Do you believe Preston Jacobs' explanation for dragon riding?

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

10 minutes ago, Ser Scott Malkinson said:

I like Preston's videos and I thoroughly enjoyed this theory.

Having said that though... there are a lot of holes in this theory, and even though he does a pretty good job coming up with possible explanations for these, the evidence for it is rather thin and based on a lot of conjecture. For example, the Hightowers are explained to have the Valyrian look, and therefore are possible carriers of the dragon-X gene because Jorah says Lynesse kinda looks like Daenerys, which could also be explained by Jorah now having a thing for Daenerys (Jorah: the original pedobear). Plus, her hair is golden blonde, not platinum blonde like the Targs have. His second reason is that Alerie Hightower, Mace Tyrell's wife, cannot possibly have grey hair at around age 40, which is plain not true. My father was grey before he was 25. It is especially more likely for your hair to turn grey early if your hair is blonde, like the Hightowers according to Preston all have from these two examples.

I think what you consider to be weak evidence is actually very strong evidence. We are only given the physical descriptions of 2 Hightowers, and they are 2/2 on having at least potentially Valyrian features. And the point wasn't that it's impossible for a 40 year old woman to have silver hair. The point is that it's not impossible, but it is less common. It is ambiguous, so that we don't catch it, because GRRM is a sneaky bastard. Yes, it is possible for a 40 year old woman to have silver hair. However, he doesn't even say her age. He just mentions in that moment that she is younger than her husband, who's age is mentioned somewhere else in the story. So the first time we read it, we don't think anything is amiss about her hair color, but if we saw the same scene on TV we might be like "wow look at that lady's hair". In a story where GRRM is trying to fool us and not make anything super obvious, I think that is fairly strong evidence they have Valyrian origins.

[lujo]

5 hours ago, Ferocious Veldt Roarer said:

GRRM doesn't write a story about Mendelian inheritance and X-chromosome disorders. GRRM writes a story where "gold always yielded before coal".

That's an ideological statement there, about your own beliefs. Martin is a life-long Science Fiction guy and writing about X-chromosome disorders is right up his alley, honestly.

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Preston suffers - or profits, I don't know - from a compulsion to overcomplicate things).

That's a really nice way of putting it. I'd say he does overcomplicate or read too much into things, but I would be inclined to agree with the whole genetics thing. He could be wrong on it, of course, but, erm, it's quite likely to be the actual fact.

[Ser Scott Malkinson]

1 minute ago, AdesteFideles said:

Yes, it's about made-up fantasy-land genetics that have little resemblance to the real thing.

 

To be fair, dragon-riding genetics would also be made-up fantasy-land genetics that have little resemblance to the real thing.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

4 minutes ago, AdesteFideles said:

Yes, it's about made-up fantasy-land genetics that have little resemblance to the real thing.

Or so GRRM has led you to believe

[Ferocious Veldt Roarer]

1 hour ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

I would like to see your evidence that GRRM doesn't write a story about Mendalian inheritance and X-chromosome disorders. There are people with webbed hands and feet in the story. Genetics is presented as a key part of the story in book 1 as you pointed out, and "gold always yielded before coal" at least with a limited sample of one family line going back only 3 centuries, is scientifically sound with Mendelian genetics and black hair being dominant over blonde in real life.

Nope, it's scientifically BS, I believe GRRM himself has admitted as much (can't find the link right now). He also said outright that he doesn't get into genetics when building the story: he's afraid that if he opens that door, then next he'll have to look into the physics of dragon flight, and then it all will fall apart (I won't be surprised if Preston soon makes a video on dragon flight mechanics). Furthermore, he has said, and specifically in the context of genetics, "this is fantasy, not scifi".

(The Lannisters still have the same golden manes as Lann the Clever did, BTW. So clearly in Westeros black is not dominant over blonde). 

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Tyrion and Maelys the Monstrous are chimeras (2 people fused into 1 in the womb). And GRRM is in fact a sci-fi writer. And again, Barth's syndrome is an X-chromosome linked disorder, so I think you are telling me that GRRM picked that name by total coincidence, which I find hard to believe.

There's at least a score famous people named Barth. And one of them an American football player. There's, according to my count, two more Barths in the story, Lord Barth Stark and Barth the brewer, once cuckolded by Theon Greyjoy. Might be there really isn't anything specially meaningful to this name.

(By the way, Septon Barth did not "focus on studying breeding the dragons". It's a false claim - his focus was very wide - but those sure help a theory look better).

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I simply disagree that PJ over complicates things, but I used to think the exact same thing about him before I saw the light.

Oh, OK. In that case, our discussion is pointless and I'm out. I could never make someone unsee the light, and I'm not foolish enough to try again.

44 minutes ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

Sure!

As PJ points out, we are given the physical descriptions of 2 Hightowers. Alerie Hightower is silver-haired and handsome, and she is younger than her husband Mace Tyrell, so her silver hair is probably not due to old age. Lynesse Hightower looks like Dany, according to her husband Jorah.

Oh. That's what "we know the Hightowers have Valyrian features" sums up to. Alerie's silver hair (could be she'd gone grey ahead of schedule, could be she got her mum's hair, could be she got them from her paternal grandmother...). And love-struck Ser Jorah's "she looked a bit like you". What we know for a fact is just that she was blonde and pretty. Which most decidedly is not "pretty telling".
One would think that if the author had wanted to say "the Hightowers have Valyrian looks", he could've done a better job of that.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

10 minutes ago, Lady Lia said:

Not all that many people. Valyrian blood is common, but only a minority of Valyrians were dragonriders, and most of them were in Valyria when the Doom hit. And Lynesse and Alerie's appearance, if related to Valyrian blood at all, can equally well be explained by the later marriage of Rhaena Targaryen into House Hightower.

The argument about the Hightowers plan is circular. Alicent having Valyrian ancestry is required to support the theory of matrilineal inheritance, and you're using the theory of matrilineal inheritance (as understood by the Hightowers) to support Alicent having Valyrian ancestry. There's no problem with the plan if you assume that either parent can pass the gene down.

Only a minority of Valyrians had dragons. That does not necessarily mean that only a minority could ride dragons.

That's a very good point about Rhaena, but I don't think the logic for the theory is circular. The logic is: Alicent having Valyrian ancestry is required to support the theory, so we should look to see if GRRM might have left any clues for this. Those main clues are 1) there are stories of dragons in Westeros from a long time ago, so there must have been dragon hatchers in Westeros. 2) other non-Valyrian people, notably Darkstar, have clearly Valyrian-esque features. 3) the only 2 members of Alicent's family that we have physical descriptions for are ambiguously Valyrian-looking.

[Dex drako]

8 minutes ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

Frankly, and I really don't mean to sound rude, but you have a lot of certainty and little evidence.

Males apparently hatching dragons can be explained by twin sisters or mothers hatching the eggs. there are a couple points in the theory that directly support this, e.g. eggs that are not around hatchers not hatching.

"Jon will ride a dragon" --- that sounds great, I can't wait to see it.

"the whole thing gives me a headache..." --- sorry to hear that

He is obviously thinking about genetics with at least one major character, Tyrion, who has 2 different colored eyes. And again, the entire main plot thread of AGOT, Joffrey's parentage, is fundamentally about genetics.

"fundamentally about genetics" in the abstract big picture view not the this one gene makes this work view.

and if you want to take about people who have "a lot of certainty and little evidence" go back and watch the video again. I'm not the person rewriting the story to make fit what I want it to. because that's exactly what he and you are doing when you say the male egg hatchers have to be a lie  and it was really someone else.

the story as written but GRRM does not agree with this theory in anyway, you have to assume half of what we read is a lie to even make it work,

that's not how you make a theory about someone else work that'ds how you make a fanfic a nd in that way this theory works. you can make a story thast would work that way just not this one. 

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

1 minute ago, Dex drako said:

"fundamentally about genetics" in the abstract big picture view not the this one gene makes this work view.

and if you want to take about people who have "a lot of certainty and little evidence" go back and watch the video again. I'm not the person rewriting the story to make fit what I want it to. because that's exactly what he and you are doing when you say the male egg hatchers have to be a lie  and it was really someone else.

the story as written but GRRM does not agree with this theory in anyway, you have to assume half of what we read is a lie to even make it work,

that's not how you make a theory about someone else work that'ds how you make a fanfic a nd in that way this theory works. you can make a story thast would work that way just not this one. 

I'm sorry, and not trying to be rude, but you are literally just saying I'm wrong with zero points to back it up. So, I'm unconvinced by your non-argument.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

13 minutes ago, Ferocious Veldt Roarer said:

Nope, it's scientifically BS, I believe GRRM himself has admitted as much (can't find the link right now). He also said outright that he doesn't get into genetics when building the story: he's afraid that if he opens that door, then next he'll have to look into the physics of dragon flight, and then it all will fall apart (I won't be surprised if Preston soon makes a video on dragon flight mechanics). Furthermore, he has said, and specifically in the context of genetics, "this is fantasy, not scifi".

A fair point, but I personally think GRRM straight-up lied.

15 minutes ago, Ferocious Veldt Roarer said:

There's at least a score famous people named Barth. And one of them an American football player. There's, according to my count, two more Barths in the story, Lord Barth Stark and Barth the brewer, once cuckolded by Theon Greyjoy. Might be there really isn't anything specially meaningful to this name.

(By the way, Septon Barth did not "focus on studying breeding the dragons". It's a false claim - his focus was very wide - but those sure help a theory look better).

totally fair points

16 minutes ago, Ferocious Veldt Roarer said:

Oh, OK. In that case, our discussion is pointless and I'm out. I could never make someone unsee the light, and I'm not foolish enough to try again.

I was joking. I don't think PJ is right all the time, only when he backs it up with solid evidence

17 minutes ago, Ferocious Veldt Roarer said:

One would think that if the author had wanted to say "the Hightowers have Valyrian looks", he could've done a better job of that.

I think he is purposely obfuscating the fact to make it solvable but not at all obvious, which I consider to be his general strategy with crafting these different mysteries in the books

[AdesteFideles]

1 minute ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

A fair point, but I personally think GRRM straight-up lied.

GRRM will do a lot of things when in discussion with fans. He will avoid direct answers, talk in generalities, or just refuse to answer a question, but he has never "lied" about anything as far as I can ascertain.

Any theory that relies on the author being a "liar" can be immediately and safely ignored.

[Ser Scott Malkinson]

1 minute ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

I think what you consider to be weak evidence is actually very strong evidence. We are only given the physical descriptions of 2 Hightowers, and they are 2/2 on having at least potentially Valyrian features. And the point wasn't that it's impossible for a 40 year old woman to have silver hair. The point is that it's not impossible, but it is less common. It is ambiguous, so that we don't catch it, because GRRM is a sneaky bastard. Yes, it is possible for a 40 year old woman to have silver hair. However, he doesn't even say her age. He just mentions in that moment that she is younger than her husband, who's age is mentioned somewhere else in the story. So the first time we read it, we don't think anything is amiss about her hair color, but if we saw the same scene on TV we might be like "wow look at that lady's hair". In a story where GRRM is trying to fool us and not make anything super obvious, I think that is fairly strong evidence they have Valyrian origins.

So, it is strong evidence that there isn't a lot of evidence? I must really rethink Alleras=Sarella then, it just seems too obvious...

I said Alerie was around 40 because we know she has children in their 20's and Mace is about 43 years old (according to the wiki, so take that with a grain of salt). But she could still be grey if she was younger, she just can't be a lot younger. And Lynesse's hair is a different kind of blonde than the typical Targ hair, as I mentioned, so she doesn't seem to have Valyrian features. Also, as mentioned by Lady Lia, even if they have Targ features, this could come from Rhaena.

Plus, Preston also argues in this series that warging is matrilineal, but the Starks seem to be known for warging direwolves. Of course, Preston argues that this generation gets its warging abilities from their supposed Lothston genes through Cat's mother Minisa Whent (because her father was a Whent?), but what about every Stark who was able to warg before, making the Starks feared for it? And what about Jon? Seems to be more patrilineal than matrilineal...

[Isobel Harper]

2 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

Dragons dying off as they were being born weaker is a generalization made by book characters, and PJ does touch on this in the videos.

True.  Only one dragon was born "stunted."  Her stunted growth could be due to her dragon's hatcher (as one of the videos postulates) having a corrupted/"deformed" dragon-hatching gene.  Or, if Lady Dustin is correct, the maesters might have had something to do with it.

6 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

My conclusion was that PJ is correct about 95% of the time (as far as I can tell), and I feel like a fool for not listening to him sooner on so many things.

I don't know how often he is right, but I do enjoy his videos.  (However, I personally agree with PJ with regard to this video series.  This is my favorite series!)

6 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

but I will summarize here: dragon riding ability is basically an X-chromosome linked genetic disorder.

Little correction.  I don't think he describes the gene as being a "disorder."

54 minutes ago, Dex drako said:

tryed to watch the videos but couldn't make it throught the first video for how wrong it is.....

it only takes a quick wiki dive to see the whole theory is wrong. I mean there have been males targs that have hatched dragon eggs so it can't be a female only thing.

Twin sisters and/or mothers with two dragon X genes would be able to hatch the eggs.  This is stated at various times in the video series.

55 minutes ago, Dex drako said:

A bigger in world problem for this is Jon will ride a dragon but if you believe this theory there is zero chance of that because he could only get that gene from having a targ mother.

This is clarified in a later video.  The warging gene may be able to substitute the dragon gene (if in fact the dragon-X and warging-X genes are not the same gene).  If R+L, Jon would receive a warging gene from Lyanna , making him capable of riding a dragon.  If Ashara+Stark, then Jon would receive a dragon gene from his (Valyrian-descended) Dayne mother.

59 minutes ago, Dex drako said:

a dany that is the mad kings daughter is the product of at least 4 generatoins of in breeding, she shares something like 75 to 80+ persent of her genes with her parents. there's nothing new in her make up to make her a speaicl egge hatcher but a Dany born of R+L she woulf have the warg x gene.

Again, this is explained in one of the videos.  Aerys and Rhaelle both had one dragon*-X gene, enough to ride, but not to hatch.  (Only one of their parents had an dragon*-X gene.)  They passed on two dragon*-X genes to Daenerys.  OR, if R+L=D, Daenerys received one dragon*-X gene from Rhaegar and one from Lyanna.  (* or warging-X gene?) 

@OP:

Valyrian people(s) and dragons having been in Westeros before the Targaryens is not a new theory, at all.  We are currently discussing this very same thing in LML's most recent thread.
http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?/topic/143922-dragonslords-in-westeros-in-the-dawn-age-how-azor-ahai-came-to-westeros/  If anyone would like to research the topic, I recommend reading/listening to LML's work or searching anything in relation to "Proto-Valyrians."

 

[Universal Sword Donor]

No and mostly because it's a PJ video. That man could extrapolate an Orwellian dystopia out of a rock stuck in a stream.

[Gertrude]

51 minutes ago, Isobel Harper said:

Twin sisters and/or mothers with two dragon X genes would be able to hatch the eggs.  This is stated at various times in the video series.

Haven't watched the video, but I've seen this come up a few times. Why specifically a twin sister?

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

16 minutes ago, Gertrude said:

Haven't watched the video, but I've seen this come up a few times. Why specifically a twin sister?

They give eggs to babies in the cradle, so when Targs are twins, a twin sister is physically close to both eggs. Similarly, a mother would often be around her children's eggs and hatch them, like Rhaenyra.

[Dex drako]

58 minutes ago, Isobel Harper said:

This is clarified in a later video.  The warging gene may be able to substitute the dragon gene (if in fact the dragon-X and warging-X genes are not the same gene).  If R+L, Jon would receive a warging gene from Lyanna , making him capable of riding a dragon.  If Ashara+Stark, then Jon would receive a dragon gene from his (Valyrian-descended) Dayne mother.

Again, this is explained in one of the videos.  Aerys and Rhaelle both had one dragon*-X gene, enough to ride, but not to hatch.  (Only one of their parents had an dragon*-X gene.)  They passed on two dragon*-X genes to Daenerys.  OR, if R+L=D, Daenerys received one dragon*-X gene from Rhaegar and one from Lyanna.  (* or warging-X gene?) 

@OP:

Valyrian people(s) and dragons having been in Westeros before the Targaryens is not a new theory, at all.  We are currently discussing this very same thing in LML's most recent thread.
http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?/topic/143922-dragonslords-in-westeros-in-the-dawn-age-how-azor-ahai-came-to-westeros/  If anyone would like to research the topic, I recommend reading/listening to LML's work or searching anything in relation to "Proto-Valyrians."

 

its also just as likely that it was midi-chlorians that had the eggs hatch that is not what the story says happened. if we're going to start disregarding the story that much there is no point in having this conversation.

the whole theory is BS, there 23 chromosomes to make a human hair color is controlled by like 3 of them. the idea that dragon riding/warging  is controlled by one one of them and that its the female only one at that doesn't and it shows. just look at knots this "theory had to tie itself into to make the story work. suddenly warging powers have nothing to do with the stark lines it from like three generations back.

its insane.

its Occam's razor and this theory fails, it disregards far to much of the story and what it replaces it with is so complex that it could never be true. warging and dragon riding have something to do with genes this is for sure, but to say they're the same single gene that runs through the female line just isn't backed up by the story.

1 hour ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

I'm sorry, and not trying to be rude, but you are literally just saying I'm wrong with zero points to back it up. So, I'm unconvinced by your .

that's funny because my argument is very clear this theory disregards the story in favor of make up fact out nothing as it pleases. your problem seems to be you don't want to hear decent you've just convinced yourself the "theory" is ture and you won't hear anything else.

 

[Dex drako]

24 minutes ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

They give eggs to babies in the cradle, so when Targs are twins, a twin sister is physically close to both eggs. Similarly, a mother would often be around her children's eggs and hatch them, like Rhaenyra.

you see this is the biggest piece of Fanfic BS, don't like what the story says just make stuff up

[Universal Sword Donor]

I still don't believe one whiff of this.

1 hour ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

They give eggs to babies in the cradle, so when Targs are twins, a twin sister is physically close to both eggs. Similarly, a mother would often be around her children's eggs and hatch them, like Rhaenyra.

Then why would one twin get a dragon and the other wouldn't? Rhaena and Baela would beg to differ with your theory.

[Lady Lia]

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

Only a minority of Valyrians had dragons. That does not necessarily mean that only a minority could ride dragons.

That's a very good point about Rhaena, but I don't think the logic for the theory is circular. The logic is: Alicent having Valyrian ancestry is required to support the theory, so we should look to see if GRRM might have left any clues for this. Those main clues are 1) there are stories of dragons in Westeros from a long time ago, so there must have been dragon hatchers in Westeros. 2) other non-Valyrian people, notably Darkstar, have clearly Valyrian-esque features. 3) the only 2 members of Alicent's family that we have physical descriptions for are ambiguously Valyrian-looking.

Specifically the claim that Alicent's family must have expected her to produce a male dragonrider, used as evidence for Alicent having Valyrian ancestry, is circular. The three clues you give here are valid evidence, albeit not particularly strong. Additionally, if Alicent was known or suspected to have dragonrider genes, it seems strange that that was never (so far as we know) brought up in favour of Viserys' marriage to her.

I'm not clear on what the theory is being put forward to explain in the first place. All the known dragonrider genealogy fits better, requiring fewer suppositions, with the hypothesis that either parent can pass along the gene.

[Hodor the Articulate]

I don't take note of anything PJ comes up with.

We're talking about a series where no Lannister-Baratheon union has ever resulted in a non-black haired kid, and incest gives you exceedingly attractive kids. I doubt GRRM was recalling highschool biology when he was deciding who got to ride magical beasts.