Evolution of tsaheylu

[Cyvaris]

I still like my, it was a result of a highly advanced biotech the Na'vi had and then lost/gave up/evolved out of and into a better/more peaceful life style.

[auroraglacialis]

Originally Posted by Cyvaris

I still like my, it was a result of a highly advanced biotech the Na'vi had and then lost/gave up/evolved out of and into a better/more peaceful life style.

Thats a good one indeed. I also think that it is a possibility, but it would then make Pandora a result of "intelligent design". Not exactly my favourite...

Originally Posted by Human No More

Sex is via the normal method .

It does not have to be about sexual intercourse. There is more to sex than that. A lot of biological properties are because of that. Or do you think that a stag will penetrate his mate with the antlers or a peacock spreads his genes with his colorful feathers?

The idea of parent/child as an initial one is an interesting idea, but I don't think it fits in with it not being unique to them - it's a question of top-down vs bottom-up approaches; I'd say it's more likely to have originated from an early form of life that had this ability to some degree - existing as individual cells or individual multicellular organisms, yet able to share sensory data, perhaps neurochemical transfer as well, which would give it a clear advantage over other species. OF course, that's not to say that such data transfer doesn't happen; just that it wouldn't be so widespread;

Ok, I was not really referring specifically to mother and child of a NA'Vi. But rather to mother and offspring of their distant ancestors, the one they have in common with most other large lifeforms on the planet. I dont know if there are some animals (insects? jellyfish?) that do not have that ability. Clearly the "purpose" of this connection is to share information, emotions, feelings, experiences,... with the NA'Vi or with other animals. And I would say that the first being that a newborn being would connect to is the mother. Especially in mammals, who care for their offspring for a long time.

I just think that it makes evolutionary sense that this way of connecting originates from a more close connection that a mother and her offspring have. After all, the offspring is a part of her body, that grows and eventually is separated - it makes sense, I think, that re-establishing a connection between these two beings that once were more or less one (of course there are limits to that - DNA is different, but a lot is shared - nutrients, blood,...) makes a lot of sense as a evolutionary strategy. As I said - the analogy in terms of nutrients are the development of mothers milk - in that sense, connecting to a direhorse would be the equivalent to drinking cows milk.

In addition, I would think that if it was a simple memory transfer that was something approaching routine, they'd be more likely to do it with each other rather than just with one they are mated with, considering the likely efficiency and removing the potential for misinterpretations.

No, I would not say that it is a memory transfer like telepathy or something. It is more intimate - it is something on the emotional level, it is "seeing the world through the others eyes", feeling the others body and so on. It may be something that is reserved for lovers and parents. But those are of course not the only instances - after all, the same thing that is done with lovers is also done with ikran or pali or other animals and of course also trees...

Originally Posted by Moco Loco

I think all those theories are nice, but run into problems with the sacred trees I can't see how those fit in.

Indeed the whole concept of connected trees and then the sacred trees is a different thing. Maybe it has similar roots, maybe it is a convergence. In any case, I can imagine that an entity like Eywa would desire to connect with animal life, especially with intelligent animal life. It would probably - in order to maintain the balance - want to connect to these beings that are possibly able to do a lot of harm (like skypeople on their home planet )

[Moco Loco]

Originally Posted by auroraglacialis

Maybe it has similar roots, maybe it is a convergence.

I highly doubt that could occur through convergence if they really are trees, "will" of Eywa or not.

[Human No More]

Originally Posted by auroraglacialis

It does not have to be about sexual intercourse. There is more to sex than that. A lot of biological properties are because of that. Or do you think that a stag will penetrate his mate with the antlers or a peacock spreads his genes with his colorful feathers?

So you're talking about displaying? I don't see how tsaheylu comes into that, at all. They don't do it with any other Na'vi than their mate, unless you just mean queue length/quality etc as an attractive physical attribute.

While attraction is obviously a factor in sex, it isn't actually a part of the physical process past the concept of getting participants into a willing and ready state.

Ok, I was not really referring specifically to mother and child of a NA'Vi. But rather to mother and offspring of their distant ancestors, the one they have in common with most other large lifeforms on the planet. I dont know if there are some animals (insects? jellyfish?) that do not have that ability. Clearly the "purpose" of this connection is to share information, emotions, feelings, experiences,... with the NA'Vi or with other animals. And I would say that the first being that a newborn being would connect to is the mother. Especially in mammals, who care for their offspring for a long time.

That's a little more plausible, but I still wouldn't think so in that it would still imply a single complex (multicellular, motile, potentially semisentient) ancestor for all species rather than branching at many points back as far as eukaryote and prokaryote.

I just think that it makes evolutionary sense that this way of connecting originates from a more close connection that a mother and her offspring have. After all, the offspring is a part of her body, that grows and eventually is separated - it makes sense, I think, that re-establishing a connection between these two beings that once were more or less one (of course there are limits to that - DNA is different, but a lot is shared - nutrients, blood,...) makes a lot of sense as a evolutionary strategy. As I said - the analogy in terms of nutrients are the development of mothers milk - in that sense, connecting to a direhorse would be the equivalent to drinking cows milk.

This may very well be the case, I've always thought it likely to some degree, but in utero would seem the likely context, where there is already a significant physical and biochemical link. When it comes to making evolutionary sense, that isn't required for an attribute to be maintained so much as things being maintained if they are non-detrimental, even benignly so.

I think that the queue does provide a different evolutionary advantage in terms of within the Na'vi though in that it allows mated pairs to have a strong emotional connection that is likely part physical too, on a neurochemical level, which would make it far less likely for them to even allow the other to come to harm, and to remain in a mated pair, perhaps care for offspring, although even that is ancillary to the fact that one without the ability would be heavily constrained in being unable to perform so many normal activities, potentially have problems mating with another.

No, I would not say that it is a memory transfer like telepathy or something. It is more intimate - it is something on the emotional level, it is "seeing the world through the others eyes", feeling the others body and so on. It may be something that is reserved for lovers and parents. But those are of course not the only instances - after all, the same thing that is done with lovers is also done with ikran or pali or other animals and of course also trees...

No, not telepathy at all, I definitely never said that. It's not magic

It's likely transfer on a neurochemical level - more of the exact information as stored physically than a reinterpretation/being copied in, even if the recipient is then able to do so from their own experience of the information.

As I said, it's not routine simple memory transfer that might be used in a parent/child context; that was my entire point there. In any case, if it is intimate, then that's something against 'within family', not that I follow that line of reasoning any more than the fact hat such a sharing with any sentient being would have a degree of what could easily be considered intimacy, while not so with a nonsentient one due to differences in thought processes, formations, and the role of instinct.

Indeed the whole concept of connected trees and then the sacred trees is a different thing. Maybe it has similar roots, maybe it is a convergence. In any case, I can imagine that an entity like Eywa would desire to connect with animal life, especially with intelligent animal life. It would probably - in order to maintain the balance - want to connect to these beings that are possibly able to do a lot of harm (like skypeople on their home planet )

A convergence to such a degree of sophistication seems unlikely, it would probably take longer than the lifetime of any star without (and indeed, possibly even still with) an extreme mutagenic environment (and appropriate resistance to damage far greater than any known life) and rapid reproduction cycles, perhaps rapid even for bacteria, which for such trees, would be even longer than most trees' slow ones.

It's a question of how far sentience goes - I would say that such fine manipulation is completely infeasible, it would be much the same as a human adjusting their DNA (and having to do so via means such as retrovirus) to make a permanent change (and without any of the thousands of theoretical or extreme early-stage technologies that would be required). There's just no real mechanism for such fine control without a truly prodigious mutation rate, a far faster environmental reaction to selective pressures (and some means of controlling that and ensuring it creates the desired response rather than, for example, extinction, or changes in the wrong species) and unprecedented error checking and generation shortness.

That's why it seems implausible compared to such an ability reaching far further into a shared genetic history, where it would have proved a massive competitive and thus selective benefit against other non-sensitive life in single-cell, multicellular microscopic or protozoan forms.

Originally Posted by Moco Loco

I highly doubt that could occur through convergence if they really are trees, "will" of Eywa or not.

Agreed. It just doesn't fit in - convergence doesn't produce compatibility on such a scale, only vague similarities in form, particularly in regards to extreme environmental conditions. Same body layout between humans and Na'vi is plausible, parallel development of wings in various species even more so, but biological compatibility between relatively unrelated species? (in terms of a divergence point being distant) Not so much.