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Old 09-01-2019, 07:52 AM   #51
Randyman
 
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Default Re: Elven maturation and population growth

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Originally Posted by Flyndaran View Post
"Race mixing" is a very different kettle of fish to species mixing. Not that any of that matters for overtly magical creatures like elves and even heroic human populations. That whole half elf thing of getting to choose whether to follow the fate of man or elf means even early 20th century genetics may not exist in Tolkien reality.

But even deleterious genes can get easily fixed in small populations. LotR world never seemed very populated to me.
Also bad or neutral genes can go along for the ride with some truly beneficial genes which I'd assume elves would pass on.
Some recent analysis suggests we inherited some negative genes from neanderthals along with the useful immune system ones, for example.
Bolded for emphasis.

Trying to apply real-world biology to any mythical setting, such a Tolkein's MIddle-Earth, leads to nonsensical results. Especially because magic is the rules-breaker - even when magic follows its own rules, it breaks the physical rules we all know from the world outside our front door.
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Old 09-01-2019, 07:58 AM   #52
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Default Re: Elven maturation and population growth

In general, for most full fantasy settings, I'd agree whole heartedly. But LotR, at least to me, seems like the last hurrah of a heroic age as reality starts falling to more historic if exaggerated realism.
I think Tolkien would have, if not appreciated, at least not despised us considering a bit of the real world sciences creeping into some aspects of the setting.
Also as with all things gaming and internet, it's fun to consider and BS ourselves about fiction. :)
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Old 09-01-2019, 09:51 AM   #53
David Johnston2
 
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Default Re: Elven maturation and population growth

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Originally Posted by malloyd View Post
But the vast majority of them, including the royals, probably inherited no genes whatsoever from that ancestor. .
As an island dwelling people who would rarely find pure humans to be attractive that would probably not true even if Tolkien thought in terms of genes.
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Old 09-01-2019, 10:32 AM   #54
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It’s fairly standard to depict elves as having very low fertility, which often coincides with a weak sex drive; these two together can readily explain why elven populations grow slowly (or not at all, provided enough elves die to negate the births). As elves are often depicted as androgynous, a humorous twist would be to have them be more attracted to species with more pronounced sexual dimorphism than to other elves (hence there being so many half-elves running around). I recall a manga that had this as something of a minor plot point. There existed a quasi-religious schism amongst elven men after they had encountered humans - the traditionalists extolled the virtues of small breasts, the reformers the appeal of large breasts (and IIRC called for interracial couplings to introduce “large breasts” genes into the elven gene pool).

The female elves were not amused.
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Old 09-01-2019, 11:36 AM   #55
Anthony
 
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Default Re: Elven maturation and population growth

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Originally Posted by Flyndaran View Post
"Race mixing" is a very different kettle of fish to species mixing.
Well, mostly just a matter of degree. Different species have less similarity than different 'races' (though if crossbreeding is possible at all they're pretty similar) but other than that there's the same general gene swapping going on.

On the other hand, there's no reason to think Tolkien's elves even had genes, let alone human-like genetics.
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Old 09-01-2019, 02:13 PM   #56
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Default Re: Elven maturation and population growth

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Originally Posted by Flyndaran View Post
I think Tolkien would have, if not appreciated, at least not despised us considering a bit of the real world sciences creeping into some aspects of the setting.
Tolkien did a lot of it himself. He went a long way toward rationalizing his mythology. Instead of a flat world without a sun and moon, there was a globe and Melkor covered the world with dark clouds to blot out the sun and moon. Stuff like that. He eventually abandoned it, probably because it took away all the mythic quality of the work.

Tolkien wrote essays on elf maturation, marriage, and child-bearing, which some of this discussion has drawn upon. Far from simply not despising this, he actively wrote about it. But he also knew when to stop scientificating it.
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Old 09-01-2019, 06:31 PM   #57
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Default Re: Elven maturation and population growth

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But the vast majority of them, including the royals, probably inherited no genes whatsoever from that ancestor.
It's a matter of what proportion Elros made up of the initial population, since everybody will have been descended from him through multiple lines. As long as the number of genes in the genome is larger than the original population the expected number of genes inherited from Elros in a random selection from the gene pool is greater than one.

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And a gene rendering you beardless doesn't seem like a great candidate for one that increases your reproductive success enough to competitively fix in a population either.
No, it doesn't. Besides, I have a vague impression of a description of an ancient statue of a Gondorian king which mentions his beard (and not as a remarkable thing for him to have). I tried checking the descriptions of Isildur and Anarion at the Rauros, but that wasn't it. Anyway, I'm far from convinced that (whatever he may have put in speculative notes and abandoned drafts) Tolkien said in any work he chose to publish that the Dunedain have no beards. I can't even recall a statement that he chose to publish that elves have no beards.
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Old 09-01-2019, 11:41 PM   #58
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Default Re: Elven maturation and population growth

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Tolkien did a lot of it himself. He went a long way toward rationalizing his mythology. Instead of a flat world without a sun and moon, there was a globe and Melkor covered the world with dark clouds to blot out the sun and moon. Stuff like that. He eventually abandoned it, probably because it took away all the mythic quality of the work.
He never entirely abandoned it, part of the problem was that he was getting older and no longer had the energy and focus to rewrite it all. But he was quite well aware of the problems that arose from the change in the nature of the story.

His 'legendarium' started out as a 'fictional myth', specifically myth, to sort of fill the void created by the loss of the Anglo-Saxon mythologies in the Conquest. As such, flat earths and ages lit only by starlight made sense because it was 'fictional fiction'.

Later, the stories became 'fictional fact', set in a fictionally real past in the same way that most SF is set in a 'fictionally real future'. That required that practical reality had to be more carefully considered, and impossibilities had to be addressed. He was still gradually addressing them when he died.

As far as Elven biology goes, they aren't that different from us. The primary differences are a result of the differences in the nature of our souls, Elves are immortal because of that, not because they have a biological tendency toward immortality as such. Their souls maintain their bodies in a way that ours do not.
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Old 09-02-2019, 10:02 AM   #59
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Default Re: Elven maturation and population growth

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He never entirely abandoned it, part of the problem was that he was getting older and no longer had the energy and focus to rewrite it all. But he was quite well aware of the problems that arose from the change in the nature of the story.

His 'legendarium' started out as a 'fictional myth', specifically myth, to sort of fill the void created by the loss of the Anglo-Saxon mythologies in the Conquest. As such, flat earths and ages lit only by starlight made sense because it was 'fictional fiction'.

Later, the stories became 'fictional fact', set in a fictionally real past in the same way that most SF is set in a 'fictionally real future'. That required that practical reality had to be more carefully considered, and impossibilities had to be addressed. He was still gradually addressing them when he died.
All respect to Tolkien, but I think he addressed impossibilities adequately in The Silmarillion - the Valar are minor deities, Eru Iluvatar is an activist God with a capital G, and Arda was flat, lit at first only by the stars, and physically connected in the extreme west to Valinor/Heaven. Later, after the fall of Numenor, Iluvatar altered the universe, bending Middle-Earth into a round world and making it impossible for any ships but those crewed by Eldar to leave the curved world and sail to Valinor.

It's entirely self-consistent, IMO, and more than adequately explains the questions left - "a God did it" works with fiction in a way it doesn't in our world.
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Old 09-02-2019, 11:48 AM   #60
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Default Re: Elven maturation and population growth

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All respect to Tolkien, but I think he addressed impossibilities adequately in The Silmarillion - the Valar are minor deities, Eru Iluvatar is an activist God with a capital G, and Arda was flat, lit at first only by the stars, and physically connected in the extreme west to Valinor/Heaven. Later, after the fall of Numenor, Iluvatar altered the universe, bending Middle-Earth into a round world and making it impossible for any ships but those crewed by Eldar to leave the curved world and sail to Valinor.

It's entirely self-consistent, IMO, and more than adequately explains the questions left - "a God did it" works with fiction in a way it doesn't in our world.
There's always been more than one Silmarillion. The one that was published was assembled by Christopher Tolkien out of selected writings to produce a semi-coherent narrative, but JRRT was constantly revising it, and even the bits Christopher chose don't match perfectly, as he himself admitted.

JRRT, after he changed the nature of his story, didn't want it set in a 'never never land', to paraphrase something he wrote in correspondence. He wanted it set in an imaginary past of the real world, which left all sorts of issues that had to be addressed.


For ex:

If there was no sunlight for multiple ages of the world , how did the Elves eat? Esp. since during that period, most other life forms were said to be in the 'Sleep of Yavanna' anyway? The Elves have physical bodies and can certainly die of hunger or thirst.

If the Earth was flat, how was there a horizon?

There were all sorts of such issues, arising from the change in the nature of the story.

Tolkien was gradually revising the Silmarillion, which started out as 'fictional fiction', into something compatible with 'fictional fact', but age kept him from ever finishing the project.
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