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Comment by d3x | Hacker News Reader

I really hope you are kidding. If not this is so typical of the american way of thinking. Yes, we are so superior lets convert them all to our [insert culture, religion etc...]. What is so bad about leaving them alone? I would bet they are much happer than the majority of the FB and Twitter obsessed narcissist that I run into every day.

While we are at it lets make sure they all become good christians too because anyone that has not accepted christ in their life just does not know what they are missing.

Im not trying to be an ass but I fundamentally disagree with everything you just said. BTW: you to know that Western medicine is not the only medicine in the world. While we are at it lets take them our aids, diabetes, obesity etc...

You are basically saying that your beliefs and way of life are so superior and better than theirs that you must convert them and that is total bullshit. They have a right just as you do to continue their way of life without someone like you coming along and deciding what is and is not ok for them.

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What is so bad about leaving them alone? I would bet they are much happer than the majority of the FB and Twitter obsessed narcissist that I run into every day.

What is so bad is you making the decision for them -- one way or the other. It's that kind of pompous paternalistic attitude that caused all kinds of pain and misery.

If they are happy with a life expectancy of 30, of having mothers die in childbirth commonly, of dying of things like scratches and measles -- if they want that life, let them have it. But show and tell them what they are missing and let them decide. Don't arrogantly assume that there's something romantic about living like a caveman. It's just as whacked as automatically assuming they would want all of the modernity we enjoy.

What we've found, over and over again, is that contact with primitive cultures destroys the cultures. That's because you'd have to be a flaming idiot to want to live like that (I find the greatest supporters of "leave them alone" are armchair philosophers living all nice and comfy in the west) We can't help that, but it's no excuse to let people suffer when we can help them stop if (If they so desire) There is nothing noble in inaction.

Treat people as you would like to be treated if you were them. It's really very simple. If you'd like to rant and rave about how much modern life sucks, fine. But don't use these guys as props to do so. They deserve better than that.

By the way, this is also a pet peeve of mine, and I come at this from exactly the opposite pov. Sometimes I think "Star Trek" has done more to muddy up an entire generation of thinkers than a hundred piss-poor colleges could have ever hoped to accomplish.

Treat people as you would like to be treated if you were them.

I wish I had 100 upmods to give. This is exactly what I was saying elsewhere, we should think about how we would want to be treated. Would we want medicine and education offered to us? Would we want the option for some of our elders to live out the rest of their lives in a traditional manner? Would we want bulldozers knocking down our trees? Would we want jobs driving bulldozers?

I don't know the answer, I just know that I'd want to ponder that for a good long while if I had to make a call.

I don't know the answer either, but I sure as hell know it's not my decision to make for somebody else.

Your point about possible alien intelligences is an excellent one. How would we want to be treated if the shoe were on the other foot? I don't know my answer -- I suspect I would be all for change even if it were uncomfortable. But I absolutely know that I would be the one to make my personal decision about the matter. That's not for others to decide for me.

We have a word for a situation where beings are allowed to live in fake isolation, while we secretly observe them and feel great about ourselves for letting them live as close to their natural state as we can allow. It's called a "zoo"

I don't know what they're going to do here. The isolated tribe in India live in a protected zone, but the government regularly offers them a chance to make contact, and the tribe drives them off with weapons.

That's a way forward that is neither dragging them into the 21st century nor running a zoo. I'm not advocating for that, of course, just pointing out that contact/isolation is a false dichotomy.

Some members of the tribe drive them off with weapons.

Others are children who do not get to make a choice until AFTER they have been indoctrinated with the tribe's values.

We see the same problem in the Muslim world. In some countries, Muslim women are treated as property and not allowed outside without a chaperone. How can they make a free choice to join the West when their male guardians say "no" for them?

We see the same problem universally.

We're all brought up in societies which indoctrinate. We're all introduced to ideas at an early age, which we grow attached to. It's unavoidable.

Yeah, I was aware of the peculiarities of this particular case (the tribe not wanting contact) and chose to ignore them in order to make the larger point.

Science fiction is great. It lets us look at some of these issues without (perhaps) so much emotional heat.

So let's assume that in the 1950s, aliens contacted the president of the United States -- a theme which recurs over and over again in sci-fi. The president decided that we were too primitive and paranoid to handle contact with a galactic civilization, so he told them to leave us alone.

What I'm saying is that whatever the nature of the leader, whether they are the president, or prime minister, or head of NATO, or head of the UN, or whoever else, it doesn't matter. They don't have the moral authority to be making decisions like that for me. No part of the social contract allows leaders to make decisions of such huge import and keep them secret.

So while I support any individual's right to be left alone and live however they like, I do not support people who are presumed leaders keeping information of that magnitude from others.

Just to speculate a bit, if you're the chief of a tribe, or part of the power structure, it probably sounds pretty good to be left alone. After all, who wants change? However if you're a mother who just watched her 5-year-old kid die from something that was easily prevented? You might have different ideas. Keeping the mother uniformed so that you can continue exercising your power over her is immoral and I do not support it.

As you point out, in the real world, these kinds of things are murky at best, with lots of little conditions and details you want to consider. All I'm saying is that it's not acceptable to simply throw your hands up and give up. From what little I know, I think the idea of repeated gentle contact -- as much as it can be done without annoying them too much -- is probably the wisest course of action. This would allow us to be sure we have made a reasonable and polite effort to inform them of the outside world, as well as trying to catch the newer members of the tribe as they are born and grow up. After all, even if you're left alone, it is reasonable to expect that you still have some kind of relationship to your neighbors.

I remember I said to my philosophy teacher, 'nobody considers native tribes to be poor or miserable, even though they lack material comfort,' and she replied 'I think the comfort of these situations greatly depends on whether you're male or female.'

I'd want to be left alone - give one example of colonialism that worked out well for indigenous people, and I'll maybe change my mind.

There are much less invasive options for contact than colonialism. Nobody said we have to move ourselves into some indigenous peoples' lands in order to offer them the chance to accept or reject a modern life.

But the effect is the same - their society would be absorbed, and probably forgotten.

It's like time travel - you can't go back because you don't know what kind of effects you'll have on the future. In this case you don't know what kind of effects contact will have on their (the tribe's) future.

So how about Japan for example? Do you think contact with the west was bad for them?

you're comparing different things, or do you think that a highly advanced CIVILIZATION like the japanese encountering the west is similar to a TRIBE of HUNTERS-GATHERERS.... damn!

No. I was referring to messages by lwhi and nitrogen. As nitrogen said, there are less invasive options to contact them than colonization and there are cases where it is beneficial to the (in some ways) less advanced civilization. It might not have been fun for the japanese when the westerners first came there, but in the long run it was a good thing. And while the japanese culture was certainly changed, it was not destroyed or forgotten.

Ok.

India is now an "important" country. Burgeoning technologically and culturally, what it received from Britain was access to the intellectual firestorm of the Enlightenment. Hindu thinkers were involved in the formation of Universalism, the idea that all religions were different aspects of the same thing and could be united.

Of course, it cost them the pain of the Pakistan-India divide, the struggle of Gandhi, and a confusing cultural identity among a people that didn't necessarily have a singular cultural identity in the first place. But what price is too much?

South Africa paid the price, and is now among the most advanced of African nations.

Of course, most indigenous peoples just got royally fucked. Aboriginal Australians and the Maori. So I suppose your point in general holds.

It is a bit presumptuous to assume that India or S.A. would not have made progress or exchanged "intellectual" information without a country sailing over and lording over it for a hundred years.

Disclaimer: I am an Indian.

I'm not assuming anything, I'm making an assertion--an assertion that could be right or wrong. In particular I am not assuming/asserting that India or S.A. would not have made progress.

I am saying that the effects of colonial rule are so unstable and so varied that it can be difficult to the point of meaninglessness to say a country would be "better" or "worse" without it.

The Bengal Renaissance is a documented movement, founded and driven by people exposed to Western thought. That doesn't mean the movement wasn't theirs, that they weren't the ones producing "intellectual" information. But they were in a different place because of colonialism than they would have been without, one where Indians went to school in Britain and where people were writing letters to each other across the ocean.

Technically, I agree, but using this same logic, the effects of _any_ major historical incident are so unstable and so varied that "it can be difficult to the point of meaninglessness to say a country would be "better" or "worse" without it."

You should look at India's share of world GDP before the British came and after they left.

GDP is one measure of a country's power. I should point out that measuring the GDP of India prior to British imposition is a little bit hairy since India was not really a singular political entity.

Besides, my point was never that India didn't suffer; my point was to illustrate some of the advantages of colonial rule and demonstrate _just how muddy_ the interference of a technologically superior culture can become.

Hong Kong.

Your reply is so laced with hypocrisy its disgusting. How do you know their lives are so bad? From what the video showed they seem to be doing just fine.

I would rather be A West coast armchair philosopher than an elitest who feels he is so superior to other people that I have the right to be condescending when discussing their way of life and I have the obligation to convert them to my way of thinking.

FYI: one of the main justifications for slavery - Slavery was good for the slaves; the slaveowners took on the burden of caring for the interests of inferior beings, seeing that they would be fed, clothed and given religious instruction.

This is the post I'd give a 100 upvotes to.

Hypothetically what would you do if these tribes had a system of slavery?

What are you doing about the non-hypothetical slavery in the US right now?

You're talking about human trafficking/sex slaves?

It's already illegal. I leave that up to the cops.

I hope he was talking about something a little more subtle, like the fact that we have so many Hispanic people here without citizenship and have therefore created a sort of lower subservient class. But probably not, slavery's a bit too strong a term unless there's a somewhat-mitigating "wage" in front of it.

Actually I was thinking about both situations. Others as well but the sex slave trafficking and migrant slavery are two of them.

http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2010/mar/03/farmworker-slaver... and http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/columns/modern-day-slavery-m... are some articles about recent situations in Florida.

There's also domestic servant slavery and even factory worker slavery, such as the slaves that are imported to US Territory Saipan to work in Chinese owned garment factories. (http://articles.sfgate.com/1999-01-22/news/17677080_1_garmen...) Workers there are raped by managers, kept in guarded chained enclosures, and have to undergo forced abortions when they get pregnant from the rapes.

There's also legal slavery, such as prison labor, which is explicitly permitted under the Constitution, although many legal experts believe that it actually has to be part of the sentence as punishment for the crime, and not just something that applies to all prisoners without a judge's approval during sentencing. To simplify things we'll skip those as being "OK" slavery since some believe there is legal justification for it even when not part of sentencing. Don't want to confuse the issue.

By slavery we mean you are not free to leave and you are not paid wages for your work. Many workers in the US are even shackled up and beaten.

Gosh look I even just now found a new book on Modern American Slavery.

http://www.amazon.com/Nobodies-Modern-American-Global-Econom...

Of course there was also slavery of black people in the US that lasted until the 1940s. Oh, didn't know about that? http://www.slaverybyanothername.com/

Most people prefer not to know why the goods and food they buy are so cheap.

It is possible to link all of these happenings by the single term "slavery" but that does not make it prudent for the course of communication. In your original post you elucidated images of chattel slavery, the actual written right to own another person within the law, which does not exist in the United States. In practice there are other forms of slavery, of course, as you demonstrate, some more subtle and some less.

But don't fall into the trap of over-applying the label, particularly one as loaded (in the US) as slavery.

Also, your smugness is... well, smug. Yes. Yes I did know about that. Stick to the information and cut out the assumption that you're delivering a revelation, because you're not.

However, I appreciate your bitterness and rage towards the unfairness of the world.

Huh, what's that word where someone describes themselves and applies it to others? Like a smug person calling another person smug? Oh yeah, projection, it's called projection.

Lots of real modern slavery in the US and elsewhere regardless of your personal opinions about it.

Yeah, I'm perfectly willing to admit I was being smug, though I might prefer the term coldly critical or openly irritated. Your deflection of my criticism does not address my criticism, it merely weakly attempts to declare it unimportant. "You're smug too!"

Additionally you have failed to address anything about my point concerning precision of definition, except perhaps _very_ obliquely by using the phrase "real modern slavery" to deselect chattel slavery.

I do not question that some (many) form(s) of slavery exist(s). I was the one that suggested a form of slavery you might have meant.

When your terms are overbroad, you fail to communicate (as has happened in this topic). Clarity is your responsibility as a writer.

The selection of chattel is your own arbitrary distinction. Being held against one's will, forced to labor, and not paid, is slavery.

Is your concern that slaves are not being bought and sold as property? Well they are bought and sold in many of these cases. Not all of them are, but not all slaves in plantation days were bought and sold either. You're trying to claim that slavery doesn't exist because you want to make it be only something exactly the same as plantation era slavery, which is an absurd claim for which there is no justification.

It is arbitrary but so far as it is my own, it is also most people's, tying into my point about clarity of definition. Chattel slavery means the public acceptance of slavery--slave markets, the fugitive slave act. Chattel is a legal term connoting legal approval of slavery.

It is also what people think of first when someone starts talking about slavery. Alongside chattel slavery was indentured servitude, which might well fall into your definition of slavery.

>You're trying to claim that slavery doesn't exist because you want to make it be only something exactly the same as plantation era slavery

No, I am not. I am asking you to be more precise in your language, because typing off a one-line post about non-hypothetical slavery was confusing. Notice how more people upvoted you when you were expanded the precision of what you meant by slavery?

Perhaps in your imagination. Speaking of clarity, I hope you will come to some clarity in your mind that you are the only person here trying to insert these qualifiers into this discussion.

there are two of us here, though this will be my last post. I already inserted the qualifier into the discussion, way back in response to Charuru. I clarified your point. Karma's not important, but it does demonstrate how many people resonated with concepts; and as I already said, the flow of karma demonstrates that when you actually communicated, people agreed with you more.

I've rarely seen more assumptions and projections made in a few paragraphs.

On the one hand, you judge these cultures as "primitive" and "caveman". Then in the next breath you decry pomposity and paternalism.

Yeah, we've found over and over again that contact with "primitive" cultures destroys the cultures. Tell that to Native Americans in both South and North America. Their "primitive" culture could have taught our "modernity" plenty...that is, if we'd taken a few minutes to listen to these "primitives" before we practiced a policy of systematic genocide.

Don't arrogantly assume there is anything wonderful about your "modern" life with carcinogens and pollution all around, man made global destruction of the environment, and nuclear destruction of the whole fucking planet just a half hour away. Talk about arrogance...and ignorance.

Since you seem to subscribe for the concept of "noble savage", I should mention that much of the "primitive" tribes indeed do wage wars upon neighbours. That they are not commiting acts of large scale genocide has more to do with their technical insophistication than with any inherent set of cultural values.

He is not making the decision. Uncontacted tribes are extremely aware of the western culture outside their area. Many tribes choose not to make contact, and when contact is forced, they might even kill the enemies who refuse to leave them alone.

There are few-to-none cases of tribes for whom forced contact with westerners* has been beneficial to them.

* If you don't like the term westerner, feel free to insert or state your own preferred term and move on rather than argue the term in an attempt to change the topic.

some uncontacted tribes.

I'm not sure you can speak for all of them ;)

While I agree totally with the points you've made, I don't know how to balance that against the nearly unavoidable side effect that contacting them may very likely end up killing most of them from diseases to which they have no resistance.

there is medicine you know, we don't live in XV century?

it's the thought that kills indigenous tribes, not disease.

Then first, you must comprehend yourself how all of these "improvements" would impact their society and minds. And then, you have to teach them enough so they can understand all of those facts you just learned, so they can take an INFORMED decision. That alone would make you get in contact with them, show them things they have never seen before, change their culture in unimaginable ways.

There's no "interface" here to which you can give them access, and expect that if they choose not to use it, their lives would remain as they were.

If you touch it, you change it. You don't know how. Perhaps you will destroy it and will never know what of all those things you showed/gave them did it.

Pardon me, but while you are certainly well-spoken I cannot help but notice that you present two options only: either someone wants to keep knowledge and culture from "them", or "they" get to decide whether they want to partake in our ways.

I find that large parts of the discussion are missing another point of view: perhaps we could also learn something from them?

I would assert that the problem is in the problem and not in Star Trek's analysis of the problem.

That is to say, the problem of interference and controlling choice is not an easy one. Star Trek portrays one viewpoint and its pitfalls. That's not muddying, that's _clarifying_ how muddy it already s.

One thing that people in this conversation are overlooking is that if these tribes were contacted they wouldn't be brought into an American culture, they wouldn't get quality health care and internet access. There are millions of indigenous people living throughout South America and they mostly live in squalid slums. Personally I'd rather live in the jungle.

What is so bad is you making the decision for them -- one way or the other. It's that kind of pompous paternalistic attitude that caused all kinds of pain and misery.

On the other hand, can they even make an informed decision?

I mean, heck, we let the FDA make decisions for us every day. 99.9% of us are not chemist or biologist enough to make a real decision on many consumables and drugs, so we let the more informed make that call

It's true, there's a whole mess of slippery ground around this subject, but is it actually ethical to allow someone to make a choice if they cannot fully comprehend the ramifications etc? (honest question)

If it were unethical, then the entire system of voting in a democracy would be unethical.

The simple fact is: nobody is informed enough to make the kinds of decisions they are responsible for making in life. Many times doctors don't know what the heck they are doing, lawyers have no idea which way the court might rule, economists can theorize all day long but couldn't tell you the GDP five years out. I would say something pithy like "we live in a complicated world that nobody can master", yet the sad fact is that we reach the limit of understanding possible consequences to social changes after the number of people involves climbs past one or two. There simply is no way for anybody to make an informed decision about these folks -- us or them. We can cite statistics or tell stories about similar situations, but that's about it. But whether or not an informed or good decision can be made is a completely different question than who's responsibility it is to make one. If I am very sick, there might be nobody on the planet that can tell me how my treatment might work out, but that doesn't mean that somehow I should surrender that decision to a doctor. In fact, just the opposite is true: the more unknown and hard-to-understand the situation, the more important it is for all of us to let the individuals involved make the choices. It is, after all, those people who are going to have to live with the consequences.

EDIT: Also remember that it's not just the individuals who are affected: it's also all of their descendants. My great ancestor who fought the Roman conquerors in Europe probably had a much different opinion of the Romans than I do today. He and I disagree, but I fully support the fact that it was his decision to make, not the Romans'. I also feel that it was best that the Romans won. These opinions are not self-contradictory: I fully believe that individuals are the ones who are supposed to make these decisions about themselves, even if they make what to all intents and purposes look like the wrong choices. For any of the rest of us to step outside the system and start making choices for those involved is an awful affront to the dignity of man. (Sorry for the over-the-top rhetoric. Like I said, it's a pet peeve)

You should really read the book "Ishmael". It explores the end-game of our "way of life" and gives thoughts to alternatives. It doesn't involve an extraordinarily intelligent alien showing us the way, but an alternatively evolved intelligence here on earth.

>BTW: you to know that Western medicine is not the only medicine in the world.

There is only one class of medicine in the world, and is scientific. Your attempt to frame science-based medicine as a racial or cultural property ("Western") lies at the root of your reasoning fallacies: you reinterpret comparison between industrialized and tribal humans as cultural/racial, regardless of whether race or culture has anything to do with it. The superiority of empirical medicine is not cultural hegemony. The life-saving knowledge of microbe theory and hygiene is not a religious belief that be can relativized with shamanist "healing."

There is only one class of medicine in the world, and is scientific.

what is considered scientific is very often defined by culture though.

I bet those tribes consider their shamans scientists, even though they won't pass our western scientific criteria.

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

"By definition, Alternative Medicine has either not been proved to work, or been proved not to work. Do you know what they call Alternative medicine that's been proved to work? Medicine."

--Tim Minchin

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujUQn0HhGEk

Traditional medicine != Alternative medicine, it's the only medicine available for majority of people on Earth (about 80% of people in Asia are exposed almost exclusively to it). Chinese had their medicine when we europeans were still living in caves.

There is also a european traditional medicine, only that it has been largely forgotten because scientific medicine was so much more effective. In China they never developed any scientific approach to healing, so the traditional stuff was all they had. And no, its not "that" old.

For all intents and purposes, there are two types of "medicine". Modern science based medicine, and everything else. I put medicine in quotes there because the "everything else" isn't medicine. Traditional medicine is a form of alternative medicine, and it is bullshit.

"The American National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) cites examples including naturopathy, chiropractic medicine, herbalism, traditional CHINESE MEDICINE, Ayurveda, meditation, yoga, biofeedback, hypnosis, homeopathy, acupuncture, and nutritional-based therapies, in addition to a range of other practices.[5]"

Capitalization for emphasis.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9bT73BM2Ic#t=28s

"I would bet they are much happer than the majority of the FB and Twitter obsessed narcissist that I run into every day."

Hi, I am an obsessed FB and Twitter narcissist, and I'm proud of it. I'm also happy about having access to the Western medicine, which, while not the only one, and not perfects, seems to be the only one that consistently works.

And you are not talking about giving them a "right". You are talking about choosing something for them -- we can contact them (which will unavoidably deeply alter their culture, and is quite dangerous) or not (and let them live uncomfortably). It's our choice, and we can't really run from it. By doing nothing we decide for them, whether we like it or not.

Oh, and your parent didn't really say that we should convert them. He said that we should give them access to our technology. And if that converts them, then possibly it's actually them who preferred our culture over their own.

I'm actually mostly on the side of avoiding contact for now -- but mostly because of health risks related to contact, not because I'm afraid for their culture. Culture is about the change, not about maintaining some snapshot of society.

Don't forget that technology is in itself a drug and nearly impossible for a "simple" mind to resist. To them technology appears as "tools of the Gods"... how could they reject it?

After all that, you have to think... do they really have the self-driven choice to accept it?

Keep in mind that most of our thoughts about what is good have been shaped by the society we were raised in. If you were born and had lived your entire life in the rain forests of South America, you almost certainly wouldn't feel the same way.

Their very definition of comfort might be different from yours. Keep in mind that many people in more advanced countries prefer heat and humidity, sleeping on bare floors to soft mattresses, and many other things that many other people would consider odd.

Our culture is about change, many cultures are about tradition. Change is not inherently good.

What I was trying to say was that we have to make a decision and thus decide what's better for those people. We can't even ask them without influencing them.

Therefore we have to make a decision that seems best for them, even considering our cultural bias and imperfect view of their society. I can even say that we will make a decision for them, maybe just wrapping it into some feel-good distractions. When you decide not to interfere you're not really letting them evolve on their own, you're starting to avoid them. It's more subtle influence, but influence nonetheless.

I'm not really saying that change is inherently good, that's a view that can be easily disproved by samples from our own culture. I'm saying that change is an inseparable part of culture, and we shouldn't try too much to protect a culture from it (but we shouldn't actively try to destroy a culture without very good reasons -- like, I don't know, mass killings or something -- as well). Especially considering that (at least for me) people are more important than culture (while keeping in mind that culture is quite important for people).

As for preferences like those you've mentioned -- actually, here in Poland I know people from the whole spectrum on each of those issues, and soft mattresses are easily available. When you don't show a person a mattress you're not really letting the person choose to sleep on a bare floor, you're forcing the person to sleep on a bare floor.

I wonder if anyone is seriuosly advocating forcing anyone to do anything. Yes, civilization was once murderously expansionist, then it was culturally imperialist, but I'd like to think we've got better.

Remember, there are ways to make contact that don't involve oppression and/or bloodshed. Shockingly, some of them have even been tried successfully. It befuddles the hell out of me that many people here--allegedly accurate thinkers--not only can't see this, but actively dislike anyone who can.

To the entire thread: ye who hate thoughtful discussion, go away.

I don't see anything wrong with giving them the option to join the rest of civilization.

Besides, you're doing the same thing as xenophanes. You're saying that one set of values is better over another, or rather worse over another.

>You are basically saying that your beliefs and way of life are so superior and better than theirs that you must convert them

No, they're saying that they believe their beliefs and way of life are superior, therefore they have a moral obligation to improve the lives of those less fortunate than them.

Whether they're right or not is another issue, and as there's no objective way to measure such things, there is no actual correct view. If that's their belief, they're entirely justified in taking that course of action. Your belief is apparently the opposite, so you're entirely justified in preventing them from doing so. But what they said is not total bullshit, it's just opposed to you.

"No, they're saying that they believe their beliefs and way of life are superior, therefore they have a moral obligation to improve the lives of those less fortunate than them."

"Whether they're right or not is another issue [..]"

Morals are all about right or wrong - you can't have it both ways.

The OPs belief is entirely objectionable. Have none of us learnt anything from history?

EDIT: Actually, maybe that wasn't quite strong enough. The OPs belief is utterly abhorrent. It's from the same school of thought that's used in attempts at 'ethnic cleansing'.

Morals are, beliefs are not. And since morals are heavily heavily based on beliefs, they are heavily influenced by the person who is determining right and wrong.

One person can't have it both ways. Two can have opposing viewpoints and still be completely, logically correct in their own eyes. It's a fundamental aspect of communication between different entities.

I'm sorry, but I call BS.

Then you need some philosophy, metaphysics, and Lincoln-Douglas style debate classes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln-Douglas_Debate

edit: how about a starting point (in no way intended to be snide / insulting, I'm entirely serious about this):

Murder is wrong, right? Why? Completely objectively, why?

My previous reply was a bit terse - sorry.

I was referring to two (apparent) opposite points of view, and it seemed like you were using semantics to disagree. I read the last part of that sentence as you personally stating that the OP had a moral obligation, which I now realise might have been incorrect.

I understand that people form their own moral compass, and that views differ - but sometimes, I think there are issues which are so universally felt that the whole of society has to learn how to deal with them in a united way.

There are so many examples of self-proclaimed 'superior' societies dominating and assimilating smaller cultures which aren't able to defend themselves.

Many of these examples are well documented and - now that we have the benefit of hindsight, we can see exactly what kind of effect was left behind.

I think most people can agree that gross injustices took place.

Would you voice any objection to a holocaust denier?

The cultural contamination taboo is pretty clearly not so "universally felt", though. You must contaminate (significantly) to discover their decision so you can respect it, or you must prevent all contamination, when you could be improving their lives (note: could be. To disagree is to state our/your culture / technology is in every way deficient compared to theirs, the "noble savage" viewpoint).

Whether it's a majority opinion or not, it's hard to say. I encounter both sides very regularly, while you apparently don't. Such is life.

As to the holocaust deniers, yes, I would. Because I disagree with them, and because it's essentially an intentionally-ignorant standpoint that doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

---

But as to contaminate-or-not, I do prefer contamination so they can choose. Otherwise, it seems to me we're treating them like animals in a zoo, incapable of choosing intelligently for themselves. It also implies our culture is just so virulent that any who come in contact with it are sure to lose their way, join us heathens, and destroy their culture; again, insulting their intelligence and based on what's essentially a superiority complex.

For myself, I'll always choose contamination over being walled off. Others will disagree. But until we're capable of knowing they disagree, we either force some contamination to find out or we force them behind walls, taking away their choice. I find walls to be more offensive to sentients as a whole.

It's your ludicrous conflation of the OP's genuine concern for the material welfare of these people with "ethnic cleansing" that's abhorrent.

Okay, it's an extreme example .. but it definitely exists on the same side of the scale.

Look at what happened to Australian Aboriginals - the settlers who separated kids from their families had the best of intentions - but they also had a sense of superiority which gave them an utter contempt for the culture of the children in question.

There are some parallels between those settlers and the OP's statement:

"There is nothing good or enviable about uncivilized lifestyles to preserve; any actions that maintain them in that lifestyle are ensuring they literally die young, mostly of preventable causes."

EDIT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_Generation

I've got to agree with the parent to yours, it's still a different scale. Ethnic cleansing seeks to destroy that which is different. Ethno-centric superiority complexes (like this, not necessarily all) seek to improve that which is different. They are capable of causing the similar outcomes, but I know of no examples (they didn't kill the children), and the motivations are almost total opposites. Both are essentially insulting to the other group though, absolutely, but in different ways.

Maybe children weren't killed, but Australian Aboriginal society has been completely decimated - many of the stories involved are heartbreaking, and these people now have many many more problems that ever before.

I'm sure that regimes that take part in ethnic cleansing believe that they're doing the right thing. A sense of superiority helps them to make their choices.

Whether violence is used or not, in some ways, the effect is the same.

EDIT: If you read about these people and the problems that they're facing, it's not difficult to see that they were pretty much undeniably better off before. It's nothing but a tragedy - and their ill-treatment even continues to this day.

>many many more problems that ever before.

That's committing the same error the OP made, but in reverse. Instead of viewing your lifestyle as superior, you clearly view theirs as superior, since adopting the new one has been a net loss. "many of the stories involved are heartbreaking" - I don't doubt that. But all change comes with cost, though that one was certainly far higher than it should have been.

Citing past injustices in the pursuit of improving life doesn't mean the pursuit is incorrect. How about all the successes? Slavery was partially under the guise of improving lives (recently. Slavery has existed for far longer than we have records, usually the losing warring culture becoming slaves for the winning), but so was/is removing it.

In some ways, at some times, the effect is the same. What about the others? Should the pursuit be abandoned entirely?

The debate can be made more general: should we abandon everything that has ever caused suffering? Should only 100% successful lines be pursued? And, as no action is totally identical to a previous one: what's the measure used to tell if something is adequately different to be worth a shot?

edit to match edit: OK, so their problem is current ill-treatment. That is wrong. But that's still not the only thing that happens with cultural assimilation, nor does it always happen, nor must it continue indefinitely. If it improves at any point in the future, would it have been worthwhile? If 100 years of suffering result in 1000 of improvement, was it right or wrong? Not "could it have been better", is it right or wrong to suffer to gain improvement, or to impose suffering to grant improvement? We're debating broad decisions, not issues with a single choice. There's always something wrong with a single choice, and those nuggets of wrongness don't decide whether the core choice was right or wrong as a whole.

It really is immensely complicated - I have no solutions, but I do know that we have to learn from history.

Good intentions almost always fail. People deserve respect. Superiority is often an illusion. Motivations are multifaceted.

I know I'd be happier with a simple life, and - perhaps romantically - I imagine that these people might have a better life than we do. Realistically, that's just as likely as the opposite - because, for all the interesting things our lives have to offer, there are some deep-routed problems we face, that we're very far from solving.

I think I said it in another post - but I'll reiterate before signing off .. I really hope this tribe is left alone. If a lot of contact is made, I'm sure no good will come from it.

EDIT: Nice debating with you btw.

I can agree with almost all of that except "almost always fail". Saying that means you think the amount of evil in the world outweighs the amount of good, to which I must ask, "how are you measuring?" I'd argue that good goes unnoticed and taken for granted because it's the norm; people notice exceptions far more quickly than what they encounter every day. We're able to debate on the internet; is that not good? How many billions (trillions?) of good interactions happen because of the internet?

Quite a few people choose simpler lives voluntarily. If they're happy, that's fantastic, they made the right choice. I de-clutter occasionally, which is a similar choice. But I see no reason that any style of life could be without deep-rooted problems. Ours is most likely ennui; I'll take that, because it's a personal problem that can be battled personally, and solved. Our culture could be better for such things, but not without other costs / problems which really can't be predicted, so I won't try. Many more "primitive" cultures have problems which are less solvable by individuals - food, safety, health, and yes I'm oversimplifying and it could be insulting, but it's more true of smaller, more isolated, less-technologically-advanced cultures than it is of the rest of the world.

We have far more individual options than they do, if only because we can choose to do without them (see: Amish). Which may be the root of the problems with our culture. But I like personal problems. I can fix them. I can't fix society as easily.

edit: I've enjoyed it too :)

"Morals are all about right or wrong - you can't have it both ways."

Bullshit! While morals are about distinctions between right or wrong, the only moral debates worth having are ones that are about conflicting moral principles. In this case, between the moral principle that says we should allow people to determine and preserve their own culture and the principle that we want people to have the highest quality of life possible. It involves clashing interests and ill-defined concepts, so, yes, you can have it both ways. That's why it's a debate.

I was referring to the fact that two opposing statements had been made.

I am not kidding.

You are posting a very typical left wing way of thinking where you have a hard time believing people can both exist and fundamentally disagree with you. You hope they don't really mean it, or at least they are Christians so you have something unintellectual to blame (I am not).

You are advocating some kind of "tolerance" of primitive cultures (consisting largely of non-intervention which is rather different than tolerance) but you have have no tolerance of opposing viewpoints within your own culture.

I did not advocate forced conversion. That you refuse to differentiate between access to better ideas and depriving them of their rights is a straw man.

I don't see what's left wing about it.

The basic premise of conservatism is that government should be limited, and that its primary role should be to protect people's rights from other people, the government, and other governments.

Obviously, these people have a right to their property. It is being encroached upon. The issue is not, should we go through the jungle and make conversation? The issue is if Peru should allow the destruction of this group of people's property by farmers. There is nothing liberal about saying that the government should be protecting the property of these people.

We have already in essence made contact. They have seen an airplane or helicopter taking a picture of them. They are all clearly looking at the camera. They know there is a world out there that they aren't a part of because they certaintly can't fly and other people can. That could make them do things they would not have done if they had not seen the airplane, so we have shattered their world view already.

What I'm more interested in is if they want to keep their land or not. There are plenty of tribes in the world who know about the real world, and choose to stay in their own way of life. There was an entire American TV series about this, they brought people from tropical islands to the US and showed them everything, and most of them chose to go back. I think these people should have a choice as well, but that choice will not be there for them if their forest is destroyed.

Very typical left wing way of thinking? I'm staying out of this slugfest because there's no way anybody will end up edified by it - but in what possible way can you characterize philosophical intolerance as an exclusively left-wing trait? That's just weird.

Because he sees himself as right-wing, so anyone disagreeing must be a socialist; therefore he's falling in the very trap he warned his opponent of. Funnily recursive indeed.

You're wrong. I do not self-identify as right wing. I dislike most of the right wing. I said some stuff is left wing b/c left wing ppl so often believe it.

OK, so you dislike right wing, and apparently despise left-wing. So what are you, apolitical? I have news for you : people calling themselves apolitical usually are right wing, preferably of the wingnut/fascistic category :)

Sorry to bother you. What kills me is that it's almost impossible to have a good coherent political discussion on usenet, forums, whatever. It devolves incredibly fast in flamebait, and that's a pity. That would be a great startup idea : invent a forum system that allows proper, reasonable and contradictory political discussions but somehow avoids the Godwin malediction. Am I asking too much?

If you want a political discussion try here: http://groups.google.com/group/rational-politics-list/

Or email me.

I'm a (classical) liberal. This does not fit into the "political spectrum" very well. You might think that being pro-capitalism is right wing but most of the mainstream right wing is not really capitalist and doesn't have that much in common with me. They also do stuff like oppose abortions and gays, favor traditional/conservative values, etc (ugh)

As you know, "right" and "left" aren't that meaningful, conservative vs progressive, authoritarian vs liberal are probably more significant oppositions.

I'll have a look to the group.

I agree - it's a shocking point of view. I'm choosing to read it as parody.

EDIT: Does the downvote mean it's not parody?

EDIT,EDIT: So maybe the OP was being sincere - in which case I'm v depressed.

You're mistaken. I did not post a parody. I'm serious.

That you have a hard time believing that people who disagree with you (like myself) even exist should perhaps be a wake up call to open your mind.

It's just that many (feared and hated) leaders from history took a similar view.

I'm surprised so many people on HN share it.

(Did I dodge the Godwin's law bullet...?)

Seriously though, this is exactly the point of view that was used by all colonial movements. It's antiquated, unjust and it's also completely xenophobic. I'm genuinely shocked.

Respectable people like Jacob Bronowski, David Deutsch, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali -- not to mention easily over 100 million Americans -- believe this kind of thing. Don't be so shocked by a mainstream point of view.

It is not xenophobic to be pro-civilization, to think that allowing people the option to join civilization is good for them, or to wish aliens would come along and share advanced knowledge with us (thus radically transforming our world).

Change is not bad or scary on principle. Change is a necessary aspect of improvement. Improvement exists. I'm not going to force my idea of improvement on anyone, but I damn well am going to offer it to them and give them the choice.

Maybe you are ignorant of how some Western organizations strive to keep uncivilized people backwards against those people's will by putting up barriers between them and integration with the modern world. They treat them a little like a zoo. That's disgusting.

(You might have dodged Godwin's law if you hadn't included the parenthetical about it... :)

Honestly - I think our politics are so far removed, that talking about this sanely would involve a hours of deprogramming on either of our parts.

My biggest problem with your point of view is that you're claiming superiority for our society, when the quality of a culture can't easily be measured.

It's equivalent of saying 'mine is the best, because it's mine'. I can't agree with it.

I am not programmed with these views. I grew up in an environment heavily leaning the other way. Then I rethought things on my own initiative.

I am open to discussion including lengthy discussion.

HN is not a suitable place for that. Why don't we talk here:

http://groups.google.com/group/rational-politics-list/

You can also read some of my philosophy if you like (if you think I am programmed by someone, please let me know who I've copied here! :) http://fallibleideas.com/

I'm not trying to say that you've been programmed by someone, or that you're being mindless.

It's just that sometimes views are so strongly held that discussion is very drawn out - I was being a bit flippant.

Thanks for the invite to the group. I will take you up on your offer, I'll also have a read through your site - it looks very interesting.

EDIT: I should point out, if I had to choose a school of philosophy, it would be existentialism - we might be a bit like oil and water.

  *reminder*

You know, it's a good thing that people are not all the same. There is harm in trying to make everyone alike - both at a micro level and a macro level.

"(Did I dodge the Godwin's law bullet...?)"

If you have to ask, then no. Of course you haven't.

I was joking.

"BTW: you to know that Western medicine is not the only medicine in the world. "

First off, can we not call it "Western medicine?" Because what you're calling "Western medicine" happens to be practiced all over the world. I'd prefer to call it "science-based medicine" or "evidence-based medicine", although I will admit the applicability of those labels is more range-based than absolute.

However, you're right. Western medicine isn't the only medicine in the world. There's also voodoo-based medicine (with "voodoo" representing any variety of "ancient chinese secret"-type of treatments). So which would you prefer to be treated with? "Western" medicine, or voodoo medicine?

Also, "While we are at it lets take them our aids, diabetes, obesity etc..."

You do realize AIDS originated in sub-saharan Africa, right? Not exactly the heart of modern civilization.

Actually, I've pursued "alternative" medicine for treating my (very deadly) medical condition and gotten much better results than "modern" medicine can promise. I have a form of cystic fibrosis, as does my 23 year old son. I have gotten off 8 or 9 prescription drugs. I have not been on antibiotics for about 7 years. I have been drug free for about 18 months. My son has not been on antibiotics in nearly 13 years. He has been drug free for about 4 years. Ten years ago, I was bedridden for 3 1/2 months and spent a year at death's door. Doctor's told me "People like you don't get well. Symptom management is the name of the game." I currently live without a car, thus walk a lot, and have a full-time job. The hole in my lung has closed and my symptoms have basically all disappeared or greatly improved.

Modern medicine has it's good points. But a lot of other traditions also have value. I think it is unproductive and a straw-man argument to pit them against each other. I don't see why we can't take from both and build something better than either.

I've been trying to stay out of the comments in this thread about medicine because I'm basically one lone "nutcase" who is dismissed by most folks in the CF community. So you can either believe I am telling the truth or not. I really don't have a leg to stand on if you choose to think I am making up tall tales, as many people think.

(And I hope you will take my post as a compliment, as a statement that you seem like a reasonable person who might listen, rather than as "argumentative" or attacking.)

Peace.

If you don't mind me asking, I'm curious about what alternative medicine you used.

I put "alternative" in quotes because I don't see a practitioner of any kind of medicine. I hang out on a forum where folks know all kinds of interesting things (about non-drug treatments and other related stuff) and I do a lot of research and have made it up as I go. It's basically a diet and lifestyle based approach. There is a little info about what I have done here:

http://healthgazelle.com/

I have no reason to not believe you, and I'm very glad that it sounds like you've found something that is working for you. I wrote my original message at about 2 a.m., and re-reading it in the light of day I realize I missed a few qualifiers. Namely, that "western" medicine doesn't have all the answers and that voodoo medicine can work. We trust "western" medicine more, however, because effort has been put into at least trying to understand the underlying mechanisms of both the disease and the treatment. That doesn't mean it always gets it right, but it's better than trying to explain that your CF symptoms are caused by your chi being out of whack.

That's not to say that they are not, in fact, caused by your chi being out of whack. We just really have no real evidence that that is the case, whereas we do have a scientific basis for the present "western" explanation for CF and its' treatments. Anyway, you sound reasonable and I imagine most of what I just wrote is essentially preaching to the choir.

"Modern medicine has it's good points. But a lot of other traditions also have value. I think it is unproductive and a straw-man argument to pit them against each other. I don't see why we can't take from both and build something better than either."

I agree with this. There's a lot of value in traditions and common sense. In reality, medicinal treatments arrived at through modern, scientific processes, and treatments arrived at through tradition are somewhat similar, process-wise. Both are evolutionary processes in which superior treatments are selected over time and inferior treatments fall out of use. I don't want to equivocate, however. In western medicine, the ways in which new treatments are proposed is more evidence-based, and the feedback loop for determining the efficacy of a treatment is much faster.

Anyway, like I said at the beginning, I have no real reason to believe that you're not telling the truth, and as such, I would really encourage you to try to get your message out to the medical community. You may be dismissed by many as "one lone nutcase", but if diet and lifestyle can better treat CF for the population at large it's important that that message get out.

...I would really encourage you to try to get your message out to the medical community. You may be dismissed by many as "one lone nutcase", but if diet and lifestyle can better treat CF for the population at large it's important that that message get out.

Thanks. I have a website. I don't think the medical community will ever listen to me. But sick people might -- some of them do anyway. I just need to find better ways to convey the information.

Thanks.

"If not this is so typical of the american way of thinking. Yes, we are so superior lets convert them all to our [insert culture, religion etc...]. "

Why is this the typical american way of thinking? Surely every culture believes theirs is superior, otherwise they wouldn't have adopted it.

It's very possible to exist in a culture without thinking that it's the best.

I didn't adopt my culture, it adopted me (I was born into it).

Please could we have this discussion without the ad hominem?

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