Posted: Sat Mar 08, 2008 12:44 am
Interesting. Aasimov wrote a short story along the same lines once, about humanity and three other intelligent interstellar species. Humanity was the only one that actually stopped growing at a point in its lifespan, while when that happened in the other three species it was considered a rare and deadly disease. In humanity, the reverse occured - occasionally, there was an occasional disease which caused portions to continue to grow, much like the natural state of the other species - but in humanity, it was called "cancer."