BajaNomad - Primitive People [ long and also boring]

Primitive People [ long and also boring]

bajalera - 5-30-2010 at 09:45 AM

As Europeans traveled the rest of the world during the Age of Discovery, they occasionally met people like those of Baja California, whose technologies could be judged as woefully inadequate when compared to their own.

A view that prevailed in the 1600s was expresssed by philosopher Thomas Hobbes, who described primitive people as living "in continual fear and danger of violent death; and the life of man solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short."
Still, the existence of such groups needed to be explained, and the Bible (which failed to mention the American continents) could no longer be trusted as a reliable record of world history.
One explanation for the low-tech state of primitive groups was the theory that initially there had been a single civilization consisting of white people. But after God demolishied the Tower of Babel and created races that spoke different languages, they could no longer communicate with one another and went their separate ways.
Some groups gradually drifted downhill into a state of savagery.
An alternative belief held that all humans strive to reach perfection, and races differ in their ability to get there.
Europeans--who had benefited from the advances in shipbuilding, navigation, weaponry and manufacturing that had been passed down to them from previous civilizations--had no problem identifying themselves as the most intelligent and progressive beings the wolrld had ever seen.
With the gradual amassing of detailed data on various human societies, an orderly game plan was devised:
All human groups start out as Primitive, and pass through three stages of Savagery (lower, middle, upper), then through the lower, middle and upper stages of Barbarism, before finally---ta-DAH!---arriving at Civilization.
Each level was assigned its own specific traits, and it was assumed that advances in technology brought about higher moral standards.
The dominant figure of primitive hunting-and-gathering groups was portrayed as Man the Hunter, who was usually pictured brandishing a spear at a mastodon that tolwered above him in an attack mode.
As anthropology, geography and psychology became accepted as separate fields of study, theories accounting for human differences were influenced by the writings of Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud and many other serious thinkers whose names are less familiar.
Fast-forward to 1966, when 75 anthropologists from all over the world met at a conference in Chicago, at which it was established that Man the Hunter had been accompanied by a significant other--Woman the Gatherer--whose existence had previously been ignored.
Evidence was presented that the plants and small animals collected and processed mainly by women were more important in the hunter-gatherer diet than the larger game provided by the men. (Although "gatherer-hunter" would obviously be a more appropriate name, it's a bit late for a change.)
Whatever the level of their technological achievements may be, all hunter-gatherers have been subject to the quantity and quality of the resoources available in their region's ecosystems.
The limitations that environments place on human activities had yet to be recognized in the 1700s, however, and most of the outsiders who encountered the Indians of the peninsula judged them to be mentally deficient as well as lazy.
******
P.S. This would have been a lot easier to read if the paragraphs had been indented, as they were when I typed them.

[Edited on 5-30-2010 by bajalera]

[Edited on 5-30-2010 by bajalera]

Osprey - 5-30-2010 at 09:53 AM

Well, Baegart said the Pericue were climbing cardon. He didn't mention any climbing shoes, spikes, cleates, chaps, shoes, socks or jocks so either he left all that out or these Indians were crazier than me when I'm wasted.

Fortunately

MrBillM - 5-30-2010 at 10:06 AM

European Culture and Technology took over and brought forth the Bounty we enjoy today.

The GOOD guys came out on top so that we could do our "Hunter-Gathering" at Vons and Walmart, along with others. The only spearing I want done on my Steak is the guy behind the meat counter.

Hallelujah.

Here, I'll attempt to double space where the indents would otherwise be (If you fix yours by hitting enter before each indent, I'll delete this because I'm sure I wont do it correctly.):

Packoderm - 5-30-2010 at 10:18 AM

As Europeans traveled the rest of the world during the Age of Discovery, they occasionally met people like those of Baja California, whose technologies could be judged as woefully inadequate when compared to their own. A view that prevailed in the 1600s was expressed by philosopher Thomas Hobbes, who described primitive people as living "in continual fear and danger of violent death; and the life of man solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short."

Still, the existence of such groups needed to be explained, and the Bible (which failed to mention the American continents) could no longer be trusted as a reliable record of world history. One explanation for the low-tech state of primitive groups was the theory that initially there had been a single civilization consisting of white people. But after God demolishied the Tower of Babel and created races that spoke different languages, they could no longer communicate with one another and went their separate ways. Some groups gradually drifted downhill into a state of savagery.

An alternative belief held that all humans strive to reach perfection, and races differ in their ability to get there. Europeans--who had benefited from the advances in shipbuilding, navigation, weaponry and manufacturing that had been passed down to them from previous civilizations--had no problem identifying themselves as the most intelligent and progressive beings the wolrd had ever seen.

With the gradual amassing of detailed data on various human societies, an orderly game plan was devised: All human groups start out as Primitive, and pass through three stages of Savagery (lower, middle, upper), then through the lower, middle and upper stages of Barbarism, before finally---ta-DAH!---arriving at Civilization.

Each level was assigned its own specific traits, and it was assumed that advances in technology brought about higher moral standards. The dominant figure of primitive hunting-and-gathering groups was portrayed as Man the Hunter, who was usually pictured brandishing a spear at a mastodon that towered above him in an attack mode.

As anthropology, geography and psychology became accepted as separate fields of study, theories accounting for human differences were influenced by the writings of Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud and many other serious thinkers whose names are less familiar.

Fast-forward to 1966, when 75 anthropologists from all over the world met at a conference in Chicago, at which it was established that Man the Hunter had been accompanied by a significant other--Woman the Gatherer--whose existence had previously been ignored. Evidence was presented that the plants and small animals collected and processed mainly by women were more important in the hunter-gatherer diet than the larger game provided by the men. (Although "gatherer-hunter" would obviously be a more appropriate name, it's a bit late for a change.)

Whatever the level of their technological achievements may be, all hunter-gatherers have been subject to the quantity and quality of the resources available in their region's ecosystems. The limitations that environments place on human activities had yet to be recognized in the 1700s, however, and most of the outsiders who encountered the Indians of the peninsula judged them to be mentally deficient as well as lazy.

Cypress - 5-30-2010 at 10:25 AM

Climbing cardon? :?:

Baegart just stretched the truth till it snapped. :biggrin:

Packoderm - 5-30-2010 at 12:18 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Cypress
Climbing cardon? :?:

Baegart just stretched the truth till it snapped. :biggrin:

"One explanation for the low-tech state of primitive groups was the theory that initially there had been a single civilization consisting of white people. But after God demolished the Tower of Babel and created races that spoke different languages, they could no longer communicate with one another and went their separate ways. Some groups gradually drifted downhill into a state of savagery."

Is this the part you don't believe?

Cypress - 5-30-2010 at 12:55 PM

Packoderm, :tumble:

Sometimes I just don't know what to believe.

Iflyfish - 5-30-2010 at 02:11 PM

My Mormon friend tells me Jesus came over to the New World after doing his thing in the Middle East. The Haida say we came out of the ocean on the back of a turtle and the Hopi say it was on a spider coming out of the Kiva. Go figure. Christians, Jews and Muslims believe in some dust being blown on to become human.

Ethnocentricity does seem to be the prime directive for all cultures, we humans, them, not so much. Throw in a good dose of religion to sweeten the pot and you have good/bad people, saved and unsaved people, more them and us. Primitive/Civilized seem to be permutations of this way of viewing or generating reality.

The Buddhas view was that grasping on to any of those views and identities will cause you a lot of pain and suffering.

Iflyfish

Eli - 5-30-2010 at 04:15 PM

Thanks Lera, I thought that was very interesting.

Skipjack Joe - 5-31-2010 at 06:31 AM

Yes, I enjoyed it also.

Could you clarify the difference between Savagery and Barbarism. That is, how the anthropologists saw it when they came up with the 3 stages.

Regarding why europeans came out on top - this is a good read:

Guns_Germs_and_Steel_The_Fates_of_Human_Societies-119191404559643.jpg - 24kB

Guns_Germs_and_Steel_The_Fates_of_Human_Societies-119191404559643.jpg - 24kB

wilderone - 5-31-2010 at 07:03 AM

"...most of the outsiders who encountered the Indians of the peninsula judged them to be mentally deficient as well as lazy."

The "outsiders" - the Spaniards? Those rapists, murderers? the Spaniards who kidnapped and enslaved indigenous wherever they went? From the words of a kidnapped West Indies islander, "I know the waves caress our shore, once and again an ancient rhythm by which my people breathed. What our world was, how we saw life, how we lived by our heart, by the belly-button of belonging and thememory of ancient teachings-this from my blood and my heart, it seems, the friar does not ehar. I know what we had, the personality of our people that was like a gentle breeze, ....

Who are the Europeans to judge what they know nothing about? The Portugese and Spanish explorers wanted riches and glory for themselves, funded by their rulers who wanted the same. They were the ones who killed, stole, destroyed. They were the ignorant savages.
Christopher Columbus was a murderer and the USA should certainly not dedicate a day in his honor.

DianaT - 5-31-2010 at 07:11 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Iflyfish
Ethnocentricity does seem to be the prime directive for all cultures, we humans, them, not so much. Throw in a good dose of religion to sweeten the pot and you have good/bad people, saved and unsaved people, more them and us. Primitive/Civilized seem to be permutations of this way of viewing or generating reality.

The Buddhas view was that grasping on to any of those views and identities will cause you a lot of pain and suffering.

Iflyfish

Your statements are very interesting. One of the first things I thought about when reading what Bajalera wrote was how some of the Asian Cultures viewed the Europeans at that time.

And while I have often viewed ethnocentricity as the cause of so many of the problems in history and today, I never really thought about it being the prime directive for all cultures. I need to ponder that one --- prime directive is an interesting concept. Thanks.

Bajalera---not boring AT ALL. I laughed as I remember when they suddenly decided that Man the Hunter was not alone. Thanks for the post. It is interesting to read, think about, and agree, and or disagree.

Reading it again.

DianaT

wilderone - 5-31-2010 at 07:35 AM

I'm reading an interesting book now titled "The Columbus Exchange - Biological and Cultural Consequences of 1492." Here's an excerpt:

A sensational preview of the impact that Old World livestock would have on the American mainland took place in Espanola and, shortly after, in the other Antilles. One who watched the Caribbean islands from outer psace during the years from 1492 to 1550 or so might have surmised that the object of the game going on there was to repalce the people with pigs, dogs and cattle. Disease and ruthless exploitation had, for all practical purposes, destroyed the aborigines of Espanola by the 1520's. Their Arawak brothers in Cuba, Puerto Rico and Jaimaica followed them into oblivion shortly after. The Bahamas and Lesser Antilles were not occupied by the Spanish, but as the Indians of the larger islands disappeared, slavers sailed out to the smaller islands, spread disease and seized multitude of Arawaks and Caribs to feed in the death camps that Espanola, Cuba, Puerto Rico and Jaimaica had become. Thus, within a few score years of Columbus's first American landfall, the Antillean aborigines had been almost completely eliminated."

The whole book is a real eye-opener on how seeds, plants, trees, animals - cattle, pigs, horses - forever changed landscapes and agriculture throughout the world. I can only ponder what might have been otherwise, if the Spanish explorers chose to have some respect for those they encountered. The Spanish and Portugese of the time were not "civilized" in my opinion.

Iflyfish - 5-31-2010 at 07:59 AM

Diana T
Would you elaborate on "Asian Cultures viewed the Europeans at that time". This is the other side of the mirror.

The concept of "Prime Directive" comes from that fascinating Anthropology body of work called "Star Trek" :biggrin:

I don’t find this thread boring at all. In fact I think it gets to the heart of what for many of us is one of the underlying motivations for travel. “Who is the other?”

For an interesting twist on this I would recommend:

The Botany of Desire :dudette:

This is a book about how plants have manipulated man into furthering their differentiation and dispersal.

Don't want to hijack this fascinating thread, just another perspective on it.

Pigmentocracy is another construct that has influenced our views of “the other”. This may be a fruitful topic for yet another thread.

Iflyfish

DianaT - 5-31-2010 at 09:15 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Iflyfish
Diana T
Would you elaborate on "Asian Cultures viewed the Europeans at that time". This is the other side of the mirror.

The concept of "Prime Directive" comes from that fascinating Anthropology body of work called "Star Trek" :biggrin:

Since I am not a Trekky (sp)---I missed that concept in my education. :biggrin:

Guess I need to expand my horizons.

I really should not have used the term Asian Cultures because that is somewhat like saying they are all the same----just like many lump together all the cultures from Mexico to Tierra del Fuego and they are all so different.

What I had in mind when I wrote that were China and Japan, which are VERY different cultures. But neither one of those cultures thought much of the Europeans back then in terms of culture. It was that same ethnocentric concept.

Think I would like that book you suggest---sounds like another interesting slant on things.

[Edited on 5-31-2010 by DianaT]

shari - 5-31-2010 at 09:38 AM

Interesting topic for sure that touches the heart of many of us who question the history books and enjoy learning about other cultures both past and present.

I once read a fascinating book called the "Descent of Woman" that really opened my eyes to women's role in the history of evolution....

but my favorite all time creation story was told to me by an elder woman of the Clayoquat tribe on northern Vancouver Island....it goes something like this....and I cant remember the beginning of it but the Creator put women on the sweet earth but she became lonely so she decided to create a boy which she did by blowing snot into a clam shell...which grew into man...there are many carvings and painting with a baby boy in a clam shell and they call it Snot Boy...really!!

Skipjack Joe - 5-31-2010 at 09:55 AM

Once again feminism raises it's ugly head.

Too bad. It started out with much promise.

Packoderm - 5-31-2010 at 10:00 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Skipjack Joe
Once again feminism raises it's ugly head.

Too bad. It started out with much promise.

It looks to me like it started out with a bit of feminism: "Evidence was presented that the plants and small animals collected and processed mainly by women were more important in the hunter-gatherer diet than the larger game provided by the men."

DianaT - 5-31-2010 at 10:17 AM

Wilderone, I agree with a lot of what you wrote and how you characterize the European "explorers". It was nasty business and so often the victims were considered less than human.

The old versions of history needed to be rewritten. But with some of it has come a far too romantic view of some of the indigenous cultures. For example, the Aztecs had quite a complicated culture that was destroyed by the Europeans. But many of the indigenous peoples of Mexico hated the Aztecs and saw them as conquerors, brutal and nasty.

That is just a very simplified and common example, but I am sure you know what I mean, and it does not excuse the behavior of those "explorers".

It just seems that with what we like to call "advanced" culture comes war and brutality---with all of them. And the term "advanced" is one of those questionable labels.

And while I have always enjoyed studying different religions, they all do seem to have a few things in common----a simple explanation of creation, an innate superiority, something to cling to for simple answers, and far too much intolerance----a recipe for disaster. ( That was just another way of saying what IFYFISH said.) :biggrin:

Then there is always the question about the clash of cultures as to if it was inevitable, if anything is inevitable. And with just a simple contact, so often the diseases arrived before the people.

Iflyfish - 5-31-2010 at 10:57 AM

"The old versions of history needed to be rewritten. But with some of it has come a far too romantic view of some of the indigenous cultures" Diane T.

You have cited historical facts about the Aztecs; few know that the Haida of the Queen Charlotte Islands slaved all the way down the west coast North America as far as San Francisco Bay. The description of early life as brutish for most is in my view an accurate portrayal of early life from the comfort of my easy chair, sitting behind insulated glass windows, sipping my morning coffee out of a porcelain cup and tryping on my laptop.

I suspect that in all cultures there have been a few prescient, intelligent, far sighted people who had a positive influence on the quality of life. However there is the concept of the bell shaped curve and those few may have occupied one of that narrow areas in that bell curve with most somewhere in the middle.

It would appear that human beings are by nature genocidal if one looks at our history with ethnocentrism and hubris playing a very large roll in all of this. Might makes right and we fight “with god on our side”.

Feminism? The comments seem descriptive to me and counter a commonly held belief that the hunting of men provided most of the nutrition for tribes. It appears that meat may have played a smaller role in the diet of our ancestors than we had previously thought.

Is it possible that most of the history that we read has a sexual bias toward men who have been the physically stronger of the sexes and have had the better weapons? Is there a bone in our own nose that we cannot see in regard to this issue?

As to the snot business, I laughed my burro off on that one! Seems in many ways a less brutal genesis than thoracic surgery! Humans are it seems eminently creative in the generation of mythology.

Pass a Pacifico please, this is getting interesting.

Iflyfish

DianaT - 5-31-2010 at 11:19 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Iflyfish

It would appear that human beings are by nature genocidal if one looks at our history with ethnocentrism and hubris playing a very large roll in all of this. Might makes right and we fight “with god on our side”.

Iflyfish

While I might agree with Watts, (not Watts, ERIC HOFFER) but not completely, that most people do things strictly out of their own self-interest and one might extrapolate that idea to a society as a whole, and I definitely agree that all wars are fought "with god on our side", genocidal seems quite strong----um another thought to ponder.

Pondering..........

Yikes---edit to change the name from Watts to Hoffer---quite a HORRIBLE mistake--- one of those brain burps!

[Edited on 5-31-2010 by DianaT]

Iflyfish - 5-31-2010 at 11:28 AM

Skipjack

Great question regarding Savagery and Barbarism. I found the following Cross Cultural Analysis site, interesting stuff. Anthropology is not my primary area of expertise but I have always been interested in what it has to offer to our understanding of human beings and how we got to where we are.

http://www.as.ua.edu/ant/Faculty/murphy/crosscut.htm

I think that this way of thinking, organizing reality, comes out of the Aristotelian method of breaking down into parts that which is observed and coming up with some sort of naming system. Since the name ain’t the thing and comparisons are inherent in this way of viewing things this sort of value laden language may be inevitable?? This way of understanding things contrasts with Eastern Philosophies that do not separate the thing from its context, if that makes any sense. The Western view is reductionist and the Eastern view contextual. These are very different ways of viewing the world. I suspect that most cultures throughout our history as a species experienced the world in this Eastern way of seeing things and the advent of Aristotelian logic being a branching point in our perception of how the world is organized and works.

Heraclites, another Greek philosopher, saw the world in “flux” and may have been more of the mind of the Eastern philosophers. Aristotle won and now we have generated a bacterium out of whole cloth.

In my reading it wasn’t till the late 1800s that the West started to again explore these notions of flux and the inevitable impact of the observer in the field of observation. These notions were explored in the works of the German philosophers and American Transcendentalists. http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/help/co...

I think it is very difficult to name things without doing so in the context of some comparison, which leads to quickly to hierarchical thinking.

Iflyfish

Iflyfish - 5-31-2010 at 11:43 AM

Diana, do you mean Alan Watts?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrLtWZzKeX8&feature=relat...

Iflyfish

DianaT - 5-31-2010 at 11:58 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Iflyfish
Diana, do you mean Alan Watts?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrLtWZzKeX8&feature=relat...

Iflyfish

Yea---did not know there were all those U tubes of him---need to listen to them when I have a little more time.

I go back to him because when I was young----many moons ago, his Book, "The Book" had quite an impact on me. It was my first real exposure to something different than the Western way of thinking. It led me to further investigation of Eastern philosophies and into the development of my own personal spiritual beliefs---eventually ending up in the Unitarian Church-----also influenced by many other philosophers and writers.

BUT! what I wrote was a MAJOR mistake---MAJOR. I meant to say Eric Hoffer----who I also found to be very interesting.

But glad I made the mistake or I might not have found those u-tubes!

Iflyfish - 5-31-2010 at 01:03 PM

The Book, on the taboo against knowing who your really are. Great book and influential in my thinking too.

Pass me another of those cold Pacifico's por favor.

Iflyfishwhilewaxingphilosophic

Looking Back

MrBillM - 5-31-2010 at 01:15 PM

Is an interesting Hobby. Bad things were done to Good (and Bad) people long before anybody we know came along.

That's History and That's life. Things could have been different, but they weren't and nothing changes that.

Euro culture won out. I've enjoyed growing up and living as a result of that culture. Since there's no way of knowing what alternative events "might" have changed that culture, it's a waste of time speculating. Enjoy what was built without guilt.

And, "Do it OUR way".

DianaT - 5-31-2010 at 01:27 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by MrBillM
Is an interesting Hobby. Bad things were done to Good (and Bad) people long before anybody we know came along.

That's History and That's life. Things could have been different, but they weren't and nothing changes that.

Euro culture won out. I've enjoyed growing up and living as a result of that culture. Since there's no way of knowing what alternative events "might" have changed that culture, it's a waste of time speculating. Enjoy what was built without guilt.

And, "Do it OUR way".

There is a whole school of history that does focus on the what if part of history----things like how the US would be different if the railroads were not built---that one earned someone a PHD.

In my opinion, that is a waste of time, other than for a little fun----but not that serious.

I do, however, believe that history should be looked at from lots of different perspectives---after all, there are only a few facts and the rest is interpretation.

I would agree that one does not need to feel guilty about what happened in the past, but learning about it from other perspectives can promote greater understanding and acceptance. Not the "what ifs", but just seeing it through a different mirror.

Loving History

MrBillM - 5-31-2010 at 04:54 PM

It's certainly true that "Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it", But I think that really applies to a point in the history of Man quite a bit down the road from the period in discussion. The study of Primitive man (for me, anyway) holds less interest than that of the Dinosaurs or the physical history of the earth itself.

Speaking as someone who has a (sometimes) obsessive interest in History, I simply don't have the same fascination with the History of Prehistoric, Primitive Pre-Discovery Man and don't see where their societal interactions have much to "Teach" us today. Like their Primitive Existence, Weapons and Tools, their societal organization was Primitive and fundamental to simply staying alive.

But, everyone has a different focus.

"Woman is the niggar of the world"

Skipjack Joe - 5-31-2010 at 09:20 PM

So go the lyrics to a Lennon song during the heyday of feminism.

And the proportion of work by primitive man was one of the finest examples of man's enslavement of woman throughout history. But let's examine this work allotment more carefully. Hunting to food is a lot more than that, isn't it? The hunting skills developed are the same ones used to defend your band at night from marauding predators. The same skills used to gain territory from neighboring tribes and the same used to defend your clan from genocide from competing tribes.

Let's fast foward 5 million years forward to the Siskiyou mountains in the winter of 2008. A family of 3 runs out of gas in a snow covered road 25 miles from hwy 5. They eat all their rations and burn their tires to create a signal fire for a hoped for rescue. After a week it becomes clear that nobody will come to their aid. The father decides to hike out for help. His tracks follow 12 miles down a steep canyon where his frozen body is eventually uncovered. The mother and daughter eventually are saved. We assume that there is never any doubt as to who will go seeking help. This story is important because it shows that nothing, absolutely nothing has changed. Being a man in today's world is no different than what it had been at the dawn of time.

You can get further examples of the role of men during the last 2 hours of the sinking of the Titanic. Women and children were always the precious cargo of every family and it's always been the man's responsibility to keep it safe and intact.

This look at our earliest begining also shows, in my opinion, about why the argument of one culture being 'unjust' to another makes little sense. From the begining it was never about justice but about domination or being dominated (The Sioux were in the Dakotas because they had used the US repeating rifle to wipe out the tribe that lived there). Nationalism and patriotism are just different aspects of the same act. A war like the Civil War about slavery is really a historic anomally.

wilderone - 6-1-2010 at 07:39 AM

"From the begining it was never about justice but about domination or being dominated"
Regardless of the label you put on it, it's murder. And it was primarily carried out by men.

Osprey - 6-1-2010 at 08:37 AM

Early man had it very tough. Doesn't take much imagination to see the cave groups, clans and how they were set up. The male brings home several skunks in one week and claims that he hasn't seen a rabbit or a bear, no tracks, scat, missing berries on the bush. The female undercooks the skunk, sleeps in another part of the cave for a few days. The male goes on a well-deserved guilt trip and picks on smaller males or those with infirmities. The clan turns against Mr. Skunk (as he is now called) and drives him from the cave until he can find an antelope carcass with a little meat on it. He has to outlive most of the clan to wear out the nickname and regain some semblence of self respect. I'm just saying, in the beginning we were all Jewish.

The ENTIRE History of Man

MrBillM - 6-1-2010 at 09:18 AM

Is worthy to satisfy Curiosity, but becomes Significant and Interesting with implications to the future once the Tribal Hunter-Gatherers moved from a daily subsistent existence and they began to use those primitive tools and weapons, along with basic fortifications, to protect their "resources" from other tribal groups who might want to acquire it AND those groups began to venture into other lands for acquisition from still other groups whose land, wildlife and possessions they coveted.

Thus began the Golden Age of Civilisation.

Coveting and Conquering became, and remain, THE great impetus for Giant Societal and Technological Leaps forward.

At times, a little hard on those less-advanced, but the end result has been an overall positive.

Barry A. - 6-1-2010 at 09:36 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by wilderone
"From the begining it was never about justice but about domination or being dominated"
Regardless of the label you put on it, it's murder. And it was primarily carried out by men.

Bingo----------and it continues when conditions get desparate or even too trying. Human nature remains essentially intact and the same, only being tempered or less visible when conditions are tolerable, relatively speaking..

It is a dog eat dog world out there------but conditions elsewhere are impossible! This is why it is paramount to keep alert, and keep your powder dry, and protect your turf any way you can. :light:

Barry

Iflyfish - 6-1-2010 at 11:41 AM

I participated in a week long workshop with Warren Farrell PhD, Clinical Psychologist, San Diego author of Why Men Are The Way They Are, and first man to serve on the board of NOW, National Organization for Women. After a week it was clear to me that the relationship between men and women is a highly choreographed dance that both play an equal part in.

Having said that there is no doubt about the fact that women have historically had less power than men in the world outside of the family and it is therefore necessary for women to know that they can be heard and influenced by the man they are with. This in fact is one of the significant findings of the 24 year 2,000 couple study done by John Gottman, PhD Psychologist, from Seattle, with whom I have also trained.

I appreciate Bajalera’s starting this very stimulating thread. The bone in our own nose is the hardest one to see and sometimes gets in the way of our perception.

Iflyfishwhilesometimesscratchingmyheadaboutthingslikethis

Iflyfish - 6-1-2010 at 11:44 AM

Barry

"Human nature remains essentially intact and the same, only being tempered or less visible when conditions are tolerable, relatively speaking.."

Abundance requires less competition indeed and human nature does remain as it always has. It is however cooperation that got us out of the caves, and that includes cooperation between the sexes.

Iflyfish

Barry A. - 6-1-2010 at 11:53 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Iflyfish
Barry

"Human nature remains essentially intact and the same, only being tempered or less visible when conditions are tolerable, relatively speaking.."

Abundance requires less competition indeed and human nature does remain as it always has. It is however cooperation that got us out of the caves, and that includes cooperation between the sexes.

Iflyfish

Absolutely--------and I could not agree more. Include "cooperation" to my list. And beyond cooperation just between "the sexes", I would expand that to with everybody on the planet within common sense bounderys, utilizing the other things on the "list".

Thanks for pointing that out.

Barry

bajalera - 6-1-2010 at 03:33 PM

I just entered a fairly long post and nearly all of it somehow got deleted--Computer Magic at work. I'll try again when I have more time.

Barry A. - 6-1-2010 at 04:09 PM

Lera---------that is soooooooo frustrating!!!! I know.

Barry

bajalou - 6-1-2010 at 04:45 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by bajalera
I just entered a fairly long post and nearly all of it somehow got deleted--Computer Magic at work. I'll try again when I have more time.

I read you're last post - I think it was all there except it had about 150 blank lines in the upper middle of it. If you scrolled down far enough, it was there. Try it again.

Extraordinary use of Primitive Tools

MrBillM - 6-1-2010 at 05:17 PM

Recently Unearthed example of Primitive Man's tool usage ?

They apparently hit a snag due to still-to-be-developed additional technology.

Including development of the wheel.

Lysistrata

Skipjack Joe - 6-1-2010 at 05:18 PM

Quote:

You're not the first to feel this way. I always thought that this was part of Athenian history but it turns out to be a play.

From Wikipedia:

Lysistrata is one of the few surviving plays written by Aristophanes. Originally performed in classical Athens in 411 BC, it is a comic account of one woman's extraordinary mission to end The Peloponnesian War. Lysistrata convinces the women of Greece to withhold sexual privileges from their husbands and lovers as a means of forcing the men to negotiate peace, a strategy however that inflames the battle between the sexes. The play is notable for its exposé of sexual relations in a male-dominated society and for its use of both double entendre and explicit obscenities.

MitchMan - 6-2-2010 at 06:57 PM

Wow, reading this thread was the most entertaining, stimulating, and thought provoking thing that I have done in the last 7 days. Especially since I sucked down three Margaritas in the process.

This forum never ceases to impress and amaze me at the quality and caliber of its participants. As soon as I can collect my thoughts, I am going to contribute something really profound.

IF I WERE KING OF THE FOREST

Skipjack Joe - 6-2-2010 at 08:55 PM

If I were King of the Forest,
not queen, not duke, not prince.
Each rabbit would show respect to me
The chipmunks genuflect to me.

Dorothy: If you were king, you wouldn't be afraid of anything?
Lion: Not nobody, not no how.

Tin Woodsman: Not even a rhinoceros?
Lion: Imp-oceros.

Dorothy: How about a hippopotamus?
Lion: Why I'd thrash him from top to bottom-us.

Dorothy: Supposin' you met an elephant.
Lion: I'd knot him up in cellophant.

Scarecrow: What if it were a brontosaurus?
Lion: I'd show him who's King of the Forest.

Group: How?
Lion: How? - Courage!
What makes a King out of a slave? Courage!
What makes the flag on the mast to wave? Courage!
What makes the elephant charge his tusk in the misty mist, or the dusky dusk? What makes the muskrat guard his musk? Courage!
What makes the Sphinx the Seventh Wonder? Courage!
What makes the dawn come up like thunder? Courage!
What makes the Hottentot so hot?
What puts the ape in ape-ricot?
What have they got that I ain't got?

Group: Courage.

Lion: You can say that again. Huh?

Iflyfish - 6-2-2010 at 09:03 PM

Follow the yellow brick road! This ain't kansas Toto!

Iflyfish

David K - 6-2-2010 at 09:31 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by bajalera

As Europeans traveled the rest of the world during the Age of Discovery, they occasionally met people like those of Baja California, whose technologies could be judged as woefully inadequate when compared to their own.

A view that prevailed in the 1600s was expresssed by philosopher Thomas Hobbes, who described primitive people as living "in continual fear and danger of violent death; and the life of man solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short."

Still, the existence of such groups needed to be explained, and the Bible (which failed to mention the American continents) could no longer be trusted as a reliable record of world history.

One explanation for the low-tech state of primitive groups was the theory that initially there had been a single civilization consisting of white people. But after God demolishied the Tower of Babel and created races that spoke different languages, they could no longer communicate with one another and went their separate ways.

Some groups gradually drifted downhill into a state of savagery.

An alternative belief held that all humans strive to reach perfection, and races differ in their ability to get there.

Europeans--who had benefited from the advances in shipbuilding, navigation, weaponry and manufacturing that had been passed down to them from previous civilizations--had no problem identifying themselves as the most intelligent and progressive beings the wolrld had ever seen.

With the gradual amassing of detailed data on various human societies, an orderly game plan was devised:

All human groups start out as Primitive, and pass through three stages of Savagery (lower, middle, upper), then through the lower, middle and upper stages of Barbarism, before finally---ta-DAH!---arriving at Civilization.

Each level was assigned its own specific traits, and it was assumed that advances in technology brought about higher moral standards.

The dominant figure of primitive hunting-and-gathering groups was portrayed as Man the Hunter, who was usually pictured brandishing a spear at a mastodon that tolwered above him in an attack mode.

As anthropology, geography and psychology became accepted as separate fields of study, theories accounting for human differences were influenced by the writings of Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud and many other serious thinkers whose names are less familiar.

Fast-forward to 1966, when 75 anthropologists from all over the world met at a conference in Chicago, at which it was established that Man the Hunter had been accompanied by a significant other--Woman the Gatherer--whose existence had previously been ignored.

Evidence was presented that the plants and small animals collected and processed mainly by women were more important in the hunter-gatherer diet than the larger game provided by the men. (Although "gatherer-hunter" would obviously be a more appropriate name, it's a bit late for a change.)

Whatever the level of their technological achievements may be, all hunter-gatherers have been subject to the quantity and quality of the resoources available in their region's ecosystems.

The limitations that environments place on human activities had yet to be recognized in the 1700s, however, and most of the outsiders who encountered the Indians of the peninsula judged them to be mentally deficient as well as lazy.
******
P.S. This would have been a lot easier to read if the paragraphs had been indented, as they were when I typed them.

Just double space the lines at each new paragraph to put in the spaces Lee......

vgabndo - 6-4-2010 at 09:24 PM

Skipjack, there is a classic "other side of the story" of the Siskiyous tragedy. I don't know if there was a group decision to drive the road he attempted, but the man who sacrificed his life trying to save his family had first driven them into an area where good maps and a gps wouldn't do a guy much good especially with snow in the forecast. My sense is that that story was less about heroism than about trying to avoid the ramifications of a very bad judgement call.

Men are good at that too! Well...humans in general.

Bajatripper - 6-6-2010 at 01:19 PM

My retyped post wouldn't show the Post Reply, and I'm not going to try again. U2Us won't open, either.

I think my computer is telling me it needs to be replaced.

Iflyfish - 6-6-2010 at 01:24 PM

I will often print on a Word doc. and then cut and paste to the thread, saves the frustration of losing text and can use spell check as well. Write like a rock star....well, maybe poor analogy.

Iflyfish

Open eyes

wessongroup - 6-6-2010 at 01:31 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Iflyfish
My Mormon friend tells me Jesus came over to the New World after doing his thing in the Middle East. The Haida say we came out of the ocean on the back of a turtle and the Hopi say it was on a spider coming out of the Kiva. Go figure. Christians, Jews and Muslims believe in some dust being blown on to become human.

Ethnocentricity does seem to be the prime directive for all cultures, we humans, them, not so much. Throw in a good dose of religion to sweeten the pot and you have good/bad people, saved and unsaved people, more them and us. Primitive/Civilized seem to be permutations of this way of viewing or generating reality.

The Buddhas view was that grasping on to any of those views and identities will cause you a lot of pain and suffering.

Iflyfish

Wow.. darn good there Iflyfish ... speaks volumes and volumes... thank you