If we didn't have heavily entrenched imperialist tendencies that allowed us to destroy so-called "inferior cultures" at will, we'd probably have learned a lot more from our fellow man than we have.

The Australian aborigines knew about anti-septics and anti-biotic preparations hundreds of years before we, in the West, claimed the victory for ourselves. They even had a Hippocratic oath hundreds of years before Western physicians, who were still practicing blood-letting as a norm. Colonists arrived, and those injured who stayed in their camps for treatment by the blood-letters, died. Those who consulted the locals, learned bush medicines, were healed and survived.

If only some rational souls had been there to observe, we could've had antibiotics a hundred years sooner. One wonders what sort of world it would've been if we'd paid more attention to the aborigines, rather than massacre them.