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What's Disappearing From the Amazon — Even Faster Than Wildlife?

Part 1 of theTED Radio Hour episode Finite.

About Mark Plotkin's TED Talk

The isolated tribes of the Amazon are getting dispersed or dying out. Ethnobotanist Mark Plotkin describes what we'll lose if their culture and collective wisdom vanish with them.

About Mark Plotkin

Mark Plotkin is an ethnobotanist, studying the medicinal uses for plants in Central and South American forests. Part of his research involves working closely with shamans, community leaders who practice traditional healing techniques. But when the forests are disrupted and the communities shrink, that irreplaceable repository of knowledge is at risk of being lost. Plotkin's work helps collect and share shamanic learning and preserve the rainforests, along with the people and knowledge they carry.

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NPR/TED Staff