Our sense of smell can be extraordinarily precise, yet it’s almost impossible to describe how something smells to someone who hasn’t smelled it. The smell of the glossy pages of a new book, for example, or the first solvent-damp sheets from a mimeograph machine, or a dead body, or the subtle differences in odors given off by flowers like bee balm, dogwood, or lilac. Smell is the mute sense, the one without words. Lacking a vocabulary, we are left tongue-tied, groping for words in a sea of inarticulate pleasure and exaltation.
Diane Ackerman, A Natural History of the Senses
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I am a avian natural historian, but I am helping with the overhaul of the fish collection at my university and the common names make me laugh.
My favorite so far is “Southern Slippery Dick” but “Alabama Hogsucker” is a VERY close second.
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So the Temeraire series doesn’t do the Pern-derived magic/telepathic bond thing, and it’s nice to have some variety on that count since the telepathy thing is pretty widespread. But there’s this passage in crucible of gold that’s like—
Wait, my thriftbooks order arrived, let me go grab the quote
Or, Temeraire thought, he might as easily have gone alone--more easily, in fact; he had to carry Forthing cupped in his talons, and it was not at all convenient to always be looking to make sure he had not dropped out; Temeraire was not aware of him in quite the same way as of Laurence.
(Emphasis mine)
And this combined with the number of times it’s mentioned that (Russians aside) aviators just don’t seem to be capable of fearing their own dragons (and not just aviators who raised the dragons from the egg—it’s the same with inherited dragons) indicates to me that there’s something really interesting psychologically/biologically going on “under the hood,” there, so to speak.
And maybe this is just me and all those anthropology classes I took in college but that actually makes a lot of sense?
The historical record in the series dates the intentional breeding of dragons to a couple thousand years in the past, in china, but there’s a lot of evidence that there’s been a looser symbiotic relationship between humans and dragons a lot longer than that. Namely the domesticated elephants and the dragons in the Americas being the same species and of the same attitudes towards humans as dragons in Eurasia. So that’s likely at least 20 thousand years of symbiosis/mutual domestication, (if we assume they migrated together, which I do because it’s the simplest explanation) and it could well be much longer than that. That’s a long ass time. Like. The spread of IRL lactase persistence took less time than this.
And much like the benefits of being able to drink milk as an adult, the benefits of mutualism with an intelligent dinosaur-sized flying predator would absolutely have selective pressure on human populations. That’s just a given. I would talk about early hominins being third-tier scavengers here and Pleistocene megafauna and the canonical prevention of malaria via dragon proximity as compared to sickle cell anemia, but nobody wants me to regurgitate my entire biological anthropology 215 class in a tumblr post. Just trust me on this one.
Basically, the entire human species in the Temeraire universe will have been under a lot of positive selective pressure to be good symbiosis buddies to the dragons, so it’s no wonder aviator attachment is so intense.
This is likewise true for the dragons. A lot can be put down to intentional breeding in the last couple thousand years, but the foundation of dragons being prosocial with humans would have to be laid before then. Humans have domesticated predators IRL, but dragons are like 2-3 orders of magnitude larger than wolves and it took a long time to get dogs. The romans wouldn’t have had any luck if the dragons weren’t already partially on board. My theory is that this would have started way back. Australopithecus times, way back, because— [Anth 215 sneaks up behind me whilst the jaws theme plays] ANYWAY there’s a few benefits I can guess at for dragons having assistance hunting from small bands of persistence predators on occasion. I also think this would have intensified post-Pleistocene as the megafauna that would have been the dragons’ main prey went extinct and eventually agriculture would be the only way to replace— [Jaws theme intensifies] JUST TRUST ME BRO.
All this to say that humans being able to very quickly lose all instinctive fear of the dinosaur-sized flying predators they spend their time around and said predators developing not only attachment to humans but particular awareness of their humans specifically so as to prevent any possible accidental harm makes a lot of sense from an evolutionary biology perspective. It’s evidence of the same mutualistic relationship biologically shaping both species across the broader time spans that the series hints at.
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I sort of like the thought that Zuko and Aang take the Sun Warriors' warning not to tell anyone about the dragons a little more seriously… and they keep it between them. Of course, they trust Sokka, Toph and Katara. Of course they know they wouldn’t tell anyone, but now three people (including Iroh) know the truth about Ran and Shaw. And that’s three too many when you’re trying to keep a secret.
(and there are other people at the temple as well - like Haru, Teo and The Duke - who, while trustworthy, aren’t as close to them as the others, and when it comes to secrets with as much consequence as this one, you can’t afford to take any chances.)
Furthermore, the culture within the Fire Nation since Sozin’s rein has been warped. The culture is not to respect the dragons as the original firebenders, it’s to conquer and kill them. It’s the ultimate proof of your strength as a firebender. All it takes is one mistake before rumour spreads, and people go looking for the ultimate hunt. It’s not something Zuko or Aang can risk.
Whether Katara, Toph and Sokka (and Suki) ever find out the truth is up to you. But post-war, after Zuko returns from a strange, poorly explained trip with a dragon, and eventually develops the ability to use rainbow fire, either the others have some questions about Aang’s knowing look, or they are finally let in on a monumental secret.
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The Quest for Buddhism (53)
Punnovada Sutta – Buddha's teaching to his No.5 disciple, Purna (Pali: Punna)
The Punnovada Sutta is the 145th discourse of the Majjhimanikāya.
On one occasion, Buddha was staying at the Anathapindika (Jetavana) in Sāvatthi (Skt. Shravasti). Bhikku Punna (Skt.Purna :Ref) visited him there and asked him about the art of devotion in seclusion that he may follow it and be purged of self. The Buddha tells him to avoid finding delight in the pleasures of the senses.
The Buddha's teaching on the Buddha Dharma to the Bhikkhu Punna. Reveals that suffering is caused by 'joyous pleasure' arising from stimuli entering from the six places.
The Buddha explains the control of the Six Ayatana (the six internal-external organs of sense):
Six roots - the six organs or senses on the side of subjectivity:
Eye - visual ability or the organ of sight.
Ear - the ability to hear or the organ of hearing.
Nose - olfactory abilities or olfactory organs.
Tongue - the ability to taste or the organ of taste
Body - Tactile abilities or sense of touch
Will - Perceptive abilities or organs of perception
Six borders - the six objects on the objective side, the objects of the senses:
Colour - the colours and forms seen by the eye root.
Voice - objects of hearing.
Aroma - object of the sense of smell.
Taste - object of the sense of taste.
Touch - firmness, heat, heaviness, etc. perceived by the roots of the body.
Dharma - all existence, including concepts, perceived by the mind-root.
仏教の探求 (53)
プンナ教誡経 (プンナきょうかいきょう、巴: プンノーヴァーダ・スッタ)〜ブッダが5番弟子のプールナ(富楼那、巴:プンナ)に説いた仏法
プンナ教誡経とは、マッジマニカーヤ(中部)の145番目の講話ことである。
ある時、ブッダはサーヴァッティー(舎衛城)のアナータピンディカ園(祇園精舎)に滞在していた。そこに比丘プンナ (富楼那、プールナ:参照)がブッダのもとを訪れ、、人里離れて精進していく術を問う。それに従って自己を浄化するようにと頼む。ブッダは、六感の楽しみを見出さないようにと言う。
ブッダが、比丘プンナ(富楼那)に六処の制御を説く。六処より入る刺激に基づいて生起する「喜悦」によって、苦が発生することを明らかにする。六処(しょ、梵・巴: アーヤタナ)とは、感覚器、感覚媒体、感覚範囲を意味する。仏教では、6つの内部感覚器六根(ろっこんと、6つの外部感覚器六境(ろっきょう)に分類される:
六根(ろっこん、六内入処(ろくないにゅうしょ)とも) - 主観の側の六種の器官、感官のこと:
眼(げん) - 視覚能力もしくは視覚器官
耳(に) - 聴覚能力もしくは聴覚器官
鼻(び) - 嗅覚能力もしくは嗅覚器官
舌(ぜつ) - 味覚能力もしくは味覚器官
身(しん) - 触覚能力もしくは触覚器官
意(い) - 知覚能力もしくは知覚器官
六境(ろっきょう、六外入処(ろくげにゅうしょ)とも) - 客観の側の六種の対象、感官の対象のこと:
色(しき) - 眼根によって見られる色彩と形象
声(しょう) - 聴覚の対象
香(こう) - 嗅覚の対象
味(み) - 味覚の対象
触(そく) - 身根によって感じられる堅さ、熱さ、重さなど
法(ほう) - 意根によって知覚される概念を含むすべての存在
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