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...destination was a tiny area in the midst of the Amazon basin, a few hectares of land in the middle of a preserve called the Tapaj?s National Forest, 67 km south of Santar?m in the Brazilian state of Par?. After a tooth-loosening ride along a cratered, flooded jungle road and a short but slippery hike into the 25-year-old preserve, I finally got to my goal?a surreal scene in the heart of the rain forest. As far as the eye could see, transparent plastic tents covered the forest floor, which was crisscrossed by a complicated network...
...area was the center of a $700,000, U.S.- and Brazil-financed experiment to slowly starve a patch of rain forest of life-sustaining moisture and see what happens as a result. The seemingly sadistic effort was a controlled version of what biologists fear happens periodically all across the Amazon, the precursor of a disaster that could be only a few years, or even months, away...
...behind the bizarre experiment is Daniel Nepstad, 42, a personable and laconic American ecologist who divides his time between the Woods Hole Research Center in Massachusetts and the Amazon Institute for Environmental Research (ipam), based in Bel?m, near the mouth of the Amazon. The 16th century philosopher Francis Bacon wrote that nature best reveals her secrets when tormented; Nepstad is doing just that to help save 150 million hectares?an area three times the size of France?that are in imminent danger of destruction by firestorms that would dwarf anything ever seen before. ?For the first time,? says Nepstad...
...support Nepstad?s concern. Almost every year, more and more of the rain forest is going up in smoke. In 1998, in the wake of the weather shifts brought on by El Ni?o?s warming the Pacific waters off South America, some 40,000 sq km of the Brazilian Amazon was scorched. Smoke-related ailments killed 700 people, put more than 10,000 in the hospital, according to ipam, and afflicted tens of thousands of others who did not show up in official statistics. The following year, when Brazilian President Fernando Henrique Cardoso tried to become the first chief executive...
Scientists fear the Yanomami controversy could tarnish the reputation of anthropological research at a time when indigenous peoples are asserting their rights to restrict foreign scholars. But whatever the sins of past decades, the real issue is not the squabbles of academics. It is how to help save the Amazon's largest tribe from modern diseases and threats to their land. "The Yanomami have been in danger of extinction on a lot of fronts--from investigators, missionaries, government officials, miners," says Venezuelan anthropologist Nelly Arvelo. "Everyone must bear some responsibility...