How does Honor know so much?

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

tlb wrote:Cthia had already conceded that her father was in the Navy and was asking WHO ELSE was military.

We've never been told. Honor and Alfred have been pretty quiet about their family in all the stories. We don't even know Alfred's parents' names or whether they were alive when Honor was a child. Unlike Allison's side of the family, they've never come up. Even Devon Harrington, a cousin, barely gets a single speaking line in the entire series. But his existence tells us that Alfred had cousins too, if not a younger sibling.

We do know that Honor wanted to go into the Navy at a very early age, from her "Best Laid Plains" (which Nimitz nearly screwed up by adopting her). Her father had been a marine non-com and was a Navy officer, so she had a role model. She'd probably have had more role models than just her father, but those don't need to have been family. She was born after King Roger III had begun the modernisation and expansion of the Navy, so that career was in prestige at the time. In fact, the royal family was itself a role model and had been providing Navy officers for at least 3 T-centuries.

That is a good point. "The tradition lives on" is a good catch phrase for the RMN; it just gives you goose bumps. Like our own Marines', Semper Fidelis – “Always Faithful.”

Or our Navy's, "Non sibi sed patriae" (Not self but country) is often cited as the Navy's motto. Also sufficiently intoxicating is the old navy motto, "Faith, Courage, Service true, with Honor, Over Honor, Over All."

"The Few, The Proud, The Marines" gives me goosebumps as well.

But was Honor living in the Star Kingdom long enough to be influenced by such things? She was living on Sphinx. She didn't move to the SK until her enrollment. Right?

BEWARE DOUBLE POST

cthia wrote:But was Honor living in the Star Kingdom long enough to be influenced by such things? She was living on Sphinx. She didn't move to the SK until her enrollment. Right?

Wrong, Sphinx is part of the three planet Star Kingdom. She did not move to the planet Manticore until her enrollment. I expect that Sphinx had a good percentage of veterans though.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

cthia wrote:There is only so much IQ that can be mined before side effects negate it all. I think the MA milked that cow dry.

I never said the other accoutrements were not important to be labeled as a "modern" Alpha. I am only saying that for the sake of our discussion about Honor, all is equal. All of the added options of the MA's Alphas won't ever come into play on the battlefield. On the battlefield it will come down to strategy and tactics. And not whether one can withstand insane elements, or if one has staying power in bed.

As tlb said above, we don't know for sure that all that could be done has been done. Given the state of Beowulf's prohibition on the experimentation, I'm pretty sure Beowulf wouldn't know for sure. They'd know that there could be side-effects, but not what workarounds for those side-effects might be.

Plus, the MAlign might be more accepting of side-effects. Intelligence makes a person a sociopath? That's a feature, not a bug!

Either way, the point remains: the MAlign has continued to do genetic experimentation for 5 centuries since the loss of contact with the Harringtons. That implies they've done something. Lots of somethings. Even if they were all "nice to have" improvements, they've accumulated. Like in the analogy of cars, we it would be like saying that the engine was perfected 70 years ago, but now we have nicer entertainment systems, air conditioning, remote telemetry, tire pressure sensors, power windows, etc. And no, neither engines nor aerodynamics were perfected 70 years ago.

The MAlign decides what an Alpha is. We don't know that they wouldn't call Honor Alpha, but we don't know that they would either. In my opinion, the most likely would point to not being so, because she has 10-13 generations of non-eugenetic ancestry and none of the splicing since.

I would tend to think the "lots of somethings" they have done is mainly about correcting their mistakes. Or long-term observations to determine if there are side-effects (there simply has to be a long waiting game.) Along with the research to develop the options and add-ons. The accoutrements.

BTW, the wicked wiki states that "Stephanie was extremely intelligent, her test scores placing her squarely in the top per mil of the entire human race.

This makes me even more adamant that the MA has already mined as much IQ as is humanly possible. Did Stephanie have the same side-effects as Honor as far as her anger? And could Stephanie regenerate?

tlb wrote:

cthia wrote:But was Honor living in the Star Kingdom long enough to be influenced by such things? She was living on Sphinx. She didn't move to the SK until her enrollment. Right?

Wrong, Sphinx is part of the three planet Star Kingdom. She did not move to the planet Manticore until her enrollment. I expect that Sphinx had a good percentage of veterans though.

Doh! Thanks for smelling the brain fart?

That should have been Honor was not living on Manticore long enough to be influenced by the commercialism of the RMN. I am assuming that HD TV is more local than all encompassing. IOW, Sphinx and other members of the SK are not as inundated with Manticoran commercialism. My uneducated guess anyway.

BEWARE DOUBLE POST

cthia wrote:Did Stephanie have the same side-effects as Honor as far as her anger? And could Stephanie regenerate?

There is at least an 80% chance that Stephanie could not regenerate, but we would not know unless it turned up in a story.

In Enemy Hands, chapter 3:

In many respects, the Meyerdahl genies are the most successful, in my modest opinion, though. Our musculature enhancement is certainly the most efficient, at any rate. But we do have one problem most of the others don't."
"Which is?"
"Most of us don't regenerate," she told him, touching the left side of her face. "Over eighty percent of us have a built-in genetic conflict with the regen therapies, and not even Beowulf has been able to figure out how to get around it yet.

At All Costs, chapter 16:

I made identifying the gene group which prevents her from regenerating a personal project, and I found it years ago. The problem child is a dominant, unfortunately, but it's not associated with the locked sequences of the Meyerdahl modifications—if it were, Alfred wouldn't regenerate either, and he does—so it's not automatically selected for at fertilization. Once I'd determined that, I also determined that she carries it only on the chromosome she received from her father, and I've done a scan on her child. As a result of which, I was able to reassure her that she hasn't passed it along to him."

tlb wrote:

cthia wrote:Did Stephanie have the same side-effects as Honor as far as her anger? And could Stephanie regenerate?

There is at least an 80% chance that Stephanie could not regenerate, but we would not know unless it turned up in a story.

In Enemy Hands, chapter 3:

In many respects, the Meyerdahl genies are the most successful, in my modest opinion, though. Our musculature enhancement is certainly the most efficient, at any rate. But we do have one problem most of the others don't."
"Which is?"
"Most of us don't regenerate," she told him, touching the left side of her face. "Over eighty percent of us have a built-in genetic conflict with the regen therapies, and not even Beowulf has been able to figure out how to get around it yet.

At All Costs, chapter 16:

I made identifying the gene group which prevents her from regenerating a personal project, and I found it years ago. The problem child is a dominant, unfortunately, but it's not associated with the locked sequences of the Meyerdahl modifications—if it were, Alfred wouldn't regenerate either, and he does—so it's not automatically selected for at fertilization. Once I'd determined that, I also determined that she carries it only on the chromosome she received from her father, and I've done a scan on her child. As a result of which, I was able to reassure her that she hasn't passed it along to him."

Thanx tlb! Interesting stuff, but it creates more questions than it answers.

First off, let's assume the Detweilers are correct that Honor is a lost Alpha line. Does that include the entire Meyerdahl line? If so, and Stephanie also could not regenerate, then there had been no improvements to the mods for (what is Stephanie from Honor?) two generations removed? Which means the MA was not making quick improvements.

Why does Stephanie test so high and Honor has issues? Since Honor is a later Alpha than Stephanie, and if tlb and ThinksMarkedly's take on constant improvement rings true, then Honor should at least match Stephanie in IQ. And Honor should be able to regenerate; assuming the MA has solved that problem.

Unless the Alpha mod didn't begin until Honor, or later than Stephanie. Even if that is true, Honor still should match, if not exceed, Stephanie in every category. Unless Honor is the point where side-effects began to show. I'm confused; where is my disconnect?

cthia wrote:First off, let's assume the Detweilers are correct that Honor is a lost Alpha line. Does that include the entire Meyerdahl line? If so, and Stephanie also could not regenerate, then there had been no improvements to the mods for (what is Stephanie from Honor?) two generations removed? Which means the MA was not making quick improvements.

Why does Stephanie test so high and Honor has issues? Since Honor is a later Alpha than Stephanie, and if tlb and ThinksMarkedly's take on constant improvement rings true, then Honor should at least match Stephanie in IQ. And Honor should be able to regenerate; assuming the MA has solved that problem.

Unless the Alpha mod didn't begin until Honor, or later than Stephanie. Even if that is true, Honor still should match, if not exceed, Stephanie in every category. Unless Honor is the point where side-effects began to show. I'm confused; where is my disconnect?

NO, if the Harringtons are a lost Alpha line, then the broken connection occurred BEFORE Stephanie; or when they moved to Sphinx. So Stephanie and Honor are the same genetic iteration, aside from whatever genetic drift occurred in the over 400 years that separate the two. Once the connection is lost, NO further improvements can be made.

Why are you thinking that Honor is not equal to Stephanie?

cthia wrote:I would tend to think the "lots of somethings" they have done is mainly about correcting their mistakes. Or long-term observations to determine if there are side-effects (there simply has to be a long waiting game.) Along with the research to develop the options and add-ons. The accoutrements.

It's possible, but I find that unlikely for two reasons. First, that would mean that there were lots of mistakes to be corrected, which would mean there should have been a spike of ill behaviours observed at the time and that might have not gone unnoticed. More importantly, such defects would have applied to the lost Alpha lines, which include the Harringtons of the time, unless they were simply lucky to have not carried such traits. Though I'll grant you that the inability to regenerate might exactly be such a problem.

Second, because I don't see the Inner Onion being content at not trying to improve anything further in the time available. Even if you're just fixing bugs for the last 3 centuries, someone is bound to have come up with new ideas and tried them. And it's rather unlikely that none of those ideas panned out or did not add up to a better "product."

In any case, we also know they were ruthless in culling even back to several generations prior if a fix couldn't be found, and I don't think they would have waited 3 centuries fixing issues.

BTW, the wicked wiki states that "Stephanie was extremely intelligent, her test scores placing her squarely in the top per mil of the entire human race.

This makes me even more adamant that the MA has already mined as much IQ as is humanly possible. Did Stephanie have the same side-effects as Honor as far as her anger? And could Stephanie regenerate?

She was top 0.1% of the time. But that doesn't mean she would still be so today, because she was also compared to the humanity of the time, not of today's.

Besides, the fact that Honor did struggle means some of that intelligence was diluted along the way, either by genetics or by comparison. Which brings me back to my point that the MAlign is the one assigning the label "Alpha" they may not apply it to Honor with their current criteria.

So maybe the MAlign had perfected IQ at that time and was busy dealing with the side-effects of such because it was a feature sine qua non. But in the intervening 3 T-centuries, they did other things like physiological beauty, longevity, dexterity (possibly ambidexterity), cure for baldness and tooth decay, making people taller or other parts of their anatomy bigger (feet! get your mind out of the gutter!), whatever. If the intelligence was easily diluted, then they may have researched a way to make it more permanent. Or maybe not, because reserving it for those with "proper breeding" may have been seen as a feature, not a bug.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:Besides, the fact that Honor did struggle means some of that intelligence was diluted along the way, either by genetics or by comparison. Which brings me back to my point that the MAlign is the one assigning the label "Alpha" they may not apply it to Honor with their current criteria.

We know that Honor had the innate mathematical ability (see her calculating the heading to disable the courier boat in OBS); so it may have been a self-confidence issue (we certainly know that she had issues with self-confidence, it was a main reason that she did not report the attack in the shower), rather than anything fundamentally wrong with her intelligence.

For all we know, Stephanie could have the Harrington anger (which only manifests itself when someone loved is hurt or killed) and that might be what enabled her to attack the Hexapuma that was about to kill the 'cat, despite her broken arm and other injuries.

An Olympic champion runner has to have the inate ability, but then to practise continuously for years to reach the top.
Intelligence is much the same, in that to be in the top 1% you have to be inately bright, nurture it with learning and challenges, plus have the right attitude.
Using myself as a single example, at 13 I topped my state in exams, yet at 18 I struggled to be accepted into university. In the intervening years I had discovered girls, and rebelled against the authority of my church boarding school.
Later in life I found my "mojo" again, had a successful career, and picked up numerous university qualifications studying part time.
Perhaps Honor's long adolescence due to prolong caused her to lose that edge for a time, due to low self esteem?