Perpectives on Living Systems

• With the absence of writing, this knowledge was transmitted orally
• another method of transmitting knowledge is through experientially in which it is taught directly to younger generations
• Elders are esteemed for their knowledge, and the knowledgeable among

  them are required to perform special roles.
• the ability to tell

  stories in a memorable, engaging way, performs an important teaching function in

  the life of a tribe; for stories, myths, and legends are how experiences of the tribe,

  especially of catastrophic events, are recorded and stored.

  storyteller
• Hunter, whose

  knowledge of wildlife, capacity to read the slightest of signs, and the capability to

  create tools and weapons, teach the knowledge of the environment without words;
• who has knowledge of fruits, animals, and

  herbs and their uses;

  gatherer
• who has knowledge of the seasons and the

  signs of the wind and sky.

  farmer
• abbreviation of IKSP

  Indigenous Knowledge Systems and Practices
• examples of IKSP

  myths

  legends

  folklores
• knowledge that is rooted both

  in the natural environment and what is readily available, at the same time

  grounded on the culture—values and norms—of the people who hold it.

  biocultural knowledge:
• were the sole interpreters of the gods’ desires, such that, they

  had exclusive access to the stored knowledge, and they were the only ones

  authorized to interpret them.

  priestly class
• keeper of knowledge

  storyteller
• what did they write on?

  1. sumerians = clay tables
  2. egyptians = papyrus scrolls
  3. animal hide = mayans
  4. wax tablets = romans
  5. bone, wood, or bamboo = east asians
  6. medieval europe = parchment
• literacy allowed for the expansion of collective knowledge
• The knowledge held by the Sumerians was kept in clay tablets written in

  cuneiform.
• The Sumerian belief system encompassed both empirical and the

  magical,
• earliest known writing system

  cuneiform
• it is the collected knowledge about the therapeutic properties of any susbtance for healing

  materia medica
• The History of Biology usually traces the beginnings of abstract

  scientific thought to the Greek Philosophers.
• the specialist -- one who has a considerable

  body of experience in practical fieldwork – and the generalist -- one who knows many

  different areas of study, when he wrote:
• a breeding group of particular animals or plants that can breed

  and produce offspring that eventually could reproduce

  species
• Medieval European society is commonly characterized as feudal and

  hierarchical.
• The business of seeking and using

  knowledge was relegated to a select few who knew how to read and write.
• Thus, knowledge and its interpretation were prescribed by a ruling class; the

  Monarchies and the Church
• It was the sole interpreter of the Holy Texts, and the arbiter of the

  appropriate knowledge and use of knowledge, as it was responsible for its

  flock not only in this life but also the next.

  The Church