Elves

[Cantriped]

Re: Elves

 

Elfquest was great, I never finished it, but it was very nice indeed.

And as for Faries not paying for college, darn those lazy bastiges! Darn them to warm places with uncomfortably high humidity!

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: Elves

 

I've never understood the concept of elves or other long-lived races taking most of a human lifetime to reach adulthood. Even if they physically matured that slowly, they'd be nothing like humans at any comparable stage of physical development past "4" or so, simply because an elf "10 year old" would actually have decades of life and experience than a human 10 year old does not have.

 

But the idea of physically maturing that slowly makes no sense to being with.

 

I simply shudder to think of the 'terrible twenties' elven children would undergo.

 

For myself, elves (and any race that lives longer than the human baseline) mature to puberty only slightly slower than humans. If humans hit puberty at, say, 14, then elves hit at at 18, dwarves at 16, etc. Then the slow-aging factor kicks in.

 

(Reads Dale A. Ward's post) Hmm. We had the same idea, and I've never even heard of Elfquest until this thread.

[Cantriped]

Re: Elves

 

Yeah I have trouble believing that a species that take 100 years to mature physically would be survivable, especially combined with low fertality rates.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Elves

 

...brew ale in an eggshell, ...

I doubt the same trick would work anymore; but a modern home probably has plenty of gadgets and wonders and things to see and do that would be just as strange even to someone who had seen three forests grow and wither.

Plagued by changelings swiping your babies? Tired of making ale in barrels, the old-fashioned way? It's Mr. Popeil's new Changling-B-Gone! Brews ale in an eggshell! Just perfect for when you want one small serving of ale! Operators are standing by! If you call now, you'll also get this handy carrying case and a can of spray-on Gazebo Repellent!

[Kenn]

Re: Elves

 

Well, there is an old folktale about a changeling...

 

For those who don't know, a "changeling" is when a Human child has been taken away and a Faerie child (or sometimes something else, like a block of wood disguised by glamor) left in its place. Usually it's supposed to be infants.

 

In this story, the parents who suspected this had happenned were instructed by the local wise woman or cunning man to brew ale in an eggshell, and let the baby see what they were doing. The baby watched, eyes getting wider and wider, until it exclaimed "I am old and old; I have seen three forests grow and wither, but never have I seen ale brewed in an eggshell." Whereupon, perhaps because it knew that in being startled into speaking it had given away the deception, it vanished up the chimney. I'm afraid I don't recall that they got the original baby back, but they certainly ended the changeling's charade.

 

I doubt the same trick would work anymore; but a modern home probably has plenty of gadgets and wonders and things to see and do that would be just as strange even to someone who had seen three forests grow and wither.

 

Reminds me of the method to tell if one's bride is a virgin by painting ones naughty bits green and yellow. When she laughs ans says "that's the funniest pair of ***** I've even seen" you'll know she's been around.

[Haerandir]

Re: Elves

 

No doubt sapient mice would have trouble wrapping their heads around the notion of human babies taking 18 years to reach adulthood... "What would they be like with years of life experience when they've just started walking? How can they be survivable when they take that long to mature? It just doesn't make any sense. Clearly they would reach physical maturity in a few months, then remain exactly the same for 50 years or so, then start aging."

[Kristopher]

Re: Elves

 

No doubt sapient mice would have trouble wrapping their heads around the notion of human babies taking 18 years to reach adulthood... "What would they be like with years of life experience when they've just started walking? How can they be survivable when they take that long to mature? It just doesn't make any sense. Clearly they would reach physical maturity in a few months' date=' then remain exactly the same for 50 years or so, then start aging."[/quote']

 

Um...no.

 

There are reasons it takes humans as long as they do to mature.

 

There are no reasons for something like the standard silly D&D "elves take 10 times longer to mature" nonsense, other than the fact that the people who came up with it didn't do their homework and thereby realize that it was a silly idea.

[Spence]

Re: Elves

 

I've never understood the concept of elves or other long-lived races taking most of a human lifetime to reach adulthood. Even if they physically matured that slowly, they'd be nothing like humans at any comparable stage of physical development past "4" or so, simply because an elf "10 year old" would actually have decades of life and experience than a human 10 year old does not have.

 

But the idea of physically maturing that slowly makes no sense to begin with.

 

Actually to me it does. I think that the reason it doesn't to some, is because we are applying human standards to it.

 

First the physical part. A dog lives maybe 12-15 years and matures within 2-3. A human lives 80-100 years and we say the mature in 18-21 years. In the past a human could expect to live 30-40 years and was an "adult" by 12-15. In some early cultures a woman could be a "matron" with several children by 20 and dead by 30. To a race that lives 1000 years, taking a mere 20-30 to physically reach full growth isn't far fetched at all.

 

Now the maturity or mental growth. Who said a Elven "immature teenager" would be considered immature when compared to us. A 30-40 year old elf sitting in a group of us would be right there and just as mature as us. He would be able to hold a conversation and be just as mature as us. He has just as much world experience as we do. But if he was sitting in a group of elves, to the "mature" ones, you know 400-600 years old. Well he is just a young'un. Amusing and tolerated. After all he is just a child and doesn't really know better.

 

This would also explain how they appear to humans. Imagine if dogs were able to speak and reason. And yet still die at 6-7 years or maybe 10-12 for a "venerable ancient". How many could you meet, befriend and watch die before you start to pity them, or avoid them rather than watch another friend die. What would the dogs think of you. Powerful, condescending? Arrogant?

[Vestnik]

Re: Elves

 

In the past a human could expect to live 30-40 years and was an "adult" by 12-15. In some early cultures a woman could be a "matron" with several children by 20 and dead by 30.

 

Is this really true? As far as I know the low premodern life expectancy was mostly due to very high child mortality. If you made it to 20, you stood a good chance of living as long as a lot of contemporary people. Plato and Aristotle both died at around the age of 80, and I don't recollect them being thought of as Methuselahs.

[Captain Obvious]

Re: Elves

 

Is this really true? As far as I know the low premodern life expectancy was mostly due to very high child mortality. If you made it to 20' date=' you stood a good chance of living as long as a lot of contemporary people. Plato and Aristotle both died at around the age of 80, and I don't recollect them being thought of as Methuselahs.[/quote']

 

It depended largely on how hard you had to work. Farming and construction, for example, were devastating to one's health back then.

[Vestnik]

Re: Elves

 

It depended largely on how hard you had to work. Farming and construction' date=' for example, were devastating to one's health back then.[/quote']

 

Ah. So elves are just really, really lazy then.

[Markdoc]

Re: Elves

 

Is this really true? As far as I know the low premodern life expectancy was mostly due to very high child mortality. If you made it to 20' date=' you stood a good chance of living as long as a lot of contemporary people. Plato and Aristotle both died at around the age of 80, and I don't recollect them being thought of as Methuselahs.[/quote']

 

Yes and no. Infant mortality was certainly high, but even if you looked at median survival of adults, it was certainly lower. So there were a few people who lived into their 80's or 90's: but they were rare. Aristotle for example was considered quite elderly, and he died at the age of about 60 (62 is the commonest cited age).

 

Basically *how long* you live has a lot to do with *how* you live. Poor nutrition, disease and accidents - even if you survive them - wll shorten your life expectancy.

 

So we see this even today: in countries with poor life expectancies, even if you take infant mortality out, adults die much, much younger than most westerners do. And if you autopsy them, they *look* physically older too, even down to the subcellular and cellular level (shorter chromosomes, more organ degradation, less muscle fat, more connective tissue breakdown, smoothing out of the brain, neural death etc).

 

This is actually true in western society too as you move up the economic ladder. Rich peple not only tend to live longer, they tend to stay young longer. Seems unfair, but that's life for ya.

 

cheers, Mark

[Vestnik]

Re: Elves

 

Yes and no. Infant mortality was certainly high, but even if you looked at median survival of adults, it was certainly lower. So there were a few people who lived into their 80's or 90's: but they were rare. Aristotle for example was considered quite elderly, and he died at the age of about 60 (62 is the commonest cited age).

 

 

cheers, Mark

 

Thanks for the info.

 

IIRC, somewhere (Nichomachean Ethics?) Aristotle says no one should begin to study philosophy before they are 60 (50? memory is vague).

 

OK, now back to elves!

[Vestnik]

Re: Elves

 

Are you sure you don't mean Mary Sues?

 

 

Can I play a Dark Elf ninja with claws that come out of his knuckles? That would be kool.

[Lemurion]

Re: Elves

 

Can I play a Dark Elf ninja with claws that come out of his knuckles? That would be kool.

 

Absolutely! In his game.

 

*Points to the guy running the D20 game down the way.*

[Markdoc]

Re: Elves

 

Can I play a Dark Elf ninja with claws that come out of his knuckles? That would be k3WL!!!!!!!!.

 

Fixed it for ya.

 

cheers, Mark

[Cantriped]

Re: Elves

 

No doubt sapient mice would have trouble wrapping their heads around the notion of human babies taking 18 years to reach adulthood... "What would they be like with years of life experience when they've just started walking? How can they be survivable when they take that long to mature? It just doesn't make any sense. Clearly they would reach physical maturity in a few months' date=' then remain exactly the same for 50 years or so, then start aging."[/quote']

 

Yeah it woudln't work like that at all, you can't compare things on an arithamitc scale, statistics tend to increase or decrease exponentially. With a maturation rate of a century infant mortality rate would be insane, not just counting problems of oportunistic diseases that would take advantage of the species early frailty, but also accidents.

Of course even given those factors it's still possible for a child to survive to maturity with an inane level of sheltering, but combined with fertality rates that can be compared with the likelyhood of being struck my lightning the species simply could not survive.

These ratios would be made worse in a world where the level of advancement tends to range from 2-6 hunder years behind what we curently have (or more ) depending upon the availability and scope of magic.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Elves

 

??? It's ridiculous to compare maturation of animals such as mice or dogs to the maturation of humans. Animals simply don't have as much maturing to do. The hypothetical sentient mice would take as long as humans to mature. Why not compare them to hypothetical non-sentient humans? If all we had to do was learn to feed ourselves, we'd "mature" pretty quickly too.

 

Now, maybe elves take proportionately longer to mature because they are as proportionally more advanced than humans as humans are to mice, but then what would they really be like? We'd probably think of them as gods. In any event, they probably would no longer be suitable as PCs in the same game with human PCs.

[Hermit]

Re: Elves

 

is one World of Warcraft's Dwarf's opinion on Elves (nightelves anyway).

[Old Man]

Re: Elves

 

Now that was frickin' hilarious.

[Haerandir]

Re: Elves

 

Wow, if I'd known my frivolous little mousie post would kick off a veritable Catgirl Holocaust, I might have held my tongue. Sorry if this post seems a little cruel, but I've been chuckling about some of the recent posts since I read them at work, and I just can't resist...

 

Are Elves (other than longevity), biologically, genetically, psychologically, culturally and metaphysically identical to humans? Why should they be?

 

Psst, guess what! Elves aren't real. (Unless an awful lot of people have been joshing me for an awfully long time, anyway.) They don't exist in the real world. For them to exist, they would have to live in an alternate universe where we can safely assume that Things Are Different. We already know, from our baseline hypothesis, that Elves are different from humans in one significant way: they live a lot longer.

 

But of course, you're right, a longer period of (physical) maturation would expose them to all sorts of risks human children avoid by growing up relatively quickly. Why, to assume that Elves survive this gamut of horrors, at least one, and probably several, of the following things would have to be true:

 

1. Elves would have to have a much stronger immune system and/or more efficient metabolism than humans. This would probably grant additional benefits such as enhanced resistance to diseases and poisons, reduced need for sleep and reduced nutritional requirements.

 

2. Or perhaps Elves are just physically superior to humans, better adapted for survival. They might be more agile, or smarter, or tougher, or have sharper senses.

 

3. Or, possibly Elves have an affinity for magic, which grants them a survival advantage.

 

4. Maybe, just maybe, because Elves live so long, they're willing to accept a low rate of population growth.

 

5. Or perhaps they're just a decadent, over-specialized dying race.

 

6. Maybe Elves aren't mortal at all... They're supernatural critters composed of moonbeams and dreamstuff. Then they could take as long as they wanted to reach maturity...

 

7. They might have odd dietary requirements, preferring to eat and drink special super-secret Elven foodstuffs and potables.

 

8. Their longevity might give them sufficient time to devote a century here or there to raising kids and taking really good care of them.

 

9. They might be forced to withdraw into a special, magical place, such as a sacred forest or Under the Hill, a place where they could better protect themselves from the rigors of the outside world.

 

10. Getting away from the fatality issue, we come to the notion that a several-decade-long maturation process would make Elves largely incomprehensible to humans. They'd probably behave in ways that were inexplicable to shorter-lived races, have odd customs, probably be really devoted to art and music and poetry (because they have lots of time to study the 'less vital' disciplines once they've mastered basic survival). They'd be really keen on children, perhaps even to the point of becoming obsessed with children of other races and stealing them away from their parents. They might seem aloof, or flighty, or intimidating, or arrogant, or impatient. They'd very likely withdraw from contact with other races, unless there was some big catastrophe going down that affected everyone. They'd probably work out all sorts of best practices, which would translate into things like better equipment, funky magic and combat techniques, spells nobody else knew, that sort of thing.

 

Gee... Does all this stuff sound familiar to anyone else? Because, to me, it looks an awful lot like a list of traits that are often attributed to Elves in one bit of source material or another. Some of which has already been discussed in this very thread, in fact! Wow! Who'd'a thunk it?

 

So, to sum up: Elves aren't human. Elves aren't real. Elves live in a fantasy universe. Please, think of the poor catgirls.

[Kenn]

Re: Elves

 

In this discussion are we talking PHYSICAL maturity or MENTAL/EMOTIONAL maturity?

 

From a physical standpoint, the idea of a humanoid race maturing at one tenth the rate of a human being is really kind of silly. If their bodies grow that slowly, their healing rate would be one tenth of a human's as well. The idea of being toddlers for 30-40 years seems really, really strange. Similarly, the idea of not even hitting puberty until one is over 120. The 30-40 year old elf Spence mentioned would be a child. I have problems in role-playing games with my buddy's 12 year old particpating.

 

Mental/Emotional maturity is even harder to guage. We live in a society that says after you've been around the sun sixteen times, you're responsible enough to handle a piece of heavy machinery along with thousand of other people handling similar machinery. After seventeen trips around the sun, you're responsible enough to see bare boobs, or hear the f and s words in the movies without your parents' permission. After eighteen, you can vote and fight and die for your country. But you have to be twenty-one in order to legally consume alcohol. Our system of guaging maturity is seriously messed up. Now, do elves mature emotionally slower or do they mature emotionally on a level comparable to humans. Is Elven Daycare full of jaded 40 year-old elves because they've matured, emotionally, at the same rate as humans? And then there's the issue of sexual issues. Are they emotionally ready for sex at 20, even though their body is comparable to a human two year old? (That's just seriously wrong!!) And if their emotional maturity is slowed to match their bodies? Didn't someone already mention the "terrible twenties?"

 

Then there's the other way, they age physically normally for the first 18-25 years, but their emotional maturity is slowed. Yeah, just what I want, a elven chick with the body of a 35 year old, and the emotional maturity of my niece. (Actually, I may have gone on one, and only one, date with her.)

 

Because puberty and hormones affect our emotional state, physical and emotional maturity have to be syncced up.

[Kristopher]

Re: Elves

 

In this discussion are we talking PHYSICAL maturity or MENTAL/EMOTIONAL maturity?

 

From a physical standpoint, the idea of a humanoid race maturing at one tenth the rate of a human being is really kind of silly. If their bodies grow that slowly, their healing rate would be one tenth of a human's as well. The idea of being toddlers for 30-40 years seems really, really strange. Similarly, the idea of not even hitting puberty until one is over 120. The 30-40 year old elf Spence mentioned would be a child. I have problems in role-playing games with my buddy's 12 year old particpating.

 

Mental/Emotional maturity is even harder to guage. We live in a society that says after you've been around the sun sixteen times, you're responsible enough to handle a piece of heavy machinery along with thousand of other people handling similar machinery. After seventeen trips around the sun, you're responsible enough to see bare boobs, or hear the f and s words in the movies without your parents' permission. After eighteen, you can vote and fight and die for your country. But you have to be twenty-one in order to legally consume alcohol. Our system of guaging maturity is seriously messed up. Now, do elves mature emotionally slower or do they mature emotionally on a level comparable to humans. Is Elven Daycare full of jaded 40 year-old elves because they've matured, emotionally, at the same rate as humans? And then there's the issue of sexual issues. Are they emotionally ready for sex at 20, even though their body is comparable to a human two year old? (That's just seriously wrong!!) And if their emotional maturity is slowed to match their bodies? Didn't someone already mention the "terrible twenties?"

 

Then there's the other way, they age physically normally for the first 18-25 years, but their emotional maturity is slowed. Yeah, just what I want, a elven chick with the body of a 35 year old, and the emotional maturity of my niece. (Actually, I may have gone on one, and only one, date with her.)

 

Because puberty and hormones affect our emotional state, physical and emotional maturity have to be syncced up.

 

That's part of what I was getting at...that the mental and emotional maturity of anyone 40 years old is not going to be comparable to that of a 4-year-old, unless they have some kind of developmental disability, simply because they've been around for 40 years instead of 4, and experienced 10 times as much. The idea of 40-year-old elves having temper tantrums and wetting the bed is, well, patently absurd.

[Captain Obvious]

Re: Elves

 

That's part of what I was getting at...that the mental and emotional maturity of anyone 40 years old is not going to be comparable to that of a 4-year-old' date=' unless they have some kind of developmental disability, simply because they've been around for 40 years instead of 4, and experienced 10 times as much. The idea of 40-year-old elves having temper tantrums and wetting the bed is, well, patently absurd.[/quote']

 

There are a lot of brain chemistry changes that occur as people grow. I could see a greater tendency to tantrums, although the bedwetting thing, being a mostly physical thing (as far as I can tell), would probably be mastered long before 40.

 

Although, to be honest, I prefer the idea that elves mature like humans, and then just stay at twenty-something for a couple hundred years.

[Kristopher]

Re: Elves

 

There are a lot of brain chemistry changes that occur as people grow. I could see a greater tendency to tantrums, although the bedwetting thing, being a mostly physical thing (as far as I can tell), would probably be mastered long before 40.

 

Although, to be honest, I prefer the idea that elves mature like humans, and then just stay at twenty-something for a couple hundred years.

 

And that makes the most sense to me, as well.