I have a fondness for pseudodragons, and I believe that Mexican free-tailed bats are comparable to pseudodragons. That’s why I incorporated these bats into my writing.
While they are remarkable, they need to be more than just a “species” to be part of a rich sci fi world building landscape. For starters, they need to have a name. Since I want my stories to be woven with real-world references, I figured I’d start with a portmanteau naming convention.
The scientific name of the Mexican free-tailed bat is Tadarida brasiliensis. Thus, the tadaribrae are born. But that’s just the beginning of the writing process.
Tadarida brasiliensis
A name makes them easier to anthropomorphize, but the tadaribrae are far from being a people at this point. So what makes a “people”?
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Well, based on what I remember from my sociology classes, institutions are part of what makes a society. Generally speaking, there are five major institutions: Family, education, economy, government, and religion.
Additionally, a shared history and a language for communicating it are important for a group to develop and evolve. Add a bit of tool use and technology as well as some societal norms and allegiances, and you create a basic outline for a society.
With this in mind, I began to create my template for worldbuilding culture.
The full structure that underlies my culture worldbuilding template is too much to get into during this short conversation, so I’m going to focus on one aspect of my tadaribrae build: religion worldbuilding.
Worldbuilding Religion: A how To
I’m not a religious person, so religion worldbuilding doesn’t come naturally. Nonetheless, religion is an important element of social structure and individual choice, so it’s disingenuous to build a world without religion.
But what makes a religion a religion? Many have tried to answer that, but for the purposes of simplifying my task, I chose to focus on eight characteristics of a religion:
Belief in spiritual beings
Sacred vs. profane objects, places, and/or times
Ritual acts focused on sacred objects, places, and/or times
Moral code with supernatural origins
Characteristically religious feelings
Prayer and other forms of communication
A world view and organization of one’s life based on the world view
A social group bound together by the above
As you can imagine, what we know about bat societies is limited. And what we know about bat religion? Well… Let’s just say we don’t typically think of non-humans in those terms, but here are a few interesting areas of Mexican free-tailed bat behavior that align with the above definition of religion.
Meditation and Music: Two Powerful Traits for Worldbuilding Religion
One unique behavior of the Mexican free-tailed bat is torpor. Similar to hibernation, torpor is a state of rest that allows an animal to conserve energy. While it is common for other bats to hibernate, Tadarida brasiliensis is more like a battery in that it uses energy efficiently then recharges daily through this almost-meditative state.
To be clear, “almost-meditative” is not a scientific designation. Because I was keeping an eye out for behaviors that aligned with the five institutions, I noted this one as being akin to meditation–recognizing that some religions make use of this calming practice, I began to think of the tadaribrae as having at least one religion, But how else did they fit the religion definition?
Singing. Tadarida brasiliensis sing. While there are a few hypotheses about why these bats sing, it is generally agreed upon that this is a costly behavior because it sacrifices foraging time for the singer. However, there is a reproductive advantage because the singing often attracts more bats to the singer’s roost during the spring mating season.
Both these activities, torpor and singing, have perfectly reasonable scientific explanations. But remember that this is fiction based on science. So what leaps could be made to create a culture. On a narrative level, I found it reasonable to think of the singing as a means of binding a group in a way that elicits characteristic religious feelings. Sort of like gospel music which is often directed at a supernatural being, brings people together in their spiritual beliefs, and elicits spiritual emotions.
Another Mexican free-tailed bat trait I thought may be useful is their community-based behaviors. Their tendency to share roosts, hunt in groups, and often share food with bonded individuals (“friends and family,” in human terms) can be connected to religious values.
Worldbuilding Religion from Just a few Behaviors
So, now it’s time to bring this all together. Let’s revisit the “characteristics of a religion” list.
Belief in spiritual beings is clearly something that bats are not believed to have, so I need to draw from the story I wish to create. The tadaribrae have a strong history of science and engineering, and as the navigators of the most successful space technology in this known universe, it is important that any major tadaribrae religion is compatible with advancing technology and science. Pantheism grew out of the Scientific Revolution, so I think it’s a style of religion worth emulating.
Sacred things and ritual acts are not necessarily tenets of pantheism because pantheism is a belief that the supreme power is immanent (meaning that God and the universe are one). I decided to keep this aspect of pantheism for religious tadaribrae, so no sacred things or ritual acts are expanded upon.
A moral code with supernatural origins and a world view are aspects of pantheism that I decided to leave primarily intact. Essentially, because of the belief that all are God, religious tadaribrae respect all people and belief systems–whether or not they agree with them. They are also careful to respect their resources through a conscious effort to control their population. Similarly, they distribute, throughout the galaxy, fertilizer that they produce via a complicated system of guano refinement.
Characteristically religious feelings such as awe and a sense of mystery are, as I mentioned, commonly elicited in humans through music. So while religious feelings are not a notably pantheistic characteristic, feelings elicited by song is an embellishment that I wanted to include as part of this story. Because Mexican free-tailed bats are thought by some to choose roosts based on song, I thought it interesting to include a religious element in this behavior. Generally speaking the leader of each tadaribrae roost outlines scientific pursuits that the roost will focus on that season. The plan for the season is then sung out to the people, and each individual selects the roost that plans to pursue scientific endeavors of interest. For religious tadaribrae, it is also common to form social groups intent on discovering the universe through the leader’s stated scientific pursuits.
Prayer and other forms of communication is covered through torpor or daily meditation.
Worldbuilding Religion: A bat Religion Emerges
And there you have it: the basics of a tadaribrae religion. As individual tadaribrae discuss their beliefs and the books’ plot develops, more detail will be defined. But as a baseline for a religious value system, I think this is a strong start.
This is the first religion I’ve ever created, so I’m sure I’ll learn more along the way. I’m looking forward to exploring ways to expand on these ideas.
Until next time, keep creating.
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