Back to Midichlorians, Luke has to have as many as Anakin

The thing about the will of the Force is that almost all we hear about it comes from the mouths of the Jedi, and because they're the 'good guys', it tends to be accepted as truth. What the Jedi say isn't necessarily true and what they say and what they do aren't necessarily the same thing either. There will always be darkness, because darkness partly defines light and allows light to exist. The Force going out of balance was an out-of-control skewing in favour of the dark. Yes, that was largely due to the actions of the Sith, but the environment in which they were able to act so effectively was created by many other people, including the Republic, and their agents, the Jedi.

 

An energy field with a gradient which we know as "the will of the Force".

Nice theory, but the original context of the scene has a different meaning.

 

I'm not saying that he was mind tricking the entire Senate, because that would undermine the entire point of the Prequels. Rather, his ability to touch the Force makes him cast a larger shadow than those who have far more limited means.

Oh, I would still argue with people who label them as corrupt.

I only brought it up because I believe that unlike Lucas, I think Filloni may actually depict it. I still don't think they were corrupted(a term which places undue moral condemnation on them), but I think that they had lost their way due to the fact that the Dark Side clouded everything. Their goal(defending democracy) and their means were still good, they just didn't see the man behind the curtain. It's also hard to label an order of thousands with a single characteristic. Mace and Ki-Adi Mundi were certainly arrogant, but on the other hand you had Yoda who was smart enough to know that the Jedi were fallible.

I probably should have put "Will Of The Force" in quotations. I don't think it's a sentient deity or anything like that, but rather what the Jedi refer to as the Will of the Force is simply how the Force is flowing at that time and that it tends towards harmony with the Sith corrupting it away from harmony towards discord.

 

Lucas simply said that a "super-Sith" ( read Plagueis ) creating Anakin was one of the options.

It was Rick McCallum that "confirmed" it.

 

Ah, that's right.

 

Is that the same Rick McCallum who guaranteed we wouldn't see Tarkin or Mon Mothma in ROTS? The same Rick McCallum that promised ROTS would answer EVERY question? The same Rick McCallum who said it was definitely not true that Ewan McGregor was being cast as Obi-Wan Kenobi? Like Lucas, McCallum's comments have to be taken with a grain of salt.

 

A grain of salt would be putting it mildly.

 

I'm talking about the DVD commentary. You know, the one that came out after the film was released. I don't think the comment in question is to be interpreted as a prediction regarding a future Darth Plagueis film.

 

Oh, they definitely do, even Lucasfilm doesn't say he's an authoritative source on canon.

 

Of course this was said many, many years after the fact...

Exactly.

Except that the fans were correct, and what little was 'planned' ending up changing one way or another (over the years and ultimately with the PT itself). And the part in bold sounds like a smoke-screen to obscure the fact that changes were made to the back-story.

 

So what does it mean? If it doesn't mean the Emperor is losing his power?

 

Toschi, he said he was making the PT before "The Empire Strikes Back" was released at the theaters, so would you please elaborate a little more.

 

Things change in production you know. The story gets simplified. ROTS answered the necessary questions. And about his denying that McGregor was cast, alot of producers and directors deny such things until the official announcement. Sometimes they will deny things up until the very hour of the announcement. It isn't our place to know every little thing before hand. We have to wait and wonder just like the rest of the general public otherwise wheres the fun and excitement. I mean for god's sake look what Maichael Bay is doing with Transformers 2. He is purposefully planting fake stuff to throw the fans off.

 

I've not read through every post (too much bickering), but early on someone mentioned mendelian inheritance which is doubtful, though I'm sure Lucas didn't dwell that much (if at all) on the mode of midichlorian inheritance, so I can't imagine that there's a solid answer.

I think it would have to be controlled by multiple loci, otherwise every Jedi's mother or father (or both) would have the same proficiency in the force as their offspring, i.e. Yoda's mother or father would have been as strong as he was (potentially). If that were the case then the number of Jedi should plateau off, given that as the Republic catches potential Jedi at a young age (and makes intimate relationships forbidden), the Jedi would eventually go extinct. That Luke and Leia inherited a strong connection to the force, implies that perhaps Padme was force sensitive, and it just was never brought to her attention, or that it was simply chance that they inherited a strong midichlorian count.

As for power as dictated by midichlorian count/concentration, who can really say? Does a smaller individual with two hundred midichlorians per cell have a stronger affinity to the force than an individual with twice the number of cells, but only one hundred midichlorians per cell? You can do nothing but produce useless conjecture on the subject. The concept of midichlorians was not developed that heavily enough to determine. Qui-Gon's description of them is a dumbed down explanation for kids (and the audience). They "speak" and offer "knowledge" of the force. The same number distributed differently would have the same number of midichlorians "speaking." Therefore, if Anakin lost limbs, he lost midichlorians that were once able to "speak to him." If Vader was withered away to simply a brain in a mechanical shell, it's almost ludicrous to believe that his ability to use the force would be the same as a healthy Anakin's, simply because the concentration was the same (even if such a belief has yet to be disproven).

That, and the force is an energy field produced by living things. That Vader was "more machine" (even if that's not entirely accurate) than man, indicated that he was composed more of inorganic material than organic material, which could possibly interfere with his ability to manipulate the energy field. E.G. we know he couldn't use force lightning for obvious reasons, but he probably would have had a hard time using the force to perform any sort of acrobatic feats, since the energy field that his own body is producing is diminished. He could still use the force as an extention to lift, throw, choke, etc. But I think he'd have to learn to use such abilities to compensate for a lack of agility (which would limit his prowess with a saber).

 

[image=http://quityourdayjob.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2007/02/yoda.jpg]

 

In a word, yes. Its a per-cell count, not per-body count. Yoda, who was very diminutive, was extremely powerful in the Force, and we know from the dialogue in TPM, that he was that powerful because of his Midichlorian count. A blood sample cannot tell you how many midichlorians total are present inside a body, because it does not take the size of the body into account. Its just a blood sample. But, what it can do, is tell you how many midichlorians in each cell. Given the test that we see Qui-Gon give to Anakin, it can only be something akin to a blood sample, meaning it analyzes the count per cell. A test like that cannot differentiate between a 3'4" individual and a 7'6" tall one. But, if midichlorians are per cell, the size of an individual doesn't matter, and the test makes sense.

 

Then why doesn't Vader ever square off against the Emperor like he said he was going to do in "Revenge of the Sith"?

Why does the Emperor say that Vader will become more powerful than either the Emperor or Yoda but again we don't see Vader take on the Emperor?

So answer why Vader, who is still twice as powerful as the Emperor per your interpretation, can't just kill the Emperor with telekinesis if it all comes down to the per cell count?

 

I don't think anyone is saying Vader in RotJ is what Anakin could have been in terms of power. They're simply using the idea put forth in Dark Lord, which is that Vader's problems were more psychological than they were physical.

 

So now I'm reading it's psychological. And that's fine but that's just an interpretation.

But see, that means you're interpreting the movies the way you want to interpret them and there is nothing wrong with that but you can't go around vehemently contradicting someone else's interpretation of the movies if you have an interpretation that isn't backed up by something a little more substantial than some vague dialogue about midi-chlorians means Vader has psychological issues that prevent him from using telekinesis to kill the Emperor.

See the only thing I'm getting from the per-cell midiclorian camp is well "if you're not getting that from the movies then...".

But see, there in lies the problems because the movies hardly discuss the midi-chlorians. But what I see is that one moment Vader wants to overthrow the Emperor all by himself but then he spends the next 20+ years begging people to help him overthrow the Emperor. Like Lucas says it's a visual story not a verbal story.

 

I'm not sure I'd say I'm "in the per-cell camp" to be honest(hence why I said "they're simply using the idea...") I think their argument makes sense, but I also don't have a problem with the idea that Anakin's injuries limited his power(or at least his potential.)

 

That doesn't mean anything. They took a per cell count, but that says nothing of how distribution matters. As I said, if ONLY per cell concentration mattered, then if Vader was like Grievous - i.e. was just a bag of organs - then he would be just as strong as limbless Vader, who would be just as strong as a fully intact Anakin. Of course only a blood sample would be taken, to get an ESTIMATE. It's not like Qui-Gon is going to slaughter Anakin and turn his corpse over to Obi-Wan to a complete midichlorian count (which is not only inconvenient, but sacrifices the prospective padawan in the process).

Besides most of the Jedi shown were comparatively the same size (most had a humanoid frame, and were similar to humans in size). But in the case of a human compared to Yoda, it's a jump in logic to say that because they took a per-cell count, that that must be all that matters. Anakin was a kid at the time his count was taken, and he was only going to get bigger, so naturally he was going to have more cells with a higher concentration than Yoda; there was no need to do further tests to compare Yoda's count to Anakin's.

If midichlorians help an individual relate to the energy field that is the force, then one might suspect that by losing his arms and legs (and all of the midichlorians associated with those cells), and replacing them with bulky mechanical parts, that Anakin would have to manage to move a greater mass with an diminised force affinity, because fewer midichlorians are helping him manipulate the energy field, and there's less organic matter to generate the energy field.

 

Well, I think you are wrong based on what George has said about midi-chlorians. First, he says his Star Wars midi-chlorians are akin to real-world mitochondria. This goes hand in hand with what he says about Anakin losing his connection to the Force as he loses more and more of his physical body.

Qui-Gon takes a midi-chlorian count in The Phantom Menace to get and idea of Anakin?s possible connection to the Force. The ?count? refers to the concentration per cell, but what the count denotes is with that high of a concentration in each cell, Anakin?s entire body is loaded with midi-chlorians. And what this tells Qui-Gon and the rest of the Jedi is with that many ?connections? to the Force, Anakin could potentially be the strongest, wisest, and most spiritually adept Jedi of them all. So when Anakin starts to lose his body parts, his connection to the Force is thusly weakened?as George has tried to explain.

Now to get back to George?s analogy to mitochondria? Did you know that part of a marathon runner?s training routine most likely includes a long program of uphill running? Seems only natural, right? Run uphill and then when it comes time to run a horizontal race, you will have built up the stamina to outrun your competition. One of the reasons this works (or really any training for that matter) is that it increases the number of mitochondria per cell, thusly allowing each cell to metabolize more oxygen, thus enabling the entire body to consume more oxygen and have the energy it needs to win the race.

It only makes sense if the person doing the testing has a good idea of how many cells the individual may have (or potentially have as time goes by). And FYI, some animals that are physically smaller (mass and weight) than a full-grown human being have a greater number of cells than a full-grown human being. This is because the biology between the different species is not the same. In terms of size, it may take five cells from the smaller animal to equal the surface area of a similar cell from a human being.

So in this case, ?Size matters not.?

 

Obi-Wan was astonished that the sample Qui-Gon sent him had a count higher than Yodas. Qui-Gon did not tell Obi-Wan ahead of time whose sample he was sending, and Kenobi had not met Anakin at that point in the movie. From Kenobi's perspective, he was going into it blind, no preconceived notions about how many cells the host that gave the sample would have approximately had. Yet, within seconds, he knew the significance of the sample sent to him. All Kenobi was given was a readout of the results, without knowing anything at all about the patient other than he was probably human. (I would expect a test that can do a blood sample that quickly to be able to identify the species that provided the sample as well)

As to why Vader didn't remain exactly as strong, I have covered this issue already, at length, and it has nothing to do with his per-cell midichlorian count. If you would like to read it, go back and reread earlier posts, I am not gonna rehash it entirely yet again, but in essence, the artificial limbs inhibit his access to those midichlorians, not that the concentration diminished. Replace the artificial limbs with cloned limbs, he regains his full power. The mechanical limbs act as an outside source for preventing him from accessing his Force potential as efficiently as he used to.

I agree that the artificial limbs prevented him from achieving his full potential, but, for different reasons. You think its because he lost midichlorians, I think its because the artificial limbs act as an outside barrier. The world's fastest man can't run as fast for as far if he is carrying a 100lb backpack. The backpack slows him down, despite his physical prowess as the worlds fastest man. Remove the backpack, he goes back to being able to run at full speed. His body never lost the ability to run that fast, but, the backpack added an outside barrier that prevented him from being able to run as fast as he was capable of. Anakin's artificial limbs are like that backpack. Outside source preventing him from achieving what he is capable of.

 

I still disagree that Vader had the same potential (going by the engine-tires analogy).

Again, we only get a dumbed down explanation as to what the midichlorians are (and Anakin STILL doesn't understand). But, Qui-Gon says that they "speak" to the individual, enabling them to have "knowledge of the force."

And it appears to be inherently better to have 200 little "voices" talking to you than having 100. We're all in agreement so far. What I don't understand is what makes some people think that arrangement matters. What difference does it make if these little "voices" are bundled in the same organizational unit or different ones?

As to why Obi-Wan didn't inquire as to Anakin's size or species. I think on a practical level it didn't matter. Most of the sentient species seem to fall within a certain size range (possibly due to an optimum range of brain/body size ratios). And the difference in the number of cells from one species to another may have been negligible (though we don't know that for a fact). As someone else said, cell count and body size don't necessarily have a positive correlation, so without an intimate knowledge of the biology of various species, the fact that Anakin may have been a Nikto, a Weequay, or a Hutt, really wouldn't have meant anything to Obi-Wan.

Also, we really don't know the full extent that midichlorians play in force affinity. Does it truly measure potential? That in itself is simply an educated guess. It might simply be a measure of how naturally the force comes to an individual. Thus, it could simply mean that Anakin would pick up on new abilities and such much quicker than his peers. But once he discovered these abilities, I don't think he would be inable to pass them on due to his peers having a lower midichlorian count, I think they would simply have to exert themselves much more to match his ability because they aren't receiving the same amount of "guidance" from their own midichlorians.


For example, some academic subjects like mathematics or science come really easy to some. Some people can cruise through calculus with hardly having to study or without any help, while some others need to seek out tutors, need to practice the subject a lot, and need to apply themselves much, much more. Anakin might be the equivalent of the calculus genius whose use of the force comes naturally, while others might need to meditate, seek out guidance, might be slower to reach the rank of Jedi Knight, etc. Anakin's potential might not be necessarily higher, he might simply catch on faster than others.

Palpatine, having (at least allegedly) lost the ability to "cheat death" when he killed Plagueis, might have spent years trying to rediscover the secret, whereas Anakin might have been the "star pupil" that might learn such techniques naturally. But given that he was injured, and didn't have as many "voices" offering him "knowledge of the force" his ability to learn new techniques might have been curbed significantly.

Edit: Just to add... in practice, this would make Anakin's potential greater, given that he might achieve in a year what another might fail to achieve in a lifetime. But once knowledge was obtained, with Anakin's guidance, he could probably pass it on to other Jedi. I don't think there would be any sort of barrier that would lead to a moment where Anakin would say, "I'm sorry, I simply can't teach you, you're midichlorian count is too low."