Primarchs: Nature or Nurture?

[Midgard]

Lately I've been toying with an idea of an alternate Heresy in which Primarchs' home worlds were reshuffled - that is, the Primarchs landed on planets the other Primarchs landed on in canon. For example, "Sanguinius" lands at Nostromo instead of Baal, while Kurze lands at Fenris, Russ at Macragge, and so on*.

 

This brings up an interesting question. Do you see the Primarchs as more or less "blank slate" when they arrived, and fully shaped by their environment, or do you see them as being already formed with specific character flaws, personalities, and aptitudes when they were first created?

 

Some of the recent statements in the Heresy series almost seem to point at the latter - otherwise the hypothesis that the Emperor created the Primarchs for specific roles becomes seriously flawed. If the Emperor did create the Primarchs for specific roles, and with some redundancy (it seems that some of the Primarchs had very similar aptitudes/skills, and considering that two had apparently failed even before the Heresy, it only makes sense that the Emperor would want to build in some safeguards), it points to their personalities and aptitudes being determined even before their home worlds affected them. If this assumption were to hold true, then even if someone like Guilliman was to be found on Angron's home world and outfitted with implants, the end result would have been different from the "canon" World Eaters, while Angron would not have built a supremely efficient marvel of organization on Macragge. Of course, if we are to take the "nurture" argument, there would have been very little difference in the above example.

 

So, what do you think? Is it more "nature" or more "nurture"? What are your arguments for each?

 

 

 

* Note that this is not necessarily how I am planning the alternate Heresy storyline, if I will even write it at all - that is just an example. Naturally, if I was to ever write it, the Primarch names would end up being different, and their Legions may not quite resemble the "canon".

[The Crimson Cartel]

Seems pretty clear to me that they are written as being products of their environments. Alternate versions could be a fun idea though. I like the idea of a vigilante winged angel. :rolleyes:

[GooseDaMoose]

I really think this topic has a high chance of becoming a huge internet debate/war. Already in real life this is an incredibly central debate in sociology and when you add internet anonymity into the already volatile mix that is Nature vs. Nurture debates, well it won't go well.

 

But, since I now have the opportunity to state my belief without being dragged into an already huge argument, I think as Crimson Cartel says the way the Primarchs are written, it certainly seems like they are all products of their surroundings. Although presumably Alpharius would still be split, Sanguinius would still have wings and Magnus would have super psychic powers. If Sanguinius was found on Nostramo there's a good chance they would've killed him for being a gross mutant, or just because killing babies is fun.*

 

 

*For Nostramans.

[ICHD?]

Hmm...I guess my stance is that, because Sanguinius had wings, certainly he would have been raised to know that he was "special", but on some levels he would have known that. The fluff does say that their methods of war did come to them as second nature and their foster families, for want of a better term, just gave them a nudge in the right direction.

[Khestra the Unbeheld]

I think their past fluff gives a large impression that it's Nurture over Nature, but one of the things I like about the Horus Heresy series is that the Primarchs are getting much-needed doses of three-dimensionality, along with a solid injection of Nurture and Nature into their behaviors and personalities. Given that they're artificial lifeforms that were created by someone and not actually "born" into a traditional family makeup, I don't think the and can be readily divorced from them: their creator crafted them for purpose, and their various and scattered environments honed those templates into who they were, so both Nature and Nurture were contributing factors to their developments. I'm not sure that was ever the Emperor's plan for them (he seems more a Nurture But With A Nature That I Gave You kind of guy) but we'll never really know if Angron missed out on the Emperor's plan to make him a champion botanist and flower arranger or whether there was just an element of "Let's wind him up and see what he does" (I doubt it, though, the Emperor seems like the type to abhor spontaneity in favor of rigid planning).

[Midgard]

Just to be perfectly clear, and to address a concern stated by GooseDaMoose, I definitely have no intentions of bringing the real world (and the real-world debate of nature vs nurture in the upbringing of children) into it. I think that, as Khestra says, we are dealing with artificial beings in a fictional universe, with a very real possibility that certain character traits were deliberately wrought into them.

 

In case of the Primarchs, if "nature" (or, rather, the technologies and possibly even warp-sorceries of the Emperor's design) is at least a part of the mix, the concept I was thinking of becomes plausible. If not, the differences are likely to be largely cosmetic with the exception of very few Primarchs who had major physical differences with the rest - Alpharius (due to the twin), Sanguinius (due to obvious physical mutation), and Magnus (due to his psychic potential being activated from even before his creation was fully complete). That alone might make or break the hypothetical "plausibility" (as much as possible in a fictional universe) of the concept I mentioned in the OP.

[Iron_Adam]

I think the most logical approach to this argument is too compare the primarchs to computers, they were built for a specific purpose, and were given the genetic tools (adaptability, intelligence, motivation, and physical presence; not to mention the individual specific traits like magnus' psychic ability.) these tools are like the top of the line versions of what every human has, and is geared to grow a super human who does all he can in every sense.

 

Just think for a second, every primarch adapted perfectly to the planet they landed on, and adapted so well they ended up doing that culture better than the natives; thus becoming the leader. Furthermore, evidence of programing is evident in how the primarchs ended up following the emperor. It's like a math equation, it makes more sense to follow the emperor because you will have soooo much more in the end, it's challenging, it promises more room to grow.

 

Using this argument, it is completely evident that some primarchs would end up becoming traitors, they just followed their programing over their allegiance.

[lithior]

I don't believe the fluff allows for it to be a case of either Nature OR Nurture, if the way they turned out was due to plans the Emperor had for them then that would imply that the worlds they ended up on weren't responsable, which means it would have to be a series of MASSIVE coinsidences that landed all 18 known Primarchs on planets who's current culture was almost a mirror image of their own mentality.

 

However, it would also be a huge coincidence for all the Primarchs to land on 18 totaly different and highly unique planets that all led to the creation of 18 leaders who were masters in 18 completely differenty forms of warfair. To me this smacks of some sort of programming by the Emperor.

 

The only conclusion I can come to is that they are a result of a mixture of the two, that they were indeed highly pre-programmed and that this was what drew them to their respective planets during the disaster that saw them scattered across the galaxy. Maybe in the warp it was their highly tuned psychs that led them to planets that were so similar to them?

 

Just my thoughts

[blamb]

if i recall from the index astartes articles Perturabo had a natural affinaty for machines, Konrad Kruze shaped the world he was on more than being shaped by it and Angron was discovered amongst some dead aliens (supposedly eldar) which he was believed to have slain.

 

That said Angron wouldn't have become the killer he is if not for the implants and slavery, Lion El Johnson wouldn't have become as knightly as he is if not for the knightly orders on Caliban

[Iron_Adam]

I'd also like to point out how much of the 40k universe feels prophetic. All the names, the archetypes, and the coincidences seem pre planned in a way, what are the odds that as Sanguinus ends up on a planet where he is venerated instead of destroyed. And I doubt the emperor could have made these predictions, I still think everything is the long term game of the forces of chaos, it is how they work isn't it?

[Mark VII]

It could be that the primarchs have preset personalities, but their homeworlds would colour these characteristics. Vulkan loved the local people of his homeworld and later on the Salamanders become a chapter that actually looks after imperial citizens. Now put Vulkan on Night Haunter's homeworld. Yeah, he probably would still become a protector of the people, but who knows how he would go about it. Would he become a vigilante like Curze or would he become so disgusted at the crime rate, he'd turn his back on the people? Even though one has a personality, its what's going on around them that determines how they act.

[Billuriye]

It's hard to tell. Too much ambiguity. You can't tell if Leman Russ was always wolfy or got the traits from Fenris for example.