I've been in Australia 60 odd years, frequently in contact with anthropologists in the Kimberley and PNG.
The noble savage trope died out years ago - haven't seen much of that in any serious circles since the back to nature french quasi-anthro types were grooving to La Vallée by Barbet Schroeder (with the Pink Floyd soundtrack).
> The idea that they are also responsible for the mass extinction of the megafauna is
.. pretty hard to land, save for the possibility of a small number.
Head on down to "Causes of extinction" and read carefully, there are a lot of some's.
New evidence based on accurate optically stimulated luminescence and uranium-thorium dating of megafaunal remains suggests that humans were the ultimate cause of the extinction for some of the megafauna in Australia.
The evidence we have (sure, there may be unknowns) is that the bulk of the megafauna were dwindling as a result of the environmental changes following the end of glaciation.
Humans in Australia appear to be responsible for, at most, the final death blow to a few of the species that were on their way out already.
If you have evidence to the contrary I'd gladly accept it.
The noble savage trope died out years ago - haven't seen much of that in any serious circles since the back to nature french quasi-anthro types were grooving to La Vallée by Barbet Schroeder (with the Pink Floyd soundtrack).
> The idea that they are also responsible for the mass extinction of the megafauna is
.. pretty hard to land, save for the possibility of a small number.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_megafauna
Head on down to "Causes of extinction" and read carefully, there are a lot of some's.
The evidence we have (sure, there may be unknowns) is that the bulk of the megafauna were dwindling as a result of the environmental changes following the end of glaciation.Humans in Australia appear to be responsible for, at most, the final death blow to a few of the species that were on their way out already.
If you have evidence to the contrary I'd gladly accept it.