Should we contact “lost” tribes?
Dramatic photographs of previously unfound Amazon Indians have highlighted the precariousness of the few remaining “lost” tribes and the dangers they face from contact with outsiders. (Click here for a slideshow of the tribe.)
Rather than “lost”, Amazon expert Thomas Lovejoy said the tribe has likely had contact with other indigenous groups over the years.
“I think there is an ethical question whether you can in the end keep them from any contact and I think the answer to that is no,” Lovejoy said.
“The right answer is to have the kind of contact and change that the tribes themselves manage the pace of it.”
Jose Carlos Meirelles, an official with Brazil’s Indian protection agency who was on the helicopter that flew over the tribe, said they should be left alone as much as possible.
Should modern civilization attempt to contact isolated tribes?
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