In her 2003 novel The Companions, Sheri S. Tepper uses 'delongar' to define a state of community mind in the macro social context whereby sentients carry mutual love and responsibility for one another as a social contract of 'group care', as differentiated from the pack culture of elite leadership dominate in human and other species. Dogs and men follow the strongest leaders who manipulate all aspects of society. A delongar conscious culture washes over all a protective almost prophylactic mist of universal caring, a conscious need to care for the group, the species as well as the person.
