In The Tender Carnivore and the Sacred Game, Paul Shepard traces the human story and presents a suggestion for living a truly meaningful human existence. Shepard argues that the hunting lifestyle is the only one which lets us be truly human. This element was criticized in class because it appears that an agricultural lifestyle can be meaningful. Shepard has a point when he criticizes our destructive and demeaning form of agriculture, that critique does not necessarily apply to all agriculture and does not prove that hunting is the "natural" way for humans to live. Daniel Quinn makes a big point of arguing that there is no one way for humans to live. I tend to agree with him and would prefer to see cultural diversity rather than only hunters or only agriculturalists.
It seems somewhat ironic that Shepard would like to pick and choose elements from existing culture. He wants to drop agriculture in favor of hunting, but would like to continue using civilization's advanced technology. While it's erroneous to say that technology does exist for pre-agriculturalists, the highly advanced nature of our technology is possible only through agriculture. Do the ends (a techno-cynegetic society) outweigh the means (our destructive agriculture)?
-Tyler Wake
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment