SCIENCE CONGRESS

Evening Star, Issue 18173, 13 January 1923, Page 15

SCIENCE CONGRESS

PROBLEM OF THE NATIVES.

WILFUL DESTRUCTION OF THEIR CULTURE.

Before the ethnological and anthropological section of the Science Congress, now meeting at Wellington, Captain Pitt Rivera spoke yesterday on problems in mental anthropology. Tbo ethnography of Papua and tho Melanesian and Micronosian communities of tho Pacific showed three principal factors of social integration—(l) idjcfteimffiip, (2) (magic and sorcery, (5) a system of exchange J>f gifts, partly economic and partly ceremonial and non-cconomic. Amongst these people tho tribal law and tribal morality ■were unwritten, and needed no police and no established Church to enforce them; vet they were far less transgressed_ than European law and morality. Jn spite of this fact, the whole history of European contact with tho natives of tho Pacific, especially the recent British administration, had been a story of wilful destruction of native culture and morality in a vain endeavor to replace it with culture and morality, neither capable of being thoroughly absorbed nor of over proving efficient. Tho speaker then proceeded to discuss tho importance of tho plurality of wives amongst tho Melanesians of Now Guinea, and declared that in some cases tho missionary policy to abolish this custom would result not only in tho virtual disappearance of chieftainship, hut also of all tribal and communal enterprise and tho dislocation of all tho personal and functional relationships that bound their societies together. Coming to tho question of primitive magic and norcory, he said wo were here dealing with one of the least understood factors in native life, and were apt to depreciate it and arbitrarily suppress it in tho laws wo gave to the native peoples; but a careful of the working of tho native social organisations and tho history of the native institutions would reveal tho intimacy between institution of chieftainship and sorcery. Tho motive 'behind the primitive communism was one of tho questions calling for immediate study, as ignorance of this problem on the part of colonial administrators was one of tho means by which they struck at the very root® of tribal life and cohesion and so created native discontent. BIRDS IN SCALE OF EVOLUTION. MORE HIGHLY~ivOLVED THAN MAMMALS. The position of Ibirds in the scale of evolution was the subject of a paper read by Professor Benham. In the course of his remarks, Professor Benham said i “ Birds are usually regarded as lower in the evolutionary iscalo than mammals, probably because man is traditionally regarded as tho lord of creation and placed at the head of tho animal kingdom; os man is a mammal, birds would naturally be lower than they. But structurally man is in many respects, apart from hia huge brain, a member of a rather primitive group of mammals. Both -birda and mammals are descended from extinct reptiles which lived in Tdasno times. Birds axe reptiles which have become terrestrially active on their hind limbs; mainmain arc reptiles which have developed activity in all four limbs. A detailed comparison of the skeleton of mammals and reptiles on tho one hand, and birds and reptiles on the other, demonstrates that, whereas tho mammals have tho habit and general structure of primitive repthon, the birds have departed much more considerably from them than have tho mammals. And ns the degree of departure from an ancestral typo is a measure of tho stage of evolution, then birds must bo regarded as at & higher ctago than mammals. Tho physical and mental activities of birds, their various instincts, each as shown in migration, nest-building, oaro of the nestlings, etc.; their eyesight, their powers of producing music, and so on, are equal to and in most respects in advance of anything found amongst mammals. Tho 'domestic fowl is on tbeso grounds more highly evolved than man; but man, owing to his brain and consequent mental powers, has become tho controller of all Nature, and in this respect stands higher than tho fowl and all other creatures; but not structurally. Tho beauty of the bird, its astonishing adjustment of all its parts, tho elegance of its flight, have so surprised mankind that the artist wishing to portray tho superman, or angel, lias introduced the bird wing into tho human form. STONE AGE SAVAGE. THE AUSTRALIAN ABORIGINE. Sir Baldwin Spencer, lecturing under the auspices of the association on ‘ Life of the Stone Age Savage,’ said that Australia was now the only pa.rt of the world in which it was possible to study a really backward race that had not passed- beyond tho stage of the genuine early stone age savage. It was true there wore other races, such as those of Polynesia, who had not reached tho mental stage, but Urey had developed far beyond the culture level of tho Australian aborigine, and tm*y were able to hold their own when they came into contact with European*. A still more backward people were the Tasmanians. An adequate account of their customs ami beliefe would have formed; a document oi incalculable value to students and 1o the early history of mankind, bun our near ancestors harried them to ilicir doom with scarcely a thought of the grievous wrong they were doing, not only to a ample, helpless people, but to posterity. Rynust. however, he remembered ’bat both the Tasmanian and Australian aborigines, though backward, were far from l-e'i.g primitive, grid that probably a greater gap separated •tlem from the really p' mi* tive man than from the most iiurhiy enveloped race. Of the old stone age races_ of '•be \v. rid we know little save for a tew remnants of their skeletons that had been pros.vvad, their stone 'mpUivncurs, and u -oine their works of art. Tho exact relationship between, I here races and the Australians was difficult to stale. If the, .Australians had become extinct bolero we came into contact with them ail wo would have had to judge of their culture would have been poihaps a lew skulls, revealing ■a wonderful variation, in sine and form, and scunc ruck paintings, which, were not comparable in their execution- with those executed by other rude peoples of prehistoric Europe. There had been many theories formed into tho origin of the Australians, but none was quite convincing. The most important point to be remembered was that for long ages Australia, hud been cut oil from the Eurasian and all other land masses by barriers which served to prevent the entrance of any higher forms- of mammalian life. This may have served to isohue in Australia the remnants and descendants of a very -early human ia.co, just as it certainly isolated and preserved those of other forms of life now extinct elsewhere. This would mean that tho early aborigines had reached Australia- with a knowledge ot how to- make and use certain primitive implements, and at a cultured level which we may tuippo.se to hnvo been akin to that of some, -stone age people such as the Cromagnons. In the course of the long ages which had since elapsed before they had developed along certain lines, elaborating complicated rituals, customs, and beliefs, but at the same time remaining Mono agesavages as we know them now. .It was, lie said, groally io be regretted that opportunity had not been laken earlier lo learn as much as was possible concerning the Australian aborigine,-.; but it stood lo tlncredit of the, l.ahijr L’a.rly l-lict it v. asdic tirst to recognisu the .Stale’s obligation io these people, and lo lake steps In (-slab lish a special di-parUnont lo care for them and watch over their intrrests.

Tin; lecture was followed by a talk, with lanlinn slides, films, and phonograph records illustrating 1 the daily life of the Australian aborigines and their customs and ceremonials, taking the audience further back into the history ot the stone ace than was possible with any other section of tho human race.

OTHER ADDRESSES. In aa address before tho education section, Mr J. A. Johnson (president of the education section) said- tho idea was bow -being pressed homo that the best results in education flowed from individual freedom along the path of self-realisation. Training for good cibienshdp implied an early association with activities likely to bo similar to tlioso in adult relations, and tho schools as at present corporated geemed to offer few opportunities. The centre of interest in education had moved from the individual to the community, and a demand was made for social service rather than for individual advancement. Tho aim was to lay the foundation of intelligent citizenship, tending to a belter social order.

Mr H. D. Skinner ,of tho Otago University, read a paper before the ethnological section- on Tho Moa Hunters of Canterbury and Otago.’ Tho earliest elaborated theory on this subject was, he said, that of Yon Haast, who hold Ural the moa hunters were of tho palicolithie period, but from all tho evidence that ho had been able to gather form the deposits at Monk’s Gave (Stunner), the Shag River, and tho mouth of Hamilton's Swamp, he came to tho definite conclusion that tho moa hunters wore of Polynesian origin. Amongst other papers read were ‘ Hainan, Capital,’ by Charles H. Wdctenr (Commonwealth Statistician), which dealt wholly with tho population problems of the Commonwealth; 'The Eat and Flea Problem in Prevention of Plagues,’ by Hr Purdy, of Sydney, who described the precautions taken in Sydney to prevent the spread of pllgguo germs; and ‘Carboniferous Volcanic Activity in Southern Queensland,’ by Professor H. C. Richards, of tho Queensland University. Dr Sutton, In an address on ‘Child Hygiene,’ raid that health control of childhood 1 was now rapidly assuming a position reoon.d to none in the wjiold range of public health. Now eZaland undoubtedly led tho world in infant care and management. Healing with Malnutrition, 1 a giving children fresh milk, fresh fruit, arid fresh vegetables, which he described as “our sheet anchors.” Ho dealt at length with epidemics amongst children, and indicated the measures being taken by the health authorities to deal l with them.'