Population Control Solves Alot of Problems

MSimon · Post by **MSimon** » Thu Nov 26, 2009 2:52 pm

Luzr,

According to http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr57/nvsr57_14.pdf the American death percent per year from murder is .8%

The H-Gs had Roughly 3.75 to 8.75 times as many deaths from homicide. And America is considered a violent society for one of the OECD countries.

alexjrgreen · Post by **alexjrgreen** » Thu Nov 26, 2009 6:09 pm

MSimon wrote:Luzr,

According to http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr57/nvsr57_14.pdf the American death percent per year from murder is .8%

The H-Gs had Roughly 3.75 to 8.75 times as many deaths from homicide. And America is considered a violent society for one of the OECD countries.

It's probably misleading to use the rate for the US as a whole, since the population density is very low.

By the time the figures were measured, hunter-gatherers were already under stress from agricultural societies encroaching on their range.

A comparison with Detroit or New Orleans is probably more enlightening.

Skipjack · Post by **Skipjack** » Thu Nov 26, 2009 7:43 pm

By the time the figures were measured, hunter-gatherers were already under stress from agricultural societies encroaching on their range.

A comparison with Detroit or New Orleans is probably more enlightening.

Not really. The population density that hunter gatherer societies are facing are still waaaaaaaay lower than even the suburbs of a major city.
A comparison like that is silly.

Also, there has been murder as long as humans existed.
Ötzi, the Ötztal mummy had an arrow wound in his back.

MSimon · Post by **MSimon** » Thu Nov 26, 2009 8:02 pm

Detroit murder rate: 46 per 100,000

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Sta ... crime_rate

If you can find a death rate for Detroit you could figure out the rest.

TallDave · Post by **TallDave** » Fri Nov 27, 2009 5:27 pm

They were the first miners and are quite capable of small to medium scale smelting. Nowadays they mostly trade.

A hunter-gatherer who is mining and smelting and trading for food isn't really hunting and gathering, but okay, let's accept this widened definition.

Their medicine is different from ours, not inferior.

It is vastly inferior. I don't know why anyone would even try to argue this. If you were sick, would you visit a hospital or a medicine man?

It looks like we have a couple really violent hunter-gatherer societies, and a couple relatively peaceful ones. I'm not sure that really supports your point very well. Also, 1/3000 is still more violent than almost any country in the world, so even the peaceful tribe is horrifically violent by our standards.

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_m ... per-capita

Wrong list.

1/3000 is 33 per 100,000, which is less than Detroit (40 per 100,000) and New Orleans (67 per 100,000 if you believe the New Orleans Police Department or 95 per 100,000 if you believe the FBI).

You're comparing the least violent hunter-gatherers to the most violent modern cities. On average, hunter-gatherers are much more violent than modern civ.

It's probably misleading to use the rate for the US as a whole, since the population density is very low

Why would that be misleading? They're still part of modern civ.

alexjrgreen · Post by **alexjrgreen** » Fri Nov 27, 2009 6:17 pm

TallDave wrote:
They were the first miners and are quite capable of small to medium scale smelting. Nowadays they mostly trade.
A hunter-gatherer who is mining and smelting and trading for food isn't really hunting and gathering, but okay, let's accept this widened definition.

Trade and flint mining have been going on for perhaps 120,000 years, since long before agriculture. Smelting goes back at least 8,000 years. Trade in metal goods contributed to the emergence of cities.

TallDave wrote:
Their medicine is different from ours, not inferior.
It is vastly inferior. I don't know why anyone would even try to argue this. If you were sick, would you visit a hospital or a medicine man?

That would still depend on what was wrong with you. Trying to paint the issue in black and white doesn't do justice to the subject. Western medicine has had many successes and not a few failures.

TallDave wrote:
It looks like we have a couple really violent hunter-gatherer societies, and a couple relatively peaceful ones. I'm not sure that really supports your point very well. Also, 1/3000 is still more violent than almost any country in the world, so even the peaceful tribe is horrifically violent by our standards.

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_m ... per-capita

Wrong list.

1/3000 is 33 per 100,000, which is less than Detroit (40 per 100,000) and New Orleans (67 per 100,000 if you believe the New Orleans Police Department or 95 per 100,000 if you believe the FBI).
You're comparing the least violent hunter-gatherers to the most violent modern cities. On average, hunter-gatherers are much more violent than modern civ.

The most violent hunter-gatherer societies are at war, so perhaps you should compare them to WWI or WWII.

TallDave wrote:
It's probably misleading to use the rate for the US as a whole, since the population density is very low
Why would that be misleading? They're still part of modern civ.

Most of the US isn't suffering from a lack of space, and competition for resources is mild. The hunter-gather societies studied have all been displaced and hemmed in by agricultural societies taking over their land. So it's only fair to compare them with stressed parts of our own society.

Skipjack · Post by **Skipjack** » Fri Nov 27, 2009 8:28 pm

Western medicine has had many successes and not a few failures.

Ever since we have established a goo procedure for testing and verifying results, there have been very few failures.

That would still depend on what was wrong with you.

Just taking the extracts from plants is almost always inferior to modern medicine, even to semi modern medicine.
Take aspirin for example:
The extract of the willow bark (among other sources), salicylate, or salicylic acid, has been used since 3000 BC. It is basically the working agent in Aspirin. Problem: It had horrible side effects often worse than the actual ailment it would be used to cure.
It took until the mid of the 19th century until chemistry had advanced enough to bring about acetylsalicylic acid, which has much less side effects than just salicylic acid.
It takes modern chemistry to do that though. It is not something a hunter and gatherer can just do.

Helius · Post by **Helius** » Fri Nov 27, 2009 8:48 pm

TallDave wrote:
Their medicine is different from ours, not inferior.
It is vastly inferior. I don't know why anyone would even try to argue this. If you were sick, would you visit a hospital or a medicine man?

This was all a good chuckle. We can resection a bowel *and* do a medicine dance.

alexjrgreen · Post by **alexjrgreen** » Fri Nov 27, 2009 8:49 pm

Skipjack wrote:
Western medicine has had many successes and not a few failures.
Ever since we have established a goo procedure for testing and verifying results, there have been very few failures.

Thalidomide, Seroxat, Vioxx...

Skipjack wrote:
That would still depend on what was wrong with you.
Just taking the extracts from plants is almost always inferior to modern medicine, even to semi modern medicine.
Take aspirin for example:
The extract of the willow bark (among other sources), salicylate, or salicylic acid, has been used since 3000 BC. It is basically the working agent in Aspirin. Problem: It had horrible side effects often worse than the actual ailment it would be used to cure.
It took until the mid of the 19th century until chemistry had advanced enough to bring about acetylsalicylic acid, which has much less side effects than just salicylic acid.
It takes modern chemistry to do that though. It is not something a hunter and gatherer can just do.

Check out Willow bark.

You don't help the debate by exaggerating your position.

TallDave · Post by **TallDave** » Sat Nov 28, 2009 2:26 am

Trade in metal goods contributed to the emergence of cities.

Yes, that was my point. Flint mining is a bit different and might reasonably be called "gathering," but even Bronze Age metallurgy is a specialized skill.

That would still depend on what was wrong with you.

Really? What ailments would you go to the medicine man for? How often do you use your medicine man? Can I get a referral?

Western medicine has had many successes and not a few failures.

Tribal medicine has vastly fewer successes and vastly more failures.

The most violent hunter-gatherer societies are at war, so perhaps you should compare them to WWI or WWII.

Even better, let's compare the average amount of time hunter-gatherers spend at war vs modern humans.

Most of the US isn't suffering from a lack of space, and competition for resources is mild

We would be and it would be, if we had 300 million hunter-gatherers. Competition for resources is mild precisely because of our modern production capabilities. Chalk up another point for modern civ.

This is also why we live much longer.

Brian H · Post by **Brian H** » Sat Nov 28, 2009 2:42 am

Luzr;
3% of 100,000 is 3,000, not 300. Really.

If you remove gunshot and auto deaths from the numbers, the US has the highest life expectancy in the world, even over supposed leaders like Japan and France.

(The current real frontier is anti-senescence, which is the mantra of SENS.org , lead by Aubrey de Grey.)

Skipjack · Post by **Skipjack** » Sat Nov 28, 2009 10:45 am

Check out Willow bark.

Pure Salicylic acid has much stronger side effects than Aspirin. The effects on the gastrointestinal tract were very severe and often irreversible with the state of medicine back then.
That is why Acetylsalicylic acid was developed in the first place.
I do know my Aspirin (and history), I have to take that stuff every day.

Also: For treatment of flu like illnesses there is much better modern medicine now, with even less side effects.

Thalidomide, Seroxat, Vioxx...

Thalidomide was in the 60ies btw. Our procedures for testing have much improved since.
Seroxat was not that big of a deal.
As for the others, yes mistakes still happen, but considering the millions of people who are treated every year by modern medicine, these mistakes are very rare and successes much outweight them.

I would definitely prefer modern medicine over some HG- stuff.

alexjrgreen · Post by **alexjrgreen** » Sat Nov 28, 2009 1:11 pm

TallDave wrote:
That would still depend on what was wrong with you.
Really? What ailments would you go to the medicine man for? How often do you use your medicine man? Can I get a referral?

See, for example, Understanding Alaska Native Medicine. I don't have a local medicine man, but in the Kalahari I would happily go to Jan van der Westhuizen.

TallDave wrote:
Western medicine has had many successes and not a few failures.
Tribal medicine has vastly fewer successes and vastly more failures.

You want Western medicine (your team) to be right about everything, and tribal medicine (their team) to be wrong about everything. How is that good science?

alexjrgreen · Post by **alexjrgreen** » Sat Nov 28, 2009 1:21 pm

Skipjack wrote:
Check out Willow bark.
Pure Salicylic acid has much stronger side effects than Aspirin. The effects on the gastrointestinal tract were very severe and often irreversible with the state of medicine back then.
That is why Acetylsalicylic acid was developed in the first place.
I do know my Aspirin (and history), I have to take that stuff every day.

Pure salicylic acid just isn't the same thing as willow bark...

Skipjack wrote:Also: For treatment of flu like illnesses there is much better modern medicine now, with even less side effects.

And the Tibetans were treating viruses before we even knew what viruses were (we thought they were talking about evil spirits).

By all means applaud the successes of Western medicine, but don't make the mistake of assuming that it's the best at everything.

Brian H · Post by **Brian H** » Sat Nov 28, 2009 2:19 pm

Many of the problems of Western medicine have to do with congealed regimens and their rationalizations. My father had ulcers from his early 40s on, and had the Vagus nerve connection to the stomach severed, and numerous dietary restrictions, and medicines and antacids up the kazoo for the rest of his life. About the time of his death in the 90s I began to see noises about the dispute a Dr. Williams (?) in Australia was creating by insisting that there was a bacterial etiology. After my own investigations I happened to mention in company of my siblings and in-laws that I thought the evidence was sound, and that ulcer treatment would change drastically in the near future, and in fact resistance to the idea had held change up already far too long. My youngest brother's wife is a nurse in the internist area, and jumped down my throat, informing me that ulcer treatment, according to the best doctors, many of whom she worked with, knew perfectly well what they were doing, and the helicobacter connection was nonsense.
Within 5 years, the Williams regimen of a couple of weeks heavy doses of a sequence of antibiotics to take out the bacterium was 'standard of care' for 80% of duodenal and stomach ulcers. (I exploited that development only once in later discussions, but the point was made. My sister-in-law is much less disrespectful these days!)
There are other instances of long-delayed corrections in theory and practice for the same reason. Breaking habitual certainty is tough.

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Population Control Solves Alot of Problems

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