Post by Cer on Jan 25, 2017 2:10:00 GMT -5
Swith has a cousin that studied the evolutionary progression of theropods - a paleontologist, now retired. We had an interesting conversation last week, and the cousin provided a link to a docufiction about dragons. Finally sat down to watch it tonight.
It originally aired on BBC 4 in 2004 and, despite a being a bit hokey at times, it gives a glimpse into physiology that budding world builders and alien designers often don't consider. It sets up basic riddles and proceeds to find answers. How did dragons evolve? How did they have the ability to fly when physics says they shouldn't? How did they breathe fire? What caused them to go extinct?
Sometimes what best separates pure fantasy from science fiction is the realism behind the riddles.
Something we also fail to consider during our world building efforts is an overarching set of rules. The docufiction touches upon why dragons had six limbs when no other lizard, avian, or mammal on earth had the same. Too often we find writers departing "world laws" without any explanation - Avatar is a prime example. Much effort was put into crafting Pandora's ecosystem and xenobiology.
Nearly everything is hexapodal. Why then did the Na'vi have only four limbs? Other than it being cheaper to animate? It somewhat ruined the movie for me. (As did the script, the premise, the names given to things on and on and on. I digress.)
The cousin's friend, Darren Naish, wrote an interesting article on his old blog concerning Pandora's fauna:
scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2010/01/14/creatures-of-avatar/
It gives a bit of insight to world building but also a clue about the missing limbs: Prolemuris, a supposed lemur which would serve as a missing link of sorts, had fused limbs at the elbow. Feh. I won't even get into absorption vs apathy...it's too late at night to drag up this old debate when you can read the basics here. If you would like to delve more into the topic, I encourage you to read Naish's old work plus his new blog over at Scientific American.
At any rate, I'm posting this as food for thought while being half awake. It was on my mind as I finished the last of my uploads. Would love to start a discussion about it.
Do you use xenobiology in your nations or fictional works? What did you draw inspiration from? Do you have any "world build laws" that you stick to (everything has six legs, every mammal has four eyes etc)?
It originally aired on BBC 4 in 2004 and, despite a being a bit hokey at times, it gives a glimpse into physiology that budding world builders and alien designers often don't consider. It sets up basic riddles and proceeds to find answers. How did dragons evolve? How did they have the ability to fly when physics says they shouldn't? How did they breathe fire? What caused them to go extinct?
Sometimes what best separates pure fantasy from science fiction is the realism behind the riddles.
Something we also fail to consider during our world building efforts is an overarching set of rules. The docufiction touches upon why dragons had six limbs when no other lizard, avian, or mammal on earth had the same. Too often we find writers departing "world laws" without any explanation - Avatar is a prime example. Much effort was put into crafting Pandora's ecosystem and xenobiology.
Nearly everything is hexapodal. Why then did the Na'vi have only four limbs? Other than it being cheaper to animate? It somewhat ruined the movie for me. (As did the script, the premise, the names given to things on and on and on. I digress.)
The cousin's friend, Darren Naish, wrote an interesting article on his old blog concerning Pandora's fauna:
scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2010/01/14/creatures-of-avatar/
It gives a bit of insight to world building but also a clue about the missing limbs: Prolemuris, a supposed lemur which would serve as a missing link of sorts, had fused limbs at the elbow. Feh. I won't even get into absorption vs apathy...it's too late at night to drag up this old debate when you can read the basics here. If you would like to delve more into the topic, I encourage you to read Naish's old work plus his new blog over at Scientific American.
At any rate, I'm posting this as food for thought while being half awake. It was on my mind as I finished the last of my uploads. Would love to start a discussion about it.
Do you use xenobiology in your nations or fictional works? What did you draw inspiration from? Do you have any "world build laws" that you stick to (everything has six legs, every mammal has four eyes etc)?
