Uncontacted Tribes Of The Amazon

[the_walkin_dude]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24880941/

A Brazilian government plane overflew a village of one of the few remaining uncontacted tribes of the world, deep in a protected jungle reserve on the border with Peru. The tribesmen responded by firing arrows... an indication of how they feel about outsiders?

Given that they undoubtedly suffer from lower life expectancies, higher infant mortality rates, etc etc... what should the outside world do? You've got the traditional 'white man's burden' argument, that these are human beings in need of help and don't deserve to be categorized as some sort of exotic wildlife. On the other hand, interference doesn't have a good historical track record. Plus wouldn't just coming into contact with them mean passing on all sorts of diseases onto them which they have no immunity to?

 

[Yithian]

Given that they undoubtedly suffer from lower life expectancies, higher infant mortality rates, etc etc... what should the outside world do?

With no external reference, i'm not sure we can say they are 'suffering from' any of these things. From their perspective their mortality rates and life expectancies would be considerd quite normal - unless they have dropped recently, thus giving an unfavourable comparison with the past.

We should leave respectfully alone.

If they come looking for others then we should interact. Until then, let's not run the risk of screwing their lives up.

Also, you say one of 'a few' remaining tribes. 100 is not a few. Although it is dozens more than i suspected before this story arose.

 

[foxenigma]

We should leave respectfully alone.

If they come looking for others then we should interact. Until then, let's not run the risk of screwing their lives up.

sadly as they have now witnessed a 'mysterious metal bird in the sky', remembering that technology way in advance of that possessed by the viewer of an event is 'indistiguishable from magic' then damage may already be done.

 

[eburacum]

This is interesting;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7427417.stm

MALOCAS
Malocas, or communal houses, are typically thatched. They often have fires, used for cooking or heating during the night. Smaller structures are used for cooking and other tasks, while larger buildings can be used as sleeping areas, and are usually equipped with hammocks.

The thatched roof does not reach to the ground suggesting that this is an area for communal activities including cooking, socialising or preparing the paste that is used for dyes and body paint.

COTTON AND BASKET
The white blob in the photograph could well be cotton, and the beige area next to it is probably a basket. The cotton would either be cultivated by the tribe, or gathered in the wild. It would be woven by the women, into the kind of short skirt worn by the black figure. Cotton would also be used to make hammocks.

The woven basket has a strap which would be either worn across the forehead or over the shoulder and would be used during the collection of cotton or other produce.

TWO MEN
These men are trying to drive off the plane from which these photographs were taken. They are aiming their bows at the aircraft, which had returned to fly over the settlement for a second time, after making a first pass some hours earlier.

The men have large bows made from forest hardwood, which they use to hunt for animals including tapirs, monkeys, deer, wild pigs and other small mammals.

They have also painted themselves with the red dye, urucum, commonly used by tribes in the Amazon. It is made from the seeds of a fruit similar to the horse chestnut. The seeds are ground into a paste to form the dye.

The body paint is most likely a show of aggression, possibly in response to the plane's first flyover.

WOMAN
The black figure may be a woman, although it is impossible to be certain. That this person is not carrying a bow hints in this direction. The black body paint is called genipapo, and is made from fruit. Like the red dye it is likely to be an aggressive display.


SETTLEMENT
The series of buildings have very little space cleared around them, and are set deep into the forest. This suggests that the tribe are keen to keep themselves hidden.

The larger building is most likely used for sleeping quarters, the smaller buildings would be used for food preparation, cooking and other practical tasks.

The surrounding area has signs of cultivation by the tribe, who are probably maintaining gardens of manioc, a type of tuber which would form a large part of their staple diet.

Source: Fiona Watson, campaigns director Survival International.

I must say, however, that even untouched tribes quite often have some indirect contact with the outside world, via trading or word of mouth and so on. Don't know if that is the case here, tho'.

 

[Xanatico]

At least it goes against the idea that you have to believe in things to see them, a la the ships of spansh conquerors.

When it comes to wether to interfere or not, it seems to me that the other tribes that has been done with fared rather badly. Untill the different goverments actually fulfill their promises to such people, I don´t think more tribes need to get involved.

 

[emmadilemma32]

Rare Indian Tribe Spotted in Brazil

Ok, this story is at the top of the aol headlines right now, as are the pictures. Am I the only person that quesitons the all black figure in with the red skinned natives? I wish there was a closer pic, as this figure def. has a more huminoid-apeish look from afar. Anyone have any ideas?

 

[emmadilemma32]

pics of tribe

http://news.aol.com/story/_a/rare-india ... 2909990001
here are the photos

 

[Pete Younger]

We need your land to graze our cattle, in return we will give you golden arches!

 

[PeniG]

Human-apish? It looks to me like two red-painted men and one black-painted (or dark-skinned and even darker in contrast) woman.

The color values are a bit startling. It must be a pain to paint yourself from head to toe like that every day. But maybe the plane interrupted a ceremony and they don't always make up that much.

 

[eburacum]

The theory is that they painted themselves in response to a previous sighting of the plane, hoping perhaps to scare the plane (or its pilot) away.

 

[spiritdoctor]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24880941/

Given that they undoubtedly suffer from lower life expectancies, higher infant mortality rates, etc etc... what should the outside world do? You've got the traditional 'white man's burden' argument, that these are human beings in need of help

You've got to be kidding me, in what way are they in need of help? I think its really terrible there are hardly any uncontacted tribes left. At least a protected area has been set up for them. (Although I'm not sure what the point of that is if you're going to fly low over their village in broad daylight spraying them with fumes etc and then send the pictures to international media. Why not just give out a map and coordinates of their village at the same time? )


Personally I think the body painting and arrows might not be a sign of aggression but that they are regarding the plane in a more religious way

 

[foxenigma]

Personally I think the body painting and arrows might not be a sign of aggression but that they are regarding the plane in a more religious way

That doesn't seem entirely likely, how would they know the plane was going to pass over at that moment. Seems more likely they were body painted, as a previous poster suggested, because they were involved in some sort of ritual and they were shooting arrows at the plane for the reason most peoples would fire an arrow: in the hope of knocking the potential predator out of the sky.

 

[LeapingEri]

We should leave respectfully alone.

If they come looking for others then we should interact. Until then, let's not run the risk of screwing their lives up.

I wholeheartedly agree with this! Unfortunately, we might think they've "come looking for others" when all they've done is return to familiar territory that, unknown to them, has been taken over by us.

 

[the_walkin_dude]

You've got to be kidding me, in what way are they in need of help?

Just to be clear, I think intervention is a bad idea. But at the same time it is, on some level, grotesque to be withholding modern medicine because we like the idea of there still being a community of 'primitive men' out there. Ideally there could be some sort of 'collection station' on the edge of the reserve staffed by nearby natives with stocks of medicine and if necessary somewhere where a severely ill person could be airlifted to a hospital. This is ignoring the fact that you'd have to get the word out about the station, which defeats the point of non-intervention.

I don't know, I'm just not completely comfortable with the idea that people and children are dying of easily treatable diseases... but I agree, going in and 'civilizing' them would be disastrous.

 

[BuckeyeJones]

Greetings,

I say leave 'em alone.
I bet these folks sleep a lot better than most of us.
As far as a shortened life... I would hate to live to be a hundred plus lying and dying in bed from nothing if I could have lived fifty years as a free man living in tune with the original planet lay out.

PEACE!

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

You've got to be kidding me, in what way are they in need of help?

Just to be clear, I think intervention is a bad idea. But at the same time it is, on some level, grotesque to be withholding modern medicine because we like the idea of there still being a community of 'primitive men' out there. Ideally there could be some sort of 'collection station' on the edge of the reserve staffed by nearby natives with stocks of medicine and if necessary somewhere where a severely ill person could be airlifted to a hospital. This is ignoring the fact that you'd have to get the word out about the station, which defeats the point of non-intervention.

I don't know, I'm just not completely comfortable with the idea that people and children are dying of easily treatable diseases... but I agree, going in and 'civilizing' them would be disastrous.

But, do they have 'Medicare'?

What 'Reservation,' anyway? You're talking about their entire World.

Is this something to do with 'the benefits of Civilisation'? Take a really good look at the state of the planet. They probably have very little idea of what's really going on, beyond the boundaries of their 'World', which keep shrinking. No wonder they attack their usurpers. Do you really think that they would be any healthier, or happier, if intervention stripped their consensus reality from them, to replace it with a whole new set of the physical and metaphysical, diseases of civilisation?

 

[Mister_Awesome]

Honestly, I kind of wish that tribe would save me from the modern world.

 

[liveinabin]

Greetings,

I say leave 'em alone.
I bet these folks sleep a lot better than most of us.
As far as a shortened life... I would hate to live to be a hundred plus lying and dying in bed from nothing if I could have lived fifty years as a free man living in tune with the original planet lay out.

PEACE!

I agree! I saw a program once about a tribe that worked to get their food for the day (which didn't take much) and after that sat around relaxing. Can I have that please?

 

[misterwibble]

Do bear in mind that contacting them will result in a need for modern medicine as these people are introduced to a range of interesting pathogens to which they will have little or no resistance. Simply wandering in, saying "Hi!" and shaking hands could easily result in most of them being dead within six months.

 

[wembley8]

Wow - still lots of believers in noble savages communing with nature and having a great time in the garden of Eden.
I wouldn't say it's like that at all; having read a few books and been to the jungles of Venezuela, I'd go with the 'nasty, brutish and short' view of life in the natural state. (And the murder rate among groups like the Yanomami is phenomenal - these are not peaceful folk).
Native people have always suffered from contact in the past, but that's been because the people who cantacted them did so with the intention of enslaving them and stealing their stuff. The problem isn't the difference in cultures.
On a related note, does this means everyone wants aliens to leave us alone and refuse to get in contact?

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

Wow - still lots of believers in noble savages communing with nature and having a great time in the garden of Eden.
I wouldn't say it's like that at all; having read a few books and been to the jungles of Venezuela, I'd go with the 'nasty, brutish and short' view of life in the natural state. (And the murder rate among groups like the Yanomami is phenomenal - these are not peaceful folk).
Native people have always suffered from contact in the past, but that's been because the people who cantacted them did so with the intention of enslaving them and stealing their stuff. The problem isn't the difference in cultures.
On a related note, does this means everyone wants aliens to leave us alone and refuse to get in contact?

I don't know about 'noble savages,' but would your position be one of, benign intervention, then?

If aliens came along with knowledge so far in advance of our own that it apparently completely negated everything humanity had striven toward up to that point, then their intervention might not necessarily be to humanity's benefit.

Supposing that they came with absolute and definitive proof of the existence, or non-existence of God, a true belief system, so alien to anything Humanity knows, that even Cthulhu seems quite cosy, or perhaps, evidence that humanity was viewed as nothing more than a sort of cockroach, by other advanced cultures around the galaxy, etc. Then the aliens just moved in to what they viewed as legitimate and virgin real estate, around the World. After a few years subjected to a whole range of interstellar diseases to which humanity has no resistance, the few Earthling survivors are generously gifted a few thousand square miles of desert and swamp, as a reservation, where they while away their time, getting drunk, or stoned and jacking into alien entertainment technology.

I'm thinking along the lines of Arthur C. Clarke's Childhood's End here, actually, without the hopeful ending. Mainly, all the evidence suggests that cultural exchange has not worked out too well for Native American's, Australian Aborigines, other Rain Forest tribes, or many indigenous peoples around the World.

Perhaps, you know different, of course.

 

[foxenigma]

I wouldn't say it's like that at all; having read a few books and been to the jungles of Venezuela, I'd go with the 'nasty, brutish and short' view of life in the natural state.

'nasty, brutish and short' by our enlightened standards it may be, but it's their existance and has been for a long time and we should defend their right to remain so with our last breath, if that means leaving them to it then leave them to it I say.

 

[foxenigma]

On a related note, does this means everyone wants aliens to leave us alone and refuse to get in contact?

I can't speak for everyone but yes I would much prefer that and perhaps, just perhaps, the Aliens haven't landed yet because they believe doing so could have a detrimental effect upon our society just as contact with this peoples in the Amazon would damage theirs.

 

[bazizmaduno]

Leave them be.

I'm sure they already know where 'civilization' is, but have chosen to remain where they are, doing what they do, in their own way.

Leave them be - please.

 

[goth13girl666]

tribes

these tribes have been isolated for such a long time tat they have their own culture and way of life that's alot different to their's, and the plane incident is their way of saying "please leave us alone".

there is no absolute truth that the tribes suffer from lower life expectancies or higher infant mortality rates, those quotes could be said of any area or culture.

i agree with what theyithian wrote earlier in respect to leaving them alone and i think we should leave them aloneand only interact upon their say so and not until.

they have proved they can stand the test of time as they have been around for centuries and that is all without any interference which i think would be bad for the tribe.

these people know how to look after themselves in regards to food, water and their healthn as they know how to use what they have around them in a way we probably never could with how our society and culture relates a majority of the time our culture gets involved with another it never turns out good.

one wonders would we of been better off with a culture similiar to their's?

 

[rynner2]

There are no right and wrong answers here.

I'm currently reading a massive book on modern physics, trying to bring myself up to speed with current thinking. It's fairly heavy, with equations and scientific notation throughout, and (unlike a lot of popular science books) it details exactly what the problems of modern theories and knowledge are, as well as laying out how they also succeed very well in many other aspects.

The point I'm trying to make is that our modern scientific culture is amazing rich and complex (even if 90% of our population don't appreciate it), and, although a simpler way of life might seem attractive at times, I for one would hate to lose what knowledge we have now.

It would perhaps not be right to send in 'missionaries' (whether religious or scientific) to this tribe, but if we don't we are effectively quarantining them in a little ethnic zoo, which seems rather condescending.

But the blunt fact is that on the whole we know very much more about our universe than they do, even if their local knowledge outstrips ours in their own environment.

 

[wembley8]

Re: tribes

one wonders would we of been better off with a culture similiar to their's?

I'm thinking particularly of Kenneth Good's book "Into The heart" about his years living with thwe Yanomami. They have no law as such, violence is common and rape is a particularly popular pastime. Women are treated as property; in one incident an elder settles an argument between two men over a woman by spearing her.

There is no contraception, childbirth is a painful and occasionally fatal experience, and watching most of your children die before adulthood is the norm. (Your new husband may also kill your children after he's taken you from your old husband as a way of encouraging you to bear and look after his children).

If you want that sort of life, feel free to join them. But shouldn't people also have the option to leave that sort of culture?

 

[wembley8]

we should defend their right to remain so with our last breath

I'm happy to defend their right to continue in their current lifestyle. But I'd also like to give them the option to try a different world. Should all children be forced to stay in the same vilage as their parents all their lives?

 

[rynner2]

I got back to nature this afternoon _ I went out in the garden and uprooted a load of weeds that were threatening to engulf one of our hydrangea bushes!

(But I couldn't tell you what the weed was called... )

 

[wembley8]

Mainly, all the evidence suggests that cultural exchange has not worked out too well for Native American's, Australian Aborigines, other Rain Forest tribes, or many indigenous peoples around the World.

Perhaps, you know different, of course.

Because, as I said at the start, they were contacted by people bent on exploiting them and their land. If there had been some respect for their humanity or their culture, things might have been different.

But it isn't always like that. look at Japan, whose self-imposed isolation from all things Western was forcibly blown apart by superior firepower of the American Black Ships in 1854.

150 years later and the Japanese have shrugged off or assimilated Western influences and are culturally, materially and technologically stronger than ever.