All well and dandy, but Peeves isn't a ghost.

-edit-

Whether or not Filch can interact with the house ghosts is another idea all together. Not sure if he is ever shown interacting directly with the Bloody Baron, but I seem to remember Filch threatening Peeves with him. It may have been a different character though, it has been too long since I read canon.

 

I think it likely that Muggles can see ghosts, simply because there's a lot of claims IRL of people seeing ghosts. If Muggles couldn't see ghosts, the fact that lots of Muggles claim to have seen them would be odd.

 

Rowling, unfortunately, doesn't really understand how genetics works, given that she said that the magic gene is dominant - if that were the case, then there would be no muggles left and everyone would be magical.

More likely, the magic gene is recessive: m; and, a mutated form that bestows no magic - but allows interaction with the magical world - a squib mutation, is dominant: M. A true muggle has neither of these genes, and in fact does not even have a slot in their genetic code for them. For convenience's sake, I will label this as 0 (zero), meaning, no gene. I will conceded Rowlings statement that the gene is "strong" - and interpret this to mean that if a Wizard and a Muggle were to couple, then the magic gene would always impose itself onto the genetic makeup of their children.

So a Wizard's alleles would be mm. A squib's alleles would be either mM OR MM. This is important because while the MM is a "terminal" Squib (T-Squib) gene - no matter with whom they couple, their offspring will never be a wizard - the mM squib is non-terminal (NT-Squib) - they have the potential to produce a wizard.

Wizard (mm) + Wizard (mm) = Wizard (mm), Wizard (mm), Wizard (mm), Wizard (mm) = 100% chance of producing another Wizard, assuming no mutations occur.

Wizard (mm) + NT-Squib (mM) = Wizard (mm), Wizard (mm), NT-Squib (mM), NT-Squib (mM) = 50% chance of producing another Wizard and 50% chance of producing an NT-Squib, assuming no mutations occur.

Wizard (mm) + T-Squib (MM) = NT-Squib (mM), NT-Squib (mM), NT-Squib (mM), NT-Squib (mM) = 100% chance of producing an NT-Squib, assuming no mutations occur.

Wizard (mm) + Muggle (00) = Wizard (mm), Wizard (mm), Wizard (mm), Wizard (mm), = 100% chance of producing a Wizard, assuming no mutations occur. Based on the assumption that True Muggles have nothing with which to counter act the Wizard gene, and the Wizard gene imposes itself on the offspring's genetic code. Also assuming that because the Muggle parent's genetic code doesn't have a slot, the Wizarding parent's entire magical gene gets used to fill in the gap, so there are no m0s.

NT-Squib (mM) + NT-Squib (mM) = Wizard (mm), NT-Squib (mM), NT-Squib (Mm), T-Squib (MM) = 25% chance to produce a Wizard, 50% chance to produce another NT-Squib, and a 25% chance to produce a T-Squib, assuming no mutations occur.

NT-Squib (mM) + T-Squib (MM) = NT-Squib (mM), NT-Squib (mM), T-Squib (MM), T-Squib (MM) = 50% chance to produce an NT-Squib and a 50% chance to produce a T-Squib, assuming no mutations occur.

NT-Squib (mM) + Muggle (00) = NT-Squib (mM), NT-Squib (mM), NT-Squib (mM), NT-Squib (mM), = 100% chance of producing a NT-Squib, assuming no mutations occur.

T-Squib (MM) + T-Squib (MM) = T-Squib (MM), T-Squib (MM), T-Squib (MM), T-Squib (MM), = 100% chance of producing a T-Squib, assuming no mutations occur.

T-Squib (MM) + Muggle (00) = T-Squib (MM), T-Squib (MM), T-Squib (MM), T-Squib (MM), = 100% chance of producing a T-Squib, assuming no mutations occur.

Thus, from the above, I would postulate that Muggleborns are in fact the offspring of two NT-Squibs who happened to have gotten married and who have probably had nothing to do with the magical world for possibly several, if not many generations on both sides.

Although this schematic lends some credence to the pure-blood supremacy movement, it does not actually because it could also be used to encourage Wizards and Witches to go find the best Muggles they can find - the children will be magical and the Wizarding population's genetic stock will only improve. Ensnare the world's strongest, the world's most agile, the world's most intelligent, the world's most charismatic, the world's wisest, and so on. Grab up all the best potential to ensure that the wizarding population is genetically the best of the best of the best.

The schematic does strongly suggest prohibiting Wizards from marrying squibs, but it also suggests getting those squibs together with other squibs asap to increase the chances of producing more Wizards, and it also suggests keeping squibs away from muggles so they don't accidentally muddy up the 00 gene pool (the pool Wizards should tap to get all those other great genes) with a bunch of mMs or worse, MMs.

 

In a nutshell, JKR (when she wasn't just being inconsistent and/or changing her mind mid-series) cleverly included incorrect information, hearsay, and myths about muggles in her books, along with correct facts, to show that wizards don't know everything about them.

This adds to the realism of her world.

However, she never took the time to tell us which was fact, hearsay, or myth.

Rin: I know nearly jack about genetics, but that looks like it makes sense (outside of explanations that involve magic!™).

 

I'm with you through the reasoning as a standing condition. Iteratively (that is, after generations of intermixing), the 00 True Muggles would slowly disappear with the introduction of just a few wizards into a population, leaving most muggles to actually be NT squibs. Again, iteratively, the NT's would produce mostly NTs with the occasional Wizard and a slowly-reducing population of Terminal squibs.

The rate of magic as a mutation spreading throughout a freely-mixing populace is only metered by how much the wizards like producing children with the non-magical. If there is a preference for magicals to build only magical families with magical mates, the process of NT-spread is greatly diminished, but still statistically progressive.

Basically, if the magicals stick together, they'll be keeping the magic from spreading as fast, which helps them retain power. If, on the other hand, a faction of magicals pushes to make babies almost exclusively with non-magicals, the spread of magical ability will accelerate, generationally.

From a political perspective, to keep power within the magical community, the leadership must discourage the migration of magicals back into muggle culture, and do everything in their power to prevent magical phenomena from becoming acceptable in the muggle mainstream.

Basically, the pure-bloods are right, but only if you don't want everyone to be able to do magic. Such an empowered population would create mass chaos, breeding stories of everyday acts of wonder, unless and until the magical are beaten back and told to stay in their own hidden enclaves.

Sounds like the stories of God-Kings, Pharaohs, and Classical heroes may have been more accurate than we thought.

 

Rin: the problem I have with your ideas is that I find it rather unlikely that all these Squibs have mutated magic genes independently yet resulting in the same "squib gene" in all their different cases.

 

Actually, for it to be a complete gene, the first mutation was probably mM.
It would seed through a small population until cousins marry often enough and suddenly the first true wizard appears. That wizard shares his/her gifts and over generations that population will become primarily mM. Then they start traveling to other cultures, spreading around the mM quirk, and MANY generations later a regularly predictable population of magicals starts to arise.

 

We can accept both- I was only looking at Rin's gene theory from the perspective of explaining how the world JKR presented could still operate within our understanding of biochemistry and inheritance.

The m = magic active and M = magic inactive genes might possibly be detectable by spells, allowing for a difference in how squibs are affected by magic aimed at muggles, but as I mentioned before, there's probably a lot more undetected squibs in the population than just the ones one-generation from the magical.

In that case a squib (as represented in the books) is a person with dead magic but magical parents, such that they are politically recognized as 'In the know' as far as the Statute of Secrecy is concerned. Which is what you said.

BTW: corollary to the idea that 'the more magicals mate with muggles, the more that muggleborns will show up in the population', the purebloods have every reason to kill any muggleborn that doesn't join into magical society, if they're trying to keep magic 'in the families'. One self-righteous muggleborn with too much brains and not enough savvy could easily publish a paper explaining the genetic stuff to the Ministry as described here. If taken seriously, it would trigger a Purity war.

Now that's a plot bunny for the anti-Hermione set.

 

All of which ignores the crux of the matter:

If Hogwarts has an army of magical elves that get off on the very idea of picking up your shit for you, why does Hogwarts need a squib janitor anyway?

 

Probably because they want someone capable of a level of independent thought that elves aren't. So Filch can deal with certain situations that elves can't and wizards can't be bothered to.
I don't understand any of the gene stuff but I'm with Sesc on this, trying to explain the magic (or lack of) in a person using genes is a bad idea.

 

Or charity.

Apart from cleaning, Filch takes care of minor disciplinary issues; that's all I can think of.

 

At the risk of derailing another thread, Jim Butcher disagrees. In TDF, physics and magic are not exactly mutually exclusive, and his series is all the better for it. Now, HP is its own animal and I think it ought to stay that way, but a talented author might be able to pull it off.

Well, given that "how aeroplanes stay up" is a baffling question for a man who's arguably one of the smarter- or at least wiser - purebloods, any kind of science would likely be laughed at or dismissed out of hand. However, I agree that trying to explain magic via science is a fool's errand. It's called magic because, well, it's *magic*.

Anyway, unless I'm much mistaken, JKR stated in one of her countless (and often contradictory or ret-conning) interviews that M'borns were all in fact descendents of long-ago Squibs, their "dormant" magical genes having come to the fore, or somehow returned to being dominant, w/e. It's all bullshit of course, but no doubt it helped spawn all the Secretly-Pureblood!Hermione anal seepage.

That there are

Spoiler

no M'borns but that they're all illegitimate wizard offspring

is an important point in "The Golden Age" by Arsonoe de Blassenville, one of my ATF fics.

@vlad: Filch filled the role of "leering, vaguely-pedo creeper". JKR knew that every school has one of these musty-smelling dudes, whether it has elves or not.

 

Well in that case, it should have been a musty-smelling pedo elf D: D: D:

 

Agreed on the Dresden point, but whether or not Arthur Weasley is one of the smarter/wiser purebloods is... debatable. Nicer, certainly, but I never saw him as particularly smart. Not sure what the canon take is, but I always saw him as fairly average in terms of intelligence, maybe even a little bit above average, but not as smart as people like Lucius Malfoy.

Uh, ATF?

What vlad said.

 

ATF = All time favorite I believe.

 

While I do agree that Rowling trying to explain magic is stupid, and that magic should stay the fuck away from science, I have to disagree with that statement. Until a few centuries ago, many things that are now explained and widely known facts were hailed as magic. Now one capable author who had this idea that magic is somehow explained but wizard do not bother to research and just accept it, could possibly pull it off, and I don't think we'd be able to contradict him much.
Magic= unexplained. The fact that it should remain unexplained does not stop it from possibly having an explanation.

 

Magic doesn't mean unexplained. Magic means that someone who waves a stick of wood at a rock can turn it into an elephant that believes it has a past, personality, and future. The explanation is that it was magic, because for hundreds of years this has been the explanation. There is a semi-science to magic (laws of magic, etc.), which shows that it doesn't go unstudied, and the Department of Mysteries could have studied/still be studying/be not studying it at all, and their lack of addition to the topic in at least seven years says something.

 

Magic Definition: the use of means (as charms or spells) believed to have supernatural power over natural forces

Supernatural Definition: of, pertaining to, or being above or beyond what is natural; unexplainable by natural law or phenomena; abnormal.

Magic is not the unexplained, things are just inappropriately labeled as magic because they are not understood.

In the Harry Potter universe, if there was an explanation of magic pertaining to the natural law and science, I'd have a hard time thinking of it as magic in that universe.

There's not, because it's magic.

Is there a very very small chance that the 'magic' in Harry Potter isn't magic in all, and follows physics and natural law, laws that we don't yet know about. Maybe, but I wouldn't bet on it.