Wapiti elk   (US)   (2009)                                                                                                   (credit: Kaldari, via Wikimedia Commons)

                                                           

10. The Usefulness of the Very General

I should emphasize here that general concepts and customs – if they work well to guide us in reality – are extremely important for a tribe to acquire and follow, though they take a while to learn. Consider an example: in a hunter-gatherer tribe, hunter knowledge is sacred. It is valuable to know and teach to our young that elk in our land almost always drink at a certain watering hole and visit that spot every day. Knowing the paths around it helps a hunter to feed the tribe.

Note also that it is even more general and valuable to know an elk can be killed by a spear shot into its heart. That works anywhere. And an elk’s heart is just to the left of the spot on the animal’s torso where its ribs curve together. Finding elk is good, but bagging one is better. Knowing where to aim helps to end the hunt quickly. Reduce the chances of one of your hunters getting hurt.  

It’s even more general and valuable for a hunter to grasp that this heart-spot principle applies to all vertebrates, including lions, lizards, deer, fish, birds, etc. Knowing the heart generalization enables hunters to kill much more game.

Over generations, it is still more valuable for a hunter to believe he has a sacred right to harvest only as much game as is needed to feed his tribe. In his tribe’s religion, the elk are seen as gifts from the Great Spirit. They must be killed, cooked, and eaten in moderation and reverence. Then, always, there will be elk to hunt. If He is respected, myth says, the Great Spirit gives generously.

Note again the quality of increasing generalizability here; note especially how very generalizable beliefs – if they keep proving true over generations – are valued more and more by any tribe that learns them.

“This watering hole may dry up, son, but the Great Spirit and our belief in Him will not change. He is the one who tells us to love the elk as our brothers who give their lives to sustain us. So, we kill elk with restraint and thanksgiving.”

 

                                              Woolly mammoths (artist's conception)

                                (Charles Robert Knight, via Wikimedia Commons)