(urth) Like a good Neighbor

[Marc Aramini]

--- On Wed, 11/23/11, James Wynn <crushtv at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: James Wynn <crushtv at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: (urth) Like a good Neighbor
> To: "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net>
> Date: Wednesday, November 23, 2011, 11:29 AM
> 
> > Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:
> > OK, let's see if I can summarize this correctly. You
> believe that
> > 
> > (a) the Neighbors are sentient trees native to Blue,
> who can astrally
> > project into the form the Narrator meets;
> > 
> > (b) the inhumi are not-natively-sentient reptiles or
> amphibians native
> > to Green, who take on the nature of what they feed on
> (at least in
> > their offspring);
> > 
> > (c) because they fed on Neighbors, who are trees, the
> inhumi "take on"
> > a sort of tree-ishness and become lianas.
> > 
> > Is that correct?
> 
> Precisely correct except that "reptile" is an analogy. One
> should not assume a true reptile nature.
> 
> As the Rajan says:
> "These people, like people everywhere here, seem to fear
> that an inhumu may live on even with its head severed. That
> is not the case, of course; but I cannot help wondering how
> the superstition originated and became so widespread.
> Certainly the inhumi have no bones as we understand them.
> Possibly their skeletons are cartilage, as those of some
> sea-creatures are. On Green, Geier maintained that the
> inhumi are akin to slugs and leeches. No one, I believe,
> took him seriously; yet it is certain that once dead they
> decay very quickly, though they are difficult to kill and
> can survive for weeks and even months without the blood that
> is their only food. "
> ~ OBW chapter 4
> 
> Additionally, the Rajan notes that there is a general
> belief that inhumi can survive even after decapitation. He
> asserts that this is not true, but ponders how it came to be
> so generally believed. This might be reference to the
> Rajan's lianna staff that (it is implied) is still sentient.
> Additionally, HePenSheep says that the Neighbors fires are
> burning liannas.
> _______________________________________________

I think this is confusing chicken and egg, honestly.  ontogeny recapitulates philogeny: the reptile stage of evolution shows that in the past they fed on reptiles before becoming man feeders, but the "being buried and not dying" etc is a function of their vinish origin.