Long-span races and age (Lore-based)

[Lynoa06]

Another pointless question, but I can't truly figure.

About those races that have lenghy lives (up to 10'000 years for the Draenei), there are many things I wish to know, which quite bug me. I suppose time flows the same for each of those races, namely, one human day is percieved, felt, etc. as 24 hours by a night elf, and so on.

The basic question is basically, how do those races grow mentally? I'll give two sub-questions :

1. Unless those races have extremely narrow minds and brains, and are less subject to changing and developing, wouldn't an adult Dwarf or Night/High/Blood elf be wizer than an Human person the same relative age? If so, would it mean (excluding all variability between social behavior for each race or society) a middle-aged Night elf could intellectually bypass even the oldest, wisest of Men, who can't even live up for so long?

2. Even though the extended lifespan of some races provocates a dramatic drop in the birthrate (since making children, mating, etc. at the same frequency as humans or other short-lived species would overfill the planet to the point of starvation, that's an exponential law usw.), how are Night elf or Dwarvish children raised, and how much does the child really take for education? It seems to me quite amazing a Dwarf needs some 40 to 60 years to become mature. Would it mean that a Dwarf could possibly remain speechless before the age of 10, not walk until, say, 5 to 15, follow up 30 years of continued education, be " enslaved " (sorry kids, you don't got much more rights than Roman slaves legally, in real life) and totally dependant to their parents/societies? Is it really acceptable a 50 years old Elf cannot take themselves in charge? Also it doesn't sound right that a sentient specie, of any given kind, might be mentally impaired for so long.

My questions might be biased, but there are, in our real world, few other species that breed their children and raise them longer than 15-25 years, and none of those existing are sentient enough, so I find myself clueless about this. It's mainly a lore-based question, and I would actually be accepting a Bloodelf 45-years-old only thinking about their fun (DESPITE their addictions, the Scourge, the Burning Crusade, the countless events of those past 50 years usw, but no wonder)

[Arrillion]

Older races are often wiser, that's for sure, but people who don't live as long often have a life that's way more active and fast-paced tend learn more. So to answer the question, yeah a middle aged elf could be wiser as an elder human, but it doesn't neccesarily have to be that way.

Now I'm not sure about the second question, I'd say body functions develop as fast as those of younger races. Teenage and Adult-hood is something that has to do with age and wisdom rather then physical development.

[Beltharean]

Question...

For, say, a Draenei, how long would it take for them to grow from the baby stage, to an adult?

Because it seems highly impractical that it would take say, three THOUSAND years for a baby to turn into an adult. So, would a draenei age like a dog, where the first years go extremely fast, and then it eventually slows down over an amount of time?

Link about dogs: http://www.dogbreedinfo.com/age.htm

[Vorce]

In my opinion, all the races mature at the same human rate. It's just that when they reach a specific point in time, the ageing process is decelerated drastically. Like, perhaps they reach physical maturation the same age as humans, but are still considered as 'children' by those of their race. Then again, I'm not really sure, so bleh. As for the rate of learning, so to speak, it would make sense that the shorter the average lifespan, the more urgency there is for education. So perhaps a human child is taught much more vigorously than, say, a Night Elven child. This is all just speculation on my part though, with applications of common sense here and there. If everyone were taught at the same pace, that'll make Draenei the smartest thingies alive >.< Just saying ~

[Clovis]

I think it's safe to say longer lived beings physically develop at a pace close to Human's, but slower or faster in certain areas. Intelligence may also develop at the same pace, but just -knowing- stuff doesn't make them the most intelligent beings alive. You can only learn so much. There's short term memory and crystallized - Long term memory. There's motor skill development and connections forming inside the brain. There's concrete thinking and abstract. Human children are concrete thinkers and unable to really 'get' abstract thoughts. That level of development could be the case with elves and draenei and what not.

Concrete idea (Child) - Heavy things sink.
Abstract (Adult) - It will sink if its density is greater than the density of the liquid.

Also, a 'teenager' of any race will obviously have teenage thinking. Even a 300 year old Night Elf will still have the volatile emotions, the sense of "It won't happen to me" and brashness of a human teenager just stepping into adulthood.

At least that's what I think. >.>

EDIT:

Intelligence: the ability to comprehend; to understand and profit from experience

[Lynoa06]

I think it's safe to say longer lived beings physically develop at a pace close to Human's, but slower or faster in certain areas. Intelligence may also develop at the same pace, but just -knowing- stuff doesn't make them the most intelligent beings alive. You can only learn so much. There's short term memory and crystallized - Long term memory. There's motor skill development and connections forming inside the brain. There's concrete thinking and abstract. Human children are concrete thinkers and unable to really 'get' abstract thoughts. That level of development could be the case with elves and draenei and what not.

Concrete idea (Child) - Heavy things sink.
Abstract (Adult) - It will sink if its density is greater than the density of the liquid.

Also, a 'teenager' of any race will obviously have teenage thinking. Even a 300 year old Night Elf will still have the volatile emotions, the sense of "It won't happen to me" and brashness of a human teenager just stepping into adulthood.

At least that's what I think. >.>

EDIT:

Intelligence: the ability to comprehend; to understand and profit from experience

Indeed, I like this case. While the pre-teen Elf would be just as mature as a more-or-less like-aged teenage Human, they would further their development into more abstract concepts, or maybe some kind of ritualistic training, or be seen as children by their society (much like some real-life tribes) and that could greatly lengthen their childhood. Or, much like the Dwarves I'd suppose, their brain is infantilized for a longer period of time, meaning connections can only really form and remain still past a certain age (slow-aging).

Now, is there a specific lore resource I could access? Learning to walk at 20 is one thing, but after 300 years of witnessing many events and submitting to the tides of fate so often, remaining a witless teen (sorry to some of you guys), is another thing that seems somewhat less sensible.

[Clovis]

Indeed, I like this case. While the pre-teen Elf would be just as mature as a more-or-less like-aged teenage Human, they would further their development into more abstract concepts, or maybe some kind of ritualistic training, or be seen as children by their society (much like some real-life tribes) and that could greatly lengthen their childhood. Or, much like the Dwarves I'd suppose, their brain is infantilized for a longer period of time, meaning connections can only really form and remain still past a certain age (slow-aging).

Now, is there a specific lore resource I could access? Learning to walk at 20 is one thing, but after 300 years of witnessing many events and submitting to the tides of fate so often, remaining a witless teen (sorry to some of you guys), is another thing that seems somewhat less sensible.

I think Motor Development and physical development would progress as normal, perhaps with some brief lags in time where there are no major physical landmark developments. (So they may learn to walk at the same age as a human, but they may not start growing much until a certain point, where a human may already be in puberty and what not.

Also, I think it makes sense for a 300 year old Night Elf/Draenei/Whatever to still have a teenage mentality and emotional development even when they may physically have the skills and bodily development of an adult.

Hell, think of all the immature 20 somethings out there. Or cultures where a boy can enter manhood at the age of like, 14 by doing some sort of ritual. And even then, you need to factor in - What is that cultures definition of 'Maturity'? When is a boy ready to be a man, and a girl ready to be a woman? When is a teenager ready to be an adult. I'm 19, and I know I'm barely ready to be what would be socially considered a full blown adult ya know.

[Bovel]

It is a good idea you have there on mentality and emotional development, but I still think it comes faulty when lore is taking into the count, especially night elven such. They have young characters springing up here and there that at least seem to act just as any other grown up night elf.

This discussion also opens up another que; What happened when night elves suddenly became immortal? And how will losing it affect them as a race regarding this topic?

Another interesting thing I noticed when checking the lifespans is that tauren lifespans differ alot from the others, especially age of becoming mature. They live about a century but come into adulthood at 50 and middleage at 75? This distribution so to speak is very different from all other races. This got me thinking in that these guidelines on 'age' might be cultural guidelines just aswell as biological or temporal.

[Lynoa06]

Indeed physical and emotionnal development can not be correlated; and I do reckon the lagged growth theory; but then when does, say, a Tauren, a Dwarf, a Draenei (especially them), or an Elf (Night, Blood or High), or .... get their milestones? Then, of course there are also cultural differences.

Say, what are most especially the milestones in Dwarvish and Night Elf development? (And, indeed, what changed on Elvish phylogeny since they lost their famed 'immortality'/nonaging state?)

[Bovel]

There are some physical milestones one can easily point out for some races;
Tauren - the horns
Dwarf - beard
Draenei - faceplate and tendrils
Troll - tusks
Orc - tusks

[Lynoa06]

A random idea, applying certainly more to the Sin'dorei -

Is it possible such an elf could mature to a child state in the same pace (or slightly slower) than a human; then mentally evolving very slow, reaching puberty eventually by 90-110 as they finish a more ethereal state of mind?

That would explain, as well, some parts of the natural inherent brashness (brattyness ya) and deluded pride of the Sin'dorei People.