Post by ƒelinoel on Jul 3, 2008 22:41:22 GMT -5
Our theories are similar, but slightly different.
I'd think the genetics/spirituality thing is about 50:50.
For example:
If a person was born to a father that was EE and a mother that was ee, their genotype would be Ee. They have one recessive (e) and one dominant (E) allele for earthbending, which would make them an earthbender by genetics.
But beyond that is where it gets tricky.
A person has a 1 in 5 chance of being a bender by spirituality, because there are 4 elements and then the chance of being unaffiliated. So this is a 20% chance for being spiritually connected with any of those.
If you take into account the spirituality and the genetics, this would give the person a 60% chance of being an earthbender.
Now, if a person was born EE, they would probably have a greater chance of being spiritually connected to the earth element, but that's hard to say. Maybe a 67% (or more) chance of being a bender...?
If a person was born ee, they would have a 10% chance of being an earthbender. Most likely a nonbender, in this case.
OFC, this is all a theory, nothing for sure.
I'd like the idea of 50/50, it's just at another forum, my theory was ripped to shreds at that slight mention :[
The only part about your theory that I question is the spirituality segment. I believe a bender from one nation can only bend the element of his nation :x although taking in the thought of two parents from different nations I'm going to go with Horyo's theory (the one he posted long ago) about how it works.
I think he said
FF=Dom firebender, WW=Dom waterbender, XX=nonbender
Firebender Father and a waterbending mother have a child. The child can't bend both elements but to whichever one he is strongly affiliated to. Assuming bending genes are genetically dominant, when you have codominance of FW then spirituality factor kicks in, and rather than having the 1/20 chance of the 5 possibilities, I think you have 2/3 the chance of being a bender. 1/3=FX 1/3=WX 1/3=XX
I think that's what he said, I can't recall.
All Air Nomads were airbenders because of their meditative life increasing their spirituality, but there of course were airbenders who were better then others, those better ones must have been natural benders, while others had to work hard to get good
While the Air Nomads were spiritual, I believe a factor of genetics did come into play because the air nomads had a controlled set of "breeding." In this way, it was able to keep the supply of airbenders ongoing. Although this is just a theory-speculation.
My original post was about how the first benders came to be. They must have been spiritually connected to nature, but as some could not bend, they invented. From their separate lines of...evolution or change (not Darwainian Evolution) they became more specialized and adept at what they were doing: benders to bending and nonbenders to other stuff.