Modern societies may have developed powerful political governments and more advanced technologies, but at the same time valuable wisdom and lessons accumulated through human history often become a forgotten past.
Drawing on his decades-long career of extensive research in biology, cultural anthropology and other fields, American scientist Jared Diamond suggests in his latest book "The World Until Yesterday: What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies?" that the modern world has much to learn from traditional societies, such as differing approaches to resolve universal human problems like child-rearing, treatment of the elderly and conflict resolution.
"Traditional societies constitute thousands of experiments in how to run a human society, thousands of different ways in bringing up children and in treating old people," Diamond said in a recent interview when the book came out in Japanese.