The forever war (Addendum)

Here are some additions to my main review of Steven LeBlanc's "Constant Battles".

There is very little evidence that Native peoples are "inherent conservationists" and essentially none that they have a conscious "conservation ethic" (the author doesn't even mention the issue!).

Foragers ("hunters-gatherers") are above all opportunists. They exploit whatever resources are at hand, without thinking about the long-term consequences. Indeed, they *can't afford* thinking "long term". The food must be collected *now*, while it's available, and usually can't be stored. And while good year might alternate with lean years, on average foragers tend to live in conditions of scarcity, not some kind of "Stone Age abundance".

And yes, they do degrade their environment. The Plains Indians hunted bison (buffalo) by stampeding entire flocks off cliffs. Only some of the dead animals were used for food or hides. Most were left to rot. At the West Coast, the Natives harvested clams. The method was unsustainable, since the clams harvested each year were smaller than the year before - suggesting that larger clams were collected to extinction at the locality in question. Seals stopped forming colonies at the shores, instead moving to islands, to escape the human hunters.

Anthropological studies of current foragers point in the same direction. The Hadza in East Africa (distant cousins of the Bushmen) are foragers in a harsh environment and would therefore be expected to be "conservationist". They are not. "When women dig up roots, they do not attempt to replace any portion of the plant to grow again. ... When a woman is building the framework of her grass hut, she is as likely to use branches from berry trees as from any other type of tree. ... When a nest of wild bees is found and raided for its honey, no portion of the comb is left to encourage the bees to stay on. ... There are no inhibitions about shooting females (even pregnant females) or immature animals. ... If two animals are killed on the same day, the more distant one may be abandoned". 

No "inherent" conservationism here. 

If humans were ever natural conservationists, we would expect island populations to be in perfect balance with their environment. Instead, both island foragers and farmers usually outstrip the island's carrying capacity, with endemic warfare, cannibalism and a population crash as possible results. Most endemic animal species are exterminated. 

When New Zealand was colonized by the Maori, 26 species of flightless birds (including 11 species of moa) were hunted for food and wiped out in a matter of centuries. Similar scenarios have repeated themselves in many other island theatres: Malta, Madagascar, Hawaii, the Caribbean... 

LeBlanc discusses the small island of Tikopia in Polynesia. It's only six square miles. Before Europeans reached the island, it's total population never exceeded 1,000 people. It seems the Tikopians *did* have a conservationist ethos of sorts. Population growth was stopped by widespread infanticide and abortion. Sometimes, people deemed superfluous were forced to emigrate (most probably drowned at sea trying to reach Melanesia, where they might have been eaten by the local cannibals - no Tikopian settlements outside Tikopia have ever been found). Thus, sustainability is possible - if you can stomach the literal killing of surplus population. 

Most, alas, cannot. When Christian missionaries came to Tikopia, they suppressed the population control measures. The population increased, and soon the island had to import food. Nothing wrong with that, per se, but if population control had been suppressed before the colonial powers had outlawed war, the Tikopians would presumably have been forced to remain on their little island - and starved to death (or resorted to cannibalism). 

What about the Native peoples who were peaceful when Europeans first contacted them? Don't such cases prove that Eden once existed? Not really, according to LeBlanc. Often, oral tradition, rock art or archaeology prove that the peaceful people in question were war-prone just a century earlier. The author believes that the peacefulness of many American Indians was, ironically, due to the population crash that followed in the wake of European conquest due to disease. In some areas, the depopulation was so radical that the remaining Natives had no competition and lived well below carrying capacity. This actually made them peaceful (until the White settlers took their land, forcing them on the war path again). Another factor "post-contact" is improved technology. If Natives get hold of, say, steel axes, they might increase the carrying capacity of their area since new resources can be exploited, but if the population remains low, peace follows. Of course, there are also many instances were new technology, such as hunting rifles, leads to super-exploitation of game animals...