What Would Alien Anthropologists Think of Us? - Wade Davis

Complete video at: http://fora.tv/2010/01/13/Wade_Davis_Why_Ancient_Wisdom_Matters_in_the_Modern...

Wade Davis, author of The Wayfinders: Why Ancient Wisdom Matters in the Modern World, criticizes the United States for viewing technological prowess as the only sign of progress. "Climate change should finally teach us that we're not the paragon of humanity's potential," he says.

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What does it mean to be human and alive?

The thousands of different cultures and languages on Earth have compellingly different answers to that question. "We are a wildly imaginative and creative species," declares Wade Davis, and then proves it with his accounts and photographs of humanity plumbing the soul of culture, of psyche, and of landscape.

The threat to cultures is often ideological, Davis notes, such as when Mao whispered in the ear of the Dalai Lama that "all religion is poison," set about destroying Tibetan culture.

The genius of culture is the ability to survive in impossible conditions, Davis concludes. We cannot afford to lose any of that variety of skills, because we are not only impoverished without it, we are vulnerable without it. - The Long Now Foundation

Edmund Wade Davis (born December 14, 1953) is a noted Canadian anthropologist, ethnobotanist, author and photographer whose work has focused on worldwide indigenous cultures, especially in North and South America and particularly involving the traditional uses and beliefs associated with psychoactive plants. Davis came to prominence with his 1985 best-selling book The Serpent and the Rainbow about the zombies of Haiti.

Davis has published popular articles in Outside, National Geographic, Fortune and Conde Nast Traveler.

Category:

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[SkyDaddy7]

For starters I am an American. A veteran who saw first hand the control Christianity has over our military which shocked me. And at home to see the how we have fallen in math & science over the years while more than half of the pop thinks the Theory of Evolution is "just a theory". We deny whole groups of people equal rights due to religion. And religion is used in elections to get weak minded folks to vote many times against their own economic well being.

[Steadno]

if we are lucky they wont see us as food

[wallacewithoutgromit]

The technological cat is out of the bag. How many of us humans will voluntarily give up our creature comforts? The result, the human plague or cancer on the planet just has to run its course and strangle itself in its own waste, poisons and resource depletion. The human race is just as much a natural phenomenon as a six mile asteroid coming in at 60,000 miles per hour and the end result may be not that much different.

[greenearthnazi20204u]

i would ask what do you know is true not what you believe. when did you do away with governments ,laws and religions? what are the base for your morals? i would show them a power source that produces free energy easily and a lot of it .

[hopingtoflyaway]

Many of those "other" peoples are mimicking the"subset." What about the destruction of the Brazilian rain forests? What about Asia?

[freedomland11]

Yea, we would really understand Aliens if they ever showed there face!!

[Pokarot]

@1776Matthew "Climategate" was a bit of either: intentionally misrepresented e-mails or ignorant people not understanding scientific terminology. I can't understand how you can pretend to be so well versed when you've clearly never even bothered checking out the rebuttal or look at the evidence.

You made me sigh reading this.

[1776Matthew]

Oh, woe is me!!! The white man is so, SO evil!!! He has created every problem in the world!!

Look up CLIMATEGATE. "Global Warming" is a tax-scam. It has been bloody debunked already. The leading "climate change" scientists got caught red handed admitting to trickery in their e-mails.

Is there pollution? OF COURSE. Must it be reduced? OF COURSE. But the "carbon" hysteria is a scam.

[originofnoise]

@JaredHutcheson1 Congratulations on the bicycle! I wish more people did it. I will never learn how to drive out of conviction and a feeling of guilt about ruining our precious nature. Biking also makes you healthy. But climate change is not just a problem in the USA (though materialistic societies like theirs contribute the most, making money their priority - which is abhorrent).

[originofnoise]

But this would only apply if these aliens are rational, just, emotional and compassionate beings, unlike most of our humanity.