The bottom line
“Men and women with high empathy ratings and some innate telepathic ability were trained to use and preserve the unusual animals” (Moreta: Dragonlady of Pern, p 13)
The prologue of Moreta states plainly a trend that continues throughout the books. What was science to the original colonists and superstition to the people of later Passes amounts to the same thing: not everyone is capable of Impressing a dragon.
In Dragonsdawn we are told that Kitti Ping left instructions as to who should be presented to the first dragons. “Sixty young people between the ages of eighteen and thirty, who had already shown a sympathy for the dragonets, had the privilege of standing around the circle of eggs” (Dragonsdawn, p 349). The base telepathic potential implied by close bonding with the native fire-lizards is a prerequisite for the vastly deeper and more fundamental connection of Impression to a dragon. Without this basic ability a candidate would be incapable of either sending or receiving the telepathic communications used by dragons. A hatchling dragon, seeking a connection, would pass such a candidate over entirely, unable either to hear that person’s mind or to make himself heard.
Imagine Impression as a handshake. Both parties must have a basic component – a hand – for the handshake to be possible. The ‘hand’ is that innate capacity for telepathy. Impression of a dragon, therefore, is only possible where a candidate with the requisite telepathy is available. This is the dragonet’s absolute minimum requirement: without it, the handshake can not occur; a candidate cannot Impress.
This non-negotiable requirement could arguably be considered part of Kitti’s failsafe to guard against rogue dragons. It was critical in her design brief that the dragon-rider bond be deep. Fire-lizard bonds were demonstrably erratic even in the earliest days of Landing, with Impressed lizards frequently wandering from their owners to do their own thing and later even abandoning the settlers entirely. A candidate incapable of the strong telepathy required to communicate in complex terms with a dragon could result in a similarly loose Impression bond, with the dragon free to do as it pleased: the rogue super-predator Kitti feared.
Continue to Keeping an open mind
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“In Dragonsdawn we are told that Kitti Ping left instructions as to who should be presented to the first dragons. “Sixty young people between the ages of eighteen and thirty, who had already shown a sympathy for the dragonets, had the privilege of standing around the circle of eggs” (Dragonsdawn, p 349). The base telepathic potential implied by close bonding with the native fire-lizards is a prerequisite for the vastly deeper and more fundamental connection of Impression to a dragon. Without this basic ability a candidate would be incapable of either sending or receiving the telepathic communications used by dragons. A hatchling dragon, seeking a connection, would pass such a candidate over entirely, unable either to hear that person’s mind or to make himself heard.”
“Latent psychic abilities” in human candidates as a requirement and that not everyone can Impress a dragon? But the text you quotes only talks about a pre-existing “sympathy” for dragonets. Why is you are assuming that a human who has already had contact with fire-lizards is a possessor of “latent psychic ability”? In previous posts you clearly says that fire-lizards can choose ANY human. You mentions that in the 9th Pass people have certain myths about this process and dragon abilities… but it is precisely because they lost scientific knowledge and regressed to a rather medieval level, with superstition compensating for the lack of certainties.
I don’t pretend to know more than someone who has read all the books, perhaps more than once, but with that quote and what I’ve researched so far, pre-existing “sympathy” is more like Dr. Ping refers to it as a sign of a greater mind-openness or mental/psychological predisposition to establish a deep contact/relationship. Asking for at least 60 candidates each time is a way to make sure the dragon has enough to choose from to increase the probability of the union being of the best quality possible… because it is said that green dragons prefer women more, but before humans only go for male candidates, and even then the green dragons chose one of those men. Because you yourself said before Ping did that the need to establish the mental link is so great that she/he will do it with anyone, even if there are preferences for something better, the dragon will choose what is available, whatever it may be.
And it’s for the best that it’s like this, because on the one hand it removes that “only the special ones” factor, which always leaves a feeling that maybe we couldn’t live that dream of being dragonriders… it’s better that idea that anyone can be one, but the dragon simply chooses the one that is most compatible in temperament and/or willing/flexible for contact (but if there is only one person present the dragon will choose that person over being left without one… and die. Or if that human is too bad of a candidate (perhaps a Lord who demands to have a dragon as just a mount/pet even though he really doesn’t respect or even disdains or looks down on dragons?)… I suppose in that extreme situation the dragon will jump out the window to find any less bad person nearby? XD). But it would not be surprising that the characters in 9th Pass have that belief (that you have to have something special, or a hidden talent, to be chosen by a dragon), and would even be expected, given that they have a feeling of being special in a society where there are peasants, right?
Also, this point here would be giving rise the plausibility or consistency of the thing of the fandom about making any dragon of any color be able to choose any person of any gender and orientation. It is simply a question of the fact that among the candidates present “there was nothing better or more compatible.”