"A smile touched [Runei's] lips." (CHAPTER FIVE, p. 51)
"He could barely see how [Persis'] lips curved upward." (CHAPTER NINE, p. 85)
"...[Dragoika's] halfhuman face broke into a smile..." (CHAPTER SIXTEEN, p. 160)
In haste. Persis is human but Runei is Merseian and Dragoika is Starkadian. Do they all smile?
Good night.
Addendum and explanation, the following morning: At a certain point each evening, our router is switched off because it is located in a bedroom where its flashing lights are unwelcome. This is why I sometimes hurry to complete a post or publish a very short one late in the day.
6 comments:
"Do they all smile?"
It does seem unlikely that same element of body language would arise in such totally unrelated species.
Kaor, Jim and Paul!
Not if parallel evolution ends with some intelligent races ending up having some roughly similar bodily forms and features. E.g., one head, four limbs--with the fore limbs becoming arms. With the head having eyes, mouth, ears/auditory organs.
Ad astra! Sean
Do even the other great apes use a human like smile as a friendly greeting or expression of pleasure?
IIRC they do not.
Now to think about how to find out if I *do* recall correctly.
Kaor, Jim!
But apes and other animals are not intelligent beings the way humans and fictional races like the Merseians are. Animals have no reason or ability for developing the kind of deliberately used body languages/gestures humans have (and presumably other sentient races as well).
Ad astra! Sean
Is the human smile any more deliberate than the canine tail wag?
Don't very young babies smile, and respond to adult smiles?
I think a non-human intelligent animal could deliberately imitate a human smile if the facial anatomy allowed it, but would it evolve the smile independently?
Kaor, Jim!
Dogs are somewhat of an exception, I admit. No surprise, after so many thousands of years of living among and being bred by humans.
I agree, assuming an interstellar community with FTL tech, that some intelligent races will pick up each other's body language/gestures. We see Targovi the Tigery doing that in THE GAME OF EMPIRE.
Ad astra! Sean
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