominem. Ad hominem arguments don't make you come off as tolerant and willing to have an open-ended discussion where you don't assume in advance who is right.
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What is so bad about leaving them alone? I would bet they are much happer than the majority of the FB and Twitter obsessed narcissist that I run into every day. What is so bad is you making the decision for them -- one way or the other. It's that kind of pompous paternalistic attitude that caused all kinds of pain and misery. If they are happy with a life expectancy of 30, of having mothers die in childbirth commonly…
He is not making the decision. Uncontacted tribes are extremely aware of the western culture outside their area. Many tribes choose not to make contact, and when contact is forced, they might even kill the enemies who refuse to leave them alone. There are few-to-none cases of tribes for whom forced contact with westerners* has been beneficial to them. * If you don't like the term westerner , feel free to insert or st…
I'm not sure you can speak for all of them ;)
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I don't know what they're going to do here. The isolated tribe in India live in a protected zone, but the government regularly offers them a chance to make contact, and the tribe drives them off with weapons. That's a way forward that is neither dragging them into the 21st century nor running a zoo. I'm not advocating for that, of course, just pointing out that contact/isolation is a false dichotomy.
Some members of the tribe drive them off with weapons. Others are children who do not get to make a choice until AFTER they have been indoctrinated with the tribe's values. We see the same problem in the Muslim world. In some countries, Muslim women are treated as property and not allowed outside without a chaperone. How can they make a free choice to join the West when their male guardians say "no" for them?
We're all brought up in societies which indoctrinate. We're all introduced to ideas at an early age, which we grow attached to. It's unavoidable.
You know that Golden Rule?" Not the one that VCs quote, but the one that goes "Do unto others as you would have others do unto you?" We should think about that when we choose how to deal with uncontacted tribes. It may be that one day another intelligence will need to decide how to deal with us, and on that day I hope we can say, "Yes, we used to have a habit of massacring technologically inferior peoples we encounte…
We should give them access to technology and to our way of life. Our way of life is better. Preserving their backwards culture so they can continue lives of misery and suffering is just as disgusting as the Prime Directive. Help is exactly what I would want from advanced alien visitors. I don't want them to respect my culture just because it is mine; I want something better for myself, not cultural relativism. There…
To accomplish what you suggest, it seems like the "cleanest" and most humane way would be to kidnap every child under ten and every subsequent child born into the tribe and put them up (separately) for adoption in wealthy countries. Let everyone older than ten live out their lives undisturbed, except for the tragic disappearance of all of their children. I challenge you to either endorse this method or describe a way that causes less suffering.
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I really hope you are kidding. If not this is so typical of the american way of thinking. Yes, we are so superior lets convert them all to our [insert culture, religion etc...]. What is so bad about leaving them alone? I would bet they are much happer than the majority of the FB and Twitter obsessed narcissist that I run into every day. While we are at it lets make sure they all become good christians too because any…
"If not this is so typical of the american way of thinking. Yes, we are so superior lets convert them all to our [insert culture, religion etc...]. " Why is this the typical american way of thinking? Surely every culture believes theirs is superior, otherwise they wouldn't have adopted it.
I didn't adopt my culture, it adopted me (I was born into it).
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I readily acknowledge we may agree more than it first appears given the particular emphasis we each chose. But I do think there is substantive disagreement here within the realm of non-violent (and, dare I say it: civilized) ways to approach the matter. The very idea of having a way that "we" deal with "uncontacted tribes" is collectivist on both ends. Individuals should do whatever they want without violating anyone…
Yes. And not every kind of discrimination or restriction is wrong. We must not contact them, unless they want to contact us. We cannot be certain of the impact of our presence to their minds. Just as we can't be certain (no, we can't) of the impact of an alien presence in our planet.
And how do we tell?
They can't know about us unless they... know about us (contamination: our existence, and any visual differences). They can't contact us unless they know where we are (contamination: we're watching them, and they see us doing so). Then they can't express desires until we understand each other (contamination: language and ideas). At that point, you've already significantly altered their culture, at least for the individual(s) you directly dealt with, and any they told. If we "must not contact them", then we must not contact any, because every person is part of a group, and arguably is a group of one, so you've already contaminated a person, a group, a sub-culture, a unique society that will never be the same again.
We either force contact, or we deny them the knowledge of our existence. There is no middle-ground, because any step away from zero contact is contact. Inaction is just delay of choice; what happens if they literally walk in a straight line until they hit a city? We are forcing contact by our mere existence, we could pick up the city and move to avoid contaminating them against their choice, since if they didn't know about us they couldn't have chosen to contact us.
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Our life expectancy and education is literally thousands of years ahead of anything they have. You can argue about violence, capitalism and religion, and I'd agree, but parts of our culture are better then theirs in easily measurable ways.
education: it depends on the subject- many of the people under discussion are probably expert trackers/hunters and have a more intimate knowledge of their surroundings than even our modern biologists. Most of civilization's education is not very useful in this context. I doubt there is a single part of our culture that is "better in an easily measurable way". This includes life expectancy, which of course cannot be "…
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This response is a joke, right? What constitutes a 'civilized' lifestyle? Your concepts of 'backwards' and 'civilized' are grounded in normative assumptions about what is right and wrong. I am not a post-structuralist, but I expect someone to acknowledge his or her normative stance before degrading a culture different than your own. What do you mean when you say 'There is nothing good?' What do you define as 'good?'…
Not a joke. You're mistaken in your assumption that I am ignorant of philosophy just b/c A) I didn't cite anyone impressive in my initial comment B) we disagree. Yes I am aware of Chomsky (in more detail than New Yorker articles offer). Yes I am aware of what ontology is. Yes I have studied philosophy. Do you want me to counter-cite philosophers for you to read? You might learn something by reading _The Myth of the F…
Can you please explain to me how I am 'trashing' freedom, and human rights? Cultural rights ARE human rights.
And please explain to me how Karl Popper somehow supports your theory of 'objective value.' Popper's arguments concern the contingency of analyses. Contingency, not objectivity.
I only reserve the ad hom's for close-minded dipshits like yourself.