{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/693",
    "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it.  Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.",
    "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'"
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  "archive": "urth",
  "thread": {
    "id": 693,
    "subject": "Abo Taxonomy, A Lecture",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "1998-05-31T23:42:46+00:00",
    "last": "1998-05-31T23:42:46+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0012-0032@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Robert Borski",
        "address": "rborski at coredcs.com"
      },
      "date": "1998-05-31T23:42:46+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) Abo Taxonomy, A Lecture",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "My Dear Students of Exobiology 101:\n\nHere are my thoughts on the taxonomy of the soi-disant abos of Sainte Anne.\n\nThere are basically three types of Annese, all clearly humanoid in stock,\nall proto-Adamic. Perhaps you've read Dr. Wolfe's monogaph?\n\nAt any rate the first is the oldest and most ancestral, Pleiomorphus major.\nThey still\nretain full shape-changing abilities--obviously, a Darwinian response to\nmassive predation (nasty fauna on Ste. Anne, says Dr. Wolfe: lions,\ntire-tigers, ghoul-bears), where enormously mimetic abilities would confer\na major selection advantage. Examples from Dr. Wolfe's work include the abo\nfemale who could change herself into an amorous cat, as well as the abos\ndescribed as looking like dead trees.\n\nNext, we have an offshoot branch of this, Pleiomorphus minor. They possess\nonly minor\namounts of shape-changing ability, having perhaps ancestrally moved into a\nless predatory niche, like the mountains, where they're freer to mutate\naway from the norm; they still have some shape-changing abilities, because\nthere is still some predation, but not enough so as to require full\npleiomorphism. Examples of this include the stone-colored abos or the\nactress who's known as Three Faces, mother to one of Dr. Wolfe's ill-fated\nexpeditionary comrades--Victor, I believe his name was.\n\nLastly then, we have the third and least ancestrally remote group,\nPleiomorphus\nnugarus, aka the Shadow Children, who, by becoming smaller-statured and\nevolving dark skin, and then becoming nocturnal (a pineal gland mutation\nmight spur this), have so totally escaped predation by the larger\ncarnivores of Sainte Anne that they've lost their shape-changing abilities\naltogether. \n\nYes, yes, you randy rascals. I see your hands and I can anticipate your\nquestions.\n\nThe answer is 'probably.'\n\nGiven the diverseness of our own genome here on earth, where a Masai can\nmate with a pygmy (just to pick an obvious set of extremes) and reproduce,\nit's very likely all three variants could interbreed, and might even\nhybridize with good old Homo sapiens terrae. God is sometimes wondrous--\n\nRINGRINGRING!\n\nOuh, there's the bell. Class dismissed. \n\nBut definitely do expect this material to be on the test!\n\nM.Dr.RB, Universite d'Urth, Branch Campus."
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}