Do you believe Preston Jacobs' explanation for dragon riding?

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

45 minutes ago, Ferocious Veldt Roarer said:

Let me recapitulate.

Let's invent, with no proof, "dragonseeds" inheriting the (similarly invented) "dragon-riding gene" from their mothers, even though the "dragonseed" was just an euphemism for a male Targ screwing a common woman as a variant of "law of the first night".

Furthermore, let's take "Lynesse Hightower is a pretty blonde" and extrapolate that into "the Hightowers have Valyrian features".

I'm afraid that it's Preston, and by extension you as his disciple, who present a weak argument.

My point was that the common woman could herself be a dragon seed and we would have no way to know. And Lynesse is not just a "pretty blonde". She is specifically said to look a bit like Dany. And Alerie has silver hair and isn't very old. Those are the only descriptions of Hightowers we have.

He's not inventing things, he's coming up with explanations to show the theory is at least possible. That's how theories work. When you are presented a part of the story where we lack enough info to definitively say what happened, you need to at least show that none of the info we have totally refutes the theory.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

56 minutes ago, Shouldve Taken The Black said:

Sorry, didn't realise the title of the OP was “ASOIAF is actually sci-fi. Discuss.

 

All that stuff actually proves my point. There are a myriad of reasons why Mors, a bannerman of the Starks, would know the staff of Winterfell, he’s probably been there multiple times. Probably eaten many kinds of pie there too. But PJ decides that this is proof that he’s lying, therefore he must hold Osha captive…etc. Leap after leap to get where he wants to go.

 

The meal the cook in Dorne made would take some time…therefore he must have been informed by Qyburn. Huge leaps there. Doran will have his own informers, may have been told in advance by Cersei or Tywin that the skull was on it’s way… Again, assumptions and conjecture.

 

He does what many people do, which is to decide what he thinks is happening or should happening, and then search for things that can in some way be used to confirm it. Like I said, it’s not unusual for people to do that, but it can be frustrating when people cite such things as “proof” that no-one else noticed. The reason others didn’t notice is because it’s not proof at all.

 

I think you missed the point. Let's just take the pie. Mors says the "last time he was at WF" he had a great steak and kidney pie. This is a lie, and we know 100% it's a lie. So please explain to me, why do you think he lied about the pie?

[Shouldve Taken The Black]

22 minutes ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

I think you missed the point. Let's just take the pie. Mors says the "last time he was at WF" he had a great steak and kidney pie. This is a lie, and we know 100% it's a lie. So please explain to me, why do you think he lied about the pie?

I don’t think he did lie. We don’t know exactly what he ate at Winterfell while he was there, just some of what he ate at the feast. My point though, is that there could be many explanations for why he got it wrong, if he did, which he didn’t necessarily.

There’s also many reasons why he would know the staff of Winterfell.

Connecting the dots in these ways is just an example of someone deciding what they think and then searching for things in the books that they can twist to confirm them. We all do it to a certain degree, but it’s infuriating when this method is used to the degree that Preston Jacobs does.

[Snoop Arryn]

I've lurked through this whole thread today, and I just have a few thoughts...

To the OP: I do enjoy all of PJ's videos and I'm a subscriber to his YT channel. That said, I think I believe in very few of them. (Honestly the pink letter video may be the only one I can agree with...). Preston Jacobs does take a lot of leaps when he comes up with his theories and there is nothing wrong with that. It doesn't make them wrong, but it does open them up to simple refutations. The format by which he presents his theories makes it easy go on these leaps with him. By the end of a 10 min video, you have gone on this long, thought-provoking journey about a certain topic, and you may fail to realize that the one assumption you made 30 seconds into the video wasn't a great assumption based on the text. And that makes the whole train of logic derail to an extent. Discussion forums like this one make it easier to flesh out things like that.

And a second thought to everyone: A common debate practice for lawyers or anyone wanting to be a better debater is to try and argue "the other side." I think that logic can applied to theories. If you are trying to decide if you subscribe to a theory; gather your support for it first, and then honestly try to refute it. If you're honest with yourself, you should be able to determine which side of the coin was easier to support with textual evidence. Maybe you find pages of quotes supporting your theory and 1 or 2 refutations, or maybe you find only a few quotes supporting it, but many refutations. After you complete this exercise, you can always still support a theory that may not hold up if you want to or enjoy it, just recognize the refutations where appropriate. This exercise is why I believe very strongly in R+L=J, it is easy to support and very hard to offer alternatives or refutations by comparison. (Haters will just say that's a theory being "too obvious," and to them I'd say that just means you don't want it to be true. The idea of something being "too obvious" is a logical myth based on gut feelings.)

 

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

53 minutes ago, Snoop Arryn said:

I've lurked through this whole thread today, and I just have a few thoughts...

To the OP: I do enjoy all of PJ's videos and I'm a subscriber to his YT channel. That said, I think I believe in very few of them. (Honestly the pink letter video may be the only one I can agree with...). Preston Jacobs does take a lot of leaps when he comes up with his theories and there is nothing wrong with that. It doesn't make them wrong, but it does open them up to simple refutations. The format by which he presents his theories makes it easy go on these leaps with him. By the end of a 10 min video, you have gone on this long, thought-provoking journey about a certain topic, and you may fail to realize that the one assumption you made 30 seconds into the video wasn't a great assumption based on the text. And that makes the whole train of logic derail to an extent. Discussion forums like this one make it easier to flesh out things like that.

And a second thought to everyone: A common debate practice for lawyers or anyone wanting to be a better debater is to try and argue "the other side." I think that logic can applied to theories. If you are trying to decide if you subscribe to a theory; gather your support for it first, and then honestly try to refute it. If you're honest with yourself, you should be able to determine which side of the coin was easier to support with textual evidence. Maybe you find pages of quotes supporting your theory and 1 or 2 refutations, or maybe you find only a few quotes supporting it, but many refutations. After you complete this exercise, you can always still support a theory that may not hold up if you want to or enjoy it, just recognize the refutations where appropriate. This exercise is why I believe very strongly in R+L=J, it is easy to support and very hard to offer alternatives or refutations by comparison. (Haters will just say that's a theory being "too obvious," and to them I'd say that just means you don't want it to be true. The idea of something being "too obvious" is a logical myth based on gut feelings.)

 

I agree with everything you said here. But I want to point out that I used to watch PJ videos purely for some of the connections, because I thought most of his conclusions were crackpot. But the more I analyzed the text, the more I realized PJ is correct a lot of the time (in my opinion).

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

1 hour ago, Shouldve Taken The Black said:

I don’t think he did lie. We don’t know exactly what he ate at Winterfell while he was there, just some of what he ate at the feast. My point though, is that there could be many explanations for why he got it wrong, if he did, which he didn’t necessarily.

 

There’s also many reasons why he would know the staff of Winterfell.

 

Connecting the dots in these ways is just an example of someone deciding what they think and then searching for things in the books that they can twist to confirm them. We all do it to a certain degree, but it’s infuriating when this method is used to the degree that Preston Jacobs does.

 

We know he lied about the pie because there was no steak and kidney pie at all. The pie was venison. Occam's Razor (which I usually don't use in an argument) says he lied. I think the pie lie is a big red flag from GRRM to the readers saying "hey, look over here, a clue to what is going on". I could be wrong, but it seems pretty straightforward to me. Like if it turns out he was just wrong about the pie and remembered incorrectly, my reaction would be "fuck you George".

[Ferocious Veldt Roarer]

1 hour ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

My point was that the common woman could herself be a dragon seed and we would have no way to know. And Lynesse is not just a "pretty blonde". She is specifically said to look a bit like Dany. And Alerie has silver hair and isn't very old. Those are the only descriptions of Hightowers we have.

And, as I pointed out before, it's very little. Actually, as you'll see in a moment, it's even littler than it originally seemed.

Lynesse looking like Dany is an opinion of one man, who coincidentally happens to be in love with both of them. We have, however, another description of her looks, and we'll get to it shortly.

Alerie's silver hair. Littlefinger is five to ten years her younger and has silver streaks in his hair, Ser Vardis Egen is six-to-fourteen years her older and has gone completely silver, so Lady Alerie going gray at her age is perfectly plausible. Notably, the trademarked Targ hair aren't "silver", they're "silver-gold". Silver hair are all over the place, silver-gold only on Targaryen heads. Is Lady Alerie's hair silver-gold? Nope.

Oh, but Lynesse has hair, too! As Dacey Mormont notices, "She had hair like spun gold, that Lynesse. Skin like cream". Spun gold. No Targ in the history of Targness had hair like spun gold. Actually, only four people in the books had hair like spun gold. Joffrey, Cersei, Jaime, and Lynesse Hightower. Oh, and the lady from Jaime's dream, if she counts (probably his mother). Look it up. So if anything, she doesn't look like a Targaryen, she looks like a Lannister.

1 hour ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

He's not inventing things, he's coming up with explanations to show the theory is at least possible. That's how theories work. When you are presented a part of the story where we lack enough info to definitively say what happened, you need to at least show that none of the info we have totally refutes the theory.

I would formulate that slightly differently: he conjures new entities that are essential to prevent his theory from immediate collapse, yet are unproven.

[Ferocious Veldt Roarer]

1 hour ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

I think you missed the point. Let's just take the pie. Mors says the "last time he was at WF" he had a great steak and kidney pie. This is a lie, and we know 100% it's a lie. So please explain to me, why do you think he lied about the pie?

One step back, if you please. How do we know (and "100%" at that) that it was a lie?

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

10 minutes ago, Ferocious Veldt Roarer said:

One step back, if you please. How do we know (and "100%" at that) that it was a lie?

Like I mentioned above, we have Bran's pov from the last time Mors was in WF, and the pie was venison, not steak and kidney.

[Gertrude]

Assuming that Mors or George (or Bran) didn't just mis-remember, what purpose does the lie serve?

[WilliamDhalgren]

We know Tyrion is literally 2 people fused together in the womb because of his eyes. That's how it works in real life.

and that's the second example where PJ is wrong about genetics; for eg., mosaicism is more common than chimerism as a cause of complete heterochromia. And Tyrion sure could have mutations. So yeah he can be a chimera, but its not actually a given, nor something we know to be true.

The other example is the central theory of the thread; I tried digging further about it after my previous comment, and the problem is different than what I expected; it could I think work for non-sex linked (autosomal) trait, but as far as I can see, dominant or recessive, an X-linked gene is ALWAYS FULLY EXPRESSED in males! So if a recessive X-linked trait - say dragon-something - is expressed only in females homozygous for the allele (ie having 2 copies), it will still always be fully expressed in all males, as they are hemizygous.

Closest you could get with one trait is kinda the inverse of his theory; if dragon-something gene and nondragon gene are say codominant (like A and B blood types) or incompletely dominant, and sex-linked, then all males with one copy of the gene would fully express the trait, same as what a woman with 2 copies would express, and those women with just one copy of the dragon trait and one copy of the non-dragon trait could have some kind of a mixed phenotype. .

So if you say the mixed phenotype is dragonriders that can't hatch eggs, then males would hatch dragon eggs, as would the females PJ identified, but females with 2 different genes would only be dragonriders. Too many hatchers for what PJ needs, including all of his male dragonriders. If the mixed phenotype is otoh dragonhatches, then only the females that DON'T have 2 copies but only one could hatch dragon eggs!

I find it hard to think dragonriding is the full trait and dragonhatching some kind of mixed trait, in between not being able to ride a dragon and being able to do so, or alternatively somehow including both fully (? what is that; these aren't colors of fur or flowers to have spots of both?) but I guess it can work in analogy to the AB blood type - except as far as I can see, for this PJ's theory needs to be inverse of what he wants it to be.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_linkage



I don't think any SF writer would fail to check his nifty genetic theory can actually work before building so much on top of it; its poor writing to set such intricate scientific expectations in the reader, but then just collapse under scrutiny. I think this should be enough to bury the theory in this thread, unless ofc I'm again missing something in terms of genetics...

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

1 minute ago, WilliamDhalgren said:

and that's the second example where PJ is wrong about genetics; for eg., mosaicism is more common than chimerism as a cause of complete heterochromia. And Tyrion sure could have mutations. So yeah he can be a chimera, but its not actually a given, nor something we know to be true.

The other example is the central theory of the thread; I tried digging further about it after my previous comment, and the problem is different than what I expected; it could I think work for non-sex linked (autosomal) trait, but as far as I can see, dominant or recessive, an X-linked gene is ALWAYS FULLY EXPRESSED in males! So if a recessive X-linked trait - say dragon-something - is expressed only in females homozygous for the allele (ie having 2 copies), it will still always be fully expressed in all males, as they are hemizygous.

Closest you could get with one trait is kinda the inverse of his theory; if dragon-something gene and nondragon gene are say codominant (like A and B blood types) or incompletely dominant, and sex-linked, then all males with one copy of the gene would fully express the trait, same as what a woman with 2 copies would express, and those women with just one copy of the dragon trait and one copy of the non-dragon trait could have some kind of a mixed phenotype. .

So if you say the mixed phenotype is dragonriders that can't hatch eggs, then males would hatch dragon eggs, as would the females PJ identified, but females with 2 different genes would only be dragonriders. Too many hatchers for what PJ needs, including all of his dragonriders. If the mixed phenotype is otoh dragonhatches, then only the females that DON'T have 2 copies but only one could hatch dragon eggs!

I find it hard to think dragonriding is the full trait and dragonhatching some kind of mixed trait, in between not being able to ride a dragon and being able to do so, or alternatively somehow including both fully (? what is that; these aren't colors of fur or flowers to have spots of both?) but I guess it can work in analogy to the AB blood type - except as far as I can see, for this PJ's theory needs to be inverse of what he wants it to be.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_linkage



I don't think any SF writer would fail to check his nifty genetic theory can actually work before building so much on top of it; its poor writing to set such intricate scientific expectations in the reader, but then just collapse under scrutiny. I think this should be enough to bury the theory in this thread, unless ofc I'm again missing something in terms of genetics...

I think you are trying to apply super complicated science to simplified sci-fi.

But that other point you made about mosaicism is good to know, I was ignorant. But we do know Maelys the Monstrous was a chimera.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

38 minutes ago, Gertrude said:

Assuming that Mors or George (or Bran) didn't just mis-remember, what purpose does the lie serve?

What purpose does it serve for the character? Or for GRRM? The character probably doesn't need to lie at all, but I imagine Mors is probably keeping Rickon a secret for now and doesn't want to tell anyone he has Rickon and Osha, so he came up with a little excuse for why he knows those 2 people in particular. George made the character lie, I think, to be a red flag to the reader saying, "hey look over here, a clue to the plot"

[Ferocious Veldt Roarer]

46 minutes ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

Like I mentioned above, we have Bran's pov from the last time Mors was in WF, and the pie was venison, not steak and kidney.

Well, actually we have Bran remembering "course after course after course", so it's entirely possible that one, or two dozen, of them would slip his attention. However, assuming that indeed, the kidney-and-steak pie was not, in fact, served at the harvest feast at Winterfell - what of it?

And further assuming that Crowfood Umber lied deliberately - what for? Is this a test, one of the "now you should correct me" variety? Then there's no one around who would correct him, because neither real Arya, nor Jeyne Poole (nor Theon Greyjoy, BTW) were there. It would make a perfect crime, actually: "I'll say in a tent full of people that I had a steak and kidney pie, while I did not have a steak and kidney pie, and I'll get away with this, mwahahaha!". The Crowfood could take to his grave the sweet knowledge that he managed to fool everyone, including Stannis Baratheon. But that has little bearing on the plot.

It's a lot more believable that George, writing the chapter for TWOW, didn't bother with double-checking it against ACOK.

[Gertrude]

1 minute ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

What purpose does it serve for the character? Or for GRRM? The character probably doesn't need to lie at all,

Exactly. There is no point to the lie. It serves zero purpose and looks much more like a slip up than a clue. GRRM isn't immune to letting small details get away from him.

[Snoop Arryn]

1 hour ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

I agree with everything you said here. But I want to point out that I used to watch PJ videos purely for some of the connections, because I thought most of his conclusions were crackpot. But the more I analyzed the text, the more I realized PJ is correct a lot of the time (in my opinion).

This is where you're losing people on this thread I think. At this point in the story, on just about every theory he's put out here, no one can say that he is either correct or wrong with certainty. That is why these are theories. We can argue whether or not his position is supported by the text, and maybe that's is what you meant. (in which case, apologies for arguing semantics.)

PJ's videos are often full of textual support and hints for small things or initial ideas, the problems arise when PJ then compounds these things into large grand theories that require assumptions or leaps in logic to get from the starting text to the conclusion he's drawing. And often those assumptions or leaps in logic are easier to refute than to support. 

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

5 minutes ago, Snoop Arryn said:

This is where you're losing people on this thread I think. At this point in the story, on just about every theory he's put out here, no one can say that he is either correct or wrong with certainty. That is why these are theories. We can argue whether or not his position is supported by the text, and maybe that's is what you meant. (in which case, apologies for arguing semantics.)

PJ's videos are often full of textual support and hints for small things or initial ideas, the problems arise when PJ then compounds these things into large grand theories that require assumptions or leaps in logic to get from the starting text to the conclusion he's drawing. And often those assumptions or leaps in logic are easier to refute than to support. 

Yeah, of course I'm not certain PJ is correct about any particular theory. Even PJ fully admits in every video how wrong he could be. But your criticism of PJ is, no offense, stereotypical and in my opinion, not accurate. You're making these big generalizations about his videos, but if you actually try to pick apart any particular PJ theory, they actually hold up well under scrutiny. And yes, plenty of people will disagree with me on that point.

[WilliamDhalgren]

Ah, I really add litte further science that PJ's theory isn't already invoking; PJ has a sex-linked recessive trait as the centerpiece of the theory, and considers how such a trait would manifest in males, and how in females.

I just note that in real life, it always fully manifests in males just like in females with 2 copies, as opposed to what PJ thinks, that it manifests in males like in females with 1 copy.

Yet that basically footnote to this construction is a step too far? Hasn't a writer writing about sex-linked genes and their dominance and their inheritance already invited readers to consider such science?

Rest is just me struggling to nevertheless construct PJ's result as close as I can. And its not too far away actually; just make your dragonhatching females have one and not two copies. Wouldn't a writer be able to construct the family tree correctly under that constraint too?

I'd submit that, if you'd go into this nerdy topic as an experienced SF writer in the first place, at the very least you could do it right.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

14 minutes ago, Gertrude said:

Exactly. There is no point to the lie. It serves zero purpose and looks much more like a slip up than a clue. GRRM isn't immune to letting small details get away from him.

This isn't really an argument, but I wholeheartedly disagree. I give it a 99% chance of being a clue and a 1% chance of being a GRRM mistake. That's just my opinion. But if you want to take evidence from the text and say "that's not evidence, it's probably author error" I have no way argue against that, and I think it's kind of a silly assumption. Yes he has made little slip ups before, but nothing similar to this, in my opinion. And you said the lie serves zero purpose right after I gave you a potential purpose. But I guess just go ahead and ignore everything I say.

[Snoop Arryn]

6 minutes ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

Yeah, of course I'm not certain PJ is correct about any particular theory. Even PJ fully admits in every video how wrong he could be. But your criticism of PJ is, no offense, stereotypical and in my opinion, not accurate. You're making these big generalizations about his videos, but if you actually try to pick apart any particular PJ theory, they actually hold up well under scrutiny. And yes, plenty of people will disagree with me on that point.

This is purely opinion and you're welcome to have that particular opinion. I however don't buy that. I am indeed making generalizations about his videos because most of his theories have been thoroughly refuted on these forums for a while. If I had a little more time at the moment, I could find plenty of old threads on here. But for now, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree.