Four Stone Hearth Newest Edition

The newest edition of Four Stone Hearth is up at Sorting Out Science. Check out this month's great collection of anthropology blog posts.

Four Stone Hearth, First Edition, Second Year

The First Edition for the second year (has it been a year already?) of Four Stone Hearth is up at The Primate Diaries. Eric has done a great job of pulling together a selection of anthropology blog posts. I would like to point out that Eric is a graduate of California State University, Chico, and is currently working on his doctorate at Duke...another northeastern California success story!

First Anniversary Edition of Four Stone Hearth Up at Remote Central

Tim at Remote Central has the First Anniversary Edition of Four Stone Hearth up. I am glad this blog carnival is continuing, thanks to the efforts of a lot of good anthropologists out there.

Are the Critics of Evolution Just Maintaining Cultural Boundaries?

Both Abnormal Interests and Afarensis picked up on my previous posts regarding Richard Colling and I notice that Professor Colling also left a message at Chris Heard's blog, Higgaion. (By the way - I noticed that every comment, email, etc. written by Rick Colling and posted online somewhere was mostly original in content. In other words, he is not simply "cutting and pasting" the same message at numerous locations to get the word out. I think there can be no criticism of Professor Colling's professional integrity - he just wants to continue to educate students in the best science possible; a science, furthermore, that Colling has personally found supportive of his faith).

Afarensis draws an important anthropological consideration regarding all the furor over Colling teaching evolution at an evangelical university. Afarensis writes:

In essence, those "...few profoundly scientifically ignorant individuals..." have decided that Dr. Colling is no longer christian enough to teach biology at the university. This is a good example of why framing won't work. Dr. Colling comes across as an intelligent individual with a sophisticated grasp of christian theology, yet he has run afoul of fundamentalist members of his community.

I am afraid I have not kept up with all the commentary on "framing" going through the science blogs of late, so I cannot really comment on whether this incident runs counter to the idea of framing. However, I fully agree with Afarensis' assertion that this is an example of groups maintaining their cultural boundaries:

It all gets back to boundary maintenance (a mechanism to prevent ideas from eeping across porous cultural boundaries - in effect boundary maintenance mechanisms serve to separate culture groups and provide a rigid, well defined marker between "us" and "them") and Dr. Colling strayed too far across the boundary. For his local community Dr. Colling has become one of "them".

Afarensis cites Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann's book, The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge. Again, I have not read the book, but the idea of a sort of "cultural immune system" is talked about with some frequency in anthropological circles. I would argue from my own currently limited understanding of boundary maintenance in anthropological theory (including its archaeological applications) that political motivations are often underwritten (or masked) by other aspects of culture, including religion. I can easily see much of the creationist movement (particularly "intelligent design") being fueled more by political and economic considerations than by sincere belief. As an example, I sometimes wonder if Ken Ham's creationist position has more to do with the ability to talk donors out of $28 million dollars for a museum (plus, no doubt, a healthy lifestyle for himself) than a sincere commitment to the idea that the earth is only 6,000 years old and tyrannosaurs were vegetarians prior to The Fall. Ken Ham, Rick Warren, Bill Donahue and others have far more to lose (in terms of economic and political power) than a scientific argument. And I find it interesting that those opposed to Rick Colling seem to be wielding financial threats (read: economic power) in a way that is more suggestive of a concern to maintain a cultural boundary where they are in control on one side. Put another way, I am very suspicious of those with power (economic or political) espousing religious or other cultural "values" - one has to constantly wonder whether they do it out of a sincere belief, or simply to maintain their economic "base".

I've rambled here, but I think Afarensis has hit on an idea that deserves further reflection and comment.

Some Hadza Updates

Afarensis and Tim at Anthropology.Net have some new posts up regarding the current situation with the Hadzabe. Both discuss a recent Daily Mail article on the Hadzabe regarding their way of life and efforts by the United Arab Emirates to have them evicted from their own lands (the picture of Gonga with the article's author is the same Gonga I knew and hunted with in the late 1980s/early 1990s - I even have a few examples of his arrows in my collection).

I have been in contact with several individuals regarding the Hadza, although I have yet to post on these developments. Part of the problem is the lack of information regarding the actual state of negotiations between the UAE, Tanzanian government and the extent to which the Hadza may or may not be involved (or other organizations are involved on their behalf). It has been suggested that we not "rock the boat" too much in the blogosphere given that there may be negotiations taking place that could be compromised by too much media attention in the West (the old " westerners interfering with sovereign people like they always do" argument). On the other hand, the UAE is apparently sensitive to publicity (particularly negative publicity - the fact that the UAE and Tanzanian governments are now accusing researchers and tourism operators of violating Hadza rights in order to shift blame (as if they really cared!) is suggestive that outside word about this shady deal may be having an effect); plus I have had some indications that the transfer of Hadza land to the UAE royal family is a "done deal".

Given this rather limited information, I have a request from my fellow bloggers and any commenters:

Do you think it is better to stay relatively quiet on this matter, under the presumption that "behind the scenes" talks might be taking place that would at least give the Hadza retention of their lifestyle (and there is no indication that this would be a condition of the negotiations at this point) and so as not to jeopardize any potential deal that might benefit the Hadza? Further, should we be sensitive to the "Western intereference" argument, or is that a red herring?

or...

Should some of us go for broke and ramp up the negative publicity (strategies are already being worked on) in an effort to completely forstall any sort of deal between Tanzania and the UAE, even if it might jeopardize a potential deal favoring the Hadza? (Let me add this: even if negotiations on behalf of the Hadza are taking place, there is no doubt in my mind that UAE royal family control of this area would still radically change the Hadza way of life).

Any comments/suggestions/advice would be helpful.

New Four Stone Hearth

Alun at Clioaudio has the new Four Stone Hearth up...as usual, Alun does a wonderful job of pulling eveything together.

Check it out!

More On The Hadza

Well, once again, thanks to all who took the time to spread the word about the current plight of the Hadzabe. Duane at Abnormal Interests actually took the time to call the US State Department and was successful in reaching two individuals in the Bureau of African Affairs. You can read more about it at Duane's blog. I received an email from the State Department in response to my email inquiries, but it was the usual bureaucratic form letter along the lines of "thank you very much for your concern...the State Department values all feedback...should you require further assistance...yada, yada, yada..." - so, altogether not very helpful. Duane's efforts I'm sure made more inroads. I have heard nothing from Cultural Survival nor Survival International.

I am also in touch with the chairman of the German branch of FPCN (Friends of Peoples Close to Nature) whose organization has been highly involved with the Hadza. A reader also left me a message saying that she had written NBC, ABC and BBC - she and her husband had recently visited the Hadza and was appalled at the efforts to displace them.

Thanks again for everyone's efforts. I will keep you posted should there be any new developments.

Hadza Diary

I can't thank those of you who have spread the word about the plight of the Hadza enough - beer is definitely on me if you ever find yourself in northern California!

Afarensis started it all, but Abnormal Interests posted, as did Tim at both Anthropology.net and at Remote Central; Kambiz posted a clarion call at Anthropology.net to "Help Out The Hadza" and got some Diggs on it today! Afarensis came back with another post on my post, and Carl at Hot Cup of Joe picked it up as well and has also summarized the current list of posts on the Hadza (so I don't know why I'm repeating it here, except to express my thanks at the effort!). Schmoo On The Run also posted. From Carl I also see that Indigenous Peoples of Africa Co-Ordinating Committee has a position paper on the subject of Hadzabe rights and a link to a Guardian article on the potential for violations of Hadza human rights. Thanks to all those who are currently "digging" it as well...

During all this, I have of course been reminiscing on my time with the Hadza. I dusted off a couple of my old field notebooks and diaries from my first visit with them and couldn't resist sharing this with you (it certainly made me laugh!!):


7 Sep 1988 Lake Eyasi

This morning I thought I would try my hand at "hunting" some Francolin hens [a type of game bird, although in retrospect, I think I was really talking about guinea fowl at the time] that were innocently rummaging for grubs near the tent. I proceeded, on my hands and knees, to position myself within rock throwing range. I was fortunate enough to launch two of the missiles with no significant effect, although I am convinced that were my aim better we would be eating hen instead of corned beef [Kenyan canned corn beef - I wrote later that not even flies touch the stuff!] tonight. Upon noting my lack of success, I stood up and turned around to notice, quite unexpectedly, that I was the subject of some curiosity by the Hadza women and children, no doubt wondering what the crazy "wazungu" [white man/stranger - my Swahili wasn't too good at the time - I used the plural when I should have used the singular "mzungu"] was doing crawling through the grass! Perhaps a little too much "bongi" [East African version of...well...grass] the night before!

Fortunately the research team didn't have to depend on my hunting skills to eat!

Update: Afarensis has another post up and discusses the IPCC briefing note in some detail. He also recommends following Carl's advice at Hot Cup of Joe to contact the Tanzanian and UAE embassies. Afarensis further suggests the State Department. A great idea!

Update II: Anthropologi.info has another post;

Hadza Tribal Lands Being Confiscated By Arab Royal Family

Afarensis notified me of this MSNBC story regarding my friends, the Hadzabe (Hadza) of northern Tanzania. He posted the story and commented on it as well. I can only say that this is the most depressed I have been in while and the lead sentence to the article says it all:

One of the last remaining tribes of hunter-gatherers on the planet is on the verge of vanishing into the modern world.

Apparently a United Arab Emirates royal family is trying to use Hadza tribal territory as a “personal safari playground” and has worked out an arrangement with the Tanzanian government to lease 2500 square miles of the Eyasi highlands. Of course the Hadza were never consulted about the agreement and now may well find themselves trespassers on their own land. Previous agreements between the Tanzanian government and other private companies have resulted in a number of Hadza hunters being jailed for subsistence hunting – an experience that ended up killing most of those imprisoned.

Most disappointing of all, Tanzanian officials and others invoked visions of the Hadza as primitive savages in need of being removed from the bush for their own good:

The [Tanzanian] official, Philip Marmo, called the Hadzabe "backwards" and said they would benefit from the school, roads and other projects the UAE company has offered as compensation…

Marmo said the Hadzabe -- who until recently had no use for money, organized religion or standard time -- are "the one backwards group in the country”….

"We want them to go to school," said Marmo, who is Tanzania's minister for good governance and represents the valley in parliament. "We want them to wear clothes. We want them to be decent."

It is ironic that government officials would be calling the Hadza “backwards”. On the contrary, it appears the Tanzanian government, far from exhibiting a societal maturity more in line with the 21st century, seems to prefer a cultural connection with 19th century Europeans in North America or 16th century Spanish in Central and South America. Indeed, catering to UAE royal family despotism might make Marmo and other Tanzania officials more comfortable with a return to the 17th century Arab slave trade across East Africa.

The Tanzanian government has frequently attempted to “settle” the Hadza and make them good little agriculturalists like we all should be. And, as the article has pointed out, this almost never works:

Government efforts over 40 years to forcibly integrate the Hadzabe into modern society have mostly failed. Instead, the Hadzabe seem to have preferred changing at their own pace, adopting bits of modern life over centuries…

A program to move families into a village of metal houses ended with Hadzabe fleeing to the bush after only a few days. "When it rains, those houses make a lot of noise," said Sarah Makungu, who tried them.

I remember returning to work with the Hadza in the early 1990s, at a time when the government forced them into settlements and brought it western development workers to teach them how to grow corn. Understanding that the Hadza would not be able to feed themselves while they were in “training” to grow corn, truckloads of milled corn were brought in regularly to feed the families until they were able to sow and harvest their own crops. The Hadza graciously accepted this government handout while the process of growing food was demonstrated to them over a number of months. All the while, Hadza men sat in the community meetings, working on arrows and bows. Eventually, the government felt the Hadza had been shown all they needed. The trucks of corn stopped coming, the officials said “good luck in your new economic system” and departed, and the development workers went back to their western countries. And the Hadza? They promptly left the settlement when no one was around and returned to hunting and gathering in the bush.

The one bright spot for me from the article is that the effort to Christianize the Hadza apparently never took hold either:

Missions to spread Christianity have also failed. "We just go to church as if we are pictures," one man said. "Our hearts and minds are not there."

The greatest tragedy in all the efforts to forcibly modernize or convert the Hadza is that these efforts destroy the strong family and cultural ties that members of the tribe have with each other. One year, after an attempt to settle the Hadza into government camps I remember sitting around the fire one night with an old hunter. We were listening to the children singing in their huts. The old man turned to me and said “We can’t go back to the government camps; the children don’t sing there”. Now they have to hide and worry they will be arrested for getting meat to feed their families:

A recent meeting in the Yaeda Valley on the issue ended with several Hadzabe men shouting at Tanzanian government officials for ignoring them. One of the men was later charged with disruptive behavior and jailed for several days. Two others who have spoken against the deal said they have been threatened with arrest and are now on the run, moving from hut to hut to elude police.

"We're not used to that kind of life in jail," said Gudo, an elderly Hadzabe whose best friend, Sumuni, was among those who perished. "Sumuni was my age. Our fathers were friends. We played together, learned how to hunt together," he said, looking away. "I don't want to talk anymore."

Reading the article was also difficult because I recognized the names of many Hadza interviewed: Gudo, Kaunda, Gonga….men I had met, lived with, hunted with and together roamed the Eyasi highlands. There were others that came to mind while I was reading: Makungu, Hamisi, Koiobe, Katembuga, Mahia…I can only hope that their way of life will remain for as long as they choose to live it.

Four Stone Hearth Edition Up At Remote Central

The new Four Stone Hearth edition is up and running...hosted by Tim Jones at Remote Central. Check out some great posts on anthropology...

Four Stone Hearth Coming Up At Aardvarchaeology!

Make sure to get some submissions into Martin at Aardvarchaeology for tomorrow's edition of Four Stone Hearth!

A Really Cool Four Stone Hearth Edition

Carl at Hot Cup of Joe has done an absolutely brilliant job of putting Four Stone Hearth together this week. You HAVE to go visit and see what one commenter called a "totally new dimension" to the blog carnival. I'm really bummed I missed this one....

Four Stone Hearth 2 for 1

Looks like there was some confusion in posting this week's edition of Four Stone Hearth, although I see it as plus. Instead of one edition, we get the special edition of Four Stone Hearth being hosted at Hot Cup of Joe and the 9th Edition being hosted at Boas Blog.

It's a "two-for-one" that's hard to beat...

Thanks Everyone!

Thanks to everyone who left such wonderful comments on the Four Stone Hearth edition! But most importantly, thanks to everyone who contributed such great posts! I had a lot of fun pulling the last one together and look forward to doing it again!

I would also like to point out that Duane at Abnormal Interests mentioned Four Stone Hearth on his blog. Duane has a variety of "abnormal" interests, including ancient languages, and as such he brings a different audience in touch with Four Stone Hearth. And while he doesn't claim to be an archaeologist, his posts on archaeological issues, especially those in the Middle East are informative. And when "bible" archaeology disputes erupt as they often do, Duane is one of the cooler heads, sticking to the issues and not getting off on tangents. I hope we can get Duane to post at upcoming Four Stone Hearth editions.

Remember, the next edition of Four Stone Hearth is coming up at Boas Blog on February 14...don't miss it!

Four Stone Hearth 8

Welcome to Northstate Science and the 8th Edition of Four Stone Hearth, the anthropology blog carnival. We have a range of topics for this edition, all of which have been ordered chronologically (more or less) from our earliest ancestors to computer applications in anthropology. So, let's get started...

Yann Klimentidis starts us off with an article in the current edition of Natural History discussing the reconstruction of hominin faces from the bone structure of the skull. We know that specialists have been able to accomplish this for some time, but new fossils within the last two decades demonstrate the rich array of hominin faces within the last four million years. As Yann points out, the path to modern humans was a well-worn one - it is easy to see something of ourselves in each of the reconstructions (Ken Ham will of course ignore any human characteristics and call every one an "ape", while Bill Dembski will ignore any ape characteristics and use the human characteristics as an example of intelligently designed specified complexity). This particular issue of Natural History is sitting on my desk at the moment so I'll have to take a look!

Afarensis (whose reconstructed face actually appears on page one of the Natural History article cited above) shows us that anatomical structures of the Dikika child have implications for the transmission of cultural knowledge. With the later advent of stone tool production this problem of cultural transmission becomes even more interesting and following John Shea, Afarensis asks what children's activities look like in the archaeological record? An important question given that archaeologists often find tool examples of poor craftsmanship (which further begs the question, are all those imperfect designs we see in nature simply a product of an "immature" intelligent designer still learning the ropes?).

Greg Laden's Evolution...Not "Just A Theory" Anymore asks whether hunting might not serve purposes other than simply caloric intake. Specifically, he questions the possibility that hunting functions prominently in male bonding. And I love this:

When a 19th or 20th century guy archaeologist holds a beautifully made, often phallic-shaped obsidian spearhead in his hands, feeling it’s heft and running his fingers along the still sharp edge, he is bonding with another guy, of a much earlier time period, who could probably have killed his quarry just as effectively with a sharp stick, but opted instead to produce, carry around, display, and use this really cool piece of gear. So it’s a guy thing, and it’s a gear thing. It’s sort of a guys-with-gear thing.

Yep...speaking as a 20th century guy archaeologist, I can pretty much buy that...(wonder if Behe feels the same way about the bacterial flagellum?). Like Greg, I've participated in hunting events with both modern hunters using firearms and aboriginal hunters (Hadza) using bows and arrows. I can certainly understand hunting's social connections.

Tim at Remote Central asks "Who Really Discovered America?".Tim takes up the issue of whether Clovis, pre-Clovis people or European Solutreans were the first to enter North America. This is a hot-button issue as the sudden appearance of Clovis technology in North America without any known lithic pre-cursors has always raised questions (and hackles) amongst North American archaeologists. The hypothesis that European Solutreans got here first also has substantial political implications for Native American land claims. While I don't necessarily agree with the Solutrean hypothesis, I see arguments against it as more political, rather than archaeological, in nature. We chew on Christian creationists and intelligent design activists a lot, but Native American creationism is also a science stopper (and the eight hundred pound gorilla in the room that no one wants to talk about!). In any case, Tim does a great job of laying out some of the issues with regard to peopling of the New World.

Aardvarchaeology introduces us to those Gothenburg Nastys. You know, those grave-like structures containing "...a handful of cremated bones looking a lot like muesli" (and what the hell is muesli?...second thought, I probably don't want to know...). Apparently, these are not the most exciting features to excavate and after reading Martin's post, I can understand why. Geez, and I thought excavating isolated historic refuse dumps was bad...of course neither could be as painful as wading through No Free Lunch.

A.J. Cann at MicrobiologyBytes introduces us to a superb topic that's going make me think twice before picking up that dead chipmunk for my comparative collection: the ancient occurrences of bubonic plague. We all know about the Black Death in the 14th century, but plague has been around for quite a while and can be identified in the archaeological record. More to the point, plague is still with us, and as Cann notes, it would be a good idea if we knew something about its history. (You suppose plague was intelligently designed?). Give this one a careful read...and be afraid...be very afraid!

Bridging the gap between our evolutionary ancestry and modern conservation problems, Primatology.org raises ethical concerns about the U.S. maintaining chimpanzee populations for biomedical research. Apparently we are the last nation to do so. Of course the issue is where we draw the line between the potential for saving human lives and the ethics of medical experimentation on another animal - our closest living relative.

Several post submittals explore that interesting area between cultural transmission and psychology. Ideas And How They Spread offers us two discussions on the topics of behavior and cultural transmission. In Behavior Trademark Tyrants we find the suggestion that at least three factors contribute to whether or not individuals adopt a certain behavior as a "trademark". The concept of having personal behavioral "trademarks" has implications for cultural continuity and transmission. In a second post you can find of the background for defining a meme. I remember Dawkins posing an interesting discussion of meme transmittal in the PBS Evolution series. Wise Bread posts a discussion on the relationship between food security and generosity. It appears that my willingness to throw change in the Salvation Army Christmas bucket might be closely linked to how satiated I feel at the time. But there are some interesting twists in this connection so take a look. Pick The Brain discusses the distinction between cognition and metacognition and proposes some interesting implications for how we define intelligence and measure success. (I was trying to draw a connection between cognition and intelligent design, but couldn't come up with anything).

Carl at Hot Cup Of Joe has a fabulous discussion (and the only linguistics submittal) of the perceived threat of linguistic diversity. In the concern over illegal immigration and the rising use of the Spanish language in the U.S. there plenty of concerns over the potential loss of "American" culture. Of course, Carl points out that the cultural door swings both ways and the perceived loss of culture to immigration seems unfounded. We may also be ignoring a great opportunity if Americans fail to consider linguistic diversity as a positive force:

In the United States, we appear to be slow to figure out what Europeans have long understood: speaking and writing in only one language is a limiting factor in economics, academia, and politics.

I remember hooking up with a number of students from the U.K. as I was traveling across Tanzania and simply marveling at their ability to collectively strike up a conversation with fellow European travels in about seven different languages. I wish I had spent more time studying French in college.

Kambiz from Anthropology.net gives us an introduction to new software for the Mac OS X system that has some significant application anthropological organization and research. Read Kambiz's post to understand more of the connection to anthropology. All I can say is I wish they had a version of this for the Windows operating system!

Finally, many of you are no doubt familiar with discussions taking place on the subject of open access, i.e. the extent to which journal publications should be publicly available as opposed to costing small fortunes to have regular access. At the request of Afarensis and Kambiz, I am also including some recent posts on the subject of open access, in something of a "mini-carnival". Kambiz was gracious enough to supply the general summaries, so I can't claim much credit for working on anything that follows:


The Open Access Issue: Some Recent Comments From the Blogosphere

Joshua Rosenau at Thoughts From Kansas comments on this issue. Here are some snippets from his post on the topic:

Scientists give those publishers their research, typically signing over copyright for that work to the publisher. In many cases those scientists also pay page charges to those same publishers, so that those publishers can have the privilege of taking those scientists'
work from them.

Scientists are beginning to feel that this situation is not equitable, and that the restrictions on accessing those publications online hurt not only authors, but researchers in the field. Congress has heard those complaints, and is pushing for NIH funded research to be made available free of charge on some schedule...

...Whether they are stupid is a harder question. Right now, a chunk of most federal grants winds up going to pay fees to publishers. Those publishers also sell advertising, and charge truly astounding subscription fees. They hire professional editors, and can afford various sorts of specialists. They do not pay their peer reviewers, they don't pay the authors, and they give relatively little back to the scientific community. The exorbitant subscription fees mean that academic libraries are forced to cut subscriptions for interesting but lower profile journals in order to maintain subscriptions to the really essential journals.

The publishers walk away from that system as winners. Society loses.
Researchers have a harder time finding existing research, and the public at large has no way to access most original research. This means that even the scientifically literate public could not evaluate new research that could help them make medical decisions, or be more active participants in policy discussions.


Rex of Savage Minds outlines why Big Content has an issue with this:

The problem, of course, is that Big Content's business model faces a strategic challenge in the digital age. Suddenly we can distribute our creative work across the Internet and make it available to everyone, solving many of the problems associated with distribution.


Afarensis also outlines the problem, and gives us some relevance to what's happening within anthropology itself:

The big publishers argue that Open Access threatens their livelihood. Open Access advocates argue that since most of this research is funded through taxpayer efforts the results of that access should be freely available to the public. A group of anthropologists, for example, is working hard to force the American Association of Anthropologists to adopt an open access model.

Lexis2praxis shows how this movement is uniting anthropology together:

...sometimes cultural anthropology seems, by nature of the discipline, prone to elitism and inaccessibility...

....It seems like anthropologists would be at the forefront of the movement to "share knowledge", but this is certainly not the case among all of the ranks. Recent actions by the AAA have set anthropology that much farther back when it comes to making our presence, and contributions, known to the public and, well, more useful rather than holed up in universities to filter down through other disciplines, and even then so gradually because in many ways we are isolated even in the academic universe.

The web and Open Access Publishing could be a way out of this, and also a way for anthropology to be at the forefront of a movement that could change academia's attachment to elitism and cater to its more "humanistic" foundations. Yet, we have a fragile presence in these areas and therefore are left unrepresented.

One thing the AAA did well, however, is to spawn a movement. I doubt there has ever been this much discussion among anthropologists regarding the goal of the discipline and whether we should embrace Open Access Publishing.

And Kambiz criticizes some of the approaches the PR consultant is taking:

This is pretty pitiful, it is actually despicable for publishers to be doing that. Peer-review can still flourish, if not be more critical and constructed under an open access model. More people can read it, more people can comment on it, more people can know about! They have lost focus of what they are in the business of, to document and disseminate knowledge. Not keep it locked away! Don't they understand the more they keep this information from the public, the more misconception will brew about?


Again, my thanks to Kambiz for providing the information. I have found this all to be an interesting discussion on the issues surrounding Open Access and I am sure there will be more to come.

Thanks for stopping by to read the current edition of Four Stone Hearth! The next edition will be February 14th at Boas Blog. Don't forget to stop by and see what's new and exciting in the world of anthropology...

Four Stone Hearth Coming Up...

I had wanted to get Four Stone Hearth up tonight before the scheduled date, but I'm having computer "issues"....
It will be up by the end of the day tomorrow; thanks to everyone who submitted!

Four Stone Hearth

Just a reminder....I'm hosting Four Stone Hearth next week (Jan 31)...don't forget so send submissions! I've received a few to date...but what about others?
Kambiz?
Afarensis?
Martin?
Carl?
Anyone else?

Four Stone Hearth at Aardvarchaeology!

The newest edition of Four Stone Hearth is up at Aarvarchaeology! If you're into the exciting world of anthropology, check out the submissions! Forgive the shameful plug, but make sure you look at the exchange between Martin, myself and some other bloggers like Afarensis regarding historic preservation. Makes for some interesting reading.

And you guessed it! The next edition of Four Stone Hearth will be hosted here at Northstate Science on January 31. I'm looking forward to seeing all the new submissions.

Four Stone Hearth

For those interested in all things anthropological, the next edition of Four Stone Hearth is being hosted by Aardvarchaeology. Get your submissions in before January 17. I'm afraid I missed most of the last Four Stone Hearth sessions, so I'll be making a better effort this time around.

By the way, Northstate Science will be hosting the following Four Stone Heart on January 31.

In Non-Belief More Prevalent Among Social Scientists?: Some Comments on the Harris/Prager Debate

In an online debate with conservative talk-show host, Dennis Prager, Sam Harris responds to Prager in the context of a discussion on the prevalence of belief in God among scientists:

An article in Nature recently reported that no scientists doubt the existence of God more than biologists, followed closely by physicists and astronomers. I’m not aware of the data you cite on social scientists, but if it is as you report, and they are more atheistic still, it would not surprise me. After all, these people spend a lot of time thinking about things like self-deception, wishful thinking, cognitive biases, and the other enemies of intellectual honesty that keep religion in such good standing in our society.

Prager specifically wrote the following:

My point remains valid, as you graciously concede. Scientific knowledge hardly invalidates belief that there is a God. On the contrary, there are more believers in God in the natural sciences than in the social sciences. This suggests that it is the virtual absence of God in education, not knowledge of science, that likely accounts for the atheism of academics.

Given that anthropology in general and archaeology specifically are considered “social sciences” and that my professional experience and training are in both, allow me to comment. First, I do not know that social scientists are less likely to believe in God than natural or physical scientists. Prager threw that out there without any data to back it up and so it remains nothing more than personal opinion. Secondly, I do not know what Prager is implying here. It almost seems as though he considers “social sciences” as non-scientific relative to the natural sciences and that therefore the supposed absence of belief among the former must be the result of a general state of education and not familiarity with science. I don’t know if that is what he means, but if so, the argument is completely fallacious. I spend significant time in my Anthropology class dispelling this mythical dichotomy between the “hard” sciences (physics, chemistry, etc.) and the “soft” sciences (biology, anthropology, etc.). Most of the social science disciplines are as equally versed in the methods and philosophy of scientific investigation as their “hard” science counterparts and so I reject the notion that scientific literacy has something to do with differences Prager perceives. Nonetheless, his suggestion that there may be fewer “believers” among social scientists than natural scientists deserves further exploration. Harris documents some good reasons for why he thinks a greater prevalence of non-belief among social scientists might not be surprising: these people concern themselves with the all-too-human characteristics of “…self-deception, wishful thinking, cognitive biases, and the other enemies of intellectual honesty”. Certainly, the human propensity to deceive other humans for purposes of gaining political (i.e. religious) power combined with the evolutionary establishment of humans as pattern-seeking primates (hence, being willingly deceived) is a common theme throughout history.

But there are other historical observations that can be added to this mix by those of us who study the past. Archaeology has shown that the number of gods and deities (and their attentive human populations) that have fallen wayside over the millennia are legion. There is some historical substance to Dawkins’ claim that all of us are really atheists in the context of the multitude of gods who have come before – he and others just choose to go one god further. Humans have changed the nature and beliefs about their gods so often that it is mind-boggling. What makes the current iterations any different than those that have come before? In addition, once writing was established we know that these “religions” all found justification in ancient texts, described as divinely inspired for those who bought into whatever version was being offered at the time. It is hard to fathom the smorgasbord of religions, no different in substance or justification than the current suite, that have come and gone through the ages.

As anthropologists most of us have also witnessed first hand the despicable behavior of missionaries bringing the “word of god” to indigenous cultures. We have certainly familiarized ourselves with the numerous historical accounts of missionaries spreading religion by force, be it the Hittite invasion of the middle east, Boer occupation of South Africa, Cortez and the Spanish friars brutalizing the Aztec people, or Native Californians enduring the mission “concentration camps” (which, by the way, is how most Native American friends of mine describe them). It is difficult to buy into a just god who would tolerate such behavior from his messengers. When you look at history, it is really difficult to envision any religion that wasn’t ultimately used to further economic and political gain among a small proportion of its advocates.

Given this I can certainly understand why social scientists may exhibit a higher proportion of non-belief, although again, I have seen no statistics to suggest this may be the case. But another question arises. What is meant by “non-belief”? Prager and other religious conservatives equate belief directly with church attendance – anyone not “active” in a religious institution is effectively an atheist. My anecdotal experience would suggest that this is probably the case among social scientists I know: almost none actively or regularly participate in religious organizations. Or are we talking non-belief in religion as an institution? I would argue that “spirituality” is not the same as “religion” – this is a distinction we have ingrained in our children. If this is the case, I would certainly argue that most of my colleagues pursue spirituality in any number of ways, none of which involve regular church attendance.

I am sure this is not a satisfying answer to Prager and other religious conservatives who prefer allegiance to religious institutions. In fact, I would bet that Islamic fundamentalists are held in higher regard among the “religiously active” than those who seek spiritual enlightenment along other paths – after all, at least Muslims suicide bombers go to church regularly!