Responses to different posts:
>
> Just the notion of being "productive" is modern. If you
> insist on being "productive", your only real option is to
> produce babies.
Perhaps so, perhaps we're just not speaking the language, but I would think anything that one can do to make survival less work or more certain for a primitive group would be helpful, and I could consider that to be productive activity. Adding to their population without a proportional addition to their food supply would be counter-productive, unless their food supply significantly exceeds their needs.
They probably don't have written
> language, you could do that, but it's probably a negative to
> their culture, since oral cultures are much richer.
Oral culture is fine, but if you introduce a little basic technology into their lives, that knowledge will be better preserved by written materials -- of course, I'm assuming, probably optimistically, that reading and writing will be taught to future generations AND that they'd need that to preserve the technological information, which would likely be pretty basic and subject to pretty easy oral communication.
>
The following were good answers, for the most part, except for skipping the part where you observe and see what their needs are -- it may well be the case that saving labor is not a concern, and I'm assuming that if health-improving / survival aids are introduced, the island can support the increased longevity / infant survival / etc with adequate food.
>
> So here's what I'd do in no particular order:
>
> 1. Learn the language
> 2. Scout the entire Island for natural resources
> 3. Introduce simple devices like the Archimedes Screw,
> lever, water wheel, and other labor saving devices, etc...
> (too long a list, I'm a history buff)
> 4. Work on creating paper from wood pulp. Make glue from
> milk as bonding agent.
> 5. Attempt to give them written language and mathematics
> 6. Personal hygiene, and if I was successful in creating
> glass lenses for magnification, show them bacteria.
>
> Depending on natural resources available--Sure they'd have
> seaweed and sand.
>
> 6. Show them how to make potash by burning seaweed and
> distilling it.
> 7. Create a kiln and get to work showing them how to make
> glass from silica and potash/ or quartz/potash.
> 8. Increase the yield of their crops by using the potash as
> a fertilizer.
> 9. If limestone deposits were available I'd show them how
> to make concrete.
> 10. If clay deposits were around introduce them to
> pottery.
> 11. If they had indigenous animals, I'd pass on leather
> working and tanning.
> 12. With metal deposits, show them how to craft metal
> tools. (pottery has to come first, to forge metal you must
> first have ceramic).
> 13. Time permitting (I'm probably old and dead by now). I'd
> continue the progression from bronze age up to industrially
> revolution giving them electricity, steam-power, etc...
> 14. If if found a wife, I would of course try to be a good
> father and pass on as much of myself to my children.
>
> I would also be extremely careful to make sure their
> technology didn't exceed their wisdom, and I'd do nothing to
> remove their reverence of nature. I would not introduce the
> concept of money. I would not create weapons for them, even
> though I know how, unless they were in danger from other
> tribes.
>
> >I would not introduce the concept of money. I would not
> create weapons >for them, even though I know how, unless
> they were in danger from >other tribes.
>
> Good on you! You should teach them to make beer though!
>
To this response, if it's serious (I expect not), I would remind everyone what the introduction of alcohol into American Indian life accommplished -- an exaggerated incidence of alcoholism (exaggerated compared to the incidence of the disease in the society introducing the alcohol to them).
--BG
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