There will be references to various Oh/Ah! My Goddess! stories in this topic, but hopefully nothing that can be considered a spoiler. Still, I consider any story that has been released by Dark Horse to be open for use as an example if it seems justified, so be warned.
The following is almost entirely my opinion and is based on my attempts to systematically examine what we know of goddess and demon anatomy and just how close they are to humans structurally. Essentially, of course, Keiichi and Bell's world is whatever Mr. Fujishima says it is. It's his creation and his decisions as to its similarities and differences to our own are the only ones that matter. (And he can change and redefine them whenever he wants as he tells his story.) Still, Fujishima Kosuke has shown himself be a careful and thorough creator and even in his flights of fancy has stuck to real technology and hard science to explain them. This has given Oh/Ah! My Goddess! a sense of reality that most fantasy stories lack. It also makes it fair to say that observation, logical interpretation, and comparative analysis can be used to try and determine the fine details of this world and I'm fairly certain that my conclusions as to how closely divine and human anatomy parallel each other are close to Mr. Fujishima's ideas, at least as far as they affect the story on a practical level.
Quick Review...... The heavenly/demonic realms are 10 dimensional , that is 4 dimensions like our length, width, depth, and time, and 6 additional dimensions that are supposedly structural but I don't have enough knowledge of that branch of physics to try and explain them. Time in both this realm and our 4 dimensional one is the same. (Bell and Keiichi aged at the same rate and the amount of time Urd and Skuld spend when they go back home is the same as the time they're away from ours. Bell also mentions a day as a unit of heavenly time in the Lord Of Terror, showing they have sequential light and dark periods like we do. This jives with the Norse view of the immortal lands having the same sun and moon as earth does and sharing the same time cycles)
Anatomy of a Goddess....... In my earlier examination of the relationship between our 4 dimensional world and the goddesses' 10 dimensional one, I said that the three dimensions we refer to as length, width, and height are the same in both realms. (Time is also the same in both places.) As explained in the Technical FAQ posted at both Nekomi Kodai and Gateway to the Goddesses, in our world that's all we get, the other six dimensions are unexpanded on our superstring. They're still there, but unavailable to us. In the goddess and demon world all 9 are expanded and represent their physical reality, but when a goddess or demon enters our world, their physical being must be altered to fit our restricted dimensional state. In other words, their additional six dimensions are either shrunk or otherwise hidden on their superstrings so their bodies fit in with our 3 dimensional reality. Otherwise they'd tend to drift out of it and fade into what to us would be hyper-space.
From our point of view, they would appear the same in either their world or ours because we can only see those three dimensions and they don't change when the god or demon crosses over. From the god's or demon's point of view things don't change much either, as their bodies haven't really been altered, only the number of expanded dimensions. Everything they're used to having is still there and available for their use, just not visible in our world. It's probably just a minor shift in sensation, like when you wear ear plugs and it makes what you hear sound muffled. You get used to it quickly and don't really notice it afterwards until the plugs are removed and your hearing returns to normal. Keeping those dimensions unexpanded does require a constant effort which releases a small amount of background energy, but Yggdrasil is doing the work not the god or demon so it isn't effected by their energy levels.
Bottom Line..... The three dimensional body we see is the real body of the demon or god, not a temporary construct, and its structure as far as the common three dimensions are concerned is the same in both worlds. This would be true on the anatomical, biochemical, atomic, and subatomic levels.
So, besides external appearances, just how similar are the god's and demon's bodies to ours? In Mr. Fujishima's world, I've concluded, they're pretty much identical. Gods and demons are clearly shown reacting to physical stimuli the same way we do, responding to sensations of pain and tickling, fear and surprise, heat and cold in ways that indicate their sensory nerves and attendant physical reactions are the same as ours. (They do, however, have a lot more options for dealing with the sensations once they get them.) They bleed if they're cut, flush if they're embarrassed, get fevers when sick, have warm skin and radiate heat, and have hearts that pound when close to someone they care about or get stressed, so they definitely have a circulatory system like ours. And they get those infamous little sweat drops when nervous or tense, meaning they have sweat glands. Belldandy's breath is described as warm and sweet (according to Keiichi) and they all talk normally out of their mouths (and can be shut up by covering their mouths), so their respiratory and vocal apparatus must be similar to ours. (At least for normal conversations.) All the evidence shows that in their normal forms, Mr. Fujishima's gods and demons are physically the same as us, down to the smallest details.
This similarity goes down to the atomic and biochemical level. Belldandy is an excellent cook, which requires her to smell and taste the foods as she prepares them. Urd, Skuld, Peorth, and Mara have all been shown to like and consume the same foods and drinks as the humans around them, turkey dinners, wine, sake, ice cream, box lunches on group dates, the dinner at the hot springs resort, etc. (Urd did have that silica gel phase, but I'm going to ignore that.) And it is assumed they processed them internally in the same way. (Peorth at least knows about bathroom breaks.) They also react to the smell of flowers, tea, spring, and in Skuld and Urd's case, unpleasant organic chemistry reactions. So those senses must be capable of reacting to the same chemical agents as our senses do, and that indicates a very high level of similarity in form and structure as the biochemistry involved in taste and smell is very complex and specific. Their abilities in these senses may exceed our own, but are fundamentally the same.
Now it can be argued that being supernatural beings and free willed physical extensions of Yggdrasil, the demons and goddesses could simply be emulating all these similarities to better fit into this world and/or make Keiichi feel comfortable. But that would contradict what's been shown to us of their home dimensions (heaven and the demon realm) and their actions there (Velsper's trial, Urd's love affair, the control room activities of Urd, Peorth, Skuld, and Bell, etc.) It seems to be Mr. Fujishima's intention to depict the goddesses and demons as physically and mentally human with extra abilities, so the assumption that they are physically the same as us isn't that far fetched.
Side Trip...... There has been a great deal of discussion as to whether or not the goddesses actually need to eat food while in our world. My opinion is they CAN, and have the gastrointestinal tract to process it, but don't normally NEED to. Their internal digestive system can function with or without food. The reason for eating and digestion is to convert the stored chemical energy and chemical compounds contained in the food to forms our bodies can use to function. That's because we cannot create matter or access energy internally and so have to bring it into our bodies from outside. Gods and demons however, by their nature, have an internal connection to Yggdrasil, and so can recharge their batteries, as it were, directly through that scource. The energy recieved could then be used to create compressed 9-D chemical substances that would be distributed throughout their bodies by their circulatory systems in the same manner as ours, or be used directly in some magical activity. They could also use the energy to make their needed chemical compounds internally from local 3-D substances, which would be more energy efficient. But either way, this still uses an internal biochemical process like ours to make it work. (Although the substances that cause it may differ, when either Bell or Urd get drunk, their behavior is the same as a typical human's, implying the effect on their nervous systems is the same.)
Apparently Yggdrasil, while capable of converting the available raw 3-D energy to a processed form suitable for use in their compressed 9-D biological system, can only process and supply it at a fixed rate. Therefore the gods and demons need to store this energy up, probably in some biochemical form, to be used later as needed. In the event too much of their energy is used or this support system fails, gods (and demons, I presume) can fall back on a variety of low grade internal systems to help supplement it. In Belldandy's case she falls asleep, and in that mode can slowly convert replacement energy from the raw energy around her. (Apparently, Keiichi can also be used as a sort of pretreatment filter to speed the process up.) Urd and Skuld both have to use a more mundane system, consuming food materials and chemically converting them to energy. (Possibly a consequence of their being second class goddesses and Bell being a first.) That they have preferences in the basic food materials required is due to some 3-D chemical materials being much more suitable for this conversion and that these materials are goddess specific (sake and ice cream, to be precise).
Back To The Main Topic........ Instead of rambling on and on repeating the same things in different ways (which I've done on several chains of thought while contemplating on this), at this point I'm just going to state my conclusions. It is demonstrably evident from the stories that Mr. Fujishima considers both gods and demons to be essentially structured the same as us humans and that their biochemistry, cell structures, and general anatomy are for all practical purposes identical with ours, at least within our common three dimensions. (He also seems to show them as being identical to us emotionally, psychologically, and in their mental processes.) This might be to make Yggdrasil's job easier while they're here, but more likely reflects the way it is in both realities, 3 and 9-D. They have access to abilities and powers far beyond us humans, but these are centered fully in their Yggdrasil connections and outside of our 3-D world. If cut off from Yggdrasil while remaining in our world, their strength and abilities outside of necessary life support are no greater than a human's the same size and physical condition as they are. As additional evidence of this, at the start of the Lord Of Terror story arc, Urd implies she can voluntarily abandon her goddess status and thus become a full human. (This is more clearly stated in the independent translations at Nekomi Kodai.) Neither Belldandy nor Skuld question this assertion, and Bell seems to add weight to the idea with her comments in the Traveler story arc.
So if they're so similar physically, what is the big difference between humans and goddesses? I believe the answer lies in how their physical reality is related to their spiritual identity.
13-Feb, 16 view(s)
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