Lit Ignorance is Bias: The Diversity Manifesto

What!? no! I am pretty tolerant! BUT SAY NO TO ROBOSEXUALITY!

Man should not love machine! Cyborgs are fine, but not robots! booooooo!

 

Such a setup completely fails to reflect the actual biology of Star Wars, which one would hope terms of pseudo-taxonomic nature would actually do. Classifying anything bipedal as humanoid reflects a visual bias, not actual taxonomy. Verpine are bipedal, but that sure doesn't make them humanoid. They aren't any closer related to Humans than Hutts or Gree.

The best taxonomic approximation for the term 'Near-Human' is that it encompasses all species that would fall within a genus level distinction, in this case the genus 'Homo.' Thus the Chiss would be something like Homo csillanicus. This setup does render Homo a hyper-diverse genus, but that's okay - it's actually logical, given the overall abundance of humanity as a whole, it should have proportionally more fragmentary divergent populations as a result.

The term 'humanoid' would fall out at a higher taxonomic level, but would still reflect species that shared a moderately recent common ancestor with humans (whether through natural panspermia, or artificial meddling). Traditionally all extinct human relatives are contained within the Tribe Hominini, but I think this is overly humanocentric and would be prepared to include all humanoids at the family level - as part of Hominidae. The majority of humanoid species would represent their own genera, though we might find some closely related groups sharing that distinction (ex. Zabraks and Elomin).

Obviously these labels, reflecting as they do a Linnaean setup, are arbitrary, but they are convienent, and they allow for the inherent expression of in-universe political tension we have seen in canon (ie. the extremely broad political usage of 'Near-Human' in Darth Plagueis). Likewise the distinction between a Near-Human species, and merely a subspecies of humans is arbitrary - arguments over whether or not this or that population deserves species-level recognition get quite contentious. Regardless, because of Rakatan/Celestial/Gree/etc. meddling in the Hominid evolutionary tree the truth is really impossible to determine, horizontal gene transfer of that magnitude makes any sort of phylogenetic reconstruction a waste.

 

For what it's worth... Yoda was portrayed twice (to my knowledge) by actors in suits. They were long shots, perhaps barely a few seconds of screen time, but for a couple scenes, there was an actor in a Yoda suit.

Take it away, fanficcers! This was the break that you've been salivating for!

 

So basically what you're saying, Mechalich, is that all Near-Humans should be considered Humans anyway? Only you seem to be using far more words than necessary to explain your views...which I'm not sure I really understand, buried under such verbose obfuscation as they are.

 

Obfuscation? Hardly, I just happen to take taxonomy seriously, and serious taxonomy, whether in a fantasy setting or not, requires careful application of terminology.

And, no, I'm saying that Near-Humans should be their own species. That's how they are defined in canon, as species, and we should hold to that. However, those species are closely related, to the point of being within the same genus. So just as say, Red Maple (Acer rubrum) and Sugar Maple (Acer saccharum) are both Maples (Acer); Humans (Homo sapiens) and Chiss (Homo csillanicus) would both be...ah, well there isn't exactly an appropriate common name and the term Homins is used for BS cryptozoological hogwash (Homo), but you get the idea.

Hmm...taking nominations for a suitable term for members of the genus Homo that would be used by the Star Wars scientific community instead of 'Near-Human.'

 

There's just one tiny problem with your...dubious assertion: there is nothing in canon to back it up. Quite the opposite in fact, as just about every source I know of identifies several distinct species that fall under a catch-all term of "Near-Human." While it may be possible that all the Near-Humans evolved from a common ancestor in the very distant past (relative to the timeframe of the Republic/Empire, that is), but again, there is no evidence, canon or otherwise, to back it up. Your application of scientific terms will not do anything to change that basic fact of the mythos.

Even if we were to take your analogy of trees into account, these are species that evolved on wholly different planets, over tens or hundreds of thousands of years. That's not only enough time for micro-evolution to create new species within the same genus, but an entirely new genus of species, never mind the fact that these different planets will have very different living conditions, and different environments and climate zones within those planets. There's a whole plethora of macro-evolutionary forces playing on a galaxy of twenty billion sentient species that shrinks your analogy until it looks positively microscopic next to them.

See? I can use SCIENCE! too.

 

When I went through Wookieepedia and counted, about a month ago, there were 155 species considered to be 'Near-Human.' That's slightly less than 10% of all species currently known in the Star Wars galaxy.

This is not correct. There is considerable evidence that many, and perhaps even all, Near-Human species were deliberately created, with Homo sapiens as the 'base model' by some combination of action by the greater powers of the previous iteration of galactic civilization. The Mother Machine is the most explicit piece of evidence.

Likewise the suggested timescale is considerably more recent, perhaps around the 100,000 BBY mark. For purpose of comparison the earliest member of the genus Homo, H. habilis, has fossil remains dating to over two million years ago.

While the variable environmental conditions of landing on a new planet, and the very significant founder effects of small population size in colonization groups do account for rapid genetic change on a small timescale, this is largely accounted for in canon. The Chiss arrival on Csilla, is dated at ~27,500 BBY, meaning they diverged from a human baseline in that much time, which is only about 1000 generations. All things considered the Chiss were evolving pretty darn rapidly.

 

Unknown Regions mentions that not all Near Humans are actually necessarily related to humans, but that it just a term that will be applied to races very similar or indeed descended from humans. With their origins mostly unknown and possibly do to any number of factors, be it genetic engineering, different direction of evolution from “baseline” humans, independently evolved etc.
So yeah just like with Star Destroyer not even the people of the GFFA actually agree on what it means.

 

You just proved my point; there are lots of Near-Human species, each with their own distinct characteristics.

And the only piece of evidence, unless you'd like to bring up some more examples of explicit species creation. If anything, it can explain why a species as sophisticated as the Twi'leks could have adapted to a planet like Ryloth, which doesn't seem like the kind of world that would give birth to a sentient species. But again, this is all just so much speculation.

It seems that as of 2010, an earlier ancestor of modern humans has been found: H. gautengensis. But aside from that, the processes of micro and macro evolution can produce subtle changes within a species such that infertile relatives can spring up within timescales short enough for humans to observe. Salamanders and finches are but two well-known examples of species that have had this occur. Compared to the kind of galactic timescales we're discussing, this is but the blink of an eye.

How is this accounted for in canon, exactly? The one source you mentioned before, which is probably the source for your claim that the Chiss represent a crucial aspect of your common ancestor hypothesis, is a mumorpuger that has done quite enough to tangle up the history of the GFFA already. If Chiss are explicitly stated to have evolved from a number of Humans deposited on a frozen planet, it still only provides one instance. It does not "largely account" for anything. You can speculate all you want, but like with Wookieepedia, if you don't have a source, it didn't happen.

 

Exactly. We can try to apply real-world science and real-life analogies to Star Wars until we're blue in the face, but it won't be of any use because ultimately, we have no control over the canon content. Canon could say that "original" Humans evolved from bunny rabbits, and we would simply have to accept that as being true—for the GFFA.

 

Chevs are considered near Human and all they have going for them is congruent evolution

 

Be glad it wasn't a joke about size matters not.

 

You're trying to make this worse than it needs to be.

 

Random Comments:

That's the point.

 

In Star Wars, the main Human species (homo sapiens zhellicus) likely originated from Coruscant to settle other worlds later by using sleeper ships or getting taken away by Celestials, Gree, Rakata etc.. On many new planets, they mutated/evolved into new species, near-Humans, like Arkanians (homo sapiens arkaniacus), Mirials (homo sapiens mirialus), Zabrak (homo sapiens zabrakus) and Chiss (homo sapiens csillanicus).

Pseudo-Humans are species unrelated to pure Humans, but looking a lot alike them, like Twi'leks and Vultans do. Currently there is no in-universe explanation for this.

Besides, I think we shoudl capitalize the word "Human", because all other sentient species' names are being capitalized, too, like Mon Calamari, Bothans, Duros, Raktata etc.

But still the Expanded Universe uses too many near-Humans and pseudo-Humans, it should portray more non-Human species. Star Wars still has too many

 

Now Chevin, that's an entirely different matter....

 

I can imagine a plausible explanation is that at some point in the distant past, the Chevin brought a species of Near-Humans onto Vinsoth to serve as a worker class that was either gradually or suddenly enslaved, and thus that species eventually evolved into the distinct species known as modern Chev. But that's just speculation.

 

As far as I know, Star Wars has:

Pure-Humans, likely originating from Coruscant (well, Humans)
Near-Humans, other species descended from Humans (Mirials, Arkanians, Chiss, Zabraks)
Pseudo-Humans, species unrelated to Humans, but looking a lot like them, with no explaination given why. (Twi'leks, Vultans, Sith)
Real non-Humans, species unrelated to Humans and looking very different (Duros, Bothans, Gossams, Kushiban, Mon Calamari, Wookiees)

It is unknown how all those species came into existence. Humans likely come from Coruscant, but they also may have been created and seeded on various worlds by the Celestials, could have evolved convergently on more than one planet or have been taken from Tatooine. Near-Humans can be product of Humans settling on new planets and adapting to the new enviroment via mutation and evolution or genetic engineering on Humans by older species or themselves. Pseudo-Humans convergently evolved unrelated to Humans, were created by other races.

Another question is, if near-Humans in fact are other species than Humans. In my eyes just different skin, eye and hair colors (Mirials, Chiss, Rattataki) don't make a new species really.

 

"Species" is a pretty blurry term even in biology. Some quite separated species (may have diverged several million years ago) can interbreed, producing offspring that are sometimes fertile. Other species that diverged more recently may have split "further" with a differing number of chromosomes.

 

Um, no, I didn't.

Yes the many Near-human species all have distinct characteristics, but aside from a handful of weird artifacts of errant labeling (ie. Utai) all of those species labeled as 'Near-Human' within Star Wars clearly share more morphological similarity with humans than they do with any other possible ancestor. They are all, to get down to brass tacks, more human than chimpanzees, the closest extant relative to humans, so as a matter of pure comparative anatomy the genus Homo would be the best place to put them.

Now, morphology is generally not the ideal place to hang one's classification decisions, but in the Star Wars galaxy it's the best point we've got. We don't have genetic data, or really even discussions thereof, besides evidence that it's been meddled with in the recent past. We can't trace the evolutionary history either, and indeed if there has been significant horizontal gene transfer or outright engineering then a traditional cladogram wouldn't represent the actual lineage anyway.

The colonization of Csilla is marked on the Essential Atlas map of the Infinite Empire, as post 27500 BBY, via human sleeper ship.

And your frame of reference is wrong. All Near-Humans sharing a common ancestor is the foundational assumption. That is the most parsimonious, and by far the most logical for Star Wars setup. The burden of proof is on you to suggest that these species are not related. The limited evidence we have: Mother Machine, sleeper ship colonization, the very fact that the Ones are depicted as human in form by the Killiks, all supports this conclusion.

The alternative is that somehow, despite living on planets with vastly varied conditions, hundreds of species from entirely different trees of life evolved into forms that are morphologically and genetically (in cases where interbreeding is even theoretically possible) more closely related to each other than Humans are to Chimpanzees today on Earth.

A handful of cases of convergent evolution (Chevs, Zelosians), are one thing, hundreds, thousands? That's simply absurd, it's a probability so low that it is almost certainly beyond the capabilities of the computer I'm using to calculate. Coupling that to the existence of an alternative explanation in canon, if somewhat nebulous (though hardly nebulous by the standards of Star Wars), why reject that explanation?

Again, the Mother Machine explanation handles the 'pseudo-human' or 'humanoid' issues. Such species are still related to/derived from humans, just more distantly, and perhaps incorporating infusions of genetic material from more distantly related groups: the Cathar incorporating feline material for instance.

There are, ultimately, very few sentient species, or in fact species period, that do not represent some Earth-analogue, that clearly come from an entirely separate tree of life. There's the handful of mineralogical species and the occasional weird thing like the Cephalon, but that's about it. You could trace almost everything in the Star Wars galaxy back to the Last Universal Common Ancestor on Earth.

That's not surprising, with the exception of a handful of heavy duty Hard Science Fiction enterprises most science fiction takes this route, since it capitalizes on human imagination as it does. Star Wars does, however, have an explanation for why this is in place now, via the Celestials, and we ought to utilize it.

 

Speaking of this....I can't shake the feeling that Zeltrons were deliberately genetically engineered to be what they are. A race of always incredibly good looking humanoids who have human affecting pheromones and a culture of pure hedonism doesn't seem like something that would, or even could, pop up naturally. I think they are either the descendents of ancient group of specially crafted pleasure slaves, or the results of an experiment of some ancient hedonistic cult trying to improve humanity.


No real evidence, just seems fun to me.

 

The hedonistic culture is at least partly a result of the telempath thing. When you feel better if your neighbour feels better, everybody kind of wants everybody else to feel as good as possible.

 

I have more of a problem with them being uniformly "attractive" at all, since that's such a subjective concept. I think it's more a matter of people reacting to their pheromones tending to find them more appealing than they might otherwise.

 

Maybe the basic Human appearance is from the Celestials, which naturally evolved so and later have created many new species that resemble them.