Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
The Droyne were mentioned in the second post.
strange/less-humanlike aliens
- Thread starter BwapTED
- Start date
The Droyne were mentioned in the second post.
Hiver
Virushi
I remember someone writing up some sentient/sophont race that lives at subzero temperatures, and who needed to be transported in freezers because their innate body chemistry would melt in room temperatures.
In Starflight, at the end of the game, you discover your main energy source for your starship turns out to be a sentient race that has a very static time frame.
Virushi
I remember someone writing up some sentient/sophont race that lives at subzero temperatures, and who needed to be transported in freezers because their innate body chemistry would melt in room temperatures.
In Starflight, at the end of the game, you discover your main energy source for your starship turns out to be a sentient race that has a very static time frame.
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
You can make your aliens are bizarre and non-human appearing as you want, but you still have humans playing them, either as player-characters or as NPC run by the Game Master. Why complicate matters unduly?
I've always liked the Sred*Ni from the old Paranoia Press Beyond sector (see the wiki). I played them up as more Reptilian/Insectoid than "cute when they're a kitten" - with a strong hive mind, a civilization based on bioengineering, and a big psionic component.
They were kind of my version of the Shadows from Babylon 5.
D.
They were kind of my version of the Shadows from Babylon 5.
D.
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
If you go through Barlow's Guide to Extraterrestrials, you can find a lot of "really alien aliens", at least in appearance. As for alien psychology, as all of these were produced and written about by human writers, you are a bit out of luck. Truly "alien" psychology is likely to be totally incomprehensible by human beings.
The basic needs of a sophont are unlikely to differ terribly. Basing off of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs...
- Air
- Water
- Food
- shelter *
- safety
- Affiliation **
- esteem **
- cognitive enrichment **
- aesthetic enrichment **
- Self-actualization ***
- Self-transcendence ***
** the means of showing it vary widely, as do the requisite amounts. This is where alien begins.
*** According to Maslow, most don't reach these
Given maslow's hierarchy, until we get to the need for affiliation, we really are only differing on what constitutes food, and in the case of aliens, "water" might also be ammonia or some other hydrocarbon.
Likewise, its unlikely that anything other than oxygen, chlorine or fluorine can serve as the oxidizer for life forms. And PC's aren't likely to be interacting with Chlorine or Fluorine breathers. (Their atmosphere reduces us, ours ignites them.)
And since amino acids occur in clouds in space, the odds are good the known ones are pretty likely to be the basis (tho' in subset) for most life, so food is likely to be at least recognizable as such. And while a lot of it might make one very sick due to incompatible amino acids...
So next we get to social needs. To be a culture axiomatically requires group affiliations. If they don't require affiliation they cannot be a culture. So... any sophonts we're likely to deal with are likely to have some level of need to belong to a group.
Once we have a need to be part of a group, we can start into the practical alienness: typical group size, bond strengths, multiplicity of memberships, typical bond durations... Humans tend to identify most strongly in the band of 20-30 individuals, and such groups can be lifetime long.
For aliens, we can rule out a large number of psychological traits. A successful technological alien culture can NOT be entirely loners. It must allow for transfer of information geographically and temporally. It must provide for the food, water, shelter, and affiliation needs of its members. It must not preclude population growth (when it does, the culture self-extinguishes). It must not result in too much insecurity (if it does, revolutions will happen until a relatively more secure form evolves).
Defining the outer limits really helps to create something that won't engender disbelief. If you have (as a few in Barlow's Guide do) cultures which exceed those bounds, you have a culture that is dying. Pierson's Puppeteers are about as alien as can be functional... they have the same basic needs... but their individual reactions are quite different. And quite appropriate for their postulated zoological origin species.
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
When I was in college, I took a class in Introduction to Folklore from a professor who was Chinese. It was quite the interesting class, as the textbook was written by an American of Western European descent, and basically assumed that the precepts of Western European folklore was universal in nature and held true for all human beings. The Chinese professor explained that he had major problems with this tenant, as a lot of the so-called "universal concepts" do not exist in Asian folklore. I enjoyed talking with him, as he represented a totally different viewpoint, and I remember him saying how many problems he had in getting his degree and doctorate, because he did not regard the "universal concepts in folklore" as universal, but strictly Western European. He finally decided that in order to pass, he had to accede to the demands of his instructors, and agree that the "universal concepts" were universal, even when he knew that they were not. He was a bit frustrated by all of this, but enjoyed the fact that he could safely disagree with those concepts in teaching his students, but he dare not disagree with them in any writings that were in English.
Then, last summer, for my World War 2 history class, we had the students role-playing the decision making process of the Japanese with respect to attacking the US, using the transcripts of the Imperial Liaison Conferences for the role-playing. We are working with gifted students in the class from 6th grade through seniors in high school. The only student that could follow the reasoning was a Korean student, the rest of them, of mainly Western European descent, were totally baffled by the Japanese way of thinking.
Based on those experiences, I have a very jaundiced view of anything by Maslow, or any Western European writer, claiming that anything is universal. In short, I regard Maslow as applying only to Western Europeans, and not all of them.
Then, last summer, for my World War 2 history class, we had the students role-playing the decision making process of the Japanese with respect to attacking the US, using the transcripts of the Imperial Liaison Conferences for the role-playing. We are working with gifted students in the class from 6th grade through seniors in high school. The only student that could follow the reasoning was a Korean student, the rest of them, of mainly Western European descent, were totally baffled by the Japanese way of thinking.
Based on those experiences, I have a very jaundiced view of anything by Maslow, or any Western European writer, claiming that anything is universal. In short, I regard Maslow as applying only to Western Europeans, and not all of them.
I was told many years ago that trying to explain 'face' to a Westerner would be very difficult, if not impossible.
Or another version of face. I recently bought a book about Geronimo. He had gone to Mexico to steal cattle from the Mexican ranchers across the border. The US Army took the cattle away, sold them, and gave the money to the Mexican ranchers as compensation. Geronimo felt he had been cheated of the cattle he needed to feed his people and was angry with the Army.
As for point of view, I find it rather tiresome to hear statements about European Emporers and Kings who 'conquered the known world' when all they had conquered was less than 10 percent of the land mass of this planet. And likely hadn't heard of much beyond Europe except as 'Asia is that way' and 'Africa is that way'. With differing directons for both.
Christopher Columbus thought he had found The East Indies, which is why he called them Indians. Hmm... the other naming story I heard was when he called them Caribes from what one Native group told him their names were. But apparently they were trying to warn him of some people on another island they thought were cannibles.
I've read a few hundred books about human history. Some of it over the same battles, arguments over border lands, etc.
Changes in point of view can certainly wind up with different reasons for events. This seems true going back thousands of years.
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
Bingo. Our Korean student spend about 15 minutes trying to explain the concept, before my co-teacher and I stepped in and said we needed to get the class moving. The discussion continued at lunch for several days.
If that happens with the interaction with another differing human culture, I can only imagine the possibilities for massive failure in communication with an alien intelligent species.
BlackBat242
SOC-14 1K
>cough< Joseph Campbell >/cough<
Believed that there was really no difference between Eastern & Western ways of looking at the world, if you dug down deep enough.
I don't buy a lot of his "there is only one myth form, and everything fits the same patterns" babble.
Frankymole
SOC-12
wiki.travellerrpg.com/Githiaskio
Although similar psychologically, their underwater physiology and technology could make for interesting fellow travellers.
Although similar psychologically, their underwater physiology and technology could make for interesting fellow travellers.
it's more easily understood in practice than in attempting to assimilate all the rationalizations.
it's simple. it's pretense - shame and honor are dispensed by external opinion, especially by superior official decree, not by facts or actions. not much more to it.
we must seem very strange to them. "what do you mean, you are right and your boss is wrong?"
FreeTrav
SOC-14 1K
A lot of people will think that the oxygen-breathing aliens of Compact Space will be "humans in rubber suits", but I have my own rant about that attitude. I'll go past just the Chanur, and include both the Mahendo'sat and the Kif as interesting races.
I'll then grab another series of SF books, and say that the Jao, the Ekhat, the Lleix, and the Khûrûsh from the Jao Empire series by Eric Flint, K.D.Wentworth, and David Carrico are all interesting aliens.
All of them, IMO, meet Campbell's demand for aliens: (paraquoted) "Give me an alien that thinks as good as a man, or better than a man, but not like a man.
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