: Wow, I never knew that. Pretty weird instinct though but
: I guess if everything else you said is true they can
: be bumbed up to sentience. My original point though
: wasn't if myrkridia were sentient but I was shocked by
: the sheer number of sentient races. Theres alot.
True enough. I think there's understandable reasons for this, though.
Consider the real world. We've got at least, say, a dozen species who can be considered "intelligent" and capable of possessing comparatively complex cultures; humans, apes, dolphins, whales, maybe elephants, maybe some monkeys. (Not that they're all as "smart" as people--whatever that means--but that they're at least in our league.) There's also a large number of intelligent species in the recent past--over a dozen other hominids, for instance. So how come humans aren't living alongside an empire of talking gorillas and an elephant monarchy? (Note: Babar is fictional.)
Well, for one thing, a species can live for a long time with the potential to become culturally "advanced," but without actually realizing that potential. Humans have been "civilized" for a fraction of their species' lifetime; the other intelligent species may just have happened not to stumble on the advancements we discovered so short a time ago.
Also, we seem to be pretty good at eliminating close competitors. Whether directly or indirectly, the success of one hominid species damaged similar species most drastically. Perhaps the only reason chimps and gorillas survived, when australopithecines didn't, is that they *weren't* advanced and so they didn't pose a threat to us as serioius competition. It's better for other intelligent species to stay "primitive" and keep a low profile, for fear of coming into conflict with us (kinda like humans had to do with the Trow.) So on Earth, the first species to reach civilization tends to hold all the other species back.
Now consider the Mythworld. Advanced races are constantly "uplifting" primitive ones, so that they can use them as slaves or allies in war. Moagim organized the Krids; Balor organized the Ghôls and provided them with access to Dwarven tech; one might even argue that the fir'Bolg and bre'Unor have been advancing the wolves they command and communicate with.
Also, it's not a huge advantage in the Mythworld to be more advanced than another race. In fact, it can often be a disadvantage because you're high-profile and get targeted for demolition by powerful enemies; the Leveller if you're Light, the Great Hero if you're Dark, the Trow either way. Look what happened to Yer-Ks, or the Cath Bruig empire. So it's better to stay down near the average level of cultural advancement, where you won't get noticed.
To summarize: On our world, the random nature of cultural advancement tends to make for widely varying rates of progress, and the most advanced races tend to eliminate the close competition; the result is that we have one or two really advanced species (like us) and all the other intelligent species are extremely primitive or else extinct. On the Mythworld, the most primitive species are constantly being uplifted by "higher" ones, and the most advanced species are constantly being attacked and cut down; so everyone tends to progress at roughly the same rate.
Whee, anthropology is fun when it's in fictional worlds.
--SiliconDream
