Re: Why were the Atreides such a threat?
Posted: 23 Dec 2011 15:46
Yes but that was after they moved.
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Yup, this was part of the plan and why the rest of the landsraad looked the other way when House Atreides was attacked.Zedwardson wrote:Also I did not see it mentioned (Sorry if I missed it), but the Atreides were left with worn out spice equipment that was about to fall apart, and between breakdowns and buying new parts, the profit of spice mining would fall, and spice mining production shortfalls would damage many great houses CHOAM profits, and that would reduce the popularity of Duke Atreides greatly.
This is surely a late reply; however, I'm glad to have found a reference to Machiavelli on the forum. It may be that Frank Herbert knew Machiavelli's works quite well. Some of the evidence is presented in an essay in a collection titled Political Science Fiction. The author describes some of the similarities between the uses of religion in the Dune series and those recommended in Machiavelli's writings. One of the problems Machiavelli concerns himself with is that of "the unarmed prophet," and it seems his analysis of the political uses of religion are the "arms" of an unarmed prophet, arms for "spiritual warfare," as it were. Well, just the other day, I looked up the meaning of "panoplia," the first word of the title of the Panoplia Prophetica. In its widest sense, it refers to all of a Greek hoplite's armor and weaponry, his arms. The Panoplia Prophetica is the arms of the otherwise unarmed prophet. I'll just add that it seems Machiavelli's book, the Discourses on Livy, seems to be Machiavelli's own, real panoplia prophetica, in which much of what he has to say is expressed as if it were merely a commentary on Roman military tactics. For the details, see the Discourses itself and Machiavelli's New Modes and Orders, by Harvey C. Mansfield.Streaksy wrote:Dune-Universe statecraft is so hard to mentally encompass. Maybe if Machiavelli comes to this forum he can help.
I think y'all are looking at it wrong. I think it was part of the plan that knowledge of the Emperor's role in destroying the Atreides get out there into the realm. All the better to intimidate the other Houses going forward. The destruction of the Atreides served as an example served by Shaddam to everyone else with the message being: shut up and go along to get along.SandRider wrote:^^ >> continued ...
all the posts after support the main idea, that Shaddam thought Leto was a serious threat ...
but, as Seamus points out, what is the balance of the threat of Leto versus the threat of the Houses
discovering the Emperor's Hand in the Harkonnen's total destruction of House Atreides ?
I think Paul knew about the ancient schools, but he didn't know what the Bene Gesserit purpose was. His mother didn't tell him and the Bene Gesserit certainly didn't advertise it. You can see that if you complete the quote from that passage:SandRider wrote: one the one hand: yes, it is just a plot-device, the set-up for the Story Frank wanted to Tell ...
the quote I gave above is about a page or so into the book; right after that is Mohiam's statement
about the Butlerian Jihad; in fact, that could be an interesting discussion - how much basic information
about the "universe" did Frank pass out in the first ten pages or so? what I mean is, how far in do
you have to go, knowing what we all know now as the "facts" of the story, before a(n)(intelligent)
reader would have all the necessary framework to understand what was going on?
I'd also like to point out here that in this, Frank was as clumsy as anybody else of his caliber;
{nice caveat, SandRider}[well, thank you, sometimes folks don't fully understand what I'm saying]
{maybe you ought to try a little plainer English ?}[naw, fuck that ... BTW, I think the better word-choice
woulda been "disclaimer" instead of caveat]{Hmmm ... maybe you're right; but neither seem to be
the exact right-word}[I know, I know ... shit like that happens all the time ...]
I would think this would have already been covered in Paul's education, and that"The Great Revolt took away a crutch," she said. "It forced human minds to
develop. Schools were started to train human talents. "
"Bene Gesserit schools?"
She nodded. "We have two chief survivors of those ancient schools: the Bene
Gesserit and the Spacing Guild. The Guild, so we think, emphasizes almost pure
mathematics. Bene Gesserit performs another function."
Frank could have found a subtler way to inform us about the "ancient schools" ...
maybe it's overlooked on a first-read; I don't know, now ...
because now, after reading this first chapter so many times (I think it's my favorite;
I know I've marveled at how almost-perfect it is, the sheer quantity of things that
are introduced, mostly well-done, with a few rougher patches, like this one) I find
this one little exchange grating - almost like a cliched sci-fi gush of information...
She nodded. "We have two chief survivors of those ancient schools: the Bene
Gesserit and the Spacing Guild. The Guild, so we think, emphasizes almost pure
mathematics. Bene Gesserit performs another function."
"Politics," he said.
"Kull wahad!" the old woman said. She sent a hard glance at Jessica.
"I've not told him, Your Reverence," Jessica said.
The Reverend Mother returned her attention to Paul. "You did that on remarkably few clues," she said. "Politics indeed."
I think Jessica doesn't tell Paul about the gom jabbar test because then the test would lose some of its meaning. The testee has to be unaware of what the test consists of in order for it to be fully valid. If you know you have to stick your hand in a box and endure pain, but that your hand is ok, that's worlds different from sticking your hand in a box, experiencing a pain like it's burning off and NOT KNOWING that it actually isn't, and yet still holding your hand inside the box!SandRider wrote: on the other hand, before that:"He's awake and listening to us," said the old woman. "Sly little rascal."
"Sleep well, you sly little rascal," said the old woman. "Tomorrow you'll
need all your faculties to meet my gom jabbar."
Is a gom jabbar something of Arrakis I must know before we go there? he
wondered.
He mouthed her strange words: Gom jabbar . . . Kwisatz Haderach.
There had been so many things to learn.
Paul sat up, hugged his knees. "What's a gom jabbar?"
Again, the training she had given him exposed her almost invisible
hesitation, a nervous betrayal he felt as fear.
Jessica crossed to the window, flung wide the draperies, stared across the
river orchards toward Mount Syubi. "You'll learn about . . . the gom jabbar soon
enough," she said.
He heard the fear in her voice and wondered at it.
Jessica spoke without turning. "Reverend Mother is waiting in my morning
room. Please hurry."
this was excellent, and how it's done; a strange non-English word, a tension-building,
a secret, a secret laced with fear and apprehension ... and in the overall context, the
gom jabbar would not have been something Paul could have known about; not from
Thufir or Duncan or Yueh ... and I think Jessica would have had little to no reason to
tell him about it at this stage of his training; in fact, altho Mohaim tells Jessica "You
know it must be done.", I've always had the feeling that Jessica believed it could have
been done later, after she had further trained Paul; or possibly, depending on the future
unknowns ... not at all ...
but also, does Paul's age, fifteen, have something to do with it ?
if so, then Jessica might have known that day was coming, and prepared Paul as much as she could;
and here is another example of Frank's set-up, establishing Paul's age by Mohiam's comment on how
small he is ... we are informed by the appropriate dialog between characters ...
I don't think the mention of the BG Breeding Program presages the jihad at all. The BG were not controlling ALL of humanity's gene-sharing, just the particular bloodlines they cared about. The real reason for the prevention of gene-mingling was the Guild's monopoly on space travel and the feudal system of the Imperium that discouraged, and largely prevented, off-world travel and emigration by the peons.SandRider wrote: and again : "If only she 'd borne us a girl as she was ordered to do!"
without yet fully understanding the Bene Gesserit Breeding Program, we understand right here
the Witches issue orders to their people regarding the sex of their children, and also, that
Jessica refused that order ... and that the Bene Gesserit took this disobedience in stride ...
possibly ... atleast we know the baby boy Jessica birthed wasn't killed right off, nor was Jessica herself ...
because of her status and the baby boy's feudal rights as a Duke's Son, or because the Bene Gesserit
just don't operate like that ? .... or now ... 15 years later, and we soon learn that the gom jabbar is
potentially fatal, and Jessica shows real fear for her son's life and relief when she re-enters the
room ( My son lives ...), could the entire "human or animal" rationale for the test be subterfuge
to allow The Emperor's Truthsayer inside the Atreides defenses and hold a poisoned needle
to the neck of the Ducal Heir ? (and where the fuck was Hawat when all this was discussed ? is that old
bastard even aware Mohiam is on Caladan ? does he have any idea who Mohiam is ?)
and so on and so forth ...
so ... have a sorta-idea about how Frank thought and worked, I'm thinking that while he straight-out
tells us atleast one of the motivations for Shaddam's desire to destroy Leto, I think he held the
general over-all ideas in his mind so deeply that they "creep out" in the dialog, maybe not even in his
conscious intentions ... I also think Frank liked to fuck with people - how many re-reads did it take
for you to catch that :
was the foreshadowing of the reason for the Jihad, a breaking of the Bene Gesserit's"The original Bene Gesserit school was directed by those who saw the need of a thread of continuity in human affairs. They saw there could be no such continuity without separating human
stock from animal stock -- for breeding purposes."
The old woman's words abruptly lost their special sharpness for Paul. He
felt an offense against what his mother called his instinct for rightness. It
wasn't that Reverend Mother lied to him. She obviously believed what she said.
It was something deeper, something tied to his terrible purpose.
hold on human genes, the "mingling" that itself is never directly spelled out, but only implied ?
there is no way, in the first few pages, to understand the significance of this passage,
unless you are a Top-Notch Intellect with Total and Complete Recall Memory and Extraordinary
Comprehension to reach back to here, in the midst of all the other themes and ideas flying at you,
and remember, oh yeah, Paul thought the Breeding Program was Bogus from day One ...
or some shit like that there ...
SandRider wrote: anyway, I think this topic can be beat to death and re-animated and beat on some more;
for some reason, it catches my attention on several levels ... and will require an assemblage
and analysis of every passage in the first book even remotely related ... and there's alot of
flashback and whatever in Messiah and Children ... Leto II had some opinions, too ...
Yes but hopefully you can see that the BG, the Guild share the same impetus and work together. It's spelled out in the first pages of Dune if I recall correctly.jakoye wrote:The BG were not controlling ALL of humanity's gene-sharing, just the particular bloodlines they cared about. The real reason for the prevention of gene-mingling was the Guild's monopoly on space travel and the feudal system of the Imperium that discouraged, and largely prevented, off-world travel and emigration by the peons.
The text doesn't support this.jakoye wrote:Paul thinks the BG program is wrong because its MORALLY wrong. It violates his Atreides morals. Which brings up another point that Paul was largely limited by his Atreides morals, the "Atreides Code". He could not crush his enemies utterly because of his moral foundation that was imprinted on him from his birth.
But there is no active plan by the Guild and the Bene Gesserit to prevent the widespread inter-mingling of genes among the human race. It's simply a consequence of the planetary feudal system this story takes place in, along with the limited technology that allows the Guild a monopoly on space travel. There's no "plan" there.Outis wrote:Yes but hopefully you can see that the BG, the Guild share the same impetus and work together. It's spelled out in the first pages of Dune if I recall correctly.jakoye wrote:The BG were not controlling ALL of humanity's gene-sharing, just the particular bloodlines they cared about. The real reason for the prevention of gene-mingling was the Guild's monopoly on space travel and the feudal system of the Imperium that discouraged, and largely prevented, off-world travel and emigration by the peons.
The control the BG exert on a few bloodlines is an analogue for the less stringent restrictions on breeding between the divergent human populations subject to the selective pressures particular to each planet and regime.
Paul's role is to bring down both.
You mean your interpretation of the text doesn't support this, not that the "text doesn't support this". That's all we're doing here, interpreting what Frank Herbert wrote. None of us can know "the truth" for the things that are not explicitly spelled out, because we were not in Frank's head.Outis wrote:The text doesn't support this.jakoye wrote:Paul thinks the BG program is wrong because its MORALLY wrong. It violates his Atreides morals. Which brings up another point that Paul was largely limited by his Atreides morals, the "Atreides Code". He could not crush his enemies utterly because of his moral foundation that was imprinted on him from his birth.
To me, it's quite clear that Paul is offended by the BG breeding program because of the BG's hubris and cold-heartedness. They're essentially playing God here and Paul, at this point in his life, thinks that's wrong. Obviously, he changes his mind on a few things later in his life, but don't we all?![after the Rev. Mother Mohiam tells Paul about the Bene Gesserit breeding program]
The old woman's words abruptly lost their special sharpness for Paul. He felt an offence against what his mother called his instinct for rightness. It wasn't that the Reverend Mother lied to him. She obviously believed what she was said. It was something deeper, something tied to his terrible purpose.
He said: "But my mother tells me many Bene Gesserit of the schools don't know their ancestry."
"The genetic lines are always in our records," she said. "Your mother knows that either she's of Bene Gesserit descent or her stock was acceptable in itself."
"Then why couldn't she know who her parents are?"
"Some do... Many don't. We might, for example, have wanted to breed her to a close relative to set up a dominant in some genetic trait. We have many reasons."
Again, Paul felt the offence against rightness. He said: "You take a lot on yourselves."
The Reverend Mother stared at him, wondering: Did I hear criticism in his voice? "We carry a heavy burden," she said.
I disagree. I think if you are raised with a consistent moral code, where everyone around you is showing examples of it and it's not just "for show", a moral code in that case would become instinctual (or near enough that there is little difference). I would agree that nurture matters more than nature when it comes to morals (such as the musings by Count and Lady Fenring on what Feyd-Rautha could have been if he'd been raised an Atreides), but for Paul, the nurture was a consistent indoctrination of the Atreides Code.Outis wrote: A moral code isn't instinctual (as Jessica calls it) or mysterious (as Paul sees it).
Because Paul repeatedly didn't utterly crush his enemies. His refusal to use the paralyzing word on Feyd-Rautha in his duel with him was an example of this. There was absolutely NO REASON for him not to use this advantage other than that it would violate his moral code and sense of "fair play". His generous terms to the Emperor at the end of Dune is another easy example of him taking the boot off the neck of his enemies (and by letting House Corrino off the hook, he set up the danger for his children in Children of Dune), but it's also true that he practiced restraint with the Bene Gesserit and the Guild, even though he knew they plotted against him. He could have crushed the rebellion at any time, but he knew if he did so, that path led to "bad things" (although how things could've turned out worse than they did in Dune Messiah (Chani dead and Paul blinded), we'll never know).Outis wrote: And how do you figure Paul couldn't crush his ennemies? Not only did he do just that but, for all his purported moral code he was worse than Hitler (he says so himself).
I don't think I "fell" for anything. The Atreides are CLEARLY shown as the "good guys" at the beginnings of the first Dune novel. Yes, they're not freedom-loving democrats as we would prefer, but within the Dune universe, they are certainly on the right side of the moral meter, especially in comparison to their enemies. I agree that one of Herbert's points was that there are no perfect leaders and, by extension, no perfect families/nations, but I don't think he was duping us at the beginning. The Atreides WERE the good guys. How the good guys evolved into the "not quite so good guys", and why they had to, is one of the main story arcs of the first four Dune books.Outis wrote: The Atreides were manipulative and brutal despots.
You seem to have fallen for Herbert's narrative bias. I think he intended you to see the trap after you fell for it and learn from your mistake.
In the Dune universe, there are plans (or what looks like plans) no individual has devised or is even conscious of and which are nevertheless implemented by groups.jakoye wrote:But there is no active plan by the Guild and the Bene Gesserit to prevent the widespread inter-mingling of genes among the human race. ... There's no "plan" there.
What then is the "terrible purpose"?jakoye wrote:Thus I maintain that the Bene Gesserit breeding program has nothing to do with the species needing a jihad to shake things up.
Yes. And Herbert clearly wrote "All of this is couched in a form which makes Paul and his people admirable. I am their advocate." and so forth.jakoye wrote:I don't think I "fell" for anything. The Atreides are CLEARLY shown as the "good guys" at the beginnings of the first Dune novel.
Wow. I don't think this is true at all. The BG breeding program produced some remarkable individuals, including Paul, Jessica, Alia, Feyd-Rautha, Count Fenring, Leto II, Ghanima, Farad'n. And many of these were "superhuman" in some ways.Freakzilla wrote:The BG breeding program HELPED the race stagnate.
Then I guess you and I have different definitions of the word "plan". Unless you're invoking "God's plan" here, which I don't think you are.Outis wrote:In the Dune universe, there are plans (or what looks like plans) no individual has devised or is even conscious of and which are nevertheless implemented by groups.jakoye wrote:But there is no active plan by the Guild and the Bene Gesserit to prevent the widespread inter-mingling of genes among the human race. ... There's no "plan" there.
We don't know. Paul doesn't know. We suppose, later on, that his purpose is to unleash the jihad that would allow the inter-mingling of the species, but that may just be Paul imposing that cast to his life as he looks back on it. Oftentimes events happen in our lives and only later we cast them with meaning, even if these events had no meaning at the time.Outis wrote:What then is the "terrible purpose"?jakoye wrote:Thus I maintain that the Bene Gesserit breeding program has nothing to do with the species needing a jihad to shake things up.
I think we agree here more than disagree. Herbert was clearly interested in writing a traditional "coming of age" story and he wrote it well. But he was also interested in showing Act II: what happens after the great hero wins the day? That's what makes the Dune saga so engrossing... we get to see the wonderful rise and revel in that and then also see the meteoric fall and be touched, and chastened, by that.Outis wrote:Yes. And Herbert clearly wrote "All of this is couched in a form which makes Paul and his people admirable. I am their advocate." and so forth.jakoye wrote:I don't think I "fell" for anything. The Atreides are CLEARLY shown as the "good guys" at the beginnings of the first Dune novel.
You're right: we don't know what went on in Herbert's mind. But we know what he said and wrote about it...
I'm not arguing that the race as a whole wasn't stagnant. Herbert clearly sets that out. What I'm arguing against is that the Bene Gesserit breeding program CONTRIBUTED TO that stagnation.Outis wrote:The breeding program produced exceptional individuals. The point was to produce a super-hero.
Yet the "race" as a whole (which the BG apparently neglected or failed to understand) stagnated.
In the Dune universe, the species is more than the sum of its parts.
Your definitions also differ from Herbert's. In the original Dune, he used "plan" in the same way I just did (in one of the appendixes for instance).jakoye wrote:Then I guess you and I have different definitions of the word "plan". Unless you're invoking "God's plan" here, which I don't think you are.
The BG's plan was to openly marry a Harkonned with the Duke's daughter is it not? So such a mating musn't have been all that unlikely.jakoye wrote:What I'm arguing against is that the Bene Gesserit breeding program CONTRIBUTED TO that stagnation.
In fact, it seems to me that the Bene Gesserit breeding program was the only thing that was randomizing the gene pool of the Dune universe. How likely would it otherwise have been for a daughter of Baron Harkonnen to mate with Duke Leto???
Well my definition of a "plan" is the standard one: a plan is a series of actions a person or a group conceives of in order to accomplish a goal. If you're claiming that there was a plan with no human agent, then what else can we call that except "God's hand/plan"?Outis wrote:Your definitions also differ from Herbert's. In the original Dune, he used "plan" in the same way I just did (in one of the appendixes for instance).jakoye wrote:Then I guess you and I have different definitions of the word "plan". Unless you're invoking "God's plan" here, which I don't think you are.
I don't know where you're going by invoking God in this context.
Now reading the text, it seems like the plan referred to here could represent either Paul's plan or God's plan. I guess I lean towards it being Paul's plan, because I'm an atheist, but that may not be what Herbert meant.In the face of these facts, one is led the inescapable conclusion that the inefficient Bene Gesserit behavior in this affair was a product of an even higher plan of which they were completely unaware!
I don't remember seeing that anywhere in the book. The plan was to MATE the Atreides daughter with Feyd-Rautha, but I don't remember seeing anything about attempting to marry them. Given the state of affairs between the two houses, it would have been impossible to marry an Atreides to a Harkonnen and the Bene Gesserit would've known this. I'm not sure how they would have accomplished the mating, but maybe the daughter would've been trained as a Bene Gesserit and convinced to do her duty for the Sisterhood.Outis wrote:The BG's plan was to openly marry a Harkonned with the Duke's daughter is it not? So such a mating musn't have been all that unlikely.jakoye wrote:What I'm arguing against is that the Bene Gesserit breeding program CONTRIBUTED TO that stagnation.
In fact, it seems to me that the Bene Gesserit breeding program was the only thing that was randomizing the gene pool of the Dune universe. How likely would it otherwise have been for a daughter of Baron Harkonnen to mate with Duke Leto???
We don't know the extent of the Bene Gesserit breeding program and whom it drew from. I would be surprised if it drew only from the royal classes, but none of us can say either way since it's not spelled out.Outis wrote: Regardless, I agree that in the end the breeding program didn't contribute to that stagnation. On the contrary: it produced the means by which the stagnation was brought to an end. But that was unexpected.
And the plan had been operating for quite a while and had evidently produced a great many of that society's rulers. So it did affect the social order in the meantime.
I don't recall any textual support for this but I assume the reason they used the ruling families in the plan is that the BG wanted the intermediary products in charge (otherwise they could have done the whole thing in a controlled environment and spared themselves a lot of trouble). And since the purpose of the whole BG enterprise was security by the way of stagnation, the obvious reason for putting the intermediary products of their breeding program in charge was to make the social edifice more secure and therefore stagnant.
Yes, the Bene Gesserit breeding program did not produce as much genetic diversity as would be produced if space travel were accessible to the masses and planetary populations could freely intermingle. However, the BG breeding program certainly introduced more genetic diversity than the otherwise static Dune universe was experiencing before the breeding program was started.Outis wrote: The program was also not randomizing as you claim. Quite the contrary: Mohiam talked about deliberately segregating strains unlike th segregation caused by the harsh controls on space travel (which wasn't deliberate, I agree). That's a mechanically-minded approach, not an approach in accordance with the principles of nature.
If it's Paul's plan, it's a plan made in the future influencing its past. I don't see how you can support the notion that individuals have the power to influence the past in the Dune universe.jakoye wrote:Now reading the text, it seems like the plan referred to here could represent either Paul's plan or God's plan. I guess I lean towards it being Paul's plan, because I'm an atheist, but that may not be what Herbert meant.
...
There is one other possibility that I just thought of: Herbert was a believer in Carl Jung's theories of a universal consciousness. And I believe he alludes to that in the book as "the species" feeling the collective need to intermingle once again via jihad. Perhaps that's the "higher plan" he's referring to here?
"An Atreides daughter could’ve been wed to a Harkonnen heir and sealed the breach. You’ve hopelessly complicated matters. We may lose both bloodlines now."jakoye wrote:I don't remember seeing that anywhere in the book. The plan was to MATE the Atreides daughter with Feyd-Rautha, but I don't remember seeing anything about attempting to marry them. Given the state of affairs between the two houses, it would have been impossible to marry an Atreides to a Harkonnen and the Bene Gesserit would've known this.
I'm not sure where you get this stuff from.jakoye wrote:the BG breeding program certainly introduced more genetic diversity than the otherwise static Dune universe was experiencing before the breeding program was started.
No. The line you refer to in the appendix is talking about how "a higher plan" (unattributed to anyone) interfered with the performance of the Bene Gesserit during Paul's rise to power. I contend that one possible source of that higher plan is Paul himself. This, to me at least, seems more logical than some nebulous "species awareness" interfering with the BG's ability to reason and react accordingly to the clues they received about Paul and his likeliness of being the KH.Outis wrote: If it's Paul's plan, it's a plan made in the future influencing its past. I don't see how you can support the notion that individuals have the power to influence the past in the Dune universe.
Well, the Fremen do have Shai-Halud. And there was the God Emperor, but later. There's also the Orange Catholic Bible and an Appendix on its creation, so "God" plays a part, though, yes, there are no claims that there is an active God in the Duneverse.Outis wrote: Dune doesn't bring up God as an agent, except in commonplace metaphorical phrases.
I originally brought it up because you didn't specify whose "higher plan" you thought Herbert was referring to. I see plans as having active agents creating them and setting them in motion. Lack of attribution of a plan's author makes it seem like someone is saying "Well, that's just God's plan" (although I specifically said that I didn't believe that's what you were claiming).Outis wrote: I'm not sure why you keep bringing this up.
Because I wanted to assure you I wasn't trying to inject God into the Dune universe. I only introduced the concept because there was no source for this "higher plan" and often when people speak of higher plans, they're speaking of God's plans (ex: "I don't know why Mary fell down a well and died, but it must be all part of Gawd's plan").Outis wrote: Why does it matter whether or not you're an "atheist"?
Well that's a laugh riot. The Bene Gesserit truly were fooling themselves if they thought they could marry an Atreides to a Harkonnen. That would be akin to trying to marry a Hatfield to a McCoy. No wonder they failed so epically.Outis wrote: "An Atreides daughter could’ve been wed to a Harkonnen heir and sealed the breach. You’ve hopelessly complicated matters. We may lose both bloodlines now."
Logic, as I showed in my example.Outis wrote:I'm not sure where you get this stuff from.jakoye wrote:the BG breeding program certainly introduced more genetic diversity than the otherwise static Dune universe was experiencing before the breeding program was started.
I'm confused. I make a claim that the Bene Gesserit breeding program increased genetic diversity in the Dune universe, you say "no it didn't", I give an example of how it did and then you say "that's not the issue".Outis wrote: Genetic diversity isn't the issue anyway. It's un-natural selection.
Another thing... I don't understand what you mean by "un-natural selection"? Are the Bene Gesserit not part of nature?Outis wrote: Genetic diversity isn't the issue anyway. It's un-natural selection.
Yes. We disagree on the BG breeding program only including royalty (I don't think we have the information to make that claim and that would seem to be an inefficient way to run a breeding program, limiting your stock to one, isolated population group), but I understand your point.Freakzilla wrote:I say the BG Breeding program contributed to the race's stagnation because they were inbreeding only the royalty. I imagine the Fremen raping and pillaging everyone indiscriminately during the jihad. This was a fix for that.
I'm pretty sure they kept Germans out of the breeding program. Y'know, the whole "master race" thing. Big can o' worms.Freakzilla wrote:Is there an example of them breeding among the fraufreluches?
What good would a super-being be if he didn't have any political power?
I could be a super being, but I'd still have to bum rides off people.
Yes, eventually, when they're getting close to their goal, they'd have to ensure their breeding program was ingrained in the royal bloodlines if they wanted to put the KH on the throne. I don't know that they *did* want to do that (put him on the throne), but if that was so, yeah, can't have Joe Schmo from New Mexico as the apex of your breeding program.Freakzilla wrote:They have BG women that are non-royal, however, if they wanted to put their KH on the throne, he would have to have royal blood.