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I'm surprised that there are no mentions of uncontacted tribes (ctrl-f of 'uncon' and 'native' yields no matches). It seems that violence and extreme xenophobia

I'm surprised that there are no mentions of uncontacted tribes (ctrl-f of 'uncon' and 'native' yields no matches). It seems that violence and extreme xenophobia is the cultural norm, not the exception from a few psychopaths. And the methodology seems dubious, trying to estimate social behavior, norms and statistics based of people long gone and whose remains are scattered far and wide both in place and time.

farnsworth 2y ago
> and extreme xenophobia Maybe it's the norm for tribes that have managed to survive and remain uncontacted in the modern world
- TeeMassive 2y ago
  This doesn't really make sense for tribes living on remote small islands who displays the same pattern of violence.
abracadaniel 2y ago
There’s a selection bias there. Only the most xenophobic and violent uncontacted tribes would remain uncontacted.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
  Isn't that what evolution is, a selection process? The other, less xenophobic tribes didn't survive.
  - harrison_clarke 2y ago
    there's a pretty big alternative: they survived by integrating with a larger group (they could either maintain a subculture, or fully integrate and become indistinguishable. either way, they don't necessarily die off when they make contact)
    - NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
      "Integrating" is an interesting choice of words. From what I've seen of the integration, nothing of their genes really survive. Nothing of their culture survives. I don't think it's survival at all. They're absorbed, surely, but in the same way an amoeba absorbs some prey... little pieces of the prey move around doing what those pieces always do, at least for a little while. But eventually those pieces stop moving, and get broken down into ever smaller pieces, until nothing of them remains. And it's just a big amoeba. Not sure what word is a better choice though. Maybe someone can reply with one.
      - harrison_clarke 2y ago
        do you have any citation for the idea that genes rarely survive? i don't really have any idea what the ratio is. i do know that there are a ton of traceable groups from ancient times today. i don't know that there isn't an even larger number of groups that didn't make it
- stormfather 2y ago
  In the Amazon a lot of the "uncontacted tribes" have been contacted by illegal loggers, miners and in the past rubber harvesters, and have every reason to think we're all a bunch of demons. The ones who still hide out are often the victims of past massacres, and not even the prospect of shoes and plastic cups is enough to overcome their reaction to how they were treated in the past.
- TeeMassive 2y ago
  If that was true then the longer a tribe remains uncontacted then the more pacific and welcoming it would get. But remote tribes are just as violent than those closer to civilizations; or at least no such correlation have been observed.
card_zero 2y ago
It's in there, just not with those keywords: > ethnographic data – contemporary studies of groups that existed until some modern contact > an important challenge when interpreting evidence from ethnographies of modern hunter gatherers is determining which groups are likely to be representative of hunter gatherers who would have lived before the invention of agriculture.
- TeeMassive 2y ago
  "existed" not "exist"
- wasabi991011 2y ago
  To add another quote: >"To avoid these problems, our ethnographic sample ... excludes groups who were only studied long after sustained contact with agricultural or state societies.
Liquix 2y ago
take it sentineleasy, it's an interesting read if a flawed method

farnsworth 2y ago

> and extreme xenophobia Maybe it's the norm for tribes that have managed to survive and remain uncontacted in the modern world

TeeMassive 2y ago
This doesn't really make sense for tribes living on remote small islands who displays the same pattern of violence.

abracadaniel 2y ago

There’s a selection bias there. Only the most xenophobic and violent uncontacted tribes would remain uncontacted.

NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
Isn't that what evolution is, a selection process? The other, less xenophobic tribes didn't survive.
- harrison_clarke 2y ago
  there's a pretty big alternative: they survived by integrating with a larger group (they could either maintain a subculture, or fully integrate and become indistinguishable. either way, they don't necessarily die off when they make contact)
  - NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
    "Integrating" is an interesting choice of words. From what I've seen of the integration, nothing of their genes really survive. Nothing of their culture survives. I don't think it's survival at all. They're absorbed, surely, but in the same way an amoeba absorbs some prey... little pieces of the prey move around doing what those pieces always do, at least for a little while. But eventually those pieces stop moving, and get broken down into ever smaller pieces, until nothing of them remains. And it's just a big amoeba. Not sure what word is a better choice though. Maybe someone can reply with one.
    - harrison_clarke 2y ago
      do you have any citation for the idea that genes rarely survive? i don't really have any idea what the ratio is. i do know that there are a ton of traceable groups from ancient times today. i don't know that there isn't an even larger number of groups that didn't make it
stormfather 2y ago
In the Amazon a lot of the "uncontacted tribes" have been contacted by illegal loggers, miners and in the past rubber harvesters, and have every reason to think we're all a bunch of demons. The ones who still hide out are often the victims of past massacres, and not even the prospect of shoes and plastic cups is enough to overcome their reaction to how they were treated in the past.
TeeMassive 2y ago
If that was true then the longer a tribe remains uncontacted then the more pacific and welcoming it would get. But remote tribes are just as violent than those closer to civilizations; or at least no such correlation have been observed.

card_zero 2y ago

It's in there, just not with those keywords: > ethnographic data – contemporary studies of groups that existed until some modern contact > an important challenge when interpreting evidence from ethnographies of modern hunter gatherers is determining which groups are likely to be representative of hunter gatherers who would have lived before the invention of agriculture.

TeeMassive 2y ago
"existed" not "exist"
wasabi991011 2y ago
To add another quote: >"To avoid these problems, our ethnographic sample ... excludes groups who were only studied long after sustained contact with agricultural or state societies.

Liquix 2y ago

take it sentineleasy, it's an interesting read if a flawed method