How would we treat Neanderthals if we discovered a small population in some uncharted region?
Would we treat them like we treat our other ape relatives, or would we treat them like humans and bestow human rights upon them?
If you were in charge, how would you decide?
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I would hire linguistics experts, sociologists and anthropologists to work as a team on a way to interact with the Neanderthals without taking them out of their environment and without doing lab work on them – I would protect their land and ways of being.
ah, but tribal peoples get treated like shit all the time. what human rights do they have? I expect that the hypothetical Neanderthals would get treated with more respect, because, wow, real Neanderthals. not like those common homo sapiens. we have six billion of them, right?
@Simone De Beauvoir: no way around us, even meeting us would change them in unpredictable ways. much like our finding about them would change us. you could only safely preserve their culture by never meeting them.
@Ria777 that’s true, of course – some change will occur…I just meant that I would preserve their space and not enforce changes upon them…that’s why we need to first figure out how to communicate properly
local egends suggest that homo floresciensis existed up until modern times. if they haven’t died out, then we would have a similar situation for real. (if homo floresiensis exists as a legitimate species, and not just small members of homo sapiens.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_floresiensis
I imagine that they would be more intelligent than apes, so we would probably try to teach them language and understand as much about them as possible before they become fully assimilated into our modern world.
I’m sure there would also be extensive studies (and autopsies!) about their physiologies. And I’m sure we’ll want to know if they are compatible for procreation…
We would give them our diseases and corrupt them with the Western materialistic way of life just like we have all other populations we have encountered.
Sadly, we’d doom them with our good intentions.
I would offer them insurance from Geico.
We would do what we have done with the tribes in South America.
Close off their territory to outsiders. Let them live out the life they are accustom to.
Until the outside world seeps in and/or they die due to an immune system that cant defend them from the outside buggies.
I don’t see the problem with teaching them our language and “corrupting” them with Western materialism.
I’d imagine that’s better than subsistence farming or hunting and gathering while afflicted with painful diseases, occasional starvation, and commonplace violence, rape and revenge killings found in most human tribal societies and presumably in Neandartal tribal societies.
I’m not a cultural conservationist. Cultures generally evolve for the better.
“subsistence farming or hunting and gathering while afflicted with painful diseases, occasional starvation, and commonplace violence, rape and revenge killings found in most human tribal societies”
Sounds like pretty much everywhere. We are still a tribal society.
Only semi-related because Neanderthals were genetically engineered in this story, rather than discovered, but… N-words by Ted Kosmatka
If they seemed content I think I would let them be, and make sure we did not affect their society if possible. Kind of like the Prime Directive. If it was possible to communicate it might be interesting to learn from them, and they could learn from us if they so wished.
@ChazMaz, you think Western society is still a tribal society of hunter-gatherers. Do you know what the words “tribe” and “hunter-gatherer” and “subsistence farming” mean?
@JLeslie, shouldn’t the Neandertals have the choice of whether or not they want to continue living in their society or join the outside world?
@Qingu yes, that is what I meant by allowing them to learn from us, I should have been more specific on that point. Thank you.
Ah, I missed that. We cool.
“Do you know what the words “tribe” and “hunter-gatherer” and “subsistence farming” mean?”
Yes I do, think outside the box.
Because I am not in the woods any more finding nut and berries. I am still going through the process to acquire nourishment and shelter.
What tribe do you belong to? Republic, Communist, Socialist, Liberal? Christian, Jewish, Muslim?
You’re speaking metaphorically. In anthropology, those words have specific meanings.
We aren’t a hunter-gatherer society. We are a post-industrialized society. There is a tremendous difference.
Similarly, we aren’t a tribal-society. We are a state level society.
No, we are just more “civilized”.
Give them jobs as busboys.
5000 years ago most likely we would have driven them into extinction. Today researchers would step in. They would most likely confirm we can’t interbreed. Giving them full human rights? Well, look at the discussion about pan troglodytes versus homo troglodytes.
@ChazMaz: _“subsistence farming or hunting and gathering while afflicted with painful diseases, occasional starvation, and commonplace violence, rape and revenge killings found in most human tribal societies”
Sounds like pretty much everywhere. We are still a tribal society._
it has to do with semantics and you using “pretty much everywhere” to handwave away that you that does not mean everywhere. if you use “we” to mean collectively the world, yes, much (most?) of the world still lives that way. scale that down to post-industrial society generally, what we call the First and Second Worlds (versus Third and Fourth worlds) does not live that way.
“subsistence farming or hunting and gathering while afflicted with painful diseases, occasional starvation, and commonplace violence, rape and revenge killings”
You do not believe that it does not go on in First and Second worlds?
I have seen all that behavior go on in my back yard. In the good old USA.
@ChazMaz: I live in a walled city-state outside of Sheboygan and you would not believe what goes on here. peasant revolts, religious persecution, even leprosy from time to time. oh, and when you say revenge, I think you mean justice. but I digress.
yes, these things do go on in the First and Second Worlds (including walled city-states). they do, not, however occur with the same frequency as they do in the Third and Fourth World or else… duh duh duh… they would belong to the Third and Fourth Worlds.
you don’t have a clear-cut division between one thing and another. we have varying degrees. many cultures in the world would not think or at one time did not consider it a possibility that we could evolve out of revenge killings or invent vaccines for plagues (until recently you wouldn’t have known what “vaccine” meant, even). some parts of the world still haven’t evolved out of it.
So when we, our generation, find a way to become desensitized to something.
We sweep it under the rug. Reclassify or classify it as something else. Then we can pat ourselves on the back for becoming better then what we were/ still are.
If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck. Still going to call it a duck.
@ChazMaz: let me try to paraphrase what I think you mean… you cannot make a valid distinction exists between First and other worlds? we should do away with that classification altogether? no distinction between tribal cultures and cultures at a nation-state level of development? we should just say “cultures”?
also, did you read that link? not just glance at it, but read it?
Yes I did read it.
Should we say cultures? We are doing it with race and sexuality. When there is a major economical difference. Nothing wrong with classifying with First, Second or Third.
But the basic and current “fundamental” of how we currently live. Such as;
“subsistence farming or hunting and gathering while afflicted with painful diseases, occasional starvation, and commonplace violence, rape and revenge killings found in most human tribal societies”
Are still found in all society’s. So one grows rice and one drives to the office.
Having nothing to do with a nation-state level of development. At least not yet. Though we would like to think that.
If there is a thousand people living in poverty or one. There is a difference? No, there is still poverty.
Should we say cultures? We are doing it with race and sexuality. When there is a major economical difference.
?
Cultures = all people
Black, white, yellow = people
Hetro, homo, bi, transgender = Unisexual or something of that nature
“When there is a major economical difference. Nothing wrong with classifying with First, Second or Third.”
But only for academic clarity. But lets not kid ourselves with semantics and over bloated terminology.
earlier I had asked if you would like to do away with terms like industrial, post-industrial, tribal, feudal, etc. I don’t understand either your original reply or the later one relates to the question.
you made an unwarranted assumption that I did kid myself that all First World people live comfortable lives. I have seen some seriously brutal poverty. rightly or wrongly I think that the u.s. has more of it than western europe, though. or canada. per capita, I mean, as well as the extremes of it.
“you made an unwarranted assumption”
Re: lets not kid ourselves
That was a generality.
Chaz, look. This is pretty simple. Anthropologists divide human cultures into divisions based on their complexity. Those divisions are:
1. Band
2. Tribe
3. Chiefdom
4. State
These kinds of groups do have similarities, as you are fond of pointing out. But they have very different political structures and social relationships.
Similarly, hunting and gathering refers to a specific mode of human existence. Subsistence farming is a completely different way of life with different technology and social structures required. Industrialized production is, likewise, entirely different than subsistence farming.
You are conflating these categories solely to make a lame rhetorical point and try to sound “wise.” Please stop.
“You are conflating these categories solely to make a lame rhetorical point and try to sound “wise.” Please stop.”
Now that is your assumption. You are allowed you opinion. As am I. Don’t ever let your insecurity get in the way of a debate.
You might want to legalize it. Don’t get too hung up on yourself and your grandiose knowledge.
This is a cut and dry issue, no matter how Anthropologicalized your information.
Until a robot society provides all that we need. We are still hunting and gathering.
I understood your point from the beginning. Your information is academic.
But if you feel better drawing me a map with pictures and GPS locations. Instead of just understanding we need milk. The rest of the process being common sense.
You are more then welcome to do it. “This IS pretty simple.”
You’re entitled to your own opinion, but not to your own facts.
We are not a hunter-gatherer society. Anyone who thinks we are does not understand what the term “hunter-gatherer” means.
@mattbrowne: it doesn’t have to do with agreeing with Qingu. it has to do with either accepting a very basic model of societal development as valid or rejecting it as invalid.
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