StormyAngel

It's pretty funny that the title everyone gets for one post is Spren. I couldn't help but think, "Hey! Look at all the Sanderspren!" Sanderspren: Noun. A type of spren that congregates about the words and presence of Brandon Sanderson.

That sound's reasonably plausible. I can see you're pulling from the listener stanza in WOR that refers to Humans being like meat to the Spren, whereas the listeners are some kind of lesser nourishment (sorry, I don't remember the exact wording). Given that the spren bonded with the Radiants are distinct individuals (speaking and thinking separately), whereas the spren bonded with Listeners/Parshendi are not, there must be a reason for that. I particularly like the way this makes the Nahel bond about the spren. For some reason i always focused on the other side of the bond, wondering what it was about them that made this a "nahel" bond. Come to think of it, what are listener's bonds with spren called? Are those also Nahel bonds? A note though, we have yet to actually see a voidspren forcibly bond with anyone. While it is made clear that Eshonai is not in control of herself after bonding with a voidspren, the actual bonding was something she chose to do, at least at first. The Stormfather does seem to indicate that the new storm will change all parshmen regardless, although I have to wonder if that has anything to do with the fact that they are all mindless drones. Theoretically, an intelligent listener (read: parshendi group that escaped eshonai's stormform group) should be able to find shelter during the storm and avoid the transformation. Or if physical shelter doesn't cut it, then they can maybe refuse the bonding initially, as opposed to initiating it and then frantically trying to change their minds like eshonai did.

I don't know about you but when I was reading Words of Radiance for the first time, I was delighted with Adolin and Shallan's developing relationship. While I also found Shallan's interactions with Kaladin humorous/enjoyable, I felt a growing fear that Sanderson was developing a love triangle. I hate love triangles. Funnily enough, I remember reading a post somewhere where Brandon mentioned that his Beta-readers kept begging him that whatever else he did, not to make a love triangle. At the time I foolishly took that statement at face-value. It felt like he was reassuring us, no he wasn't going to go there. But I've looked a little more closely at the situation and I realized that this simply isn't true. Sanderson has already made the love triangle. A love triangle exists simply by being possible and generally acknowledged. The characters don't have to be discussing it in a book to make it real. Do you think we wouldn't be having so much angst over this if Sanderson didn't intend for us to get the feeling that there is one? What he has so cleverly done is refrain from making it obtrusive, but it's still there. The worst part is that Sanderson has done love triangles before, in the original Mistborn trilogy for example. I just didn't care about that one because I didn't like one of the characters. Unfortunately, I like ALL of the characters in the stormlight triangle he has constructed. I've actually come to a neutral place at this point. I could be happy with the triangle going either way, because I'm sure that Sanderson will do it right. That still doesn't keep it from frustrating me though. So what was the point of all this? I'm not trying to touch off any shipping wars or anything, I just hope that people will realize that the love triangle does exist, in that Sanderson has laid the foundations for further drama between Adolin, Kaladin, and Shallan. He could take this either direction, and definitely has one in mind already I'm sure, but no matter what he does it's going to be a bumpy ride.

I don't think Sazed meant it to justify his not interfering on a more daily level. He wasn't claiming to be too busy, instead he was just making a point about Wax's next argument that God could find the line not to cross. "here it is" he basically said. Also @Argent, I think that Sazed's two Shards allow him to pretty much hold off the enemy without any significant strain. Since he holds the upper hand, so to speak, he's just playing defensively. That's actually the smart way to do it, since he doesn't know enough about the enemy to avoid getting drawn into a trap.

Keep in mind that Prof probably would be focused on keeping his own secret (that he's an epic), and so wouldn't even be thinking in that direction when the "technology" didn't work for Megan. Maybe later when Conflux brought it up he should of thought of it, but they had a lot going on right then. Come to think of it, wasn't Megan "dead" at that point anyway?

Also, Kelsier is all about surviving, and killing off every person on the planet (like the red-eyes said was the goal at the end) is too contradictory to that. It would fly in the face of everything he's done before, and for pretty much no reason

If you think of all 3 realms as parallel planes, then a perpendicularity would be the point where all three are connected by the Shardic influence. Given that Hoid seems to travel through them, that makes a lot of sense.

Even better, the plans were intentionally designed to work better if they died.

This probably isn't at all right, but I always just assumed that because everyone views the ocean as one large singular thing it was more solid. Admittedly that worked better in Roshar where even things like a ship were represented by a single sphere.

This is why I think Sanderson had him keep saying, "It was a really brilliant plan...now if only i could remember it." He set all of those dominoes up, waaaaayyy back at the beginning.

I thought the Cognitive realm was expressly shaped by thoughts and the cognitive functions of sentient beings. That's why the geography is so similar for one thing. For another, there's nothing happening (no one sentient) in empty space, which is why in the cognitive realm you can just walk from one world to another. If that is the case, then the cognitive realm could absolutely be altered by the way people value things, aka their monetary system. Money is an essential part of strong economies, and therefore part of our daily lives. People have to think about it a lot. That being said, I get the feeling that this case on Roshar is more of a correlation than causation thing. Something about symmetry and holiness and the way Rosharan's view things, and thus the way those things show up in the cognitive realm. Edit: I think I misread your post at first. I partially agree, the shape of the money itself shouldn't matter unless it is tied into some deep cognitive aspect of the Rosharan worldview.

So having finished Secret History I have to say: Preservation/Leras really rocks the Cosmere. Reading the original trilogy it's always impressive how his plan works out to essentially neutralize Ruin forever. What the Secret History shows is that he managed to pull off this plan (with some help admittedly) right under the Cosmere's noses. It's like he managed to not only preserve his shard and capture another, but also to do so while fooling everyone else into thinking it was hopeless and that they should stay away. Preservation singlehandedly changes the balance of the cosmere, literally preserving his planet and others by preventing Ruin from running about like Odium. Basically, I think it could be argued that Preservation managed to fulfill his intent better than any other shard we've seen so far. Of course, it's also nice to see how Kelsier continues to break all the rules.

Actually there is a mention of Ruin in Scadrial's Cognitive Realm. He's the writhing darkness hanging overhead and blocking the sun. I think Kelsier mentions it a couple of times. As for Sel, WOB is that traveling there is extremely difficult/dangerous. I follow the theory that this is because Dominion and Devotion's investiture has flooded the Cognitive Realm there rather than staying put in the Spiritual Realm like it is supposed to. I like the theory because this explains why images of geography in the physical realm (which happen to be exact matches for the Cognitive Realm) can summon power. Draw a map of water (form something in your cognitive mind) and thus summon through some of that spiritual aspect. hence why the aon for water has the big lake in it, and the aon for wood has the forests in it, etc. etc. I don't track ongoing discussions too often though, so some of this may be out of date or already proven wrong.

Don't we use lithium in batteries? So if you're theory about lithium is correct then these airships are battery powered! (/allomantically...)

I may not have been reading closely enough, but I don't think is a sure thing. While they did find the body intact, I don't recall any certainty as to time of death, and Idashwy had been missing for a week minimum. Plus when we have the viewpoint at the actual party, the servant seems definitely like a guy to me. So she may have been the killer, but it doesn't have to have been her. I'm personally finding that unlikely.