Why does my species tock like it ticks?

Starting with a creature and its environment, how does one create its psychology?

Evolutionary biology and evolutionary psychology attempt to explain attributes that we observe in our fellow humans and in the animals that inhabit Earth in terms of ancient fitness. Explanations come in the form of " exists because of or ". With a well established evolution history for a planet, it's possible to work out where a particular mental or physical attribute came from. Remember also, that every single creature you see, from the smallest single-celled creature to the blue whale are always the sum of their ancestors. So this is all well and good for our planet. What if it was for someone else's planet?

On WB, we often get questions asking something like "I have this really odd creature, how would it behave?" or "I have an alien with these attributes, how does it interact with its peers or the environment?" In some cases these questions are unanswerable because our experience is only with how life and evolution worked once. We don't know the universe of how life might work only how it has worked on our planet. Still, any understanding of how life has evolved may inform some educated guess about how it might evolve.

It's common for an author to start with an alien's appearance and immediate environment. However, this starting information often isn't enough to develop a rich psychological model for the alien. What is a method for deriving a creature's psychology from its environment, evolutionary history and physical morphology? If this isn't possible, what additional information is required?

Acceptable answers will provide a series of steps describing how to gather and incorporate whatever information is required to complete the process. If there are repeated steps, provide a way to know when the process is complete.

posted over 7 years ago

Green‭

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