Saturday 18 July 2020

Kzinti And Sensory Deprivation

(A cat's head on a human body: far too terrocentric to be a plausible extraterrestrial.)

"Iron."

"They did hate sensory deprivation, still more than humans do." (17, p. 131)

That reminded me of something but it was Dominic Flandry interrogating a lupine alien by sensory deprivation. This interrogation technique has been a big blog topic. See here. In fact, the blog search result reminds us that, in another story, sensory deprivation is used to interrogate a kzin. See, specifically, Some Parallels.

Poul Anderson fans and regular blog readers, imagine what sensory deprivation would do to a winged Ythrian. They cannot even tolerate the confinement of a spacesuit. If their spacecraft hull is breached, they are dead.

3 comments:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

We have argued about this before, I don't think it would be that odd for many non-human intelligent races to be HUMANOID in their forms. That is, four limbs, bipedal, one head, etc. I would argue that evolution would tend to favor that on many planets. Of course there would be exceptions, like the draco-centauroids of Woden and winged Diomedeans and Ythrians.

Ad astra! Sean

S.M. Stirling said...

Incidentally, I've always found warlike, cat-like aliens a bit of a stretch. You've got an army of beings who sleep 14 hours a day, are obsessed with food and comfort, and are totally selfish...

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Mr. Stirling!

So a warlike race analogous to our dogs and wolves might be more plausible? Such as the lupine like Ardazirho in Anderson's WE CLAIM THESE STARS. A race descended from pack animals might be more willing to stress loyalty to the whole over individualism.

Ad astra! Sean