on Armored Bears and Their Place in HDM Cosmology
Armored bears don't have dæmons. That is a defining feature of theirs - I'm actually going to touch here on why I think you can call it a defining feature. Because, you see, in the second scene where we meet Iorek, after Lyra asks him why he doesn't make an armor from the metal available to him, he responds:
“My armor is made of sky iron, made for me. A bear’s armor is his soul, just as your dæmon is your soul. You might as well take him away”—indicating Pantalaimon—“and replace him with a doll full of sawdust. That is the difference."
-the Golden Compass, ch. 11: Armor, emphasis mine
So he doesn't have a dæmon, but considers his armor to be its equivalent. This comparison continues throughout the book, such as when Iofur is noted to be disconnected from his armor to a degree, because he's trying to get a dæmon.
Armored bears aren't like humans in other things. You can't trick them,except for when they think unbearlike - like Iofur trying so hard to be human. This sits surprisingly well with a certain interpretation of the Tree of Knowledge in Judaism - one claiming that the knowledge of good and evil replaced a different type of knowledge Adam had prior, of truth and falsehood. Iorek refers to it as seeing in a way humans have forgotten, why bears can't be tricked (in ch. 13: Fencing). He also notes he doesn't feel lonely without a dæmon. That echoes an odd idea there: that bears, in a world where Ancient Sin supposedly has a material manifestation, the armored bears are intelligent beings untouched by it.
That, of course, leads to a curious question: how does the Church treat bears? And as much as we get an answer, it seems to lean to the negative side. The church would never convert a bear, since they have no dæmons, as Lyra notes in her lies to Iofur (one might say she's only saying what she thinks will help her, but there seems to be an indication the lack of dæmon is a factor there):
“She promised you that she’d get the Magisterium in Geneva to agree that you could be baptized as a Christian, even though you hadn’t got a dæmon then. Well, I’m afraid that she hasn’t done that, Iofur Raknison, and quite honestly I don’t think they’d ever agree to that if you didn’t have a dæmon. I think she knew that, and she wasn’t telling you the truth. But in any case when you’ve got me as your dæmon, you could be baptized if you wanted to, because no one could argue then. You could demand it and they wouldn’t be able to turn you down.”
-the Golden Compass, ch. 19: Captivity
So, in short: bears might be beyond the reach of Original Sin, which if true could lead to a fascinating debate in church, but it doesn't seem anyone cares. The Magisterium at large doesn't want to convert the bears, and in the Amber Spyglass we see a priest calling them demons. So what the hell is the deal there?
In addition to all that, if you look you can see that Iorek touching dæmons isn't considered by anyone to be breach of the taboo. He kills a number of people by killing their dæmons, and Lyra never seems to remark on it. And then, in the Amber Spyglass, we get this:
"My people have no gods, no ghosts or dæmons. We live and we die and that is that. Human affairs bring us nothing but sorrow and trouble, but we have language and we make war and we use tools; maybe we should take sides."
-the Amber Spyglass, ch. 13: Know What It Is
Later, we don't seem to see armored bears in the World of the Dead. All this to say, bears are intelligent. They use tools. But it's not clear at all if they attract Dust or are of any interest to angels and the Authority. Their armors are their souls in the same way dæmons are humans', but they also don't really seem to be.
Here's what I actually think, and you'd have to excuse me for some bluntness. I think for Pullman, the bears are closer to the talking arctic foxes and cliff-ghasts. I think they're there as animals, such as in this quote:
"...As long as there have been human beings, they have had dæmons. It’s what makes us different from animals.”
“Yeah! We’re different from them all right.… Like bears."
-the Golden Compass, ch. 18: Fog and Ice
Here, Serafina Pekkala notes dæmons are what separates humans from animals, and Lyra notes bears specifically as an example, continuing to discuss bears in a way indicating she meant armored bears. So, despite them being capable of speech and tool use to great finesse, she considers them animals. And true, humans are animals too, but here it's specifically in contrast to humans. So it does seem weird. Characters can be wrong, of course, but as far as I've been able to tell, there's no indication that this is the case here.
And here's the thing: the reason this odd situation struck me in this way is because I'm used to thinking of bears and their armor, possibly partially due to influence from Dæmorphing, as sapients and their "anchor", so to speak: true souls in the way dæmons are souls. But while the comparison is made in canon, it seems like it doesn't fully extend there. In Dæmorphing, there seems to be an indication that no creature that could be considered sapient is without Dust - though Toby is attempting to entertain the idea early on. But if we look to the original books, one thing that keeps standing out to me is that no one attempted to test armored bears for Dust. And perhaps the reason is that bears wouldn't accept such things, but Iofur could be convinced of that if he thought it would help founding a university on Svalbard. Either way, it's not there. People seem to think it doesn't matter. So, my ultimate question is: based on canon material, can we tell whether or not bears attract Dust? And most importantly, why are they so easily overlooked by literally everyone?
(Side note: I don't believe we hear of the bears after Will and Lyra leave Iorek. Considering his thoughts on living in the Himalayas and the situation in the north at the time,I wonder if they just got extinct due to Lord Asriel. Just a thought.)
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