The Republic of Heaven

OK, so your daemon's shape is settled when you become adult. So what happens if you change as a person later? If say you've undergone therapy or been through some major experience that sets you thinking? I ask because Lee Scoresby seems to be changing towards the end of TSK. On page 308 he has an argument with his daemon Hester where he is thinking in moral terms and she isn't:

"What now, Hester?" he said.
"Depends. There was four of those zeppeleins, and he destroyed three."
"I mean have we discharged our duty?"
"She flicked her ears and said, "Don't remember no contract."
"It ain't a contractual thing. It's a moral thing."
"We got one more zeppelin to think about before you start fretting about morals, Lee... Survival first, morals later."

When we first met Lee, he was strictly a business man. Getting involved in Lyra's quest seems to have changed him. Should his daemon change? Alternatively, is saying our daemons don't change the same as saying people don't fundamentally change??

I don't think he changed at all. There was an earlier scene where he is talking to Serafina in the balloon, and says he isn't an aeronaut in his heart. But later on, he says that was a lie, and there was nothing better than the feeling of being off the ground.
He's not changing, he's just discovering more of himself.

i agree with ripper on this topic. i dont think that lee really changed in to book, his eyes were just opened up. i dont think that your daemon would change though even if your personality changed b/c your daemon settles in a form that is true to your heart and even if your personality changes whats true to your heart doesnt.

Taroh wrote:i agree with ripper on this topic. i dont think that lee really changed in to book, his eyes were just opened up. i dont think that your daemon would change though even if your personality changed b/c your daemon settles in a form that is true to your heart and even if your personality changes whats true to your heart doesnt.

Your heart can change its mind...It often does several times.
Your daemon is a reflection of your soul...The daemon is sort of the opposite of what is reflected on the outside of you..

Ex/
Lyra= headstrong quick to take action
Pan= was the voice of reason, more rational and had to be coaxed into doing the wild things that Lyra wanted to do...

Lyra changed over the coarse of the books but Pan pretty much stayed his same way..there was less of a change for him.. So yes I would say that they do not change as much as the person would change as they get older.

Lee is my favorite charector and I don't think he changes at all. And if you did change, I think your daemon would change with you, though not shape, you dont change shape when your heart/morals change.

I wasn't suggesting Lee changed completely, but he seems to undergo a fairly big change, given the way he holds the gulch so Jopari can escape. As to whether that's big enough to change his daemon, it can see why people say not, if that's just at the moral-intellectual level, not a deeper personal one. I can still imagine changes big enough to count as major personal change, say religious conversion (which has an emotional side), mental breakdown and especially amnesia - do you keep the same daemon shape if you can't remember your past life?

That's something really interesting to think about, but I don't think your daemon woud change no matter what, I think that maybe in a way, your daemon knows what's going to happen to you, (not conciously) and that it will fit you your whole life.... don't know if that makes any sense....

If your daemon settles, it will stay with who you are forever. If you're going to change, it'll be an animal that can change, like a chameleon. Or something that looks like something else, like a walking-stick or this alleged butterfly that Lyra talks about. It is your destiny...

Well put.

id have to agree...well put

I don't agree. Your daemon would have to be able to predict the future to know whether you were going to change or not. I think we need a working definition of the word 'change' here. daemons' forms, I think, are malleable in childhood because children have a huge range of possibility, they can still be shaped (being an aspiring linguist, I relate this to the critical age hypothesis, with language only acquired before puberty). As adults we still learn and change, of course, but our formative years are behind us.

Lee is my favorite charector and I don't think he changes at all.

Well, I do! His character develops hugely! PP really fleshes him out in TSK.

Yes, but character development is different from change. I think he essentially stayed the same, apart from becoming more open. He seemed to change because he doesn't really open up until book 2.

As to the question itself, it's possible for a dæmon's personality to change; it'd be just like the human in that, for isn't the dæmon an extention of the human's mind? So the dæmon is essentially human, I'd say...

As for form, no. Dæmon form reflects how you work; your internal essence. by the time your dæmon settles, you're not going to change who you essentially are; even if you may change from drastic circumatances, you're essentially the same, no?

Ms Coulter goes through a much bigger change than Lee, in the end even sacrificing herself. I'd say that's quite a bit different from the original icy Coulter who could only think of herself.
I don't recall her demon changing at all. I guess in Pullman's books they do not change, but in the logic I placed around the daemons they do. I guess a person that was really outgoing and fun and then lost his entire family in a fire and becomes a lonesome depressed bum would have his daemon change. But maybe not to a different species. More like the Golden Monkey turning less bright, duller nails, etc... kind of like the Creatures in Black and White 2. (If you know what I mean).

I agree with DutchCrunch on this.

As Stargirl says, when you undergo major changes, you don't physically appear differerent. You might lose/gain weight or whatever, but you don't have massive changes.

Even if he does change, his daemon shouldn't. It's a reflection of him, so even if he does change he is still Lee. And so his daemon is still Hester.

That kinda made no sense... Sorry about that...

Mmm...I agree. Your daemon settles based on the personality that you develop through the life-experiences of your youth. The idea that someone's personality could completely turn around, losing all of the baggage that they gathered throughout their life is pretty far fetched...

You've also got to take into account the fact that the daemons are not simply an animal representative, but have personalities. They are the yin to your yang, if that's how you want to understand it, something that is exemplified by the fact that Pan is cautious while Lyra is outgoing. I think it's safe to assume that as your personality changes (ie. If Lyra became incredibly cautious), your daemon's personality would change to reflect that, while still staying the same representative animal. (ie. Pan would become more outgoing).

I agree that your daemon reflects a different side of you than you show, but what then, if you were wise? Would your daemon be idiotic and do and say stupid things before you could talk it out of them?

But then again, people like Farder Coram and the witches were wise, as were their daemons, so maybe it's not that they're a complete opposite, just that they're more like, how you think, and who you are when your alone.

Some people are quiet when surrounded by people, then you get them alone and they go insane. Maybe your daemon is that little bit of insaneness that no one really sees.