Question

Does "saving" a cave mean keeping people away from it? What do you think historians, and in this case archaeologists, could do to allow people to still experience the cave without destroying the amazing cave drawings?

Answer 1

This is a super-important question for me! I love the caves, and yet at the same time, I have a great longing to go into the actual caves and see the real art for myself.

One solution was Lascaux II, a replica of Lascaux. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lascaux

Another great resource is Herzog's 3d film, Cave of Forgotten Dreams.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1664894/

Yet at the same time, for mystical people like me, who think they might be missing out on something spiritual by not being able to be inside the actual cave, there's still a little wistfulness about not being able to actually go into some of them.

All in all, I think it's best to be very careful and strictly limit access.

Answer 2

It depends on why you're trying to preserve the cave.

If the concern is with spread of disease (ie white-nose, a fungal disease that is decimating bat populations worldwide), absolutely removing ALL access to the caves is critical! (The fungus is brought in by people visiting caves, on their shoes, even when those people are well-trained biologists who have experience cleaning equipment!)

This thought process unfortunately can also be applied to preservation of art: If humans are causing the destruction of the art, by their visit, then to preserve the art, they must not be allowed access. Reproduction digitally, or through replicas, as mentioned above, is then required.