Philosophical question

[JsWill]

Cantrians are humans I believe and likewise probably have belly buttons. I honestly have this theory that Cantr is sort of like purgatory, when people 'die' in this gaming universe they are sent to Cantr and that's why no one is 'born'. Eventually they'll die and their spirit will be reincarnated into a new human only to die and to poof back into existence after that person dies. #Logic

[Snickie]

After considering everything about Cantriians, I've come to the conclusion that, despite PD and the GAB's official stance and statements that Cantriians are human, Cantriians are absolutely not human. They may be humanoid but most certainly not human.

[Snoopy]

Cantarians (both people and animals) are plants. They appear to come from nowhere like a plant popping out of the ground.

Speaking of popping out of the ground--how do you think cantarians spawn? Do they just appear? Do they come from a lump of dirt on the ground? Do they fall from the sky?

[Marian]

Cantarians (both people and animals) are plants.

Close, but they're actually sentient mushroom people.

[Snickie]

Here's what I think:

Cantriians were/are an experiment in genetic engineering.

For the first twenty years of their life, an incredibly large number of Cantriians are stored as what can best be described as blobs in maturation chambers in some area separate from the Cantr world itself, like a starship or perhaps an underground chamber inaccessible to the surface-dwelling Cantriians or a nearby moon. The day they turn twenty the blob can no longer survive in the chamber and will die if not extracted and formed before the end of the day. While in the chambers, they might have dreams of various scenarios such as growing up, but only a handful of the ones will remember these dreams and will usually interpret them as memories despite no evidence to said past.

When Cantriian blobs are extracted from their chambers, they are programmed with physical humanoid appearance, sex, basic personality, language skills, and basic knowledge before transported into an environment. One of the kinks of the transporter system that those doing the genetic engineering was that they couldn't precisely control where they would end up, although they were able to make it so that they'd end up at least where two Cantriians were or had been recently. After all, most Cantriians need some kind of companionship, and if they just spawned willy nilly they might have ended up in an inhospitable environment like the endless tundras and swamps.

Regarding physiological structure of Cantriians, Cantriians share a very similar aesthetic to humans, but there are a few features that differ greatly from human physiology. For example, while most Cantriians have fully functional sexual organs, all Cantriians are sterile and cannot reproduce sexually. Additionally, Cantriians seem to have a semi-invisible semi-transparent sack, most likely on their backs, where they can store things without fear of anything being stolen unless they are sent to a near-death state. The sack ruptures immediately upon entering near death state and takes upwards of three days to heal completely. Cantriians have the ability (though some choose not to exercise it in this specific following manner) to heal upon the immediate consumption of specific foods and drinks, especially including alcohol. The effect of alcohol on Cantriians ranges from negligible even after consuming nearly four kilograms of alcohol to total blackout with just a few swallows, which is a much wider range than alcohol's effect on humans. Caffeine seems to be negligible. Finally, the presence of a belly button on a Cantriian is irrelevant: some have them, some don't, and there is no difference in their survivability.

Further evidence that Cantriians are not human exists in the fact that they do not age like humans do. In fact, some of them have a much longer lifespan (a few have lived over 200 years and still don't feature the frailties that come with human aging) and most 90yos certainly don't look and function like a human would be expected to look and function at 90. As most species display some kind of deterioration while Cantriians seem to not (with the exception of some mental conditions brought on by the stresses of previous years or current conditions, which all Cantriians are subject to), it seems that this is also a result of their genetic engineering. Most signs of aging that resemble human aging are considered anomalies, although humans are generally not concerned with this anomaly since it tends to merely be aesthetic. Actual physical deterioration of their strengths and skills is thought by most to be physically impossible.

One issue that has yet to be resolved by the genetic engineering are the slew of mental health problems that seem to afflict many Cantriians throughout their lives. There is an alarming amount of what humans would refer to as personality disorders, especially Histrionic and Avoidant personality disorders, as well as depression and high suicide rates, usually through starvation or self-harm. There are others who perform acts of theft and occasionally assault before taking off down a road. Since most Cantriian towns state that behavior of this sort be punishable by death, these Cantriians are colloquially referred to as suicidal newspawns. Despite this, there is little violence and war among the general population, due in part to genetic engineering.

Genetic engineering has been able to combat some of the violence through a DNA sequence that hardwires an invisible force field around their bodies after being seriously attacked by a person (though that field exists only to block the attacker for a day). ((This force field also exists in Cantriian animal populations.)) Force fields however do not prevent Cantriians from being dragged by the person that just attacked them. The effectiveness of some of these measures is in constant debate, and engineers have for years been unable to decide as to the best course of action.

Cantriians are also susceptible to long periods of inactivity akin to coma and usually resulting in death after twenty days by heart failure; this phenomenon is colloquially referred to as sleeping sickness. Cantriians generally believe that it is due to the body being unable to live without the soul and welcome the body's death with reverence, most having either said goodbye to the soul during the period of sleeping sickness or having been completely unaffiliated and therefore unaffected. There are unexplained anomalies however where the sleeping sickness does not claim the body after twenty days, but the body remains alive until sometimes years later the Cantriian wakes up and returns to society as normal.

In conclusion, while Cantriians may look and in some ways behave like humans, they most certainly are not.

[Genie]

Awesome, almost sounds like a scientific research. Now I wonder where's this planet Cantr.

[Snickie]

It should also be noted that Cantriians are also telepathic, although the specifics of their telepathy are far more complex than simply "they can read other Cantriians' minds". A portion of their DNA forms many combinations that are unique to only a handful of Cantriians and this causes them to be at the very least empathic to each other even if they don't realize that what they are feeling isn't always their own emotion. Some Cantriians, on the other hand, seem so aware of their telepathy that they will act upon it, banding with other Cantriians with the same genetic anomaly. The idea of telepathy, however, is widely rejected in Cantriian society.

[Axiom]

Also, is it just me or is the whole concept of spawning and newspawns really silly-sounding? Couldn't we have picked a better word? It sounds so...gamey, and not in a good way.

[Marian]

Also, is it just me or is the whole concept of spawning and newspawns really silly-sounding? Couldn't we have picked a better word? It sounds so...gamey, and not in a good way.

Spawning is what mushrooms do, by the use of spores. Makes perfect sense.

[sherman]

I think that's thing that too should have been changed long ago. Kinda late change now

On the topic, yeah sound really gamey but at least everyone gets the idea I guess

[Axiom]

Also, is it just me or is the whole concept of spawning and newspawns really silly-sounding? Couldn't we have picked a better word? It sounds so...gamey, and not in a good way.

Spawning is what mushrooms do, by the use of spores. Makes perfect sense.

This is very true...

I dunno, the spawning thing just really bugged me when I started playing. I mean, here we are with this community that takes its roleplaying very seriously, and we have so many elaborate rules governing roleplaying so you don't break people's immersion, and then we talk about characters spawning. What really gets me is that people get mad if you say you were born somewhere and start passive-aggressively going "*looks confused* What's being 'born' mean?" because they're serious roleplayers.

[*Wiro]

What's interesting is that Cantrians do know about breeding, parents, children etcetera from the animal world. Of course that is just roleplayed, but people don't generally say animals spawned (although there are those who do).

[Tiamo]

What could be an acceptable alternative for spawning?
Popping up? Appearing? Manifestating? Being delivered? Maturing?
I think spawning is simply the correct word.

In dutch you can say 'ter wereld komen', which has the double meaning of being born and coming/appearing into the world. Perfect, but untranslatable.

[Kyriel]

Next time someone asks "What does 'born' mean?" I really want to reply, "It's the past participle of 'to bear', meaning 'to carry'. When birds are flying, they are airborne, for instance, and a warrior can bear a sword. So obviously, this person is singing about going for a piggyback ride in some town on Fu."

[Marian]

What really gets me is that people get mad if you say you were born somewhere and start passive-aggressively going "*looks confused* What's being 'born' mean?" because they're serious roleplayers.

Sorry, going to have to agree with the serious roleplayers there. Spawning and newspawns are something I love about the game, just one of those odd things about the game world that have worked into the culture. Your character wasn't born and neither was anybody else's, there's like seven people in town and obviously none of them gave birth to a twenty year old expert vehicle manufacturer with extensive knowledge of the wiki just then, people would have noticed. And of course someone would have noticed if you'd come from some vague far away place. And also all possible places on the entire island are on a map so you should be able to point to it and then they could radio and verify your story if so. And I could go on.