And because Star Trek fans are crazy about Vulcans, there is a lot of available information about how their bodies function. Read on if you want a closer look at Vulcan anatomy. One of the most observable differences between a Vulcan and a human on the surface is the tips of their ears. Where a human has rounded ends, a Vulcan has pointed ones. Vulcans have a better sense of hearing than humans because of this.
Have you ever eaten food that you've never eaten before, and because it was so foreign to your digestive system, you had Now imagine if you existed in a world where countless amounts of alien food were available to you. Yikes, your poor stomach.
Vulcans don't have to worry too much about all that bother. The digestive tract of a Vulcan is hardy. It's able to adapt to the wide variety of alien food out in the galaxy.
Now don't you wish you had the stomach of a Vulcan? No Vulcan saying is more recognizable than the phrase, "Live long and prosper. With those pointy ears of theirs, their longevity makes them seem like Elves from The Lord of The Rings. That's probably how they have learned to be so logical and patient. They have years to perfect the art of common sense, pithy sentences, and the upraised brow. The planet Vulcan is a hot place with little water to be found on the surface.
The few glimpses we have gotten of the planet from Star Trek episodes and movies have corroborated this. As such, Vulcan anatomy has learned to adapt to such conditions. They're like the camels of alien races in Star Trek. Pretty nifty, huh? If you think about it, can you recall a specific instance where you saw Spock drink a cup of water? I can't. The insides of a Vulcan are completely different from a human's insides. They must be, if a Vulcan's heart is right around where a human's liver would be.
This is great if a Vulcan were to get wounded in the chest region. But this is not so good if a Vulcan were to get wounded on the right side of their abdomen. I don't believe Vulcans have a pledge where they put a hand over their hearts, but it would be funny if they did.
They would have to place a hand on their tummies. Let's not forget the iconic Mind Meld that Vulcans can perform. All a Vulcan has to do is place their fingertips on the forehead of whoever they're trying to Meld with, and they can form a mental connection with that person.
It is very much an empathic connection. Vulcans will be able to feel the emotions of the person they are melding with. At the same time, they can transfer their own thoughts and emotions to the person they are connecting with, too. Vulcans do really well in high temperatures since their home planet, Vulcan, is one scorcher of a planet. Conversely, Vulcans don't do too well with the cold. Low temperatures are one of their only weaknesses. Since their race did not acclimate to freezing winds and like environmental hazards, Vulcans get hit pretty hard by those kinds of things.
If a Vulcan does not bundle up before heading out into snowy climes, they had better look out. The calm and logical Vulcans must undergo a period of great emotional upheaval every seven years. This time is called the "Plak tow," which means "blood fever" in the Vulcan tongue.
It drives them loony. If they don't engage in the Vulcan ritual of Pon Farr, their desires will drive them into a rage. Doesn't sound like your typical Vulcan behavior, but I guess everyone has to let off steam somehow. You may not have noticed--oh, who am I kidding?
You should have noticed that Spock has a weird thing going on with his eyebrow game. His eyebrows sweep upward dramatically, in a sharper slope than most human eyebrows do.
This is a trait common to all Vulcans. I honestly have no clue as to why their species evolved to have eyebrows that look like that. I have not the slightest idea what evolutionary benefits those eyebrows might bestow upon the Vulcans.
Sodium chloride plays a fairly major role in the human body. It makes up about 0. Vulcans have only minuscule bits of sodium chloride coursing through their bodies. Their body chemistry gets by with only the smallest of amounts. Oh, and for those of you who didn't know, sodium chloride is the fancy name for common salt.
If you were to walk up to a Vulcan and somehow provoke the usually calm alien to a fistfight, you will have made the mistake of a lifetime. I know that Spock seems like the quiet-nerd type, but that guy would own your behind in an arm-wrestling match. Of course, you'd first have to convince him to engage in such a barbaric practice, because I'm pretty sure he would find it all to be so illogical.
However, they may not be aware of the full extent of Vulcan brain power. The strongest Vulcan minds can engage in telepathic contact with other minds without having to physically touch them.
From their rich and complex history to their weird anatomies and cultural traditions, there is just something that is utterly fascinating about the Vulcan race. Something wonderful and magical about the world of Star Trek was the fact that the original creators of the show and its lore did not slack off when it came to world building. Each race has a fully fleshed out history, language, and a culture rich in unique yet in-depth traditions. In this article I will explore the history and evolution of this great fictional race as well as their traditions, rituals, weird bodily functions and anomalies, and what differentiates this race of alien creatures from the human race.
It is important to note that Vulcans have been known to drink traditionally in moments of celebration. In the original show, Vulcans were shown offering Vulcan drinks to others. For those of you who are not well-versed in Vulcan anatomy, their heart lies in the exact place where their liver should be.
It lies on the lower right side of their torso region between the lowest bone of the rib cage and the pelvis. Therefore any attempt to launch a fatal blow to the chest region of a Vulcan will fail. The Surak Code is essentially the belief that all emotions can and should be controlled.
The basic principle is that it is best for the Vulcan race to establish complete control over their emotional displays due to the fact that, as a people, they are prone to and capable of intense acts and means of expressing those emotions, if not controlled.
In my third year of University, I had accidentally overloaded on courses and ended up skipping many a nights sleep in order to keep on top of all of my assignments. However my three day no sleep events have nothing on what Vulcans can do. The average healthy Vulcan can go a total of 2 weeks without no sleep of any kind. If we could bottle that ability and sell it to college students, we could make a massive fortune. The actor, Mark Lenard, appeared so many times on the show that he was able to claim roles spanning over three of the well-known and established Star Trek races.
By the time his appearances on the show had reached their end, he had appeared as a Romulan, a Vulcan, and a Klingon. Vulcans are known for valuing logic and reason above all else and often resist participating in situations that could affect their ability to reason with their own logical faculties.
As mentioned earlier in this article, Vulcans were once a volatile and emotional people but learned to suppress that in favor of logic. But not all Vulcans agreed that that was the best way to conduct oneself. Yes, you read that correctly. If I could live exponentially longer without having to waste time sleeping, I would be virtually unstoppable.
I could cure all diseases known to man, I could change the world, I could watch every single Harry Potter movie in one sitting without reeling from exhaustion and needing to take a break. The possibilities are endless. To clarify, the Vulcan people do need sustenance eventually.
However, they can survive for concerningly long periods of time without any food or water. How long you may ask? Well, since their home planet is a relatively inhospitable environment, their bodies had to adjust to its desert based atmosphere. Consequently, the Vulcan people can go literal days without any libation of any kind. They also possess incredibly hardy stomachs in order to be able to consume any food available without fear of a negative reaction.
However, not everyone knows where the salute came from. It turns out that it was inspired by a Jewish gesture of blessing exhibited by the priests at synagogue. Though all non-priests are supposed to keep their eyes covered during the performance of this blessing this is because the Almighty himself is supposed to appear in the room during the blessing, Nimoy snuck a peek as a small child and witnessed the blessing first hand. Vulcan, in Roman Mythology, was the god of fire.
Many of these efforts met with little success. History turned out much differently for the Vulcans of the mirror universe. When the Vulcans made first contact with Earth of this universe in , Zefram Cochrane shot the first Vulcan to publicly set foot on Terran soil, believing his vessel to be the vanguard of an intended invasion. Eventually, the Vulcans were conquered by the Terran Empire.
By the s , Vulcans were considered slaves to Terrans and not treated as equals. Vulcans later participated in a rebellion against the Empire in the s. By , the half-Vulcan Spock had become first officer of a starship and eventually rose to the top of the Terran Empire itself.
Using fans, several of them cooled the Intendant aboard Terok Nor. Some Vulcans, such as Tuvok , joined the Terran Rebellion. DS9 : " Through the Looking Glass ". In the alternate reality , the planet Vulcan was destroyed by a Romulan named Nero in Over six billion Vulcans were killed, with an estimated ten thousand survivors.
After witnessing the atrocity, Spock noted in his log that the Vulcan species had become endangered. Star Trek Spock's prime reality counterpart founded a colony for the survivors, which, by the following year, had been settled and named New Vulcan. Star Trek Into Darkness. Species which shared some physiological and behavioral traits with Vulcans were categorized as Proto-Vulcan humanoids.
One example of this were the Mintakans. TOS : " Journey to Babel ". Vulcans were generally similar to Humans in appearance, distinguished mainly by their pointed ears and upswept eyebrows. Their skin color was most commonly pale with a bronze or greenish tint, though some had brown skin. Vulcan physiognomy could resemble Humans of European , Asian , or African descent. Vulcans had body hair similar to Humans, and some males could be very hirsute. Vulcan males were capable of growing facial hair , but most chose to shave it.
Vulcan teeth included anterior tricuspids , which could be protected from decay for decades by sealing them with a trifluorinate compound. ENT : " Dear Doctor ". In contrast to their external similarities, Vulcan internal anatomy differed radically from that of Humans.
TOS : " Operation -- Annihilate! TNG : " Data's Day ". Vulcan blood was copper -based and was copper- or rust-colored when deoxygenated in the veins and green when oxygenated, in the arteries, or when when bleeding. Bruises and dermal abrasions took on a greenish color. Vulcan body chemistry used little, if any, sodium chloride compared to that of Humans. Vulcans possessed a highly efficient respiratory system to extract the oxygen they needed from Vulcan's thin atmosphere. They were most comfortable in high temperatures.
A Vulcan of advanced age could become more sensitive to lower temperatures. The Vulcan digestive tract was highly adaptable. Although alien foods , notably Human food, would occasionally disagree with a Vulcan, given time, their body could adapt to the alien food. ENT : " Unexpected ". Vulcan hearing was very sensitive. Having evolved on a planet which was mostly desert , Vulcans developed ways of surviving in desert conditions. For example, they could survive for several days without water and had inner eyelids which protected their eyes.
Vulcans had a superior metabolism to Humans. Caffeine and sapotoxins had little effect on them. ENT : " Breaking the Ice " They were also capable of surviving for long durations without food or sleep. Under stress, Vulcans could do without sleep for weeks. TOS : " The Paradise Syndrome " Tuvok once claimed that, as a Vulcan, he was capable of going without sleep for two weeks, VOY : " Muse " although, shortly after making this claim, he was observed to fall asleep in the command chair after having gone a little over ten days without sleep.
VOY : " Muse ". Vulcans were, on average, three times physically stronger than Humans, and had considerably faster reflexes. Vulcans were very sensitive to nitrous oxide gas , which rapidly rendered them unconscious. Vulcans typically had a lifespan of two hundred years or more.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the Vulcan physiology was the brain. The Vulcan brain was described as " a puzzle, wrapped inside an enigma, housed inside a cranium.
A Vulcan's brain was in direct control of most of the bodily functions, acting as a control unit for many organs. Despite this, a Vulcan body from which the brain had been removed was capable of functioning and even walking around albeit in a zombie-like state with a portable life support system. TOS : " Spock's Brain ". Unlike most humanoid species, traumatic memories were not only psychologically disturbing to Vulcans, but had physical consequences as well.
The Vulcan brain, in reordering neural pathways, could literally lobotomize itself. VOY : " Flashback ". Vulcans learned to gain conscious control of many of these functions, allowing them to regulate their bodies to a high degree by simple will-power.
When injured, a Vulcan could go into a trance-like state, using this ability to concentrate all of his or her energy on repairing the injury. VOY : " Resistance ". This trance could be self-induced and gave the physical appearance of near-death. It was similar, in principle, to Vulcan neuro-pressure techniques which could be used to relax the mind and body. The substance trellium-D acted as a neurotoxin to Vulcans, destroying the neural pathways which controlled their emotions.
Treatment had to be provided quickly after exposure; otherwise, the damage was irreversible. ENT : " Impulse ". The most famous aspect of the Vulcan brain were the inherent telepathic abilities, such as the mind meld. Vulcans were natural touch-telepaths. Though considerable training was required to utilize this ability to the fullest like performing the fal-tor-pan , simpler contacts did not require any concentration, training, or even conscious knowledge of the act.
VOY : " Blood Fever ". Vulcans called focal points in the bioelectric field of the brain qui'lari. DS9 : " The Muse ". TNG : " Sarek ". Although Vulcans did not, typically, allow themselves to experience uncontrolled strong emotions, they could sense them in others. ENT : " Fallen Hero ". Vulcans were capable of performing a synaptic pattern displacement , or the transfer of one individual's consciousness into another.
The psycho-suppression system responsible for the Vulcan suppression of emotions was located in the mesiofrontal cortex. VOY : " Meld ". Approximately every seven years, adult Vulcans had to endure pon farr , the Vulcan mating period. It was marked by intense emotions and primal urges known as plak tow , or "blood fever" that could kill the Vulcan if not satisfied. Physiological symptoms included elevated dopamine levels and fever.
For such an orderly society of quiet sobriety, the madness which accompanied the outbreak of pon farr was an unavoidable evil. Vulcans and Humans could not reproduce without medical intervention according to s medical knowledge. The child, whom they called Elizabeth , had many genetic flaws due to the method of her creation and she died.
The Vulcan heritage in Vulcan-Human hybrids was dominant, with copper-based blood, pointed ears, and the full range of Vulcan abilities. The government on Vulcan was a representative democracy. Individual political advancement was based on meritocratic principles. The Vulcans held a number of spiritual beliefs. Their religious system was polytheistic. They also believed in the katra , the soul and consciousness of a person, which could be transferred psionically prior to death.
Vulcans were generally non-violent, but logic dictated that combat was sometimes necessary. Vulcans could and did use weapons and practiced martial arts called tal-shaya and Suus Mahna. Most later Vulcans were vegetarians. Vulcans were also known for their high degree of honesty. They were extremely reluctant to tell a lie , and indeed it was said that "Vulcans could not lie. Also, T'Pol's second foremother directly lied to another Vulcan, telling the commander of a rescue party that her crewmate had died in a crash, so that he could remain on Earth to "study" Humanity.
ENT : " Carbon Creek ". In of the alternate reality, Spock managed to deceive Khan Noonien Singh into transporting armed torpedoes aboard the USS Vengeance , as Khan believed they still carried members of his crew.
Khan wasn't aware that Spock had anticipated his betrayal and removed Khan's crew from the torpedoes with the intent to detonate them and cripple the Vengeance.
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