666: Mark Plotkin: Learning From Indigenous Cultures, the People Not Just Our Projections

Every step I take toward sustainability leads me to learn how much humans have figured out how to live sustainably. I'm far from living sustainably, though I've come a long way. We are wiping out the cultures living sustainably these cultures, now hanging on by threads. Besides practices and viewpoints, I'm learning humility. We don't have all the answers. Far from it. They may not either, but at least they can help us restore lost values of community we're jettisoning in favor of isolation and humility to nature we're jettisoning in favor of ignoring that our attempts to dominate nature are accumulating unintended side effects hurting us more than helping.

Such are my views. I haven't lived among indigenous cultures and don't expect to. Mark has, among several for long times. He can speak more knowledgeably, compassionately, and helpfully than many can.

In this conversation he shares his decades of learning from experience and research. He describes actual people and cultures, not projections or hopes. I share some views I've developed, which he helps me refine and extend based on that experience. We talk about how life benefits from learning from them, contrary to what our culture tells us, that without what fossil fuels and other tamed energy bring we would suffer.

On the contrary, on what means the most to us, we would thrive. And we'd stop wiping them out.

• Mark's home page
• Mark's TED talk: What the people of the Amazon know that you don’t
• Mark's podcast: The Plants of the Gods

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