Racial differences in aliens

[DinosaurNothlit]

I was just thinking about the idea of racial differences in the alien races in Animorphs, you know, the way we humans have different races depending on what region of the planet you're from.  Do you suppose there are subtly different types of Andalites, for example, depending on where they're from on their planet?  I can think of a few examples, like how Alloran and Gafinalin (sp?) are more heavily built than Andalites like Ax and Elfangor.  But the books don't specify if that's because of regional differences or just random variation.

If there are regional differences in alien species, the effect should, theoretically anyway, be especially pronounced with species like the Hork-Bajir and the Yeerks that have natural barriers on their home world (the valleys for the Hork-Bajir, the natural Yeerk pools for the Yeerks).  Hork-Bajir, by all rights, should have drastically different species.  Yeerks, maybe not so much, because they could have used Gedds to get from pool to pool.  But there still should have been some disparity.

Lol, can you guys tell that I just got out of biology class?

[Cloak]

Yes, and I often wondered this myself.  If that particular rule of biology applies, there should be.  Hmmm . . . I'll get back to you . . .

[Coal Kropotkin]

I imagine there would be some racial differences among creatures like yeerks and andalites, BUT i dont think there would be between hork bajr mainly ecause they are a not a natural species instead they were created, so i imagine they would all be relatively the same.
i have wondered though, what other species where on the andalite planet.
it seems to me that for a species so incredibly well evolved that some other semi-sentient race would have evolved by now ???




P.S Sorry for all the typos. i tried to catch as many as i could, but my keyboard's battery is going dead.... :/

[DinosaurNothlit]

I imagine there would be some racial differences among creatures like yeerks and andalites, BUT i dont think there would be between hork bajr mainly ecause they are a not a natural species instead they were created, so i imagine they would all be relatively the same.
i have wondered though, what other species where on the andalite planet.

it seems to me that for a species so incredibly well evolved that some other semi-sentient race would have evolved by now ???

Yes, but the Hork-Bajir were created long enough ago that they should have experienced some natural evolution by now, right?  Any species that cannot evolve won't survive for very long, therefore the Arn would have given them the capacity for evolution.  How long was it since the Arn created the Horks?

As for the Andalites, that's . . . actually a really good point.  I mean, we humans have chimpanzees as a close, semi-intelligent sort of sibling species of humans.  I wonder if there's an 'animal' version of Andalites, as well?

I don't know that that would have anything to do with them being so well-evolved, though.  In fact, probably somewhat the opposite.  Going back to the human example, the more advanced humans have grown, the more we've driven competing species to extinction.

[Coal Kropotkin]

thats a darn good point!
but what with them being grazers by nature.... :/
i meant lets say the kafit bird (hope thats the right spelling been a while) because the andalites are such an incredibly old race (V humans whom have only been here a short while)  it would be logical to say that something else was darn near if not already at sentience level (the kafit bird being my example)

[tta269]

  Do you suppose there are subtly different types of Andalites, for example, depending on where they're from on their planet? 

Andalites don't appear to me as a species who is too keen on adapting to the environment. In the Andalite Chronicle the Andalites was surprised to know that humans weren't "kept out of a place just because the weather's bad" so I guess Andalites only live in parts of the planet where the environment suit them the best. As the result the differences between their races will not be as significance as in human's.

[JFalcon]

I think it's interesting but as far as the Andalites go I thought Alloran was more solidly built than Elfangor or Ax because he was older, not because of any racial difference. In The Alien Ax mentions that the then Visser 3 has a physical advantage due to being a fully grown andalite and in Andalite Chronicles Elfangor and Arbon are sent aboard the skrit-na ship because they're younger and smaller than anyone else.

Elfangor was a youth as well during the Chronicles, so again Alloran would have been larger, in The Invasion Jake doesnt seem to notice a difference in size between Elfangor and Visser 3, the difference Jake notices if I recall is in general aura, suggesting I guess that Elfangor grew up and was comparable to Alloran in size.

Nevertheless the idea is a valid one, it makes sense so there probably would be differences, in fact isn't it sort of implied that the yeerks and the race the Animorphs saved from the howlers were likely once relatives that evolved apart? I don't remember that race's name, it's been too long -_-

[AniDragon]

Gafinilan and Mertil, however, are described as being very body-builder-muscly like. Well, at least Gafinilan is. Mertil, I think was described as big, but seemed smaller because he was ashamed of his tail.

That's really the only time I remember anyone really commentating on the size of an Andalite.

[DinosaurNothlit]

  Do you suppose there are subtly different types of Andalites, for example, depending on where they're from on their planet? 

Andalites don't appear to me as a species who is too keen on adapting to the environment. In the Andalite Chronicle the Andalites was surprised to know that humans weren't "kept out of a place just because the weather's bad" so I guess Andalites only live in parts of the planet where the environment suit them the best. As the result the differences between their races will not be as significance as in human's.

The thing is, though, that all species do this on some level.  Any species will tend to spread out as much as it can, to get away from competing individuals, and often has to adapt to new environments in the process.  For the dominant species on a planet, and for open-space-requiring grazing animals, this is especially true.

It's just not something anybody talks about in normal conversation.  A guy might say, "Who would want to live in Egypt?  It's way too hot there," rather than saying, "Hey!  I could adapt to Egypt's climate and go there!"

Finally, it's impossible to adapt to every environment simultaneously.  So no matter what kind of Andalite you are (if Andalites have racial differences, that is), there would be some sort of environment that would be not be ideal to you.  Thus, the quote from the Andalite Chronicles.

Or, I suppose it is possible that the Andalites once had racial differences, but don't anymore, thanks to enough interbreeding between races.  Give our own planet long enough, and we're probably headed in the direction of one giant mixed race, too.

Nevertheless the idea is a valid one, it makes sense so there probably would be differences, in fact isn't it sort of implied that the yeerks and the race the Animorphs saved from the howlers were likely once relatives that evolved apart? I don't remember that race's name, it's been too long -_-

You're thinking of the Iskoort.  The Yoort portion of the Iskoort split off from the Yeerks and evolved into a different species.

[JFalcon]

You're thinking of the Iskoort.  The Yoort portion of the Iskoort split off from the Yeerks and evolved into a different species.

Spot on, thanks for naming them, I swear it was in my head somewhere 

[wildweathel]

Or, I suppose it is possible that the Andalites once had racial differences, but don't anymore, thanks to enough interbreeding between races.  Give our own planet long enough, and we're probably headed in the direction of one giant mixed race, too.

We're talking biology, right?  In biology a "race" is a taxonomic group within a species.  In animal species, "races" are also called "subspecies"; in plants, "varieties".  Subspecies are defined by geography: subspecies don't gradually blend together and the zone of hybridization (if any) is narrow.  If geographic barriers are removed (say, by advances in transportation technology), subspecies merge together--exactly what is happening to H sapiens.

Ketrans, Yeerks, Hork-Bajir, and Ongachic could have the geographic segregation necessary for subspecies to differentiate. 

By the way, Ax states (in A08, IIRC) that Worf of Star Trek is an Ognachic female, suggesting that the Ognachic are sexually dimorphic.  (This doesn't prove anything either way about subspecies, though.)

[ChimichangaChupacabra]

Ax addresses this in one of the books, can't remember which one off the top of my head.  But he makes mention of humans being strange, "almost a sub-species", in how diverse we are.

From that line, we can probably assume that we're rare in that capacity.  ie. Andalites and Hork-Bajir and Taxxons are more or less one and the same, without the physical diversity we have.

[Blocky97]

I agree

[ChimichangaChupacabra]

It seems the Andalites and Yeerks are pretty amazed by the fact humans exist in the billions, too, so it would seem their populations are drastically smaller overall.  Obviously the Hork-Bajir being even fewer again.

But it would definitely seem we're unique in that department, Ax making that comment about humans covering such a vast spectrum it was hard to consider them a single species at all, at least in the same sense as whatever he's used to.  They're probably all pretty homogeneous.

[Yarin]

there's always divergent evolution