Steven, like Epicurus, I suspend making any judgements on whether natives
are wasteful or resourceful. My preliminary assessment supports the theory
that natives in North and South America were largely resourceful until the
introduction of Xtian values, alcohol, and residential schools, and the
stealing of their lands.  The conceptual construction of waste varies
depending on the person, and the society, I am sure.

Technological innovation has made waste into a resource. Take for instance
the modern farm. Almost every part of the chicken or cow is used to make
useful things such as frankfurters, jello, et cetera. Even feathers are used
to make pillows. Perhaps 99.9 % of everything is used.

On one level there is virtually no waste within the modern agro-ecosystem,
but on another level there is a great deal of waste. On one level every
ounce or gram of chicken, or cow, is utilized. On another level vast areas
of forest are cleared and plowed, then seeded and fertilized with the result
that only one species is grown on areas exceeding 100 hectares or 200 acres.
The land is put into production to optimize net present value of the land.
The land is not valued in-itself, but rather as a 'instrument' used to
generate 'symbolic' weath creation in the form of a commodity which is
traded in international markets.

There are two levels at which waste occurs in this technological
'agro-ecosystem'. One level occurs through leaching of fertilizers and
pesticides into the groundwater (hydrosphere). The vast natural resource
contained in the subterranean hydrosphere actually over time becomes a
'toxic waste site' after becoming contaminated with pesticides like
Atrazine, glyphosate, phenoxy herbicides, and possibly insecticides such as
malathion. Other important contaminants are nitrates, phosphates, and heavy
metals.

The other level at which waste occurs is to the biological abudance and
diversity of the local area where the farming is conducted. The obvious
impact of devoting all resources to excluding other life forms (except some
necessary biotics like rhizobium, etc.) is to displace organisms, and their
ecosystems, to areas which are less productive, or already occupied by
existing organisms. Many species though which are not moved are extirpated
(cf. prairie dog). The impact on ecosystems and species is often
catastrophic.

Native agroecosystems, by all accounts, did not result in these forms of
waste. I can think one possible exception, the Mayan civilization which
flourished about a thousand years ago and the Incan civilization which
possibly had a significant impact on the ecology of the area. The difference
though between the modern technological agro-ecosystem is decisive. On the
one hand the Incan farmers relied on an indepth knowledge of astronomy to
determine when to plant, the modern farmer simply relies on soil
temperature, and soil moisture. Much of the labour used in the Incan
civilization was manual supplied by the famers themselves. There was some
use of llamas, but there was no tillage other than with the 'spud' (a
digging tool). On the coast there were 21 oasis (perhaps more in Chile and
Ecuador) where there were fields which used irrigation works made of stone,
and were located underground.

The concept of waste is a modern concept. A concept requires an intuition
for it to be understood. I suspect that the concept of waste has it's
origins in technological agro-ecosystems. The english word waste can be
applied to land which is incapable of serving mankind such as the swamp.

"Stretch wide and wild the waste enormous marsh." [Tennyson, Ode to Memory
st. 5]

A geologist employed by an energy company may not view a large marsh as
waste since the geologist knows that coal was formed from peat bogs which
thrived millions of years ago.

Thus if there was such an occurrence of what one person may view as waste in
native hunting, the buffalo jump, then this waste was not actually waste on
the same scale or level as is the case with technologically 'advanced'
agro-ecosystems.

As far as I have been able to determine, there has been no solid evidence
that NA natives caused the extinction of species of animals. There is also
no demonstrable evidence that NA natives ruined any landscape sized
ecosystems in terms of productive capacity. The European and Asian cultures
have in the past destroyed in part many landscape level and regional such as
the Meditterean and the middle east areas of the Tigris and Euphrates. The
proximate causes of the ruination of these ecosystems in terms of
productivity is well established because the evidence is demonstrative.

On the other hand generalizations arising from European accounts after
contact are highly subjective, value-laden, and often inaccurate. These
accounts of Europeans actually, on the contrary, describe a land teaming
with life and bountiful beyond compare. North America, as well as South
America, was a veritable paradise of plenty. The only truely wasted areas
described by the Europeans were lands in the deserts of the Great Basin, but
these lands were not wasted by people; they 'supported' people like the
Nasca, et cetera.

It seems to me that some paleo-ecologists are pre-occupied with theories
regarding making judgements about a group(s) of people who arrived from
Siberia after the last ice-age. It seems pretty silly in fact that so much
time should be devoted to trying to find an answer to the question: "Who or
what caused the extinction of the Giant Sloth" in the Holocene era.

This to me this effort is the epitome of human generated waste: to spend
scarce intellectual time on trying to dis-prove a null 'conceptual
hypothesis.' Although there is evidence, the evidence suggestive of only
'plausible' argument, rather than demonstrative.

We need to employ researchers into solving the levels of waste which result
in contaminated groundwater, and displacement of species and their
ecosystems.

chao

john foster










----- Original Message -----
From: Steven Bissell <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, December 03, 2001 8:01 AM
Subject: Re: Buffalo tongues


> Mea Culpa, I did, in fact, make the statement that North American
> Aboriginals, i.e. Indians, occasionally ran buffalo over cliffs and then
> just took the tongues. I guess John Foster wants me to apologize, but I
> documented that statement with an entry form the journals of Lewis and
Clark
> and Jim Tantillo has sent further documentation. So, I guess I "got my
> history right," whatever that may mean. I never said, as John Foster
thinks,
> that they did it all the time, in fact I'm sure they probably only did it
> when there was a big surplus.
>
> John Foster confuses the difference of "when necessary" with "out of
> necessity." Indians had a respect for the "genius of the place" when using
> resources. They understood that survival depended on using resources fully
> and not to engage in waste. They probably learned this the hard way. I'm
> hardly the first person to make this observation. Paul Martin from the
> University of Arizona described it over two decades ago. The first wave of
> Asian hunters were, according to Martin, responsible for the extinction of
> several species of large mammals from over-kill. After the observation of
> this, the hunters learned, out of necessity, to control their hunting in
> order to maintain a base of animals for survival. This is necessity in
> action. It would be marvelous if modern man was as intelligent in the use
of
> resources. If we all realized that the wise use of resources was a
> necessity, then many of our environmental problems would be resolved.
>
> If John Foster wants to believe that Indians sat around pontificating
about
> "the unity of all beings," I guess he is free to do so. However in my
> opinion reducing the highly diverse North American Indian cultures to a
> common denominator marked by Hollywood speeches is a bit hard to swallow
and
> more than a bit racist. Did *some* Indian groups have a believe in "the
> unity of all beings?" Sure. Did they all? Hardly. I prefer to think that
the
> North American Indians, and early European settlers for that matter, were
> highly conscious of the necessity to live within the limits of their
> environment.
>
> John Foster wrote, "Bissell even goes so far as to claim that aboriginals
> when they hunted
> buffalo, ate only the tongues. Reading this statement, if the reader has
no
> other information sources, would put the aboriginals within the same
> socio-economic class as the fox hunters of modern Britain; instead of
doffs
> and jodpurs (sic) there would be headfeathers and tomahawks....."
>
> Clever, but inaccurate. I simply did not make the statement that Indians
> *always* ate merely the tongues. And, even if I did, I don't see how that
> makes them like British fox hunters. But the statement about head feathers
> instead of jodhpurs is interesting. If we are to accept the premise that
> Indians used every morsel of everything they killed, how do we account for
> the head feathers? Did they eat the Eagles and Hawks they killed? I've
> examined lots of weasel, including Black Footed Ferret, hides on Indian
> artifacts. Did they eat the weasels? I tried to eat a weasel once, not
> possible IMHO.
>
> I'm not sure where the rest of John Foster's post is going. Apparently he
> agrees that in times of plenty Indians did, *occasionally* waste some of
the
> meat. In times of scarcity, they made use of everything. This is, as near
as
> I can see, a good description of acting out of necessity, not out of some
> metaphysical sense of the "unity of all beings." So, I guess we agree if
you
> stick with it long enough.
>
> Finally, I wonder if John Foster really thinks that "Epithelial cells are
> stem cells." Maybe he might want to check a dictionary or Web page on that
> one. As I said, he has his science wrong, again.
>
> Steven