What has science brought about?

I have been working on a paper about American Indian elders. To prepare for writing this paper, I reviewed many academic tomes, from biology to culture, and many decades worth of writings. I not only want to describe elderly American Indians, but -- more than that -- I want to build the argument that in virtually all species with large brains, and long childhoods, elders become important. This is as true in caribou as it is in humans. This is as true in American Indians as it is in Whites, who have seen their elders migrate, like lemmings to the sea, to the Sun Cities of the world.



It was a bit startling to move from the period that encompassed the late 1800s to the 1940s. This literature included strong and clear descriptions of the role of elders, the wisdom of their words, and the respect that position held. We read detailed descriptions of the importance of the knowledge of the elders - how their wisdom saved their people-- and stories of great personal self-sacrifice on the part of the elders to protect the young. We read about the time that elders put into nurturing and educating and protecting the young and the vulnerable

Beginning in the 1950s, however, new approaches appear and slowly, with decade building upon decade, we begin to read about another picture of elders taking up resources, acting in self-interested ways, and repressing the young, because of elder selfishness. Elder influence of the young was no longer seen as a means to an end of pro-social behavior, no longer was it seen to be important to restrain the behavior of the young, encouraging such things as good manners or thoughtfulness.

Now a review of google scholar shows where all this scientific study probably led, and it is a pretty dismal picture,to paper after paper on AI elder dementia, diabetes, cognitive impairment, elder abuse, depression, and coping strategies for careworn care givers.

One has to ask, where did all those studies of noble elders go? There may be two answers here, or a million answers. First, when traditions that encourage altruism and compassion and socially skilled behaviors are lost, we see the influx of depression, abuse, and other problems. Second, there still are strong and resilient elders, our studies, unfortunately, by and large are just not focusing on them. Public health so often involves curious approaches, so often focusing on problems that need to be solved and not on what is working. We look to psychology for solutions, not at what is working in the real world. Where are the studies of those elders? Where are the studies of resilience, nobility, compassion, honesty, justice, service? One has to wonder whether or not a focus on what works, not just on what is broken, might not be important.