"We reach the second half of the twentieth century still tumbling with pros and cons of using the notion of primitive. Some consider it to be quite acceptable, together with barbarism, pagan, and savage, because nothing pejorative is found in their ]]etymological]] origins: Primitive, pagan, and savage, are, then, perfectly respectable words. But primate is the most widely disseminated, in the most recognizable forms, in major languages and has, even today, the least pejorative associations, signifying merely a prior state of affairs, a relative sense of origins."