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darthsmash-

there is no longer a quote within a quote feature which, given the way you responded to my speach, makes it impossible for me to tell what you are refering to if quote you and try to respond to each reply...

but i'll figure out something at which point i'll have a better post than simply "no i disagree" but the important thing is i do, and when i have time to cut and past the whole thing onto a word document i will...

but ultimatley MidClors suck. they are redundant as a concept.
the force flows through everything. why do you need a proxy? what was conceptually wrong with some humans being able to use the force as an inherent ability?

the same way some people have artistic ability and are creative, and most people are not? and amongst those who are... some more than others.

it was quite believable. MCs esentially overcomplicate a simple concept.

it's like lucas said, "The Force is too simple i'm going to add something to it that will make it more comlex, but i won't go into it."

it was a waste of time... there are so many other things that could have been improved with a little more complexity, but instead he added it to something that did not require it. Something that really casts a shadow on his compentancy as a writer.

you cannont simply say, "There is more to this but i'm not telling you because i can't be bothered making it up... nor have i thought about it"

it's alot like when kids claim they know something but when put on the spot they say "oh, I'm not telling you, because you don't know." to hide the fact that they don't know.

you know?

Thats a good point actually. Hadn't thought of that. Yoda definitely implies that he has been watching over Luke his whole life on Dagobah. Gyargh this whole force-sensing thing is beginning to get a little inconsistent the more you look into it. Prior to this I would have said that distance is a factor (I also think that size does matter but thats a whole other argument) but maybe distance is not so much a factor when you know or share a connection to the person of interest. After Luke and Vaders encounter on Bespin they seem to form a bond in the force that allows them to communicte telepathically as in ESB, might explain why Vader can sense him where the Emperor could not, could explain how Vader so easily sensed Kenobi on the Death Star but could not sense the force potential in Leiai and lends credence to Luke's "I sense the connflict in you" talk in ROTJ. Perhaps Yoda formed a connection of sorts with baby-Luke before they went their separate ways, thus also explaining Luke's "there's something familiar about this place" line.



Thanks for the kind words. I don't want to seem like I'm trying to force people to agree with me or anything either. For one, its impossible and I truly believe that if you don't like midichlorians then they don't have to be a part of the SW saga for you personally. Your saga can be the first three movies or the last three, or bits from all of them or whatever. For me even some of the deleted scenes from TPM and ATOC are part of "my version" of the saga, and simlaly there are bits I could do without from all the movies.
That said its fun to discuss with others who have similar and different views as long as everyone plays nice. Its not much fun when you write what you think is a pretty well constructed argument and someone just answers with "You're wrong. X is stupid and so are you." and then go on to list a whole bunch of objections that you've already addressed 3 or 4 times previously in the topic and finish off with "but if you can't understand that theres no point talking". Its cool to just say "well I disagree" or "I prefer to look at it like this" or if you've seen the same topic a million times just leave it alone what say?
Anyway nuff said on that.



I prefer to think of it as an indication of the growing bond between father and son as compared to Palpatine who has never met Luke. Its interesting that Palpatine's next line when he learns of Vaders discovery displays his concern regarding Vader's allegiances.



You have brought up what has become probably the crucial point to this whole discussion. We can talk all day long about midichlorians and Jedi force-sensing but as you point out it should always bekept in mind that SW has from Day 1 been cobbled together piece by piece with new ideas emerging at later stages and being woven into the fabric that often require elaborate explanations to retain the earlier consistency.
The classic example would be the "I am your father" line that meant Kenobi had to show up in ROTJ and explain why the hell he decided to tell Luke the Disney version of his fathers life. It is difficult enough to keep a fictional world internally consistent (the LOTR/Simarillion are pretty good in this regard) when it has been painstakingly developed over many yearsbefore seeing the light of day - its practically impossible when you are making major changes on the fly. But what would SW be without this particular twist/major change?
As I've heard it, when Empire was made there were going to be a lot more "Luke" movies than just Jedi and so "the other" that Yoda spoke of was not Leia but somebody we had not met. in the end Lucas decided to wrap it up in Jedi and Leia became his sister and the other. Whether true or not the scene between Luke and Leia in the infirmary and accompanying publicity stills of them gazing into each others eyes make it clear that Luke and Leia were not siblings at the time of ESB. And this would be the cause of much of the angst over sensing the force in Luke but not Leia etc.



I would agree with you on the first point but not on the second. Of that last sentence to be precise. I would argue that
"That boy was our last hope."
"No. There is another."
does not make a lot of sense unless there are certain people who, for whatever reason, have great force-potential. You could argue that he and the Other are important not because they are inherently powerful but because the force has ordained them to be potentially able to kill the Emperor whereas nobody else can. But I think when you look at Vader and the Emperors chat in ESB
"If he could be turned he would mke a powerful ally."
"Yes."
this theory runs into trouble IMO. Skywalker is dangerous to them and if he only has a month or two of training to separate him in force ability from any other Stormtrooper then it makes no sense to risk letting him live. Kill him off and if you really want a new apprentice/henchman take some time off and train someone who does not have the force-destiny that they may bump you off one day. This should work fine if all are created equal in regards to Jedi/Sith potential. And as mentioned its not like it would take years for someone to catch up to Luke's level of training.
But yeah its not until ROTJ that the floodgates open on force potential in familes and inherent force potential. OTOH you could take ANH as a stand-alone film and view it completely outside of the context of these concepts without losing anything IMO.
Some very good points Mnesymone and thanks for taking the time to put them forth in an intelligent and friendly way.

Yeah I was getting into all kinds of trouble and it seemed like any post with more than a certain number of quote tags would not display properly so I had to improvise with underlinings and such stuff. Sorry I'm not sure either exactly which post was yours that I was replying to - there were so many opinions and arguments coming from all over that they all kinda blurred together. Could look back - but me brain kinda hurts a bit now



Cool.



Ah but what makes someone more creative or intelligent or musically adept than another? To a medieval mind it woul be "the will of God" but we now know that you'd probably get further taking a look at genetics and neuronal development as influenced by early environment and so forth. In short, very phyical, molecular kind of stuff. On the other hand I can perfectly understand why someone doesn't want that brought in to the SW universe.



Oh I think you know I know.

well, i have abilities in graphic art (both hand drawing and CG composition), Sculpting, Music (multiple instruments, arrangement), Acting (with an ability to replicate virtually any accent and voice), writing, etc.

It's not a result of a hyperdeveloped cluster of simbiotic micro-organisms co-inhabbiting my body.

a scenario that has nothing to do with genetics.

tape worms aren't passsed genetically.

I disagree. Barend, my sister and I share many of the talents you mention. Singing, drawing and acting have always come naturally to us. Dad has his drawing skills, Mom was in theatre when in college. Don't know where the music comes in, I've heard my dear Mother sing. At any rate, I've seen these traits in my sister's children as well. My sister and I did feed off of each other to improve our various pursuits while growing up, and those are Great memories all of a sudden.

I'm not defending the chlorminitrons at all.

But I do believe that
Intuition is something we have that's part of our souls.

Not part of our cells.

I'm not denying that talent and artistic skill is often genetically passed on, I'm just saying it doesn't require a parasite.

and more to the point that if you only have something as a result of a particular parisite, it would not be passed down.

eg. if you have tape worms, you can eat alot without putting weight, if have a child, they won't share that attribute, because tapeworms aren't passed through genes.

Well no, but presumably its not a result of your connection to a mystical energy force that pervades the universe either.



OK, but as many have pointed out before, often in derisive terms, Lucas obviously took some of the inspiration for the midichlorian idea from the real world idea of mitochondria. These are microscopic organelles that are contained within every cell in your body and are responsible for providing the cell with energy, so they are pretty important. Current scientific thinking is that mitochondria did not originate from our own ancestral cells but that they were in fact a form of bacteria that infiltrated our larger cells and made their home there.
One of the byproducts of their "residence" was that they provided an energy source for our cellls and over time our ancestors (we are talking ancestors in the same way that yeast is a distant relative) lost the ability to produce needed energy themselves and began to rely totally on these mitochondria to do the job. So "we" provided them with a comfortable environment and they provided us with the energy we needed to survive. Voila - symbiotic relationship.
And BTW these mitochondria, which assuming the above is true started off as a separate organism, are now passed on from generation to generation in a very similar way to genetics (except all your mitochondria are inherited from your mother and none from your father).
Its easy to see why George was so taken with this idea. Real world example of micro-organisms that inhabit your body, are passed on in a hereditary fashion, and provide you with powers and abilities you would never have without them - such as the ability to live.

True - but if they are communicated a la mitochondria - then they are communicated in the female egg (remember mitochondrial DNA) - so Shmi would have to be the force-strong one since communication across generations of chloroplasts and mitochondria occurs through female lines.

George might have been taken with mitochondria, but he definitely didn't do his homework.

in an attempt to simplify this debate, i submit for your approval or rejection my personal theory on the rationality of midichlorians:

postulate #1) jedi can use the force to sense all living things around them. they can increase this radius by concentrating harder. the larger the radius, the more life-forms included. the more life-forms sensed, the more difficult it is to spot a particular individual.

postulate #2) jedi cannot sense latent force abilities. when a jedi calls upon the force to perform an action, the effort sends out ripples through the force. the greater dependency on the force to perform the action, the larger and more detectable the ripples will be. however, without training in jedi arts, no one can call upon the force heavily enough to send out detectable ripples.

these two ideas explain many things. they explain why vader could sense obi-wan's 'presence' but not leia's 'powers'. and why vader could sense luke's power at the battle of yavin. why the characters can sense each other at varying distances throughout the saga. why obi-wan, yoda, luke, leia, palpatine and vader could all hide from each other when they needed to. why luke could not tell yoda was a jedi but yoda(who had more time to concentrate than anyone) could watch luke from across the stars. also why vader and luke could sense each other around endor while palpatine was distracted. furthermore, it shows why gui-gon needed a midi count to recognise anakin's potential, and why jedi would need midis to locate force adepts at a trainable age.

as for mitochondria, lets remember that while they may inspire the idea of midichlorians, they are not the same thing. it apears to me that lucas could not have offered such a simple explanation without serious thought. i imagine that midichlorains existed in his mind as a nameless solution to a host of nameless problems since the very begining.

This post has been edited by xenduck: 03 May 2005 - 02:00 PM

Rationalize, apologize, Eulogize for all I care. It was a dumb idea.

no hard feelings I hope.

alright... I'll try and make this as clear as possible, for darthsmash you argue well... and i have anjoyed debating this with you. (really, you are good at this).

but...

the second you introduce an scientific element to a fantasy idea, you suddenly impose upon it restrictions.

the problem here, with science fiction concepts is that they require a realistic set of limmitations.

saying that these single cell lifeforms or micr-organisms can communicate a disturbance accross space is a bit much.

Obi wan sensed "a disturbance in the force" from across the vacuum of space. the midiCs were all vapourised as were the hosts of whom were by definition of symbiosis were the only things keeping them alive... They were in NO way in a possition to communicate long distance signals accross the fathoms of the vacuum of space.

"It was if thousands of voices cried out and silenced"

bearing in mind that the shot fired at them destroyed the planet, no one would have had the time to really feel a thing.

so, when you really look at it rationally, what ben felt was really spiritual. As the force was (as lucas himself confessed in at the time of the OT) based on eastern religion and mysticism.

arguments can be put forward on the fine points and details for and against quite equally, but ultimatley the question comes down to this.

scientifically rationalizing (adequatley or the way lucas does it) a spiritual idea that serves as the backbone for characters' motivation, is reckless and self defeating.

wars were fought because the little things living in my blood didn't like the little things living in your blood. I mean that IS what MCs would have us ultimatley beleive the essential difference between LS and DS is.

it's just not appropriate.

the concept DOES limmit the general scope of what the force is, and put's it out of place. like saying God Told Joan of Arc to fight the English using an 'Orion to Soul' Nokia 344, Metaphysical Prayer Answering modulator.

it spoils the mood... next time you ask a girl out, make your opening statement, "Hi, I don't know you, but if you're no busy later, i'd like to penetrate your vagina"
It's what george would do

"postulate #1) jedi can use the force to sense all living things around them. they can increase this radius by concentrating harder. the larger the radius, the more life-forms included. the more life-forms sensed, the more difficult it is to spot a particular individual.

postulate #2) jedi cannot sense latent force abilities. when a jedi calls upon the force to perform an action, the effort sends out ripples through the force. the greater dependency on the force to perform the action, the larger and more detectable the ripples will be. however, without training in jedi arts, no one can call upon the force heavily enough to send out detectable ripples."

These arguments and similar have been made before - but they don't actually justify midichlorians... it's a bit of a non-sequitur - but still good points, just not supporting the midichlorians.

As for Qui-Gon and the midichlorian test - he must have had some idea, otherwise he would not have conducted the test... I might need to watch it again, but was he telling Shmi that Anakin had precognitive abilities before or after the midis test?

im not saying these ideas PROVE the need for midichlorians, only that they make sense and have important applications to the whole saga. midichlorians answer many of these types of questions effectively. qui-gon must have thought anakin exceptional when he found out he was the only human who could race pods. its very fast and very dangerous, anakin must have jedi-like reflexes.

the spirituality is another issue. the midichlorians explain what makes someone able to use the force more than another person. thats it. they dont explain HOW the force works or how there can be ghosts or telepathy or telekenisis. they dont attempt to either. whats the difference in saying, "i can use the force." and "my midichlorians help me use the force."

From Qui-Gons speech in Menace he didn't mention the force at all - he didn't say that they create the Force or are a medium to the Force - he says that the midichlorians themselves seem to 'speak' - providing guidance and knowledge to those who quiet themselves enough to hear them, and that all life has them and that life could not have arisen without them...

If the midichlorians provide guidance and not power, how come Anakin, who is supposed to have the highest midichlorian count of all, is so misguided and powerful?

Bam!