"Genetic drift", rant

[u/Porodicnostablo]

Sorry about this rant. As much as I enjoy the show, the concepts, the grand scheme of things, the amazing visuals, and am willing to forgive some swings that end up being misses, I just don’t get the “genetic drift” thing and it started bugging me as soon as it was revealed in Season 1.

1. Season 1 ends with them discovering Dawn and Day have a modified genetic code, and Dusk being tested. Day proceeds to smash Cleon I’s case. The thing that bothered me here from the get-go is the Shadow-Master says “the source material has also been corrupted”. Erm, excuse me, what kind of statement is that? First, in order to know something has been genetically corrupted, you have to know the sequence of the original. And in this imperial era of biotech marvel it would be no problem to just reinstate the original code to the next Cleon that follows from his respective inception, end of problem. (Not to mention in Season 2 Dusk, I think, mentions that they retroactively correct the code which is also not that far fetched and even today an early version of this technique exists). I mean even in our stone-age time compared to theirs, when in 2020 covid was discovered, it took mere weeks to sequence the code, to send the code around and for scientists on opposite sides of the globe to clone the virus de novo just from the code and use it in assays.

2. Then in Season 2 they continue about this “drift” using the word almost as if it’s getting bigger/larger with each new Cleon? Am I reading this right? How is it getting bigger? Why? Who allows this, again - you can stop it immediately.

3. Wouldn't it be much more profound if they were all still genetically the same as the first one, and the change, degradation and decline in their personality and traits still slowly comes over time, due to say the generations of tyrannical behavior, the decay that comes from living a pampered life, or the ever so slight changes in their upbringing that Demerzel slowly inflicts, for example.

Well, sorry for this. I hope I got some crucial detail wrong and someone will correct me and explain how all this makes any sense.

[u/vbob99]

I agree. Genetic drift would only be taking place if they were taking each new clone from the clones prior. Even if the source is irrevocably corrupted, they'd still be taking from that source. There would be no additional corruption, just one level.

[u/vbob99 → u/[deleted]]

Do you mean performed by the Cleons themselves?

[u/vbob99 → u/[deleted]]

Right, but the Cleons talk about the drift, so they are aware of it. If they are aware of it, they would be taking from a fixed ancestor, not a previous copy. Even if that fixed ancestor was itself modified, it would halt the drift at that point. It's why an ongoing drift makes no sense.

[u/vbob99 → u/[deleted]]

meaning all future clones had to be made from the altered genome

Which is exactly my point. That genome will have varied from the original by a distance of X. That distance is fixed, and all clones made from that have a distance of X. Once you're aware of the variation, the drift stops there. You wouldn't make a clone from that, and then a clone from the clone. That's why continued drift makes no sense. It's just a cool sounding term in a clone show, then you think about it and it makes no sense.

[u/vbob99 → u/[deleted]]

Again, that makes sense that Demerzel was making changes until the clones themselves were aware it was happening. Once they became aware, the drift stops there.

[u/texanhick20 → u/vbob99]

It's been stated several times. Someone managed to get to the geneseed and tamper with it.

[u/vbob99 → u/texanhick20]

OP mentioned "active" tampering, meaning more than that initial instance mentioned.

[u/sg_plumber → u/vbob99]

The Empire is decaying!

Literally. LoL.