A quarter of Highsky Choth membership is human and influences the rest. Tabitha Falkayn/Hrill (human) and Draun (Ythrian) have started a commercial fishery. Her managerial skills complement his seamanship. Following Highsky custom, Tabitha had wandered across Avalon for several years as itinerant huntress, trapper, sailor and prospector and had gained her stake in the fishery at poker.
Young members of Stormgate, Many Thermals and the Tarns have launched a silvicultural engineering firm.
"...interspecies economics is often a wonderland in need of all the study anyone can give it." (V, p. 494)
We want to know more but are told enough to convey the impression of a rich bi-racial culture. Students of economics would have to observe and learn a lot before starting to formulate any new theories.
12 comments:
Advanced humans would find a species that doesn't have police and laws against interpersonal violence rather stressful...
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
And Ythrians do have laws and customs for handling things like Draun's rape of that female Ythrian (I forget her name). And duels to the death were also used for handling many offenses/disputes.
Ad astra! Sean
Eyath.
Yeah, the thing about duels is that among humans, they lead to a) very substantial violence, and b) lots of bullying by people who are very good at dueling.
Andy Jackson killed something like 20 men or more in duels and affrays -- he was what was known at the time as a "killing gentleman". Many of them were politically motivated.
It was notorious at the time that Jacksonian Democrats included many duelists who'd pursue anti-Jacksonians with constant challenges, or just beat them up and/or kill them.
That was aided by the fact that Jackson came from a very violent part of the frontier country, where duels and less formal fights to the death were very common.
For example, Jackson's wife's first husband was last seen in Tennessee running into a swamp with Jackson in full pursuit screaming curses and waving a large fighting-knife.
He got away... but you get what would have happened if Jackson had caught him.
David Weber's Honor Harrington series is set in a society in which dueling is accepted practice.
The novel "Field of Dishonor" shows the downsides of that. I don't recall an upside to the practice being shown.
Kaor, Paul, Mr. Stirling, and Jim!
Paul. Got it, Eyath. Thanks!
Mr. Stirling: Dueling can lead to feuds, vendettas, violent strife of the kind that wrecked the old Icelandic commonwealth.
I knew Jackson fought duels, but not that he had so many duels. Yes, he would have murdered his wife's first husband. I also knew politics could be rough, but not that rough!
Considering how much I dislike the Democrats, finding out they so often used duelists or plain old thugs to intimidate their opponents confirms my prejudices against them!
Jim: There's no upside to dueling. It's nothing but homicide. The Catholic Church struggled for centuries to discourage, penalize, or condemn dueling. As late as the 1917 Code of Canon Law imposed automatic excommunication was imposed on Catholics who took part in any way in duels.
Ad astra! Sean
A reasonable attitude toward the US Democratic Party for most of 19th Century. They tended to be the white supremacists. Over a few decades in the 20th century the white supremacists mostly shifted to the Republicans. One reason I currently regard the Democrats as the less bad option in US politics.
The difficulty for third parties to get anywhere in US politics looks like a flaw in the system for US democracy. I have seen the suggestion of approval voting, ie: the voter checks off all the candidates s/he regards as acceptable, both the ones they really like and the ones they like less but regard as most likely to defeat the candidate they really don't want to get in. That would make it easier for a third party to get somewhere.
Jim,
It is a sham democracy run by money.
Paul.
Kaor, Jim and Paul!
Jim: I disagree, white supremacists do not control the Republican party. They are scorned and despised by all honorable Republicans.
And I detest the Democrats for many reasons, not just for their thuggish history. Ever since 1912 the Democrats have become the party of an ever more centralized and autocratic state. They have become the party of monstrosities like "legalized" abortion and an ever more insane woke leftism. Given that I am skeptical the kind of tinkering you suggested will work.
And they still use, de facto, thugs!
Paul: There's never going to be a perfect political system. The vices and flaws to be found in the US, UK, France, Italy, India, et al, exist because of how flawed human beings are. All that can be done is for weak, imperfect humans is to try to keep such things from getting too bad. And I far prefer an imperfect political system to a brutal despotism of the kind found in Russia, China, Iran, and many parts of Africa.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Of course imperfection is preferable to despotism!
There CAN be what we would think of as "a perfect political system." Think how much progress has been made already. Think of an indefinite future ahead with massive technological advances and, hopefully, a fully social application of technology, not its continued, competitive, conflictive misuse.
Paul.
Jim: note that the nonwhite portions of the working class are following their white counterparts into the Republican Party -- Hispanics first, then Asians, then blacks considerably behind.
In fact, Hispanics are doing what Germans and Swedes did in the 18th century, the Irish in the 19th century, and Jews and Italians in the early 20th -- they're being assimilated into the 'white' group. Which is a social construct, not an objective fact.
Society is so dynamic.
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