>} The punishment for a wrong idea was much more likely to be death. In our
>} benign society you can make a lot of boo-boos and come out OK. Without
>On the other hand, the punishment for not being inventive in a hostile
>environment can _also_ be death. Make a mistake (run out of water) and
>you die; but if you don't explore every option available you may not
>make it either.
Generally only an issue when a crisis occurs (famine, drought, etc.) Even
then the best options may well be recorded from the last time that happened,
300 years ago.
>Especially in competition with braver bands who have
>found twice as many edible species to gather as you.
Over hundreds of years of trial, error, accident, and emergency, most bands
know most of what's edible around them.
>} In point of fact, "primitive" cultures are typically very conservative,
and
>} their members are typically very conservative as well. This is part of
the
>} reason they have such trouble when pitched into contact with developed
>} societies.
>Primitive == subsistence farmers or primitive == hunter-gatherers?
Both, really, but I was thinking of hunter-gatherers (HG), as agriculture is
very recent in our evolution.
>Jared Diamond feels the latter are likely to be more intelligent by
>culture if not by marginal evolution than humans living in more
>artificial, hence nicer, environments. Specifically that many of them
>are more generally exploratory and playful than modern humans, though
>outhinking a couch potato or McTourist is not difficult.
That's an interesting speculation, but factually HG groups don't do well,
even though theoretically their knowledge should give them a tremendous
advantage wrt nature films, plant botany, cult leadership, nature retreats
and no doubt many other things as well. There aren't many HG, for biological
reasons; I think there should be enough room in our enormous society for all
of them to do well.
>I'd suggest H-G problems stem more from massive technological
>inferiority and more deadly, massive immunological inferiority leading
>to societal wipeout, with which few people will deal well. Amerinds
>adapted to horses, guns, and applicable Eurasian agriculture quite
>well. Cherokee successfully adapted to US legal system, which was
>ignored by Andrew "fuck the Court" Jackson. Hard to adapt to being
>outnumbered and outgunned by people willing to destroy, not conquer,
>you.
Can't argue with any of that. The Cherokees learned everything they could
from the Europeans, but their numerical inferiority was so great they hadn't
a chance even against a distinct minority of US society.