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How many uncontacted tribes are left?


Still Waters

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News emerged this week that an indigenous tribe in the Peruvian Amazon, the Mashco-Piro, has been trying to make contact with outsiders. In the past, the Mashco-Piro have always resisted interaction with strangers, avoiding – and sometimes killing – any they encounter. How should Western societies respond to these so-called uncontacted tribes? New Scientist looks at the issue.

http://www.newscient...ml#.UhkaTn_F8dU

http://www.unexplain...o

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I'm always of two minds about this. On the one hand, "civilization" should leave them alone. One the other hand, "civilization" is going to destroy their way of life, anyway, so might as well get to it. In any event, I think they should be approached with respect, keeping in mind their beliefs and what they may want (or don't want) from the encroachers.

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God who knows. But I hope they remain "uncontacted" for their sake.

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There are no truly uncontacted tribes left in the world. All know about our civilization and have had some limited contact with it, but chose to remain isolated.

Most of these tribes have had bad encounters with loggers and miners, destroying their lands and killing their people, causing them to flee further into the forest.

Our way of life leaves no man uncontacted.

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Humanity has moved past the tribal state, trying to leave some as tribals only turns them into a novelty.

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There are no truly uncontacted tribes left in the world. All know about our civilization and have had some limited contact with it, but chose to remain isolated.

Most of these tribes have had bad encounters with loggers and miners, destroying their lands and killing their people, causing them to flee further into the forest.

Our way of life leaves no man uncontacted.

Eh, probably in a sense true. Climate change, etc. But I think there could still exist a very small number of enclaves that have not had direct contact with "civilized" humans and I think a ton of interesting sociology and anthropology data could be had from them

Humanity has moved past the tribal state, trying to leave some as tribals only turns them into a novelty.

Novelty does not mean bad. Such disconnected creatures could help to shed light on our development as a species. I think that is pretty darn non-trivial. As well as not actually proving anything. But, ideas for the "modern" world in exchange for letting the "ancient" world continue to do its thing for a little while longer. Seems a pretty decent prospect to me.

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I jsut dont see a purpose.

its like having delicious cake, seeing a hungry kid, and just setting in a dark corner, watching the hungry kid try to find scraps

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The original/true concept of memes is a sort of durable, transmissible idea. I think it would be quite interesting to see a society who's last meme contact with our society was 10 or 20 thousand years ago. They almost definitely won't be exactly like our Lithotechnic ancestors, but they could give the rest of us an interesting and unique insight into what it could have been like.

I am definitely am pure science as long as the risk vs reward respects ~sentience kind of dude, though. If think if we limit our science to only areas where a clear "advantage" can be gained we will miss out on some awesome advancements. I also think we need to keep our expenditures for that kind of ivory tower type research balanced against projects with a clear probable benefit.

edit: corrected ethyltypos

Edited by cacoseraph
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Eh, probably in a sense true. Climate change, etc. But I think there could still exist a very small number of enclaves that have not had direct contact with "civilized" humans and I think a ton of interesting sociology and anthropology data could be had from them

Tons of knowledge, too be sure. Historical, medical, etc.

While some tribes have not have had direct contact, most have traded with or warred with those that have, along with the aforementioned encounters with less scrupulous loggers, miners, poachers, etc.

I jsut dont see a purpose.

It's a direct window into our past. All humans used to live in the same sort of ancestral, egalitarian way that these tribes do.

I don;t see how learning about our physical, biological and cultural history is without purpose.

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It's a direct window into our past. All humans used to live in the same sort of ancestral, egalitarian way that these tribes do.

I don;t see how learning about our physical, biological and cultural history is without purpose.

I don't think it would be a "direct" window into our past. A direct window would involve some sort of timetravel. What I do think these dudes would represent is a disparate physical/sociological/etc evolutionary channel that has been minimally influenced by our own "standard" evolutionary line. Remember, they have experienced every bit of temporal evolution as the rest of us. It would just be in an environment that, in theory, would be closer to that which our distant ancestors experienced and minimally influenced by our own environment. Well, as minimally as a globally influential macrosociety would rock.

edit: frickin typos

Edited by cacoseraph
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I think their wishes should be respected. I wish they would stay stay isolated, hell there are days I'd like to join them, but the one thing I know for sure is to keep the fricken missionary's away from them.

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If their wishes were to be left alone, then that is exactly as it should be.

As for it just being a "novelty". One could say the exact same thing about our way of living. It is all a matter of perspective, who is to say which way is better.

If anything, their way of living is a hell of a lot more sustainable then ours.

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They should be accepted to coexist and not converted and perhaps one day our society will be in a place where people really can go and chose the lifestyle they want, even if that includes living in a tribe.

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