Editing Pak Protector (section)

== The Pak species ==

In ''Protector'', the audience learns that humans are descended from the Pak. Pak Children and Breeders appear in Earth's [[fossil record]] as ''[[Homo habilis]]''; the few Pak Protectors to make it to Earth apparently are not found in the fossil record.

The Pak species goes through three stages of development: Child, Breeder and Protector.

'''Pak Child''' is analogous to a human child: sexually immature and dependent upon adults for survival.

'''Pak Breeder''' is analogous to a young-ish human adult: sexually mature, self-sufficient (in later writings) and providing immediate care for the children. To the Pak, the Breeder stage, though capable of space travel, is not deemed fully sentient; Breeders, to a large extent, rely on Protectors for long-term survival. [[Ringworld|Earlier Niven stories]] describe the breeder as "just intelligent enough to swing a club or throw a stone".

'''Pak Protector''' is not analogous to any human form. It is described as a 'fighting machine', with armor-like skin, super-human strength and super-human intelligence. Niven's stories that focus on the Pak mostly concentrate on the unique Protector stage.

Niven explained the evolution of the Pak as resulting from high radiation levels on their home world near the core of the [[galaxy]]. The high radiation near the star-dense core caused severe mutations that can destabilize the evolutionary process. As a result, the Pak evolved a mechanism to eliminate dangerous mutations from the population. That mechanism is the Protector stage.

Protectors are highly sensitive to the smell of their close relatives and "weed out" those that smell wrong, which may indicate a potentially dangerous mutation. This weeding also suppressed positive mutations, essentially halting Pak evolution. Protectors are fully sentient, and are far more intelligent than ordinary humans. This "superior" intelligence, however, serves only a Pak Protector's instincts to protect its bloodline at any costs. The Pak have no drive toward the collection of abstract knowledge, have no concept of art, and do not even possess enough of an artistic impulse to understand the purpose of making sketches and paintings for reasons not directly useful.

The change from Breeder to Protector is the result of a [[peramorphosis|peramorphic]] transformation brought about by the plant known as [[Tree-of-Life]]. As humans (and all [[primates]]) are descended from the Pak, Tree-of-Life can create a Protector-stage human.