Why is an idea or a practice assigned greater validity if it is thought to originate from a traditional culture?
quote:
It was autumn, and the Indians on the remote reservation asked their new Chief if the winter was going to be cold or mild.
Since he was an Indian Chief in a modern society, he had never been taught the old secrets and, when he looked at the sky, he couldn't tell what the weather was going to be. Nevertheless, to be on the safe side, he replied to his tribe that the winter was indeed going to be cold and that the members of the village should collect wood to be prepared.
But also, being a practical leader, he decided to seek advice from experts.
He went to the phone booth, called the National Weather Service and asked, "Is the coming winter going to be cold?"
"It looks like this winter is going to be quite cold indeed," the meteorologist at the weather service responded.
So the Chief went back to his people and told them to collect even more wood in order to be prepared.
A week later he called the National Weather Service again. "Is it still going to be a cold winter?" he asked.
"Yes," the man at the National Weather Service again replied, "it's going to be a very cold winter. The Chief again went back to his people and ordered them to collect every scrap of wood they could find.
Two weeks later he called the National Weather Service again. "Are you absolutely sure that this winter is going to be very cold?" he asked for a third time.
"Absolutely," the weatherman replied. "In fact, it's going to be one of the coldest winters ever!"
"How can you be so sure?" the Chief asked.
The weatherman replied, "The Indians are gathering wood like crazy."
Apologies for the lame joke but (a) I like it and (b) it illustrates the point nicely. There seems to be this underlying assumption that traditional cultures, present or past, possess some kind of understanding of the world that we do not. For example:
- The Mayan calendar, 2012 apocalypse thing. The belief that the end of the world is nigh (or some great change is approaching) appears to stem from little else other than the ending of this cycle of the calendar, as if the Mayans had some mystical understanding of something forthcoming that we lack. My calendar runs out at the end of this year, and that certainly wouldn’t be interpreted by many as a sign of The End so is it just the fact that it is the Mayans that gives credibility to the idea in the eyes of some?
- Various traditional remedies, practiced ”since ancient times’. This seems to be the selling point for many of them. To hell with clinical trials, the fact that it has been in use for a long time and comes from China seems to be enough to convince some that it must be better than anything devised by modern doctors.
These are no doubt not the only examples of such thinking. I do not wish to discuss the specifics of the Mayan prophecy or of the claims of traditional medicine. What I would like is to know your thoughts on the subject in general. Do you think people tend to more readily accept something that is ”traditional’ or belonging to an ancient culture simply because it is ”traditional’? If so, why is this?
I am not sure about the forum for this. Faith and belief, perhaps?
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