Re: Conspecies Biology

----- Original Message -----
From: "Arthaey Angosii" <arthaey@...>
To: <CONLANG@...>
Sent: Sunday, August 08, 2004 5:22 PM
Subject: Conspecies Biology


> I'm beginnig to translate stories from Peter Stark's "Last Breath,"
> which deals very much with human physiology. I would like to
> conculturally translate these stories, thus replacing the human
> characters with Cresaean ones.
>
> Thus, I've hit upon a rather sticky problem: as a conlanger with
> nothing more than basic training in biology, how should I design
> Cresaean's bodies? I've known what their outer forms look like for a
> while (cross jaguar, lion, wolf, and greyhound for a rough idea), but
> I've never thought about the details of their internal organs, their
> nervous system, their sight or hearing, or anything like that.
>
> On the one hand, it's improbable that a species on another planet
> would have similar physiology to us. On the other hand, it just may
> not be worth it for me to try to devise something non-Earth-like. Does
> anyone else feel guilty for their non-humanoid species to have brains,
> nerves, blood vessels, eyes, ears, and the like?
>
>
> --
> AA
>
> Homepage: http://arthaey.mine.nu:8080/wiki/
>
My aliens are from a planet crossing both sides of the habital zone, with a
57 degree axial tilt, have one planet with winter and summer both in the
extremes of climatic condition, and the other shielded while close to the
sun and always facing the sun during the colder one. Life there flees hell,
and seeks paradise. Species born in storm are destroyed in calm, and
extinctions are a regular deal. Thus evolution has had its species cooking
on extra-high,
and warfare is necessarily the deciding issue. Think armor, air
conditioning, amazing immune systems, and a speed and agility defying
imagination. NOW put the organs into that! I know I haven't yet, but I sure
am not starting with nerves, blood vessels, eyes, ears, and the like?
     I think if you feel guilty or like you might be doing "it" wrong, then
that is a signal from your mind telling you to make some changes, and that
you can do better.
     Whatever,
Dan

"It's not what we don't know that hurts us, so much as it is the things that
we think we know that are actually wrong."

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