quote:

ORIGINAL: Moonhead

I'd suggest more that they're culturally incapable of assimilating any of that,


Please define "culturally incapable"?

for which the fact that they're still living as they were 6000 years ago,

Is it possible that they like living as they do?


despite their environment being steadily stripped away around them, could be taken as circumstantial evidence.

Isn't your environment being steadily stripped away around you?
Isn't your environment being steadily poisoned about you?
And yet you question their persistence in face of the same obsticals that you persist in the face of.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Moonhead

Having a worldview that's so narrow it can't expand to take in any new information, however long it's been around for. What the hell do you think it means? The reason they're still living as they did 6000 years ago is because they're not able to adapt any innovations to a static culture which is so ossified it's incapable of any change short of being wiped out. This is pretty common in preliterate societies, sadly.

How many britt cultures have foundered on the shoals of time while these people seem to thirve in their "static" culture?
Doesn't longevity seem to be on their side?

It's possible that they like living as they do. It's equally possible that they hate every minute of it, but can't get their heads around the notion that they have any alternative or even (as illiterate pygmies speaking an obscure language exclusively) they have no other alternatives.

You clearly have not read either Turnbul or Buhuchet, don't you think it prudent to get a little background on the subject before you make your mind up?

My environment is growing rather than being stripped away, old boy. There's a lot more suburbs than rainforests these days.

That was my point

quote:

ORIGINAL: Moonhead

Well, I have read information about them that was published since the mid '60s. Turnbull doesn't mention the impact the Congo war had on the poor bastards, did he?

Since he was writing before it happened it would be rather difficult don't you think?

Thriving is a comparative thing. A very small population can be maintained, but any expansion will lead to a Malthusian crash of the sort that could be ridden out by a more connected, wider culture.

Wasn't that the point I made, that they were a small population that has been able to maintain itself for some five or six thousand years?


Also, their numbers are steadily falling, and have been for years.

Is it because of their lifestyle?
or
Is it because they occupy a marketable resource and need to be eliminated so that someone else can take it and sell it?

If that was your point, why did you talk about my environment being steadily stripped away around me?
Are there more trees in England today than there were fifty years ago or a hundred years ago?
Is the air quality better or worse than it was fifty or a hundred years ago?
Is the water quality better or worse than it was fifty or a hundred years ago?

quote:

ORIGINAL: thompsonx

if life expectancy at birth is 32 and half die by 15 then the remaining fifty percent have a life expectancy of 64 add another 20% for the dead babies and now we are up to 76.

quote:

ORIGINAL: taleon

quote:

ORIGINAL: thompsonx

if life expectancy at birth is 32 and half die by 15 then the remaining fifty percent have a life expectancy of 64 add another 20% for the dead babies and now we are up to 76.

You can't "add another 20% for the dead babies", because they'll be included in the mortality rate by the age of 15. Worse than that, you seem to marginalize the fact hat half of them will be dead by age 15, by claiming that, well, at least the rest of them will probably get to see sixty. I'm sorry, but these figures are absolutely horrible, and I'm very grateful that I was born in an age and civilization capable of doing (a whole lot) better than that.

I was quite aware of the point you are making when I posted.
My point was to show that if the poster wanted to play fast and loose with his statistics I could use his own figures to do the same.
I have not marginalized anything or anyone. I pointed out that the Mbuti have a stable population that does not overstress their environment's ability to support them.
Twenty percent infant mortality is not uncommon in Africa. That hgs have similar infant mortality rates to the rest of non hgs Africa is indicative that hgs is not a factor in infant mortality rates.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_infant_mortality_rate

quote:

ORIGINAL: thompsonx

quote:

ORIGINAL: Moonhead

Well, I have read information about them that was published since the mid '60s. Turnbull doesn't mention the impact the Congo war had on the poor bastards, did he?

Since he was writing before it happened it would be rather difficult don't you think?

Thriving is a comparative thing. A very small population can be maintained, but any expansion will lead to a Malthusian crash of the sort that could be ridden out by a more connected, wider culture.

Wasn't that the point I made, that they were a small population that has been able to maintain itself for some five or six thousand years?


Also, their numbers are steadily falling, and have been for years.

Is it because of their lifestyle?
or
Is it because they occupy a marketable resource and need to be eliminated so that someone else can take it and sell it?

If that was your point, why did you talk about my environment being steadily stripped away around me?
Are there more trees in England today than there were fifty years ago or a hundred years ago?
Is the air quality better or worse than it was fifty or a hundred years ago?
Is the water quality better or worse than it was fifty or a hundred years ago?

quote:


Air and water quality are both a lot better than they were in the '60s: there hasn't been any black snow since the turn of the '80s. A few pieces of legislation have been passed about air quality in the last half a century.

Do you feel that this is common throughout the industrial world?



When the Pygmies can do something to stop the rest of Africa shitting where they eat, they might be able to compete with that.

They who might be able to compete with what?
Why is it the job of the hgs to do anything to anyone?


You're dodging the objections I raised over holding up a civilisation that's stuck in the neolithic as an exemplar, rather than adressing any of them, by the way.

You are unhappy that some people live pre-stone age (they are not neo-lithic) and they claim to be happy about it and you find fault with that.
I have tried to answer all of your questions. Please show me the one that I have not and I will.

quote:

ORIGINAL: thompsonx

quote:

Isn't your environment being steadily stripped away around you?
Isn't your environment being steadily poisoned about you?
And yet you question their persistence in face of the same obsticals that you persist in the face of.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Moonhead

quote:

ORIGINAL: thompsonx

quote:

Isn't your environment being steadily stripped away around you?
Isn't your environment being steadily poisoned about you?
And yet you question their persistence in face of the same obsticals that you persist in the face of.

Denying that what you said is what you meant is a pretty orthodox way of dodging a question on the internet, I've noticed.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Moonhead

Incidently, Turnbull's snow job was published in '68. The congo war was up and running by then. Apparently he couldn't be arsed doing any further research as he already had his argument nicely worked up and didn't want to dwell on the fact that both sides were killing and eating the mbuti who they saw as sub human vermin.

quote:

Isn't your environment being steadily stripped away around you?
Isn't your environment being steadily poisoned about you?
And yet you question their persistence in face of the same obsticals that you persist in the face of

quote:

That was my point.

quote:

ORIGINAL: thompsonx

quote:

ORIGINAL: Moonhead

Incidently, Turnbull's snow job was published in '68. The congo war was up and running by then. Apparently he couldn't be arsed doing any further research as he already had his argument nicely worked up and didn't want to dwell on the fact that both sides were killing and eating the mbuti who they saw as sub human vermin.

Turnbull published "Forest People" in 1961 baised on research done in the 50's.

quote:

ORIGINAL: thompsonx

quote:

ORIGINAL: taleon

quote:

ORIGINAL: thompsonx

if life expectancy at birth is 32 and half die by 15 then the remaining fifty percent have a life expectancy of 64 add another 20% for the dead babies and now we are up to 76.

You can't "add another 20% for the dead babies", because they'll be included in the mortality rate by the age of 15. Worse than that, you seem to marginalize the fact hat half of them will be dead by age 15, by claiming that, well, at least the rest of them will probably get to see sixty. I'm sorry, but these figures are absolutely horrible, and I'm very grateful that I was born in an age and civilization capable of doing (a whole lot) better than that.

I was quite aware of the point you are making when I posted.
My point was to show that if the poster wanted to play fast and loose with his statistics I could use his own figures to do the same.
I have not marginalized anything or anyone. I pointed out that the Mbuti have a stable population that does not overstress their environment's ability to support them.
Twenty percent infant mortality is not uncommon in Africa. That hgs have similar infant mortality rates to the rest of non hgs Africa is indicative that hgs is not a factor in infant mortality rates.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_infant_mortality_rate

quote:

Air and water quality are both a lot better than they were in the '60s: there hasn't been any black snow since the turn of the '80s. A few pieces of legislation have been passed about air quality in the last half a century.

quote:

ORIGINAL: pyroaquatic

Dear Head of Moon,

You are thinking like an American. Everything is handed to you on a silver platter (relative to let us say a carved wooden bowl).

Get used to the fact that people are going to do what they want in pursuit of HAPPINESS.

There is not a single thing you can do about that.

------

As we were in the womb you may notice very webbed fingers.
We come out and they are gone. Why? Because those cells were programmed to die so we may have better dexterity.

Now imagine the earth as a 'person' and we are the cells.

Each Cell has a specific purpose and place. Some cells are worked a little harder. Other Cells clump together to perform monumental tasks that we could not do individually. Appreciate what is there and how 'far' we have come. Transcend current limitations but Include past technology. It is my opinion that we are retrogressing in our pursuit of material goods... who has a nicer house, car, toys for our kids, rings for a loved one.

Programmed to Consume, Work, Propagate, and Die. What an american dream.

:)
------

What we are experiencing now is the end of a world. Not an end of the world. The ghosts are coming. :3