(1) Because the myth of Progress of Mankind is the thesis, and the myth of the Noble Savage is the antithesis*, not the other way around.
(2) Because the myth of Progress of Mankind, as an ideology that serves to legitimate colonialism, capitalism, and imperialism, has and will continue to have far more murderous and disastrous impacts on the real world than the myth of the Noble Savage has or will ever have.
(3) Because a dialectical insight (be it Aristotelian or Hegelian or Marxian) should lead you to recognize partial truths of the dialectical opposites and to seek to produce a synthesis that reconciles them.
* Modern Western writers have often used the mythical figure of the Noble Savage as a heuristic, an invention of the mythical Other who exists _solely_ to help modern Western men and women of letters criticize their own societies by virtue of satirical contrasts. E.g., Michel de Montaigne laments in his essay "On Cannibals" (1580): "Indeed, we seem to have no other standard of truth and reason than the opinions and customs of our own country. There at home is always the perfect religion, the perfect legal system -- the perfect and most accomplished way of doing everything." Such an attempt at "self criticism" as Montaigne makes in the essay is part of the rational kernel of the myth of the Noble Savage, which always says more about "us" than "them" (of whom Western writers knew and still know little). -- Yoshie
* Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/> * Calendars of Events in Columbus: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/calendar.html>, <http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/> * Student International Forum: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/> * Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio> * Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>