can various individual andalites have strong arms?

[Acalio-Laron-Jaham]

on the cover of TAC, Visser, and in #40, we see elfangor and alloran with well developed, ripped, bulging and cut biceps. the arms of a mid-level bobybuilder almost. it certainly looks stronger than the average humans arms. And marco's descriptions of ganifilans arm in book 40, saying how they were not the usual weak delecate andalite arms and hands, but big, massive built swarzchenegger like.

I am wondering if it is possible that there were exceptions to the general 'weakness' of an andalites arms, and that those who train them or something could develop them to be just as strong or even stronger than human arms, since ax and co they were always going on about how weak andalite arms are.

[morfowt]

there probably were. could even be mutations.

I doubt elfangor was one of those exceptions though. in TAC, elfangor commented how strong human arms were. I doubt he'd think that if his own arms were relatively strong.

[Chad32]

I don't think Elfangor had strong arms, and maybe not Alloran either. But I think with proper training, most Andalites could build their arm muscles up. It's just that their tails are naturally strong, and have weapons on the ends. o most Andalites just do what comes more naturally for them.

[Phoenix004]

They might be weaker compared to human arm, probably because their tail is used to defend them (rather than their fists) and the fact that humans were once arboreal (tree climbing) creatures so it makes sense that our arms are stronger. I also imagine that Andalites generally weigh more than humans (obsese people aside) so it's unlikely they could lift their own body weight (as Loren did in Andalite Chronicles).

[Acalio-Laron-Jaham]

true. when they say that their arms are weak, and if it is, how actually weak to you think they are?  

Their arms are obviously strong enough to be used to build advanced space craft, operate machinery and fire weapons (maybe they use thought controlled machinery or droids to do the assembling who knows, but this still means that they would had had to use their arms to build these assembling droids in the first place - the very first one would have had to be built somehow and obviously since it is being built it wouldn't be there to be used to help). So I'm thinking that their arms are stronger than a human child's, but weaker than a human teenager. Their general maximum arm strength (for the ordinary, untrained, less trained and un-mutated/nonspecial-gifted-gene ones) are probably about as strong as a 11 year old girls arms. the builders and such due to conditioning and constant work exercise would probably have stronger arms, as with the warriors and such - but still weaker than a human adults arms. Ax is a andalite child, and his arms were weaker then all the animorphs who were human childs. So an andalite adult in his prime would probably be about as strong as a 12 year old girls arms, and the trained warriors a 14 year old boys arm. Strong, still useful and practical, but still nowhere near the strength of their equivalent human adult in their prime.  

lol thats my simple and literal way of looking at it.

[ThinkAgain]

I think they can have strong arms the same way humans can be exceptionally strong - rigorous work/exercise, and possibly supplementation. Look at your average human with 'strong' arms, and then look at pictures of Arnold Schwarzenegger in his prime. There are obviously significant differences.

Still, I agree with Phoenix though. We, as humans, had arms originally intended to bear our weight as we swung through trees, and later used them as tools of manipulation. The Andalites never needed to bear their own weight - they were tools of manipulation from the start. Also, humans needed stronger arms for defense and food - a strong arm is needed to throw a spear or a rock, but an herbivore with a razor sharp tail does not and did not have those needs.

[Aluminator (Kit)]

Kinda makes you wonder what turn of events would have caused the Andalites to evolve hands in the first place, doesn't it? It's not like they would have needed them for defense, travel, eating, mating, balance, speed, or basically anything else I can think of. They make sense on an intelligent, industrious species, but not on free-roaming herd animals with razor sharp tail blades and stalk eyes that eat through their hooves...

[morfowt]

funny you should mention mating. according to the Hork-Bajir chronicles, andalites "kiss" by rubbing their palms against each others face. I guess that's one use...

[Cloak]

Palm to face?  I thought it was palm-to-palm, morf.

[morfowt]

no, I'm 98% sure it's palm-to-face.

[voodooqueen126]

I speculate that the andalites arms (totally unnecesarry from an evolutionary perspective not being arboreal or diggers) are an evolutionary 'frill' the equivalent of a babboons red bottom or a chicken with an awsome comb it serves to communicate but it occured as part of random mutation.

[AniDragon]

They did originally communicate via sign language before they developed thought speech, so voodooqueen's theory makes sense there.