Lord of the Rings group discussion
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Which LOTR character are you?
Found this quiz for what species you are: http://www.zimbio.com/quiz/moOknyeCao...
First try I got a Wizard, second I was an Elf.
Haha, that's the same thing I thought when I got Wizard.
Yeah, I was hoping to get an Elf or something!
I don't know!!
Ew, a dwarf! Just kidding! Haha, lets be best friends anyway. I'll be the Legolas to your Gimli. :D
Evelina wrote: "Ew, a dwarf! Just kidding! Haha, lets be best friends anyway. I'll be the Legolas to your Gimli. :D"Haa haa! Good Idea!!!
Elizabeth can be our leader!!We just need a hobbit!!
Whoa, that would be awesome! :D I'm taking the quiz, by the way! :D
HEH HEhI've only done the first level!
It takes a while!!
:D
So far, I'm stuck on Mordor. (Level 4)
Diana wrote: "Elizabeth can be our leader!!We just need a hobbit!!"
Haha, I'm in!
I took three levels of the quiz and I sadly couldn't remember some of the answers. It mostly had to do with a bunch of names almost sounding the same, so hard to remember which one is right.
Evelina wrote: "So far, I'm stuck on Mordor. (Level 4)"Really?
I guess it helps to have the book handy!!
Elizabeth wrote: "Diana wrote: "Elizabeth can be our leader!!We just need a hobbit!!"
Haha, I'm in!
I took three levels of the quiz and I sadly couldn't remember some of the answers. It mostly had to do with a b..."
Yeah! I know what you mean!!!
It's really tricky!!
;0
Elizabeth wrote: "Found this quiz for what species you are: http://www.zimbio.com/quiz/moOknyeCao...
First try I got a Wizard, second I was an Elf."
I really liked your quiz!!
Evelina wrote: "YES! GOT TO LEVEL 5! :D"YEAH!
Evelina wrote: "LAST LEVEL! :O"Way to go!!!!
Was it hard??
Evelina wrote: "LAST LEVEL! :O"Awesome!
Elizabeth wrote: "Evelina wrote: "LAST LEVEL! :O"Awesome!"
Good Job!
I have to find time to do this Quiz!!
WHEN I HAVE TIME! :9
Evelina wrote: "LAST LEVEL! :O"YAY!!
How long did it take you??
BEAT IT! :D (Like 2 days ago actually, but I forgot to say! xD It took me about a half hour. It was so fun! :D)
Maybe on the weekend I will attack it :)By the way what did you think of the Desolation of Smaug?
Yep! :DI thought it was pretty good, actually. I didn't like or dislike the romance between Kili and Tauriel, but some of the lines were HILARIOUS!
I went to the premiere dressed as Bilbo Baggins. With a stuffed dragon. And an epic middle-earth-looking journal. It was fun!
That's so cool!!Yeah I was sort of neutral about the romance between them also!!
That is so cool that you went to the premiere!!
You're so lucky!!
My dad has a studio and the walls are wall to wall with figurines!! He even has Shelob hanging from the ceiling!!
Diana wrote: "Elizabeth can be our leader!!We just need a hobbit!!"Well, I tested out as half Gandalf, half Frodo, so I'll fit in there.
I have a little Gandalf figure. So kawaii! I also have a couple maps of Middle Earth, and a poster with Bilbo Baggins on it. I have the Elven brooch that was given to the members of the Fellowship by Galadriel in Lothlorien, and multiple T-shirts. Oh, and a hobbity-looking cloak that I got in Estonia. xD
I sense that we are in capable hands, so " off we go "
For you who have read at least the beginning of the Silmarillion, you may have noted that the creation of the Children of Illuvitar (The firstborn, the Elves), the Guests (Man), and even the illegitimate Dwarves (definitive, not derogatory) seems to have had built into it (their creation) a variety for diversity. That is (if I may borrow from today's vernacular), all were uniquely hardwired as a particular "species", while possessing a great deal of variation via their soft wiring (their software, their programming). All of Tolkien's Middle Earth creations contained similar genetic variations as our world of life forms. That is, built within the genome (DNA) of all lifeforms is the potential for change, when acted upon by some outside force. The calluses that form on the hands of a hardworking farmer or construction worker is a simple example. It took the input from the outside world to stimulate the reaction to form a protective layer on the area receiving the friction (hands, heels, etc.). The change did not originate "from" the outside stimulus, but was the result of the "information" already resident within the DNA reacting/responding to the stimulus! (That is very important.)
It would seem that all Hobbits, like the Elves, Dwarves, and Man, started from a single stock. And even though the differences could be somewhat extreme, one could always tell they were Hobbits and not Elves or Dwarves or of Mankind. The potential for genetic diversity was usually expressed and witnessed in an outward form, whether in looks, behaviors, desires, etc.
Why all this info, you may be asking???? Because I scored as a HOBBIT on the quiz, and I did not like that one bit! After all, my user name is Strider, not Deagol or Ham Gangee. ;-)
But then I got to thinking of all the crossovers and similarities that both the single species shared among themselves, as well as what the four races shared in common. Bilbo was not just a quiet and peace-loving Bagginses, but he also had the apparent recessive genes of the Tooks, a "breed of Hobbit" that had adventurous and potentially combative sides to them. In Bilbo's case, it took the prodding of a respected wizard, a bit of pushing in the right (or wrong) direction, and additional external stimuli (songs of adventure, imaginative stories being told, a strong "push" on his Took genes to prove oneself) for the genes to be "expressed." Though the two sides of Bilbo battled back and forth all throughout his adventure, the Took side initially determined Bilbo's step toward adventure and away from the peace and quiet and predictability of his friendly hobbit hole, and which was necessary for carrying him throughout the entire adventure, though it was in a continual struggle with the Baggin's side of Bilbo!
So when I sometimes feel a bit 'down' that I allowed some man-made quiz to declare my genetic heritage to be from Gollum's side of the ledger, I think I will just close my eyes, and race into those hundreds of spiders in Mirkwood with Sting, and spend my time in a scene of mortal combat destroying a lethal threat to all I have sworn to protect. Whether I be a Hobbit, an Elf, a Dwarve, or a citizen of the White City, I will follow the guidelines laid down by Tolkien, and "do the right thing" regardless as to who my ancestors are. And as Gandalf told Frodo, it is what we do with the time given us that matters; and I believe that advice is relevant to us all!!
:-))))))
Diana wrote: "HEH HEH!!This will be fun!!"You are so right, my friend.
Hi Diana, the views you probably referenced were a combination of several categories. The races were definitely from the Silmarillion, and the overlap of traits came from Tolkien's writings (Bilbo had some Tookish traits). I added the science support from the discipline of genetics.Note how Bilbo's Tookish side ultimately got him to go on the adventure. For Bilbo, his Took genes were somewhat recessive, while with Pippin and Merry they seemed to be dominant.
We see this with humans. The mother has 46 chromosomes and the father has 46. At conception, the fertilized egg then has 46, 23 from each parent. But some are dominant and some are recessive. The dominant ones are usually what we see, like curly brown hair, blue eyes, 6'2", etc. There are recessive genes that lie dormant in the genes that may become dominant in a future generation.
Plus, there are genes that "lie quiet" until stimulated from an internal or external need/stimulus. We see this in a weightlifter or a construction worker. The muscles respond to the heavy load placed on them, thus increasing the muscles' fiber size. Or the strong, callused hands of a farmer. Or in the darkening of one's skin when exposed to the sun. The melanin already in the skin tissue responds to the rays of the sun by rising to the surface in order to protect from the damaging effects of the sun's rays.
What I sensed in Bilbo's case was the external stimuli from the Wizard and the Dwarves (in the form of excitement, challenges, reading maps, etc.) activating those Took genes that longed for adventure, discovery, travel. Had he been a Bagginess through-and-through, with no or little Tookish genes, the longing for adventure would have had little or no effect upon him. Had someone like Ham Gamgee, the Old Gaffer, been exposed to such stimuli, he would have just grunted and went back to raising his potatoes, never giving it a second thought.
Rabbit Trail
A whole new discipline/field called Epigenetics has opened up that deals with this very thing, that being, the DNA of an organism is now understood to be the hardware of the cell, while the epigenes are now known to be the software. As many know, the mapping of the human DNA is now completed, but we are still light-years of knowing how to understand anywhere near the totality of the way the genes operate, due mainly to these new discoveries -- epigenes. That is the science part of the above.
As a bit extra . . . . your entire life system uses this method. Genes seem to wait for a "signal" from some other part of you to inform that the blood sugar is too high or two low. Suddenly the pancreas is instructed to produce and release insulin or the liver releases glucose (blood sugar). Not enough oxygen? Respiration increases. One takes off running and all sorts of systems respond to make up the deficits caused by the increase in output from many different systems in the body. All ultimately gene/epigene directed. An internal stimulus caused multiple other systems to respond internally.
Yes, many things are controlled in the body via hormones and directed enzymes. But even these are the result of gene instructions. For example, the female has the chromosome XX while the male has the XY. That difference is initially seen being regulated with the fetus at about 16 weeks into gestation. If it is a male child, the body is instructed to bathe the brain of the baby with testosterone. If a female, mainly estrogen. And this is interesting: that heavy bath of testosterone in the male baby damages about 25% of the nerve bundle that connects the two brain hemispheres. This somewhat accounts for the slower and more sequential thinking in males, as opposed to females, who seem to be able to arrive at conclusions much quicker than their male counterpart. Seriously, men's minds work more like adding machines (one sequence at a time) whereas women's minds ( in general) work more like computers. Thus the book title, Men Are Like Waffles, Women Are Like Spaghetti, a very popular book.
Sorry. Rabbit Trailed again.
Anyway, my point of the original post was, I didn't feel too bad knowing I scored as a Hobbit, once I realized that many of the traits I wished I had may well still be available to me, as they lie in wait for the proper stimuli to awaken them. Even the events that Pippin endured assist him in "finding his courage." Like with Frodo, and Pippin, and Merry, and all of us, life's experiences change us, some for good and some for not-so-good. Our propensities come pretty much set from birth, but our decisions on what to do with those tendencies pretty much determine our fate.
P.S. Hey, you aren't by chance THE Diana Barry from Anne of Green Gables, are you????? ;-)
I've taken countless LoTR quizzes and usually I'm Legolas. But often I'm Aragorn or Faramir. There is also this personality test called the Myers Briggs test and it gives you a four letter personality and then there is a chart of which LoTR character also has that personality. I am Galadriel on that one. www.humanmetrics.com See who you are! I am an INFJ
And this is my quizfarm.com one:Galadriel 93%
Aragorn 77%
Samwise Gamgee 60%
Arwen of Rivendell 57%
Legolas 57%
Eowyn of Rohan 53%
Gandalf the Grey 50%
Meriadoc Brandybuck (Merry) 50%
Gollum 47%
Gimli 47%
Frodo Baggins 47%
Boromir 40%
Saruman the White 40%
Peregrin Took (Pippin) 27%
I am familiarveith the B-M tedting. One of the absolute best tests today!! But I must admit I havebnevrt seen it connected to any LOTR characters. Will definitely he checking this one out. Thanks for the heads up.
Sorry about the misspellings. Tried to delete and start over but wouldn't let me. :-P
Strider wrote: "I am familiarveith the B-M tedting. One of the absolute best tests today!! But I must admit I havebnevrt seen it connected to any LOTR characters. Will definitely he checking this one out. Thanks ..."Yes, it is a really neat test! There are also Star Wars charts too. Probably more.
Cool!!
Is he your favourite character?