I've seen this question posed before, not as a thread but a response. So i decided to ask in a thread. If a thread does exist, forgive my Dunmer self. Here goes.

Why can't the races interbreed? It would be nice to be a mix of 2 breeds and only be able to choose one of the two special powers and intermingle the perks each come with. I do not know anything about coding but I can't think it would be too difficullt for Beth to do. Your thoughts?

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Racial_Phylogenyanswers that question lorewise.
Usually the offsprings bears the racial traits of the mother.

I believe that for Oblivion there were some mods that allowed you to make halfbreeds that looked the part, and possibly there will also be similar for Skyrim.

I don't think that would work, the race of the baby is always the mothers race.

That book gives the impression that you come out looking your mother's race but have a chance of having some of the abilities of the father - so for example you might as a dunmer/imperial be an imperial who is resistant to fire.

Exactly. Or a dunmer that people liked. LOL.

Here's why we don't have crossbreeding. it's the stuff of nightmares...

http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1313103-show-off-your-mixed-race-characters/

The trouble is that with 8 races, Bethesda would have to create too many extra races to account for all the cross-breed possibilities. They already had to shorten or leave out many things in the game to make their deadline to ship it. like questlines, bigger cities, more npcs, etc... More races would be even less of the other things we now see in the game. It is just a matter of resource management, and crossbreeds are too far down on the totem pole to spend the time on.

If you are on the PC, you can still use the console to give yourself the powers of another race. Or make an entirely new race with the construction set though.

The book tells us however that the offspring would look like their mother, not a mix of both. So lore wise those imagines are incorrect.

I never claimed those were lore correct. And as far as I'm concerned fun > lore.

The Phylogeny Book is just a theory that seems to work as rule of thumb. But it's more complicated than that.

Modern Bretons are the result of generations of interbreeding between Nedic tribes and Direnni Altmer. Modern Imperials are a mix of Nedic tribes and Atmoran Nords. The Reachmen (Forsworn) are a mix of just about everything, basically Bretons with stuff like Orc thrown in as well.

There is also the Grey Prince, who was half orc and half... sort of human. He looked like an orc but had smoother features, more humanlike in his appearance.

I loved that dude.

Yeah, that's why that book is troll science. I know people who look totally like their dads. Although maybe it was just referring to the world of TES.

He was half vampire, which was probably the main thing at work there.

Well, duh?