h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Maybe you should give up title to any land you got then from whoever stole it in the first place. Since you don't want to inherit or assume the liabilities, why should you inherit or assume the benefits, Two Bit Trigger Pumping Moron? [That may sound like a flame, but it's your name, isn't it?]

Not only that, I presume you were alive when Norton and colleagues lied about the trust accounts. I assume you were alive when Senator Jerkwhateverhisnameis has been trying to extinguish western Shoshoni land claims. I assume you were alive when the Lakota were offered money for the Black Hills at 1870 prices and, when they rejected the offer, were informed the money would be placed in trust for them because they don't have a choice. You were probably alive when these and many other bad things were happening. Isn't that true?

Maybe you can worry about those things that happened after your grandparents were born, correct? Or maybe not. Maybe you don't care. At least we'll know now, won't we?

Pleased to meet you, Mr. Tuftin. It was kind of you to share something of your heritage too.

I understand about Vikings too I think. Our men have such reputations as well. It is often used as an argument to discount our claims because we took the land from somebody else or so it's alleged. Of course, the whites didn't make treaties with somebody else. They made treaties with us. I wonder if we had made treaties with somebody else, somebody else would have been more honorable in discharging their treaty obligations?

Your link to the gente in dios site is apparently dead, unfortunately. Maybe someone had a change of opinion or heart?

One other question relevant to Amundsen. I thought the name of the ship was changed and that they are the same ship since the Fram was designed with a round hull so it could be trapped in the ice without being crushed and so would serve for drifting, so to speak, with the sea ice in the arctic. I thought that in this way it took perhaps three years to make the passage to the Bering Strait. Was this not true? Or am I confused and there were in fact two ships of similar design?

The link isn't dead per se, it's merely resting... Actually it's my fault for putting a comma at the end. The parser doesn't understand that it's punctuation and not a part of the link. The real link, if I don't make a mistake, is (http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mgenteindios.html). I think you'll find that 'the straight dope' is a fairly reliable source of information on lots of strange stuff. It's certainly where I go when I wonder about something, if I don't find it at the Urban Legends Reference Page (http://www.snopes.com).
I'm impressed with your knowledge of Norwegian Arctic expeditions, but I think you're confusings Amundsen's voyage through the North-West passage with Nansen's Fram-voyage. Amundsen's Gjøa was a reinforced whaler, and I don't know if it was supposed to be pushed up by the ice like Fram or if the ice conditions just didn't require that.
Fram on the other hand was designed specifically to be pushed up instead of being crushed, so that Nansen could attempt to drift with the arctic ice cap. When he realised it wouldn't cross the pole itself (it reached 85deg 57min N) he left on skis with Hjalmar Johansen and a few dogs, they reached 86 14 before turning back.
Both ships are displayed in museums in Oslo, right next to the viking ship museums, and the kon-tiki museum. Neither of which I have visited... I'm a bad person.

Making claims that some tribe doesn't have the right to a certain piece of land just because it was taken from another tribe is just plain stupid. The invading Europeans made treaties and broke them based on 'might makes right' and the convenient policy of declaring your opponent of inherent lesser worth.
On the other hand I don't know anything about any current policies in the US, and I'm not so stupid as a Norwegian populist politician who was questioned on his hostile stance towards immigrants to Norway and who managed to say all Europeans should leave North America and go back. He didn't realise, I guess, that our 'share' would likely be several million.
In my uninformed opinion, "It happened before my time, so it's not my responsibility" is a simplistic cop-out. People today aren't individually responsible for wrongs in the past, but they are collectively responsible to do 'what can be done' to right those wrongs. What constitutes 'can be done' however is not something I have an opinion on.

As this seems top have become a conversation more about nationality, can anyone think of a land that has not been invaded and taken over in say the last 2000 years ?
Nations are historicaly at least made by winning wars (the one eception I can think to this is Israel formed by treaty quite recently). I don't mean any offence, bur regardless of what name the indigenous people of the north american continent go by, they lost, they were invaded and lost, they have no nation state of their own.

Back to the original question a moment as I don't think we have an answer, what is the exceptable collective term for the tribe of indigenous people from the north american continent ?
Because that is too much of a mouthful to be of any use, just like you don't refer to the caucasion people of europe who invaded america, but to white man.
It is my opinion that a name for a group of people isn't inherntly offensive, but can be made so by use, for example if I pour contempt in my voice as I speak of the english, and if I was heard by an englishman, they could take offence. Not at the use of english as a name or descriptor, but at the contempt I put there (This is an example and not how I feel about the english, being english I figure I can get away with it). The insult is from the speaker not the names they use, unless of course you wish to take offense without good reason.

Math

Well, I suppose the alleged derivation of Los Indos does represent wishful thinking then. It wasn't a bad wishful thought actually since it would seem to portray both Columbus and indians in a better light than perhaps either deserve.

I apologize for confusing the expeditions. That only goes to show how important these little discussions become in clearing up historical misunderstandings. Didn't Mr Johansen also accompany Mr. Amundsen to the antipole?

I've admired Amundsen because I believe he thought very highly of the survival skills of the Inuit and employed a number of their innovations into his expedition strategy, unlike Scott who relied principally on what he took to be the best, if not most expensive, Western scientific technology of the day.

So I guess it was Nansen who made it so far north and pioneered the idea of the ship "floating" on the ice and Amundsen who applied the notion to finally navigating the illustrious Northwest Passage, correct? This gave Amundsen ample opportunity to observe the natives and their survival strategies, something Mr. Scott failed to do at his and his colleagues distinct disadvantage.

I'm gratified that you recognize the irresponsibility, to say nothing of the callousness, of the excuses that are typically offered for not making things right. It's odd that some Euroamericans think that indian people, if they ever got the advantage, would send everyone packing. I know very few that consider exile of the immigrants a viable option.

What many do propose is that the lands held in trust by the American government be returned to the natives. There is nothing preventing this from being accomplished except for intransigence and greed. You see, much of the land holds mineral, timber, water or recreational resources that the government thinks it has a right to lease on behalf of the American people. The land is, for the most part, not inhabited or patented and would therefore be restorable without inordinant hardship on the descendents of the immigrants or people who have purchased property from them.

The problem of course is that certain greedy business enterprises have always considered the land subject to their shortterm cravings for wealth. Being in the public domain, it is generally leased at much lower rates than the patented land in private hands. So the American people really benefit very little from this arrangement and there is ample evidence that imprudent leasing arrangements have already seriously degraded the land and its resources.

The Black Hills is an rather typical example of this process. The community of Edgemont, SD has been more or less thoroughly polluted by uranium spoil. The aquifers in the Hills represent the only known source of groundwater for all of western South Dakota. There really are no perennial streams in the area. These aquifiers have been repeatedly degraded to faciliate mineral extraction.

Despite all this activity, the state of South Dakota is among poorest in the nation. The big energy concerns like Union Carbide, Kerr-McGee and maybe a couple of dozen others have looted the mineral resources and returned very little of the profits to the state or its people. The sacred Hills have been sullied in the process and will not recover or be rehabilitated in our lifetimes.

The American government has, therefore, shown itself to be a very poor trustee of the public domain lands. It has also "misplaced" literally billions of dollars of funds due indian people for the land they gave up under treaties and other agreements.

The United States concurred with a treaty made with the other American nations during the second world war that provided guidelines for the treatment of indigenous populations. Much of Latin America no longer has public domain lands so any attempts at land reform or redistribution there is fraught with difficulties. The United States is one of the few countries in the hemisphere where much land remains in the public domain, yet the government has never, to my knowledge, funded any programs in compliance with the treaty. This is hardly surprising when you consider it hasn't complied with any other treaty relating to the indigenous population.

Some people might assert that claims adjudicated by the Indian Land Claims commission have fulfilled the government's obligations. These people should note that when such claims in fact have been paid, not only has the land been appraised at ridiculously low, nineteenth century prices, but the plaintives have often been compelled to seek redress all the way to the Supreme Court, have had to bear the expense of suing the government, when the government has consented to be sued, and have had funds, called "offsets" deducted from the settlements that allegedly reimburse the government for the "care" it has provided for the people while they were confined to the reservations. In other words, they have been charged for their involuntary incarceration as if they were common criminals.

This is unconscionable in the extreme yet it persists even in our own time. Now, perhaps, some people can understand a little why some of us may be just a little bit resentful or sensitive about these issues. This is >> NOT << of exclusively historical interest. This is not about the sins of the fathers. This is about the contemporary sin of offically sanctioned avarice and a pattern of abuse that has persisted for centuries.

I am not, therefore, optimistic, okay? I am very, very discouraged most of the time. People will often say, "Just forget it." That's easy to say when you haven't been disadvantaged for years by patently discriminatory, arbitrary or capricous policies that have stripped you of the resources from which others have benefitted. In other words, Americans are rich because indians are poor. There is a direct relationship.

Indian people aren't the only victims of this but they seem to have been the most frequent victims being powerless for the most part to get their grievances redressed or in many cases even acknowledged. I hope you'll forgive me then if I sound at times either cynical or resentful towards whites or the government. If it isn't understandable, it should be.

When people respond positively to these attempts at educating the public, it gives some cause for hope. Your response is most welcome. Unfortunately, there's probably very a little a Norwegian can do to convince the US government to do the right thing. But if you can, in casual conversation or formal debate, pass on the relevant information to others, perhaps in time an international coalition may be organized to finally force the Americans to not only do right by their own indigenous population but also to avoid the offenses they have commited and continue to commit against indigenous people all over the world.

Their example then might convince other nations inclined to prey on others to avoid such things. I'm convinced the problem originates with the powerful, multinational corporations that covet the land and resources of people all over the world and will virtually stop at nothing to "enhance shareholder value" as they say. This doesn't mean the shareholders will ever benefit, except perhaps for a few. It has always been this few who have caused horrendous problems for the many.

I think we should honor treaties to which the United States is currently a party and honor our laws as they now exist. If I were specifically aware of a contemporary injustice then I might be moved to action.

The concept of giving my little plot of land to the Creek and revoking the Second Treaty of Indian Springs is absurd. We live in the worl as it exists now. We'd never get anything done if we were trying to right the wrongs from 1825.

I think we should acknowlege the problems in our past. We should be able discuss them honestly and resolve to be more just in the future.

Really, Math? If what you assert is true, then Herr Hitler was entirely justified in seeking to reduce London to a parking lot.

May I suggest you review this link? http://www.nativeweb.org/pages/legal/sovereignty.html

It has much to say pertinent to issues of nationhood and sovereignty relevant to paulie's entry and indigenous issues that are much more pertinent than what indian people may or may not be called or prefer to be called. This "native american" issue is sort of peripheral to the really important issues of sovereignty or self-determination.

If all you want to do is restate the old "might makes right" sobrique, I think we're wasting our time here.

I don't think anybody's asked you to give your "little plot" back to the Muskogee nor would most of them want it probably, however, you can certainly pressure the government to rein in the TVA when it pointlessly dams the Tellico River, for example, and you can try to rein in all the other violations of the Constitution that seem to be popular right now.

What you fail to appreciate, I think, is that the treaties carry the same force of law as the Constitution so if people can get away with abrogating or ignoring them, that compromises the whole American system of government.

In order to accomplish any of this, you will need to educate yourself of course, which will require a little effort on your part, but I think whatever affects us adversely will affect you adversely sooner or later so it might be a good idea, and in your self-interest, to become informed about indigenous issues, don't you think?

Had Hitler won yes he would have been right to level Coventry (I'll pick a city he did bomb for reasons that will becaome aparent, 50,000 civilian casulties or so, but he did get the three air bases in the area, and the UK hiding militry targets close to concentrations of civilians, thats a human shield, however ineffective in this instance, and moraly dubious to say the least), and had he won it would have been Churchill up on war crimes for the bombing of Dresden (500,000 civilian causlties, no excuse, no militry base even close, note the order of magnitude differance between Coventry and the so called retaliation on Dresden in civilian deaths). We would have had a different europian union too, who can say what might have happened, its not all that relevent. The point I'm making is that in war all sides commit atrocity, the nature of war is atrocity, the winner chooses who's to blame.
Its not that I personaly agree with might is right, moraly speaking I think thats plain stupid if not out right corrupt, however, histororicaly it is an obvious fact.

Thats just a side issue really you have still evaded the question, by what name should we call the collective indigenous poeples of the north american continent.
As you seem to find colour a suitable descriptor as shown by your referances to "white man", would perhaps "red man" be a good collective name ? Personaly I'm not overjoyed by being designated by my skin tone but I presume you believe it holds no offence, unless offence is your intent, in which case I withdraw the suggestion, as I intend none.

Math

I think the name you refer to them by collectively is mostly irrelevant. Since you probably won't get any collective response as to what their preference is. But like Rita said, if you know an Indian and they ask you to refer to them by their tribal affiliation, and you have been made aware of that affiliation, then it would be just rude to call them otherwise. That is just a matter of courtesy, but if the issue of "what shall I call them" is foremost in your mind you probably are not concentrating on the true issues anyway. War is war, always has been, yes, always will be? I'm not so sure. Don't we as a evolving species determine what is acceptable in matters of war or peace? Because a thing has always been a certain way is no excuse to allow it to continue in that fashion. No matter how many trivial details we attempt to analyze, or how many contributing factors we may point to as an excuse for the present state of affairs, we are not absolved from recongnizing the truth of the matter. Americans took the land, made promises it could not keep, and continues to oppress the Indians of this country even today. If I say we as Americans still oppress the Native Americans, continue to oppress the American Indian, whatever term I may use to state it, the gest of my statement is that these people have been mistreated and it makes little difference how I choose to designate them. To me or to them I would imagine, as they would rather we concentrate on making things equitable to their people rather than having the politically correct term with which to label them. Whatever label we could come up with would be uniquely our own anyway, what we choose to call them probably would not be what they choose to be called did we not have their input on the matter. Their input on the matter is not strictly required in order to address the true issues at hand. Anyone who was curious enough about the situation could find all the hard details and see the right way to address the issue with no input at all from the injured parties.

I call them "Indians" when I discuss their culture as a whole, or attempt to undo some of the erroneous stereotypes that have been taught to my children and grand children. I call them Indians because our culture has made them Indians to us. It's a very stong mythological connection my culture has to the Indians of this land. Only when we get a clear picture in our head of who the "Indians" are as a whole can we begin to look closer and see the Lakotas and Southern Utes and countless other tribal names we have managed to lump into this term "Indian". It is a foreign concept to us, who label people mostly by their ethnic enfluences. I am white American. The black people of this country are African American, we have German American, Chinese American, so on and so on. But the Indians have a unique set of circumstances. They are many nations, many ethnic backgrounds, that we have attempted to roll into one and find and acceptable label for. If they find our labels insulting, I would imagine it is more because of how that label has help to oppress them than because it is insulting in itself. If you call me sh*t and treated me with respect I would believe you thought sh*t to be a complementary term. If you call me "friend" and treated me like sh*t, well then even such a friendly label would not help to alleviate the truth of our relationship.

The US Government doesn't seem to think that the term American Indian is politicaly incorrect, since they are building a new Smithsonian museum called the "National Museum of the American Indian"

The US Government is the last institution whose lead we want to take in this matter. They are the ones who essentially created the injustice in the first place. Of course they are out of touch with what the tribes want and need. It is a matter of self preservation as they see it. How can they admit to having behaved so badly in the very forming of this great country. I think you use a bad example in this case.

Yeah I agree with you Paulie.

"As man advances in civilization, and small tribes are united into larger communities, the simplest reason would tell each individual that he ought to extend his social instincts and sympathies to all the members of the same nation, though personaly unknown to him. This point being once reached, there is only an artifical barrier to prevent his sympathies extending to all nations and races" - Charles Darwin
Just because I like the quote and it feels at least vaugely relevent

Though I have to say in a discussion with a friend we considered at what point does a people stop being invaders and start being native themselves ? For example, the English are for the majority made up of Saxons who invaded and the Norman French who also invaded, mixed with the Romans who invaded also, yet now they are seperate to all these and are simply the English, when did that happen, and why. If only a matter of time then surly the simplest solution is to be patient, though I doubt that ignoring the problem would actually do anything but prolong the situation. What neither I nor my friend could answer was why the difference, why have some invaders become natives to the lands they took, and others not, what are the differences, and how could this be resolved.

I know I was pressing a pointless issue in asking for a name, but I feel that Rita need(ed/s) to see it as pointless, and to stop stating that the lable is incorrect when it does carry the meaning intended, or provide one that is somehow right. Yes of course if I was to speak of an individual American Indian, and know of their tribe, then I would use it. (I use American Indian as I mentioned before because it seems to be self chosen by some representatives, specificaly AIM.)

Math

>I don't think anybody's asked you to give your "little plot" back to the Muskogee nor would most of them want it probably,

That is exactly what you said I should do in post 21. "Maybe you should give up title to any land you got then from whoever stole it in the first place."

OTOH, you are right about one thing, they wouldn't want my house.

>What you fail to appreciate, I think, is that the treaties carry the same force of law as the Constitution...

I have a very clear understanding of what the Constitution says on the matter. That's why I believe that we should honor our treaties, as I stated earlier. I believe in respect for the law.

Sometimes I wonder if we set up a lot of problems for ourselves when we distinguished indians from citizens when the Constitution was written. Now we have a distinct class of individual that resides in the United States that no one really cares about.

I think I've already answered your question more than once. I think I've answered why I don't consider native american acceptable. I think I answered why American indian might be okay and maybe even indian might be okay as well. The problem with native american is that it is a census term that lumps indian people together with the immigrants, effectively denying our sovereignty.

You can call us whatever you want. I think the term you use says more about you than it does about us anyway.

Someone asked when people start being native. I think it's when the roots of a people tap deeply into the land upon which they dwell so that when you uproot them, like plants, they tend to die and do not transplant well. Such people do not give up their land easily. They are not nomads in the sense that Europeans have been nomads, seeking their fortunes around globe.

My friend Rusty is fond of pointing out that my people are nomads compared to hers. Her people have dwelled in the Great Basin and further south for maybe 14000 years or longer. It seems that we all didn't chase mastodons across the Bering Strait 10,000 years ago. It seems like even the Euroamerican scientists are forced to admit our greater antiquity in their "new world" with almost every passing year.

That might be the problem. There seems to have been a very long period when there wasn't much travel back and forth as there had probably been during what the Europeans call the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. This period of relative isolation was maybe crucial in establishing some fundamental cultural differences that are apparent even now. In no other place on the planet except perhaps Australia has this divergence or alienation become so apparent in human populations.

But there is more to it. There is the persistant issue of color. Initially at least the light skin color was associated with ghosts or ancestors or even gods. The term "white man" was for a time a sacred word in Lakota, to be either venerated or feared. Later, the fear was replaced by resentment or rage due to the abuses heaped upon the Lakota people, that were rehensible even by the ostensible standards of the era, and still are.

This was and is a government problem. Unfortunately, I think it's symptomatic of an even more wide ranging problem. The government typically refers to the majority of its citizens as "Joe Sixpacks" with the concomitant measure of derision that implies.

The American nation has the largest ratio of attorneys to population in the world. Apparently, Americans, particularly Americans in government, have tremedous difficulty keeping their lies straight and require lawyers to do that for them.

The American business interests treat the entire planet as their opportunistic playground without regard for the rights of indigenous people anywhere. Part of this is because where the European nationstate wasn't established, the Europeans established it as part of the process of colonization. This in turn alienated the traditional indigenous people from their land and resources. These people understandably took issue with having a foreign political system imposed on them in order to facilitate trade.

Even now, traditional political systems are not recognized unless they respond favorably to American or other European derived business cultures. It's almost akin to the way the Mafia operates, and that is by no means an accident.

This is why I've emphasized that these supposed American indigenous issues may have worldwide ramifications since it was in the conquest of the American frontier that the model was devised for the American empire that was imposed on the Philippines, Cuba, Puerto Rico and other former Spanish colonies as well as former British and French colonies.

The model for American expansion in the world was pioneered, literally, on the American frontier. Prudent citizens of the world might take note of that.

Maybe Mr. Two, it's the citizens nobody cares about. Since 1924, indian people have been United States citizens. It doesn't matter as long as they persist in clinging to their traditional ways and claims to the land.

Maybe the question should be why America, the alleged land of the free and home of the brave, cannot tolerate free or brave indian people within its territory boundary, derived in part by so-called "right of discovery"? Their presence is acknowledged by the Constitution. Why that provision should be so onerous when other similarly "inconvenient" provisions such as the Bill of Rights should be vigorously defended is sort of strange don't you think?

Maybe like so many other things Americans promise, it's only good so long as it doesn't inconvience the mighty ones.

The quote attributed to Darwin reflects, if nothing else, the typical European solution to the internecine warfare that racked that continent in historic times and perhaps before. If we just get used to dealing with people we don't know everything will be okay.

The quote sort of presumes that unification into larger and larger social organizations is an inevitable natural process. Yet Darwin's own theory of organic evolution tends to bely the assertion or at least not readily provide evidence supporting it.

I don't think humans or any other creatures spontaneously tend to organize themselves into super tribal organizations. I think that's imposed by people from outside the tribes who manage to get enough coercive power to force unification, at least for a time. I don't think there's anything natural or inevitable about it. It's a consequence of human greed among other things and a misguided attempt to insure some sort of permanent security. That's after all what "settlement" seems to mean.

The irony is that rather than gaining security the people gain the hazard of having to deal with much larger organizations which are more difficult to control from either outside or inside and less responsive to the needs of individuals and smaller groups. Far from becoming more secure, people simply more frantic for less cause.

I believe that when Darwin uses the word sympathy a degree of knowledge and understanding are implicit, however as he is no longer alive to be asked, we can each make our own assumptions on that.

Odd you suggest that culural evolution tends towards something other than larger and more complex societies, when clearly history has shown that societies grow in size and complexity, and indeed are continuing to, are we not both part of the global society which is the world wide web ? I would be interested in your reasoning. If you want a more thorough and rigerous look at cultural evolution I would recomend reading Nonzero, by Robert Wright. I'm not sure I agree with all his conclusions, but there is a lot of well written and thought out theory with evidence to back it up, that demonstrates social and cultural evolution, and at the least shows what direction it has taken so far.


>I think it's when the roots of a people tap deeply into the land upon which they dwell so that when you uproot them, like plants, they tend to die and do not transplant well. Such people do not give up their land easily.<

The first sentance is usless as a definition, as when a people reaches that point is purely a matter of opinion, unless you would care to further define "roots tapping deeply", my own guess at such a definition would be a couple of generations born and raised in the place, or maybe the more morbid view of a couple of generations buried in a place.
The second sentance of this responce is equally useless, as all nations will defend their teritory, as will all individuals defend their homes.
There is a third sentance in the same paragraph, however it seems irrelevent to this point.

Math

Frankly, I was a bit taken back when you offered the quote.

Darwin was obviously a scholar of his time, perhaps susceptable to the same teleological trap his theory would subsequently dispell in organic evolution, that being that creatures invariably evolve from microbes to Man. In fact, assemblages of creatures have evolved without apparent targets. That Man is more advanced than other creatures or represents some cumulative process of evolution reflects human bias or religious dogma, not science.

We don't usually use the term "advanced" when describing organic evolution anymore. Rather we use the terms "primitive", denoting characteristics that appear early in the fossil record and "derived" denoting characteristics that often appear subsequent to the primitive ones and seem, as the term implies, to be derived from them.

The same argument might be applied to Darwin's assertion regarding cultural evolution. European history itself shows not invariable development of larger organizations following smaller ones but a rather cyclic trend between small and large and small again when large proves too cumbersome, expensive or oppressive to manage.

As when discussing organic evolution, it might be prudent to simply note that in cultural evolution we have an assemblage of cultures that appears to change over time. Some remain primitive, some show derived characteristics and some evidence some combination. There's nothing evitable except that things appear change one way or the other over time and in different places.

Again, using Europe as an example, following the destruction or collapse of the Roman system, there was period of local, tribal control often referred to as the Dark Ages by those enamoured of Roman culture. To those who admire Germanic culture the age might not appear so dark or retrograde but a distinct advancement over the primitive Roman tyranny.

That's the problem with these kinds of judgments. They're informed more by cultural biases than anything else. As long as we recognize these biases, I suppose it doesn't do much harm, but when we start asserting these things as if they were self-evident geometrical premises or axioms, we stand to miss a lot and our views become distinctly parochial and negligent.

There is in fact no single direction that cultural or organic evolution takes. That is the reason why we have such a wonderfully diverse world in which to live. It also insures that if one way doesn't work, there are other ways to take its place and things don't just come to a grinding halt.

This doesn't mean that human beings can't deliberately modify their cultural environment to their own liking just as they have sought to modify their physical environment. We should remember, however, that modifications to the physical environment have proven problematic over the years and are especially worrisome in the contemporary world where often too much is attempted with too little knowledge of the ramifications.

The same would apply to attempts to modify the cultural environment to whatever notions we might have of what is advanced or civilized. Some of the most uncivilized things have been done by ostensibly civilized people confident in the righteousness or rationality of their cause or causes. By such action, they have called into question the whole premise of civilization and have caused some of us at least to view it with a good deal less fondness than they do apparently.

I regret you can't or won't appreciate my opinion regarding the nature of the native. I suppose, like Mr. Darwin's interpretation of cultural development, we'll have to wait for your ideas or experience to catch up. You can of course continue to assert that it's only a matter a few generations with an morbid burial ground thrown in for good measure, but I suspect you'll find upon closer investigation that it might not be that simple rather as organic and cultural evolution might not be as simple or direct as some people suppose.

*Keeping my distance from the issue of Darwin*...

I came across another example today at work that reminded me of this discussion. In the periodicals acquisitions dept of a microfilm & electronic media company, we receive hundreds of publications every day which may or may not be in our database. Today's square peg that I couldn't jam into our database's round hole was "Perspectivas del economias mundial" (or something like that) published by "Fondo Monetario Internacional." Neither the title nor the publisher name was in our system, but I figured out that it was a Spanish version of the International Monetary Fund's "World Economic Outlook."

It occurred to me that in English speaking countries, we refer to this group as the International Monetary Fund, but apparently they don't mind if other languages call the group by other names like Fondo Monetario International, among others.

Now it occurred to me that a stubborn Brit could argue that the "correct" name of the organization is "International Monetary Fund," while a stubborn Mexican might argue that their correct name is "Fondo Monetario International." In this case, it's a little more obvious to see that both of them are being absurd, because the IMF itself accepts both names. (Make that "the FMI" if you prefer.)

Place names have similar problems. How far is it from Bombay to Mumbai? If a train departs from Peking travelling 30 cm per hour in the direction of Beijing, which way is up?

Right now, I'm writing this in English. That's the "correct" word for the language. If your mother asks you in French what language this post on h2g2 is written in, you would be correct to say that it is "Anglais."

So if you are talking with people who accept dominant American culture, then the appropriate term for describing people who lived on this continent before the Europeans is "Native Americans."

On the other hand, if invaders from another continent had slaughtered lots of my forefathers and tried to call me a name derived from an Italian map-maker who never set foot on this land, I might say that "Native Americans" is incorrect, no matter how much the dominant culture demanded it.