Bosda, I’m not aware of any religion which asserts the existence of dragons. Do you have any particular Chinese faiths in mind?
I would have expressed disbelief at your statement about people believing “mineral mimicry”, but I had seen a documentary recently that pointed out that some scientists believed in such a thing merely a hundred or so years ago. Still, I find that a very odd conclusion when viewing a fossil; perhaps I am “blinded” by today’s knowledge though.
In any case, I don’t think either one of us can make any statement about what ancient people would believe and honestly think all people throughout ancient history would come to that same conclusion. Likely some thought of mineral or vegetable mimicry, others thought they were rock carvings, and surely at least some people could have thought “skull of a once living creature” and started a mythology. They may have even thought that dragons had bones made of rock.
sqweels wrote:
Actually, there’s a much simpler explanation than children being “more in touch with primitive instincts.”
Adult humans are huge. Even sleeping in the middle of the night, a leopard would think twice about attacking an adult human. But human children are smaller, which makes them easier to snatch up and carry away, and they pose less of a threat of injury to potential predators. Thus, it makes sense for small children to be afraid of creatures in the night, and full-grown adults to be substantially less afraid of night attacks.
DocCathode wrote:
Yeah, but how many hit dice did they have?
<nitpick>
Although the popular image of Brunnhilde from Wagner’s Ring cycle of operas is as a 300-pound diva, this was not the image Wagner had in mind. Wagner wanted Brunnhilde to be a stunningly beautiful young woman, and would have probably preferred a slender woman to play the role. The problem was, by the end of the 19th century, all the famous female opera singers were rotund. (Hence the old saying that it’s not over until the fat lady sings.)
In short, Wagner did not so much depict the Valkyries as Rubenesque as he was stuck with Rubenesque opera singers playing the roles.
</nitpick>
Tracer-Nitpick accepted. Dragons, Linnorm are covered in an expansion volume of the Monstrous Manual
Well, in the occult/metaphysical community Dragons are “real” in the sense that they exist as elementals. Sort of like… (thinking of words others would understand…) like totem animals… proctectors and guides. Then basically they are assigned characteristics in a manner that our physical minds can grasp. They are “seen” as the classical ‘dragon’ shapes with long, large bodies, wings, scales and various other dragony type characteristics.
So, I guess they exist if you’ve experienced them. If you haven’t, then as far as you know they exist only as an idea.
I saw a good bumper sticker once “Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and good with ketchup”
Tracer, I have no cite, but I did read somewhere that children are more in touch with their primitive instincts, which fade as we grow and spend more time exercising our cognitive senses.
Your leopard example largely concurs with my reasoning. Why would a child think a leopard or other creature (it’s usually not a real animal but a phantasmagoric beast from their psyche) would be there in the first place? Adults don’t go to bed confident that any leopard under the bed wouldn’t dare attack them; we’ve long since learned to ignore the possibility. Even a 4 year-old is intelligent enough to understand that there are no real monster under the bed, but when the lights go out, his primal fears vie for control.
In primeval times, going to sleep alone was dangerous because the threat from predators was real, so we learned to be extremely wary, especially of shadowy areas, or better yet, seek the safety of a group.
Andros, not that it has anything to do with this thread, but you’re conflating two diferent people. Vlad Dracul (whose name can mean Dragon, but also Devil) was the father of Vlad Tepes, who was also known as Vlad the Impaler (he’s the much more famous one). Vlad Tepes was, of course, also known as Dracula, which meant both “Son of Vlad Dracul” and “Spawn of the Devil”, depending on who was talking about him.
Actually, “Dracula” is a classic example of the Latin diminutive form. It means “little dragon.”
“Tepes” was the Romanian word for Impaler, a nickname Vlad Dracula acquired as an adult.
I’ve been wondering for a long time if crazy_nut is real or not. Considering my background, I’m stuck with debating being a very powerful and good approach. But I still want to know if crazy_nut truly exists in our message board or have they left.
What? No one’s going to mention The Flight of Dragons by Peter Dickinson? Dickinson in the book (there’s movie with the same name, have no idea if it has anything else in common with the book) lays out a theory of how dragons could have existed. I won’t go into it all here, but he quotes from mythology to back up many of his theories about dragons, and he does even have an explaination as to why no one’s ever found any fossils (the dragons body chemistry was highly acidic, making it unlikely that any remains could have stayed intact long enough for fossils to form). An interesting read if nothing else.
On the dinosaur issue, I understood from vague recollection that dinosaur bones were first found only relatively recently (past 300 years or so?) and that people thought they were the bones of giants, not dragons.
If crazy_nut is Asian, then he is not alone in believing in dragons. I know of two buildings with enormous square holes in them here in Hong Kong, which allow the nearby dragon to descend through from his mountain top aerie to get a drink from the sea. Holes like that aren’t cheap, in terms of construction and planning, and land value.
Just did a quick search and came up with a site relating to the book if anyone’s interested:
I know I am real! 
Dragons certainly form part of Feng Shui, and I share the believe that the OP starter is probably Chinese (if not by nationality then by race). The Chinese dragon is a benevolent creature, totallly opposite from the Western dragon. IIRC, it does not fly and does not breathe fire.
Continued aside re: the Wallachian boys
Sorry 'bout that. I didn’t conflate the two so much as screw up my c&p. The first line of my post should have read “Vlad of Wallachia, father of Vlad Tepes, was . . .”
This is off the top of my head–bear with me here.
There is little doubt that Dracul took his name from his dragon standard and his membership in the Order of the Dragon (which was formed by the then-Emperor in the late 14th century to combat the Turks, IIRC). Dracul was appointed military governor of Transylvania by Emperor Sigismund and later was named Prince of Wallachia somewhere in the 1430s. The young Vlad and a younger brother were taken prisoner by the Turks, where Vlad likely learned the fine arts of depression, cynicism, and sadism. He was released after his father and older brother (the Wallachian heir apparant) were killed and spent most of the rest of his life either ruling in Wallachia or attempting to regain his position. IIRC, he actually sat on the throne only 3 times, the longest for about six years or so.
I don’t recall any instances of “dracul” as a generic word for demon prior to Vlad Dracul’s reign, but I don’t see why it couldn’t have been.
Dragon Phoenix… Phoenix Dragon… Eep, I knew I had a relatively common, simple name, but I never expected to run into someone with so -close- a name… 
(Though in fairness, I preffer to just go by Phoenix, but that name’s always taken wherever I go…)
And I’d like to say, I’m real too
Of course, it isn’t quite as easy to classify dragons as western=bad/eastern=good. There are always exceptions. I know among the western dragons in older texts, there were often benevolent ones. I even found out about one known as the “great Ure dragon” (Which is my family name ), which was supposedly a benefactor of the Campbell clan in Scotland. Unfortunatly, I havn’t been able to find much about that, since I was rather interested in that
And while I don’t know much about ancient asian dragons, I believe many of them could fly. At least, I remember mention of it somewhere. But I could be wrong. I don’t remember any mention of breathing fire or anything, either…
It’s certainly not as simple as, say, AD&D’s monster manual, either 
And I’d like to second what Mekh said. In spirit, there’s a fair number of us around
First of all Phoenix Dragon Thats a lot of smilies…
Second, as for the OP…Of course Dragons exist Frodo, of course…
re-reads post
Gah! smiley shock! twitches
Heh… Sorry, guess I add a few too many in without thinking about it (Ack, another one!!)
Said flight is the cause of storms, in some stories.
So, yeah, Chinese Dragons can fly.
firstly, i’d like to say, hi crazy_nut! (you always said I was the crazy one and you were the logical… rereads crazy_nut’s sig oh.)
secondly, she’s NOT a troll (not purposely, at any rate), and she hasn’t had much experience on the SDMB, since she rarely ever has the time to really “know” the rules (as opposed to me: i have waaaaaaay too much spare time on my paws). remind me to sit her down and explain everything to her someday…
thirdly, Bosda’s right: she’s chinese (well, taiwanese).
fourthly, dragons are real! i see them every time i go high on catnip! they only reveal themselves when you use catnip! they told me so!
what? why are you guys looking at me so funny?