Sessions summaries Role of the scientific community is publicizing local knowledge
Reference Dialogue: Scientific knowledge and cultural diversity

This session tackled the issue of the blending of "formal" scientific knowledge and local knowledge, together with the integration of both in societies. Different practices have been carried out that exemplify this relationship.

In Thailand there is a relationship with an indigenous community involving integration into the community in order to have contact with it. The project was based on a common action plan and the arrival of scientists or specialists in order to solve problems. Different ways of seeing the world have emerged through an exchange of information and a specific program needs to be drawn up in order to establish an educational project within the indigenous community. The mutual co-operation of science and indigenous knowledge is important. There is currently considerable harmony between the two.

There was news from Portugal of a community of healers who managed to bring many people from the occult sciences who had previously worked in secret together through a television station and who now hold a Congress of Popular Wisdom every year.

A case from Australia was outlined where the wisdom of local scientific knowledge was taken into account. An exhibition of this was organized, with the cures, seeking out and documenting them, as in many cases some customs had been lost and, as the culture is an oral one, it was difficult to find them.

In Mexico an attempt is being made to treat indigenous knowledge on an equal basis. However, co-operation between both systems of knowledge is difficult and, in practice, interaction is complicated. It is an attempt to establish an intercultural dialogue in an unequal world and any attempt at contact is met with mistrust. However, a plan was implemented in which cures have been developed with ancestral medicinal plants, and it has been shown that in many cases they work as well as Western medicines. The conclusion is that, if they joined forces, society would have many more resources.