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Now, I'm an ethnobotanist.

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That's a scientist who 
works in the rainforest

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to document how people use local plants.

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I've been doing this for a long time,

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and I want to tell you,

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these people know these forests
and these medicinal treasures

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better than we do and
better than we ever will.

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But also, these cultures,

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these indigenous cultures,

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are disappearing much faster
than the forests themselves.

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And the greatest and
most endangered species

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in the Amazon Rainforest

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is not the jaguar,

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it's not the harpy eagle,

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it's the isolated and uncontacted tribes.

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Now four years ago, I injured my 
foot in a climbing accident

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and I went to the doctor.

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She gave me heat,

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she gave me cold, aspirin,

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narcotic painkillers, anti-inflammatories,

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cortisone shots.

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It didn't work.

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Several months later,

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I was in the northeast Amazon,

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walked into a village,

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and the shaman said, "You're limping."

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And I'll never forget
this as long as I live.

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He looked me in the face and he said,

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"Take off your shoe and give 
me your machete."

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(Laughter)

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He walked over to a palm tree

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and carved off a fern,

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threw it in the fire,

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applied it to my foot,

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threw it in a pot of water,

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and had me drink the tea.

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The pain disappeared for seven months.

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When it came back, I went
to see the shaman again.

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He gave me the same treatment,

40
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and I've been cured for three years now.

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Who would you rather be treated by?

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(Applause)

43
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Now, make no mistake — Western medicine

44
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is the most successful system
of healing ever devised,

45
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but there's plenty of holes in it.

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Where's the cure for breast cancer?

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Where's the cure for schizophrenia?

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Where's the cure for acid reflux?

49
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Where's the cure for insomnia?

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The fact is that these people

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can sometimes, sometimes, sometimes

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cure things we cannot.

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Here you see a medicine man
in the northeast Amazon

54
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treating leishmaniasis,

55
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a really nasty protozoal disease

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that afflicts 12 million
people around the world.

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Western treatment are
injections of antimony.

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They're painful, they're expensive,

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and they're probably
not good for your heart;

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it's a heavy metal.

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This man cures it with three plants
from the Amazon Rainforest.

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This is the magic frog.

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My colleague, the late
great Loren McIntyre,

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discoverer of the source 
lake of the Amazon,

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Laguna McIntyre in the Peruvian Andes,

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was lost on the Peru-Brazil
border about 30 years ago.

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He was rescued by a group of 
isolated Indians called the Matsés.

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They beckoned for him to follow
them into the forest, which he did.

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There, they took out palm leaf baskets.

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There, they took out these
green monkey frogs —

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these are big suckers,
they're like this —

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and they began licking them.

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It turns out, they're
highly hallucinogenic.

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McIntyre wrote about this and it was read 
by the editor of High Times magazine.

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You see that ethnobotanists have 
friends in all sorts of strange cultures.

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This guy decided he would go down
to the Amazon and give it a whirl,

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or give it a lick, and 
he did, and he wrote,

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"My blood pressure went through the roof,

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I lost full control of
my bodily functions,

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I passed out in a heap,

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I woke up in a hammock six hours later,

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felt like God for two days."

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(Laughter)

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An Italian chemist read this and said,

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"I'm not really interested in the theological 
aspects of the green monkey frog.

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What's this about the
change in blood pressure?"

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Now, this is an Italian chemist

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who's working on a new treatment
for high blood pressure

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based on peptides in the skin
of the green monkey frog,

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and other scientists are looking

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at a cure for drug-resistant Staph aureus.

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How ironic if these isolated 
Indians and their magic frog

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prove to be one of the cures.

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Here's an ayahuasca shaman

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in the northwest Amazon, in
the middle of a yage ceremony.

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I took him to Los Angeles to
meet a foundation officer

97
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looking for support for monies
to protect their culture.

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This fellow looked at the
medicine man, and he said,

99
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"You didn't go to 
medical school, did you?"

100
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The shaman said, "No, I did not."

101
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He said, "Well, then what can
you know about healing?"

102
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The shaman looked at him and he said,

103
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"You know what? If you have 
an infection, go to a doctor.

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But many human afflictions are diseases 
of the heart, the mind and the spirit.

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Western medicine can't 
touch those. I cure them."

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(Applause)

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But all is not rosy in learning from
nature about new medicines.

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This is a viper from Brazil,

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the venom of which was studied at
the Universidade de São Paulo here.

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It was later developed
into ACE inhibitors.

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This is a frontline treatment
for hypertension.

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Hypertension causes over 10 percent

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of all deaths on the planet every day.

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This is a $4 billion industry

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based on venom from a Brazilian snake,

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and the Brazilians did not get a nickel.

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This is not an acceptable
way of doing business.

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The rainforest has been called the 
greatest expression of life on Earth.

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There's a saying in Suriname
that I dearly love:

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"The rainforests hold answers
to questions we have yet to ask."

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But as you all know,
it's rapidly disappearing.

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Here in Brazil, in the Amazon,

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around the world.

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I took this picture from a small plane

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flying over the eastern border
of the Xingu indigenous reserve

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in the state of Mato Grosso
to the northwest of here.

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The top half of the picture,

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you see where the Indians live.

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The line through the middle

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is the eastern border of the reserve.

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Top half Indians, bottom half white guys.

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Top half wonder drugs,

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bottom half just a bunch
of skinny-ass cows.

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Top half carbon sequestered
in the forest where it belongs,

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bottom half carbon in the atmosphere

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where it's driving climate change.

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In fact, the number two cause

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of carbon being released
into the atmosphere

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is forest destruction.

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But in talking about destruction,

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it's important to keep in mind

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that the Amazon is the mightiest
landscape of all.

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It's a place of beauty and wonder.

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The biggest anteater in the world

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lives in the rain forest,

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tips the scale at 90 pounds.

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The goliath bird-eating spider

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is the world's largest spider.

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It's found in the Amazon as well.

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The harpy eagle wingspan
is over seven feet.

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And the black cayman —

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these monsters can tip the
scale at over half a ton.

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They're known to be man-eaters.

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The anaconda, the largest snake,

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the capybara, the largest rodent.

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A specimen from here in Brazil

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tipped the scale at 201 pounds.

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Let's visit where these creatures live,

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the northeast Amazon,

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home to the Akuriyo tribe.

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Uncontacted peoples hold a 
mystical and iconic role

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in our imagination.

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These are the people who 
know nature best.

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These are the people who truly live

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in total harmony with nature.

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By our standards, some would
dismiss these people as primitive.

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"They don't know how to make fire,

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or they didn't when they
were first contacted."

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But they know the forest far
better than we do.

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The Akuriyos have 35 words for honey,

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and other Indians look up to them

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as being the true masters
of the emerald realm.

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Here you see the face of my friend Pohnay.

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When I was a teenager rocking out

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to the Rolling Stones in my
hometown of New Orleans,

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Pohnay was a forest nomad

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roaming the jungles of
the northeast Amazon

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in a small band, looking for game,

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looking for medicinal plants,

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looking for a wife,

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in other small nomadic bands.

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But it's people like these

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that know things that we don't,

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and they have lots of 
lessons to teach us.

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However, if you go into most of
the forests of the Amazon,

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there are no indigenous peoples.

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This is what you find:

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rock carvings which indigenous peoples,

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uncontacted peoples, used to sharpen
the edge of the stone axe.

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These cultures that once danced,

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made love, sang to the gods,

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worshipped the forest,

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all that's left is an imprint in stone,
as you see here.

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Let's move to the western Amazon,

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which is really the epicenter
of isolated peoples.

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Each of these dots represents

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a small, uncontacted tribe,

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and the big reveal today is we believe
there are 14 or 15 isolated groups

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in the Colombian Amazon alone.

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Why are these people isolated?

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They know we exist, they
know there's an outside world.

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This is a form of resistance.

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They have chosen to remain isolated,

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and I think it is their
human right to remain so.

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Why are these the tribes
that hide from man?

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Here's why.

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00:09:05,967 --> 00:09:09,225
Obviously, some of this 
was set off in 1492.

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00:09:09,225 --> 00:09:11,247
But at the turn of the last century

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00:09:11,247 --> 00:09:13,072
was the rubber trade.

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The demand for natural rubber,

211
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which came from the Amazon,

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00:09:16,628 --> 00:09:19,802
set off the botanical
equivalent of a gold rush.

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Rubber for bicycle tires,

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00:09:21,678 --> 00:09:23,296
rubber for automobile tires,

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00:09:23,296 --> 00:09:25,047
rubber for zeppelins.

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It was a mad race to get that rubber,

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00:09:28,054 --> 00:09:30,732
and the man on the left, Julio Arana,

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00:09:30,732 --> 00:09:33,799
is one of the true thugs of the story.

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His people, his company,

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00:09:35,492 --> 00:09:37,594
and other companies like them

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00:09:37,594 --> 00:09:40,749
killed, massacred, tortured,
butchered Indians

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00:09:40,749 --> 00:09:45,656
like the Witotos you see on the
right hand side of the slide.

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00:09:45,656 --> 00:09:48,081
Even today, when people
come out of the forest,

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00:09:48,081 --> 00:09:50,786
the story seldom has a happy ending.

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00:09:50,786 --> 00:09:53,906
These are Nukaks. They
were contacted in the '80s.

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00:09:53,906 --> 00:09:57,863
Within a year, everybody over 40 was dead.

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00:09:57,863 --> 00:10:00,095
And remember, these
are preliterate societies.

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00:10:00,095 --> 00:10:01,875
The elders are the libraries.

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00:10:01,875 --> 00:10:03,653
Every time a shaman dies,

230
00:10:03,653 --> 00:10:07,042
it's as if a library has burned down.

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00:10:07,042 --> 00:10:09,538
They have been forced off their lands.

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00:10:09,538 --> 00:10:13,761
The drug traffickers have
taken over the Nukak lands,

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00:10:13,761 --> 00:10:15,739
and the Nukaks live as beggars

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00:10:15,739 --> 00:10:18,981
in public parks in eastern Colombia.

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00:10:18,981 --> 00:10:21,881
From the Nukak lands, I want to 
take you to the southwest,

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to the most spectacular 
landscape in the world:

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00:10:24,528 --> 00:10:26,601
Chiribiquete National Park.

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00:10:26,601 --> 00:10:28,740
It was surrounded by three isolated tribes

239
00:10:28,740 --> 00:10:31,771
and thanks to the Colombian government
and Colombian colleagues,

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it has now expanded.

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00:10:33,717 --> 00:10:35,694
It's bigger than the state of Maryland.

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It is a treasure trove
of botanical diversity.

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00:10:39,135 --> 00:10:42,090
It was first explored botanically in 1943

244
00:10:42,090 --> 00:10:43,880
by my mentor, Richard Schultes,

245
00:10:43,880 --> 00:10:46,750
seen here atop the Bell Mountain,

246
00:10:46,750 --> 00:10:49,185
the sacred mountains of the Karijonas.

247
00:10:49,185 --> 00:10:51,476
And let me show you
what it looks like today.

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00:10:51,476 --> 00:10:53,405
Flying over Chiribiquete,

249
00:10:53,405 --> 00:10:55,983
realize that these lost world
mountains are still lost.

250
00:10:55,983 --> 00:10:57,788
No scientist has been atop them.

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00:10:57,788 --> 00:10:59,981
In fact, nobody has been
atop the Bell Mountain

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00:10:59,981 --> 00:11:01,940
since Schultes in '43.

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00:11:01,940 --> 00:11:04,812
And we'll end up here
with the Bell Mountain

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00:11:04,812 --> 00:11:07,070
just to the east of the picture.

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Let me show you what it looks like today.

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Not only is this a treasure
trove of botanical diversity,

257
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not only is it home to
three isolated tribes,

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but it's the greatest treasure trove

259
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of pre-Colombian art in the world:

260
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over 200,000 paintings.

261
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The Dutch scientist Thomas van der Hammen

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00:11:26,011 --> 00:11:31,697
described this as the Sistine Chapel
of the Amazon Rainforest.

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But move from Chiribiquete
down to the southeast,

264
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again in the Colombian Amazon.

265
00:11:36,082 --> 00:11:38,964
Remember, the Colombian Amazon
is bigger than New England.

266
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The Amazon's a big forest,

267
00:11:40,581 --> 00:11:42,212
and Brazil's got a big part of it,

268
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but not all of it.

269
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Moving down to these two national parks,

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Cahuinari and Puré

271
00:11:47,435 --> 00:11:48,781
in the Colombian Amazon —

272
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that's the Brazilian
border to the right —

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it's home to several groups

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of isolated and uncontacted peoples.

275
00:11:55,587 --> 00:11:57,716
To the trained eye, you
can look at the roofs

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00:11:57,716 --> 00:11:59,807
of these malocas, these longhouses,

277
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and see that there's cultural diversity.

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These are, in fact, different tribes.

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As isolated as these areas are,

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let me show you how the 
outside world is crowding in.

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Here we see trade and transport
increased in Putumayo.

282
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With the diminishment of
the Civil War in Colombia,

283
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the outside world is showing up.

284
00:12:18,368 --> 00:12:21,120
To the north, we have illegal gold mining,

285
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also from the east, from Brazil.

286
00:12:22,812 --> 00:12:26,452
There's increased hunting and fishing
for commercial purposes.

287
00:12:26,452 --> 00:12:29,509
We see illegal logging
coming from the south,

288
00:12:29,509 --> 00:12:32,164
and drug runners are trying to
move through the park

289
00:12:32,164 --> 00:12:34,370
and get into Brazil.

290
00:12:34,370 --> 00:12:37,128
This, in the past, is why you didn't mess

291
00:12:37,128 --> 00:12:38,749
with isolated Indians.

292
00:12:38,749 --> 00:12:40,613
And if it looks like this
picture is out of focus

293
00:12:40,613 --> 00:12:43,899
because it was taken
in a hurry, here's why.

294
00:12:43,899 --> 00:12:46,416
(Laughter)

295
00:12:46,416 --> 00:12:52,303
This looks like — (Applause)

296
00:12:52,303 --> 00:12:54,823
This looks like a hangar
from the Brazilian Amazon.

297
00:12:54,823 --> 00:12:57,566
This is an art exhibit in Havana, Cuba.

298
00:12:57,566 --> 00:12:59,223
A group called Los Carpinteros.

299
00:12:59,223 --> 00:13:03,574
This is their perception of why you 
shouldn't mess with uncontacted Indians.

300
00:13:03,574 --> 00:13:05,551
But the world is changing.

301
00:13:05,551 --> 00:13:08,319
These are Mashco-Piros
on the Brazil-Peru border

302
00:13:08,319 --> 00:13:10,460
who stumbled out of the jungle

303
00:13:10,460 --> 00:13:12,414
because they were essentially chased out

304
00:13:12,414 --> 00:13:14,792
by drug runners and timber people.

305
00:13:14,792 --> 00:13:17,425
And in Peru, there's
a very nasty business.

306
00:13:17,425 --> 00:13:19,245
It's called human safaris.

307
00:13:19,245 --> 00:13:22,277
They will take you in to isolated
groups to take their picture.

308
00:13:22,277 --> 00:13:25,323
Of course, when you give them 
clothes, when you give them tools,

309
00:13:25,323 --> 00:13:27,221
you also give them diseases.

310
00:13:27,221 --> 00:13:30,068
We call these "inhuman safaris."

311
00:13:30,068 --> 00:13:32,166
These are Indians again 
on the Peru border,

312
00:13:32,166 --> 00:13:35,384
who were overflown by flights
sponsored by missionaries.

313
00:13:35,384 --> 00:13:38,315
They want to get in there
and turn them into Christians.

314
00:13:38,315 --> 00:13:40,510
We know how that turns out.

315
00:13:40,510 --> 00:13:42,284
What's to be done?

316
00:13:42,284 --> 00:13:44,710
Introduce technology
to the contacted tribes,

317
00:13:44,710 --> 00:13:46,612
not the uncontacted tribes,

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00:13:46,612 --> 00:13:49,745
in a culturally sensitive way.

319
00:13:49,745 --> 00:13:53,891
This is the perfect marriage of 
ancient shamanic wisdom

320
00:13:53,891 --> 00:13:56,717
and 21st century technology.

321
00:13:56,717 --> 00:13:59,728
We've done this now with over 30 tribes,

322
00:13:59,728 --> 00:14:02,652
mapped, managed and increased protection

323
00:14:02,652 --> 00:14:06,555
of over 70 million acres
of ancestral rainforest.

324
00:14:06,555 --> 00:14:11,828
(Applause)

325
00:14:11,828 --> 00:14:15,050
So this allows the Indians to take control

326
00:14:15,050 --> 00:14:18,577
of their environmental
and cultural destiny.

327
00:14:18,577 --> 00:14:20,566
They also then set up guard houses

328
00:14:20,566 --> 00:14:22,572
to keep outsiders out.

329
00:14:22,572 --> 00:14:25,211
These are Indians, trained
as indigenous park rangers,

330
00:14:25,211 --> 00:14:26,867
patrolling the borders

331
00:14:26,867 --> 00:14:29,948
and keeping the outside world at bay.

332
00:14:29,948 --> 00:14:32,707
This is a picture of actual contact.

333
00:14:32,707 --> 00:14:34,614
These are Chitonahua Indians

334
00:14:34,614 --> 00:14:36,617
on the Brazil-Peru border.

335
00:14:36,617 --> 00:14:38,321
They've come out of the jungle

336
00:14:38,321 --> 00:14:40,062
asking for help.

337
00:14:40,062 --> 00:14:41,468
They were shot at,

338
00:14:41,468 --> 00:14:44,205
their malocas, their 
longhouses, were burned.

339
00:14:44,205 --> 00:14:46,708
Some of them were massacred.

340
00:14:46,708 --> 00:14:52,494
Using automatic weapons to 
slaughter uncontacted peoples

341
00:14:52,494 --> 00:14:56,726
is the single most despicable and 
disgusting human rights abuse

342
00:14:56,726 --> 00:14:59,671
on our planet today, and it has to stop.

343
00:14:59,671 --> 00:15:06,205
(Applause)

344
00:15:06,205 --> 00:15:08,928
But let me conclude by saying,

345
00:15:08,928 --> 00:15:11,792
this work can be spiritually rewarding,

346
00:15:11,792 --> 00:15:14,636
but it's difficult and
it can be dangerous.

347
00:15:14,636 --> 00:15:17,538
Two colleagues of mine
passed away recently

348
00:15:17,538 --> 00:15:19,903
in the crash of a small plane.

349
00:15:19,903 --> 00:15:21,681
They were serving the forest

350
00:15:21,681 --> 00:15:24,429
to protect those uncontacted tribes.

351
00:15:24,429 --> 00:15:26,366
So the question is, in conclusion,

352
00:15:26,366 --> 00:15:28,191
is what the future holds.

353
00:15:28,191 --> 00:15:30,288
These are the Uray people in Brazil.

354
00:15:30,288 --> 00:15:31,969
What does the future hold for them,

355
00:15:31,969 --> 00:15:34,640
and what does the future hold for us?

356
00:15:34,640 --> 00:15:37,121
Let's think differently.

357
00:15:37,121 --> 00:15:38,918
Let's make a better world.

358
00:15:38,918 --> 00:15:40,836
If the climate's going to change,

359
00:15:40,836 --> 00:15:44,917
let's have a climate that changes for
the better rather than the worse.

360
00:15:44,919 --> 00:15:48,084
Let's live on a planet

361
00:15:48,084 --> 00:15:50,904
full of luxuriant vegetation,

362
00:15:50,904 --> 00:15:53,010
in which isolated peoples

363
00:15:53,010 --> 00:15:54,869
can remain in isolation,

364
00:15:54,869 --> 00:15:56,842
can maintain that mystery

365
00:15:56,842 --> 00:15:58,368
and that knowledge

366
00:15:58,368 --> 00:16:00,013
if they so choose.

367
00:16:00,013 --> 00:16:02,128
Let's live in a world

368
00:16:02,128 --> 00:16:04,497
where the shamans live in these forests

369
00:16:04,497 --> 00:16:07,441
and heal themselves and us

370
00:16:07,441 --> 00:16:10,178
with their mystical plants

371
00:16:10,178 --> 00:16:12,235
and their sacred frogs.

372
00:16:12,235 --> 00:16:14,082
Thanks again.

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00:16:14,082 --> 00:16:18,001
(Applause)