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[Aqizzar]

I still want to know why every other creature on Pandora has four arms and four eyes, while the Na'vi are humanoid.  They're improbable even within the logic of the movie.

It's not improbable; it's impossible. The Na'vi not having 6 limbs and 4 eyes means that they did not evolve from the same base creature that every other animal on Pandora evolved from.

Maybe I'm being generous, but it's still just improbable.  Among land creatures on Earth we have both quadra-limbed endomorphs (including oddballs like snakes) and arthropods who have all sorts of eye and limb configurations.  It is damn weird that one and only one creature, especially one complex enough to evolve an intelligent nervous system, would be the oddball, but it's certainly not impossible.

Also, I'm hoping for a crossover.  I want to see a reincarnated Sigourney Weaver Na'vi taking on Xenomorphs.

[Duke 2.0]

 Riding the Pandora battle mechs?

[Neruz]

I still want to know why every other creature on Pandora has four arms and four eyes, while the Na'vi are humanoid.  They're improbable even within the logic of the movie.

It's not improbable; it's impossible. The Na'vi not having 6 limbs and 4 eyes means that they did not evolve from the same base creature that every other animal on Pandora evolved from.

Maybe I'm being generous, but it's still just improbable.  Among land creatures on Earth we have both quadra-limbed endomorphs (including oddballs like snakes) and arthropods who have all sorts of eye and limb configurations.  It is damn weird that one and only one creature, especially one complex enough to evolve an intelligent nervous system, would be the oddball, but it's certainly not impossible.

Also, I'm hoping for a crossover.  I want to see a reincarnated Sigourney Weaver Na'vi taking on Xenomorphs.

The vast majority of macro non-insectoid life on earth is based off the same basic tetrapod design. Even snakes are tetrapods, although their four limbs have devolved away into almost nothing.

All Amphibians, reptiles, dinosaurs, birds, and mammals are tetrapods, having all evolved from the Sarcopterygii. Every single amphibian, reptile, dinosaur, bird and mammal on this planet is descended from the same subclass of fish.


This is why we all share the same basic design. The fact that the vast majority of Pandora's life has 4 eyes and 6 limbs suggests a similar route of evolution, which means that the Na'vi should have 4 eyes and 6 limbs as well. The fact that they do not is simply creative liscence, nothing more.



In theory it might be possible for a single four limbed, two eyed creature to evolve alongside all the other four eyes, six limbs creatures. But it's highly unlikely, especially considering the Na'vi had mind tentacles as well. The Na'vi also had hair, something all other Pandoran life was missing, again this can be put down to creative liscence.

Ultimately though; we don't know enough about evolution and the process by which life comes to occupy the shapes it does to tell if it would be possible or not, but given the evidence i highly doubt it.

[Aqizzar]

I hope you're not trying to condescend to me.  We're describing the same thing (and thanks for reminding me of "tetrapod"), I'm just giving Pandora more benefit of the doubt to spit out a rarer distantly divergent phylum.  Clearly the Na'vi are at least close enough to "normal" Pandoran morphology that they have the same intercompatable nerve stem.  Although they also only have one stem (in the middle of their "hair") where everything else has two stems.  Intriguing.  The point is, if you're willing to accept plantlife that can generate electrical impulses identical to neural signals, which every species can interpret (which may or may not be probable), humanoid Na'vi aren't that hard to accept too.  (How the Hell did I wind up defending this?)

Heck, considering how purpose-designed and universally similar the nerve stems are, you could even make a case for external engineering.  Half the setting is a ripoff of Alpha Centauri anyway.  Maybe the Pandoran mentalmass saw humanity coming and invented the Na'vi as tool to interact with humans.

And son of a bitch, I just wrote the sequel.  Hey Cameron, you listening?  I thought of it first!

[Nadaka]

I noticed that too, all the other animals we saw had two "dongles", perhaps super smurfs suffer from a generic "half upper body appendages" mutation that just happens to make them look a lot more terran than the other life forms.

[Duke 2.0]

 And least we forget the massive neck breathing holes that the cameras seem to always zoom in on. I sure has heck didn't see any Na'vi with breathing holes coming out of their shoulders.

[Greiger]

This is sorta getting into religion but there are a number of people that believe that evolution is just a tool created by God so that he/she can manipulate to create creatures using an already present system.   Shuts those folks up that tell me that I'm a hypocrite for believing in both evolution and a higher power anyway.

Could be explained like that. Na'vi while still showing signs of their world (luminescence, fancy mind link stuff) are created in the image of a humanoid god, that manipulated evolution to produce a 4 limbed bipedal, 2 eyed, nose on the face oddball from a vastly different base.

P.S. Please don't take the religious stuff too seriously, just throwing this possibility out there, but I don't want to start a religious debate.

[Aqizzar]

And least we forget the massive neck breathing holes that the cameras seem to always zoom in on. I sure has heck didn't see any Na'vi with breathing holes coming out of their shoulders.

Oh yeah, I forgot all about that.  Okay, so, a compiled list of Pandoran morphology includes-

-ventral breathing holes, instead of a distinct larynx
-six limbs, with four grouped together high on the torso, or even combined/bifurcated
-four eyes, with two large eyes forward and two small eyes behind them
-two "nerve cords" on the back corners of the skull

Whereas the Na'vi have an altogether humanoid body structure, with one "nerve cord" in the back/base of the skull, shrouded by something approximating hair, yet apparently strong enough to support the body's weight (ooouuuch).

[Neruz]

Basically, the Na'vi do not fit in at all; i'd say it's pretty damn likely they're no natives to Pandora and are some sort of lifeform engineered by an external source. They just plain don't match up with the other Pandoran lifeforms.

Either that, or they were deliberately made more humanlike because humans are the intended audience.


And remember; theri bodies are reinforced with carbon fibre, their 'hair' probably is too.


Also remember that Pandora has lower gravity than Earth, that, combined with the Na'vi having carbon fibre (strong, but light) means they probably don't weigh as much as you'd think.

[Duke 2.0]

 The way they moved through the undergrowth I would assume they would be denser, thus allowing them to basically look like humans scaled up even in their movements.
 Why humans could not jump five feet high should have been addressed. We should have been able to pull off some crazy things thanks to our smaller bodies.

[Idiom]

If the Na'vi evolved, the "nerve cord" thing came first because it's a shared feature (regardless of the number of cords, a loss of a cord is readily presumable to be a simple mutation), then life branched into the 6 limbs and 4 eyes as well as the ventral breathing holes alongside 4 limbs 2 eyes species but with the loss of a cord.

The fact that the Na'vi live in trees, while the 6 legged things seem to stick to the ground, and have a somewhat simian layout to their physiology makes it slightly more believable for me. Their migration to the treetops as a species probably helped drive that evolution towards four limbs and relatively simian features. If that was the case, I guess that would support that "most efficient design" theory about humanoids (and monkeys).

Basically, the Na'vi do not fit in at all; i'd say it's pretty damn likely they're no natives to Pandora and are some sort of lifeform engineered by an external source. They just plain don't match up with the other Pandoran lifeforms.

Not quite, though I can't think of an explanation for the loss of two eyes at the moment. Though I do agree that intelligent design seems very likely.

[Neruz]

Limbs are not lost or gained easily, as the tetrapedal nature of so many creatures shows.

Man would really be much better off with four legs.


There's also really no reason why ventral breathing holes would evolve out of the Na'vi, but nothing else. if your theory really held true, we should see other Na'vi like creatures on Pandora that are descended from the same 4 limbed critter.

The Na'vi just don't fit into the environment. They plain don't match. Personally i think this is a case of realism sacrified for cinematographic purposes, but each to his own.

[Sean Mirrsen]

I think it's safe to call the entire movie one big Acceptable Break From Reality.

[Neruz]

Pretty much all fictional movies are.

[Zironic]

Yeah, The Na'vi should be weak, bitchy things compared to human beings... however the human beings have all been in space for 6 years... etc.

Now if a human came straight from earth. This human say was enormously athletic, then they should destroying everything around them.