Wade Davis on the role of culture in human experience

“I don’t believe in preserving culture. The real question is, what kind of world do we want to live in — a monochromatic world of monotony, or a polychromatic world of diversity? The idea is not to eliminate modernity, as if we’ve got the right to sequester people like some kind of specimen in a bubble. If I get my arm ripped off in a car accident, I don’t want to be taken to a shaman; no one else does either. …The distinctions between cultures are not decorative — it’s not feathers and bells or dancers or songs. Those are the symbols of culture. The essence of culture is a blanket of moral and ethical values that we place around the individual. It’s culture that allows us to make sense out of sensation, to find order in a universe that may have none.”
–Wade Davis, Discover Magazine interview, March 27, 2008