And yet very slow to thank R0bert for correcting the even more glaring colossal mathematical error.

Still waiting for that one.

Liz,
No doubt that the aborigines have been here for a while, clearly before Europeans, so we should acknowledge their place as original inhabitants. In practice, I'm not sure what that means for a discussion on culturally appropriate dress standards.

As for what you found in your little book, many wierd and wonderful things can be found in books. Recently my friend showed me one of his school text books describing human evolution that his school used in the late 1960s. The book, published in 1961, had pictures of Australian Aborigines, who were being described as stone age people. These photos were taken in the 1950s, which was actually the beginning of the space age. This little book went on to describe (with extensive charts) which 'races' were more evolved than others, placing aborignes as the most primitive, Europeans as most evolved, with the Chinese and other 'races' at various rankings in between. 

The moral of the story is don't believe everything you read in books. 

My neceessrily simple mathematical model was designed to make the point of the mutiplicative nature of population growth. A 100 year war with 20000 casualties is a minor fluctuation within an immense growth pattern spanning tens of thousands of imaginary (using the word deliberately) years.     

Robert, 
Low technology often does not hinder population growth, and can even rather be associated with it. See, for example, places like Nigeria or Bangladesh amongst others.

You say that it's safe to assume that Aboriginal populations fluctuated around the ability of the land to feed them. Well, it's not fairly safe to assume anything without first some evidence pointing you in that direction.

Your point may have something to it if there was any evidence to suggest that they had approached a critical mass given their land use. 

Sorry Dan, but your '0.5% growth rate' point has already been debunked at http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB620.html

"And as for the nuns and priests wearing funny clothes? That’s true, but at least we could see their faces, which is kind of the sticking point in the question at hand."
The question of security has been raised as a reason to ban the burqa.I submit, that nuns and priests could carry an AK47 under their 'dresses'?I also believe that 'hoodies' are also a similar threat to security.
DAN S - The book I quoted stats re aboriginal people was from "A short guide to indigenous Australia' written by aboriginal people/historians? I've also read many books/articles about indigenous Australians, by Henry Reynolds,Peter Carey and a recent one, 'Demons at Dusk' by Peter Stewart.The fact remains, that apart from indigenous Australians, the rest of us are 'boat or plane' people or their descendants.

The stats re child abuse victims could be correct - in the US. It also needs to be kept in mind, that the report rate is only a small number - the victims around the world probably go in to 100's of thousands at least? However, just because the majority were boys doesn't prove that the perpetrators were necessarily homosexual - pedophiles assault boys and girls, and sometimes girls were assaulted until they reached puberty. After all, those bastards don't want to leave any 'evidence' behind do they? The SMH had a case of one family with 2 daughters assaulted.

If young women in Australia are wearing the burqa(since 9/11 - I don't recall it much prior to then)then their using this as a protest has a lot of legitimacy, and as someone mentioned earlier, we should be asking why? Perhaps due to them being treated in a hateful and vile manner, both in their home country and here, just might provide the answers - answers we don't want to pursue it would seem. Easier to continue the hateful and discriminatory rhetoric!

Liz45, "If young women in Australia are wearing the burqa(since 9/11 - I don't recall it much prior to then) then their using this as a protest has a lot of legitimacy.."

A simple explanation which is possible if the obvious and traditional western stereotyping of women is set aside, is that these women's choice in wearing the burqa stems from their own fundamentalism. It stretches the credulity to believe that a woman would wear a clothing coffin which itself is a potent symbol world-wide of the most fearful system of discrimination against women, simply to protest against perceived mild unfair treatment in the west.

However, even in the unlikely event that some women might do as you say, wouldn't you be concerned at all and feel obliged to point out the freedom of speech and democracy in Australia that they can and should use instead? After all the other choice, the one you say they are making, is in the direction of rigidity - fundamentalism.

It is astounding that the traditional stereotyping of women is so entrenched and powerful in the West as to deny the possibility that some women could themselves have fundamentalist values (a matter of personality as well as upbringing) and the likely consequences of that for future generations. What happens to children brought up in fundamentalist households where the adult role model closest to them (mum) eschews the available democratic avenues to participate in the political process and chooses instead to retreat further into fundamentalism, cutting off her nose to spite her face?

Yes, there is a potential problem for children
who are brought up in fundamentalist religious
households. I agree that it is likely that women
adopt the trappings (pun intended)
of fundamentalism willingly in many cases, and also
that they are like to have profound effects on the
mental wellbeing of their children.

"What happens to children brought up in fundamentalist
households where the adult role model closest to them (mum)
eschews the available democratic avenues to participate in the
political process and chooses instead to retreat further into fundamentalism,
cutting off her nose to spite her face?"

It's a very good question, but certainly not one
that is confined to children of burqa-wearing Muslim
mothers. I would have much the same concerns about
children who are born into some of the fundamentalist
Christian cults, and who are subject to socially exclusive
practices such as home schooling.

However, in this country I think it would be very
difficult for any government to crack down on such
practices of fundamentalist Christian groups,
due to our tradition of freedom of religion.
It would be even more difficult to target exclusionary
practices of non-Christian faith groups, since such
action would rightly invite the additional charge of
discrimination on religious grounds.