My gut feeling says it does.
There are two essential element to being a channeler. You first need to have the right soul, and you have to have the right body. We also know that channeling is a genetic recessive.
So... Rand has babies with Elayne... will they be strong channelers or is it impossible to say?
I don't think you can easily prove any theory on this, but I tend to believe the 'Harry Potter' version, namely that power runs in certain families and is hereditary. My belief is based on this premise : Rand and Elayne will create babies that have the genes to channel. Considering Rand and Elayne are both homozygous carriers (they have to be to be active expressors of a genetic recessive), then most and if not all of their babies will have the genetic combination that allows channeling. Perhaps a small minority of their kids won't have the genes, or the soul, and won't channel "squibs", but the rest will.
As for strength, I think all their kids will be between Rand and Elayne in strength.
Do you think the same, or do you have other theories? There are many possibilities.... they might have some weak kids, or all the girls will be as strong as Elayne, or the boys as strong as Rand.
How do you think strength in the Power is expressed in the kids of channelers? Will Gawyn 'dilute' Egwene's genes and produce weaker channeling children?
Well since we don't know that either of Rand's parents could channel, at least they did not have 'the spark' or even if they did neither was anywhere near as strong as Rand then you could assume that Rand's children with a channeler could be as strong as him, more strong than him (because he is matching himself with another strong channeler for a woman) or somewhere between his and Elayne strength.
I don't think that two strong channeler's necessarily produce a strong channeler, or that two weak channelers produce a weak channeler. I think rather that two channelers together simply produce more of a chance that their children will channel.
That and that alone.
Why?
Because if the strength of someone's channeling had anything to do with their parents per say then how have Rand, Nynaeve, Egwene, Elayne, Aviendha been some of the strongest channelers either of this Age or of all time when we know all their family histories and out of all of them only Elayne has anyone we know can channel and she channels so weakly she can barely move a piece of paper with a flow of air, yet her daughter is only behind Nynaeve as the currently strongest Aes Sedai in over 1000 years and all the rest, none of their parents can channel, certainly none had the spark (which is known to be an indicator of strength).
Strength in the Power... does it run in families?
- 16/09/2010 08:52:40 PM
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*points to Talaan's family tree* I can't add anything other than that, because I epic fail. *NM*
- 16/09/2010 09:07:21 PM
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Not strength, just the ability to channel
- 16/09/2010 11:11:55 PM
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I don't think Strength is determinded this way ... Look at Elayne. A"squib" father and weak mother
- 17/09/2010 02:08:03 AM
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