mysuru both forest dwellers and the forest are under serious threat due to excessive human desire said prof p k misra president anthropological association speaking at the inauguration of the the threeday national seminar on forest dwellers art of living their values and worldview jointly organised by the anthropological association indira gandhi rashtriya manav sangrahalaya bhopal central institute of indian languagues and anthropological survey of india kolkata at ciil conference hall on wednesday misra said that modern civilization has achieved all round success but at the same time serious questions are being raised about development itself human society has reached a very critical stage in history as rightly said by prof stephen hawking we are in danger of destroying ourselves by our greed and stupidity no doubt serious attempts are being made to find technological solutions to the emerging problems and issues but such solutions are not able to address the core problems which lie in the domain of values and moral order forest dwellers life has been seriously disturbed by excessive commercial exploitation of forests he saidpeter m gardner professor emeritus department of anthropology university of missouri who has conducted extensive research on south indias paliyar forest dwellers shared his views through video conference these wise and selfcontrolled hunters and gatherers have fashioned a healthier way of life than the one we have in our massive fragmented modern societies when that is so how we can justify wiping out their extraordinary cultures in the name of socalled development he askedciil director awadesh kumar mishra said that forest dwellers are cultured and civilized people they practice the dharma of nature there are inseparable from nature modern man is selfish he is cutting trees and accumulating more than required but forest dwellers cut tree s just to meet their minimum needs the present concept of bringing forest dwellers to mainstream is a big crime against them he said more than 30 papers will be presented by experts and research scholars during the threeday seminar