In that early existence can be found the seeds of Yilanè science as we know it today. It can be seen in the Wall of Thorns here in this city. To defend the males, large crustacea were seized and brandished at predators, their claws a powerful defense. The bigger the claws, the more powerful the defense, so the largest would have been selected. At the same time the strongest and most offensive corals would have been chosen to defend the beaches from the seaward side. The first crude steps along the road to the advanced biological science we now know would have been mastered.

But this simple existence was doomed to end. As successful Yilanè grew strong and filled the Earth they would have outgrown that first city on the edge of that ancient sea. Another city would have grown, another and another. When food shortages threatened, the logical thing would have been to wall in fields and raise food animals and guard them from predators.

In doing this the Yilanè proved their superiority to the inferior life forms. Look at Tyrannosaurus, a carnivore just as we are carnivores. Yet these giant, stupid creatures can only pursue with violence, tear down their prey, waste most of the good meat on its carcass. They never think of tomorrow, they neither tend herds nor do they cull. They are witless destroyers. The superior Yilanè are intelligent preservers. To a scientist all life forms are equal. To destroy a species is to destroy our own species. Our respect for life can be seen in the manifold beasts in our fields, species that would have vanished millennia ago had it not been for our efforts. We are builders, not destroyers; preservers, not consumers. It is obvious when these facts are considered why we are the dominant species on this planet. It is no accident; it is only the logical end product of circumstance.

PHYSIOLOGY

In order to understand our own physiology we must first consider the physiology of other animals. Simple creatures, like most insects, are poikilothermic. That is, they are at one with their environment; their body temperatures are the same as the ambient air temperature. While this suffices on a small scale, more complex organisms require regularization of body temperature. These animals are homeothermic, that is, they have a body temperature that is relatively constant and mostly independent of the temperature of the environment. The Yilanè belong to the kind of animals that are warm-blooded and exothermic. All of the important animals in the world are exothermic since this way of controlling body temperature is far superior to that used by the ustuzou who must expend energy continually in order to maintain the same body temperature at all times.