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Culture War Roundup for the week of October 31, 2022

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It's authorial fiat within the ASOIAF universe that human genetics there don't work the way they work on earth; because people kept calling out that Ned's "discovery" in GoT that Cersei's children were bastards because of the blonde hair was retarded and explaining recessive genes to GRRM at conventions. So GRRM just ragequit and said the whole thing works differently, that in Westeros your paternal family "type" will always predominate over another or something like that, because magic or whatever.

I prefer the idea that Ned's discovery was based on his own misunderstanding of genetics, and while he was factually correct, his evidence was total bunk.

So there's a lot of precedent for the setting just ignoring ordinary genetics in favor of bespoke solutions. Maybe where they are, that's just how it works. I mean if we're going to apply science to that setting, the seasons are a much bigger and more glaring problem with absolutely no workable solution within the text.

So GRRM just ragequit and said the whole thing works differently, that in Westeros your paternal family "type" will always predominate over another or something like that, because magic or whatever.

I wouldn't call that rage quitting. I'd say this is the correct response. Why would a world that has dragons, walking dead people, tree people and so on follow earthen genetics? Do people in that world even have DNA? The way the story is presented it very much "feels" like Ned's discovery (actually Jon Arryn's) is correct and for the reasons he stated.

It would also be plausible that families have some kind of "magic". How else is one line able to manage to hold a position of power for thousands of years? Do we have an analog to that in our world?

Why would a world that has dragons, walking dead people, tree people and so on follow earthen genetics?

But that argument equally undermines the original complaint that it doesn't make sense for Valyrians to all have platinum blonde hair but different skin colors. Maybe the definitely blood-magic evil sacrifice thing that makes valyrians what they are doesn't impact skin color, who knows?

The Virgin Fantasy TV Show Watcher: This show is literally unwatchable, they didn't provide an adequate explanation for why this character is black. I can't even pay attention to the dragons, the whole time I'm just thinking why is he black? Unwatchable travesty. Worst episode ever.

The Chad Opera Afficianado: I just saw Carmen, the young soldier and the bullfighter were sung by fat Italian men in their late 40s, the gypsy woman so beautiful that she destroys multiple men's lives was sung by a Swedish soprano who looked like a chainsaw statue got a hold of Frosty's old silk hat. I've never been more affected by anything in my life, my heart bleeds, love is a treacherous bird!

The answer is that if shows just inserted Black characters without making a big thing about inclusion, they'd probably face less backlash. What makes it stand out is that the showrunners make it known that they're doing this for diversity reasons, and once the viewer knows this it takes them out of the setting. Perhaps I can suspend disbelief that Rodolfo the starving artist looks like this because I know he's cast for his voice, not for political reasons.

But that argument equally undermines the original complaint that it doesn't make sense for Valyrians to all have platinum blonde hair but different skin colors. Maybe the definitely blood-magic evil sacrifice thing that makes valyrians what they are doesn't impact skin color, who knows?

We shouldn't use the show to make assumptions about the book. The show could be using an entirely different rule set (or, more likely, not caring about the story or any underlying consistency at all).

The Seed is Strong incident is exactly identical in each.

I wouldn't call that rage quitting. I'd say this is the correct response. Why would a world that has dragons, walking dead people, tree people and so on follow earthen genetics?

For the same reason something like 90% of things on this world seem to work the way they did in medieval Europe?

And the response isn't correct, because he actually addressed it much better in the book. There's a line there, where were Ned thinks no one would suspect her, if Cersei gave Robert at least one child.

For the same reason something like 90% of things on this world seem to work the way they did in medieval Europe?

Actually this is counter to your point. The reason 90% of the things in ASoIaF work like the medieval Europe we know is because for the things he doesn't care about, he left them as they are (e.g. he didn't make a new gravity). But the things he did care about, he changed. For example, the people ride horses but some people ride dragons. This is generally how any fantasy story would be written because no one wants to read some text explaining every possible aspect of a universe because the author changed everything. Fantasy is like basically doing a "fork" of reality to save time and help prevent confusion (e.g. "how does gravity work in this universe again?")

This concept of a magical "biological seed" is pretty inherent to the plot. Incest doesn't work the same either. In our world you would expect centuries of inter-breeding to result in terrible deformities. What they get is beautiful people who are sometimes insane.

In the book Ned used the "biological seed" evidence first and from there uncovered the rest because it wasn't even particularly well hidden (everyone at court but the King seemed to know already).

I like this theory, although I would describe his evidence as "slightly flawed" rather than "total bunk". The Baratheon family all having black hair implies that both they and the people they tend to marry mostly have two black hair genes rather than one, otherwise you'd expect 1 in 4 of them to be lighter. This doesn't prohibit the case that one of Robert's parents might have had a recessive light hair gene and passed it on to him, but it does make it less likely.

Further, Ned doesn't learn of the family history and immediately falsely conclude that it logically implies Joffrey is a bastard, but it does raise the possibility. He then proceeds to check Robert's bastards, which again all have dark hair. If Robert did have a recessive light hair gene, you might expect some of his children to have light hair, but they do not. Again, this does not logically preclude the possibility, but it makes it statistically less likely. Combine this with the fact that all three of his supposed children are light haired, and even in the case he has a recessive gene there's only a 1/8 chance all 3 children would get it. Combining all of these is a lot of statistical evidence, even if it's not a logical certainty.

And of course, Ned doesn't actually understand genetics or statistics, but he does understand vague ideas about heredity and combining multiple sources of evidence, so I think his general process is heuristically valid. And again, he doesn't take it as logical certainty, he takes the evidence and confronts Cersei, who then confesses. Which is probably a mistake politically as it ends up getting him killed, but not a mistake in terms of deduction given the information available to him.

otherwise you'd expect 1 in 4 of them to be lighter.

But why would you expect this? Why are we assuming earthen genetics? What genetics do the fire breathing dragons have? What are the genetics of the children of the forest? For the "others"? It's just as likely as black hair being a Baratheon "curse" that all Baratheon offspring will always have forever.