Richard Schultes: Ethnobotany simply means someone who is investigating plants used by primitive societies in various parts of the world. It’s as simple as that. And ethnobotany has been around for many, many, many thousands of years. We are now trying to salvage some of the knowledge that primitive societies have amassed over thousands of years, and passed down from father to son orally. And with every road that goes in, every airport, every missionary, every commercial person, even tourism, this is fast disappearing. Because, for example, when our own effective medicines are brought in and given to the Indians, they will forget, sometimes in one generation, what their forefathers discovered by experimentation. And we may be losing some wonderful shortcuts to find new medicines for humanity as a whole. This is happening in all parts of the world where people still are living in what we call “primitive societies.”