Other Man

The Other Men (so nicknamed due to their superficial similarity to Humans) are a sapient species which evolved on a planet appropriately nicknamed "Other Earth". They lived during the early days of the Milky Way Galaxy.

Biology
The Other Men are erect bipeds with dark ruddy skin covered with shaggy green fur. Older males tend to have white facial hair. They have slender legs, large chests and well-developed shoulder muscles, and their arms are short but powerful. The neck is long and flexible, and the skull has no forehead, but extends backwards over the nape instead. They have two eyes, two large mobile nostrils which also function as ears, and a spout-like mouth that makes it look like they're whistling. Their hands and feet are four-digited, the feet consisting of three large toes grown together with an additional broad toe serving as the heel. The hands have no palms and consist only of three gristly fingers and a thumb.

The Other Men are viviparous and dioecious. Females have no breasts, but can be identified by their long tubular lips, which are ideal for regurgitating food to the offspring. Their diet is omnivorous. Their eyesight is better at distinguishing forms than colors. Their hearing is sensitive to faint sounds but discriminates poorly, to the point that they never invented music. Taste is by far their most developed sense, and they can taste objects with their mouths, hands, feet and sexual organs. The ability to taste with their feet has been historically useful to identify terrain and track wild beasts, among other uses.

Culture and society
The Other Men are gregarious creatures which often live in large communities. Their cultural dress codes differ from most Human cultures in that, since they don't have breasts, both sexes typically go around topless, covering only their lower bodies and their hands. They wear gloves practically all the time because their fingers are used as taste organs and they regard "tasting" each other as an intimate act. Their technology includes steamships and land-based steam-trains, the latter so large that they resemble strings of mobile houses. Like many species, they are divided in several nations with diverse forms of governments, beliefs, laws and customs. Due to their poor hearing, they never created music, and most of their art is centered around taste.

Appearances

 * Star Maker, by Olaf Stapledon (1937)