Resonant Frequencies and the Shattered Plains

[Leyrann]

Would the Splintering of Honor have a specific place on Roshar where it happened? Because then I'd point at the center of the Shattered Plains. After all, there was a major city there at that time (Stormseat).

[Brightlord M. Alhstrom]

46 minutes ago, Leyrann said:

Would the Splintering of Honor have a specific place on Roshar where it happened? Because then I'd point at the center of the Shattered Plains. After all, there was a major city there at that time (Stormseat).

Honor's death is relatively recent. And if the shattering of Stormseat was anything remotely recent, then people would know that Stormseat used to be there, and a lot of the Shallan plot for WoR wouldn't make sense.

[Leyrann]

Just now, Brightlord Maelstrom said:

Honor's death is relatively recent. And if the shattering of Stormseat was anything remotely recent, then people would know that Stormseat used to be there, and a lot of the Shallan plot for WoR wouldn't make sense.

It just needs to be more recent than the Recreance, right? That would mean it might be anywhere in the last, like, two thousand years. There's quite a lot of knowledge that can be lost in 2000 years, and in our own history, up until a few hundred years ago, the only way that knowledge really was passed down over many generations was through theological teachings, which might just be the reason that we even know about the Recreance still.

[Brightlord M. Alhstrom]

6 minutes ago, Leyrann said:

It just needs to be more recent than the Recreance, right? That would mean it might be anywhere in the last, like, two thousand years. There's quite a lot of knowledge that can be lost in 2000 years, and in our own history, up until a few hundred years ago, the only way that knowledge really was passed down over many generations was through theological teachings, which might just be the reason that we even know about the Recreance still.

Which event?

If you are talking about Tanavast's death, then I guess that it only has to be after the Recreance, though I suspect that it is very recent. Like, within a couple of decades. The way I see it, Odium might have realized he was getting close to killing Tanavast, so he decided to schedule the Last Desolation after he'd splintered Honor to make his work easier. Also, the visions that Gavilar and Dalinar receive are from Tanavast, through the Stormfather. If Honor died millennia ago, then why did he tell the Stormfather to wait a couple of thousand years to give the visions? If the Stormfather has been giving out the visions for centuries, then you'd think the ardentia would have heard rumors of Tanavast's death.

No, I suspect that Gavilar was the first (or maybe second) person to receive the visions and that this was because either he was the first worthy candidate since Tanavast's death, or that Tanavast had died right around then. Either way, it hasn't been thousands of years, let alone hundreds of years.

[Beast_c_a_t]

Maybe the Dawncities were built at the source of the Listener's rhythms and they used the the source at Stormseat to break free of Odium's control by basically cranking it to 11 and blowing out the speaker. This would also explain why the Dawncities are built to a pattern of radial symmetry, the patterns already existed and the cities were built around them.

[The Invested Beard]

I think it's interesting how no one's mentioned something yet. All this talk of resonances and no one has connected this to the resonances that Knight Radiant orders share between the closest two? That can't be a coincidence...

[The alertArchitect]

This is a very interesting and plausible theory, except for one thing. 

Aren’t the Shattered Plains the original capitol of Natanatan?

I can’t remember the exact place in the text, but I’m pretty sure WoR makes it fairly clear that the plateaus were actually buildings of the ancient city covered in an astronomical amount of crem, especially since Adolin uses one of the buildings for a surprise attack on the storm form Listeners in the battle during the climax. So, the plains never ‘shattered,’ the city was just abandoned for yet-unrevealed (to my knowledge) reasons.

[The Invested Beard]

1 hour ago, The alertArchitect said:

This is a very interesting and plausible theory, except for one thing. 

Aren’t the Shattered Plains the original capitol of Natanatan?

I can’t remember the exact place in the text, but I’m pretty sure WoR makes it fairly clear that the plateaus were actually buildings of the ancient city covered in an astronomical amount of crem, especially since Adolin uses one of the buildings for a surprise attack on the storm form Listeners in the battle during the climax. So, the plains never ‘shattered,’ the city was just abandoned for yet-unrevealed (to my knowledge) reasons.

I don't think that was the whole shattered plains, just the very middle of it was the city.

[Andy92]

4 hours ago, The Invested Beard said:

I think it's interesting how no one's mentioned something yet. All this talk of resonances and no one has connected this to the resonances that Knight Radiant orders share between the closest two? That can't be a coincidence...

The word resonance has a few different definitions. 

I'm referring to the mechanics/physics definition in my theory. The way resonances between two KR orders are described reminds me of the Chemistry definition of the term: two structures joining to create a single, more powerful structure. Resonance can be used to describe a few different phenomena, but I'm specifically looking at the vibrations. 

[The Invested Beard]

Just now, Andy92 said:

The word resonance has a few different definitions. 

I'm referring to the mechanics/physics definition in my theory. The way resonances between two KR orders are described reminds me of the Chemistry definition of the term: two structures joining to create a single, more powerful structure. Resonance can be used to describe a few different phenomena, but I'm specifically looking at the vibrations. 

All true, but we don't know exactly how KR resonance works yet, so the connection could still be there.

[Jonathon]

4 hours ago, The Invested Beard said:

I think it's interesting how no one's mentioned something yet. All this talk of resonances and no one has connected this to the resonances that Knight Radiant orders share between the closest two? That can't be a coincidence...

The thing is resonances aren't just perks of Knight Radiant orders. They also occur on other planets with other magic systems (i.e. Wax and Wayne have resonances). Resonances are caused by interactions between dishardic magic systems, meaning when influence from more than one shard is present (KR surges have influences from both cultivation and honor; Wax and Wayne both have allomantic and feruchenical powers which are from preservation and ruin). IIRC Khriss makes a mention of resonances in... I think it was AU? I'm not sure on that one...

[Andy92]

1 minute ago, The Invested Beard said:

All true, but we don't know exactly how KR resonance works yet, so the connection could still be there.

I'll agree on that. Don't know if the resonances caused by Stormlight-fueled powers between two orders are affecting chemical bonds or if they're doing something completely different. I'm just not 100% sure on what Brandon's intent on using the term resonance there is.  

[Andy92]

2 hours ago, The alertArchitect said:

This is a very interesting and plausible theory, except for one thing. 

Aren’t the Shattered Plains the original capitol of Natanatan?

I can’t remember the exact place in the text, but I’m pretty sure WoR makes it fairly clear that the plateaus were actually buildings of the ancient city covered in an astronomical amount of crem, especially since Adolin uses one of the buildings for a surprise attack on the storm form Listeners in the battle during the climax. So, the plains never ‘shattered,’ the city was just abandoned for yet-unrevealed (to my knowledge) reasons.

Missed this comment earlier, but like was said, I'm pretty sure the part of the plains that used to be a city was at the center of the plains. All of the vast landscape surrounding the city wasn't buildings covered in crem. That was just what happened at the city. 

[The alertArchitect]

40 minutes ago, Andy92 said:

Missed this comment earlier, but like was said, I'm pretty sure the part of the plains that used to be a city was at the center of the plains. All of the vast landscape surrounding the city wasn't buildings covered in crem. That was just what happened at the city. 

My bad. I'm either misremembering the book (since I only just started the pre-new-book-re-read, a bit late I know, but school's a time killer), or I misread/misinterpreted it.

[Andy92]

1 hour ago, The alertArchitect said:

My bad. I'm either misremembering the book (since I only just started the pre-new-book-re-read, a bit late I know, but school's a time killer), or I misread/misinterpreted it.

Honestly I'd have to go back and look at it too. I'm thinking the city was in the center though, and the shattering affected a much wider area than just the city itself. Some of those plateaus are humongous, so I think some of the plateaus are just fragmented land masses instead of crem-covered buildings. 

[Brightlord M. Alhstrom]

3 hours ago, Andy92 said:

Honestly I'd have to go back and look at it too. I'm thinking the city was in the center though, and the shattering affected a much wider area than just the city itself. Some of those plateaus are humongous, so I think some of the plateaus are just fragmented land masses instead of crem-covered buildings. 

I've read it recently. And there is a scene where Shallan asks Adolin to attack a rock, proving to here (and showing Kaladin) that the rock was actually a foundation covered with crem. I'm fairly sure this wasn't central enough because it wasn't at the Parshendi home base. So it looks like the entire shattered plains could have had villages and isolated buildings, with the center being more of a city.

[Andy92]

19 minutes ago, Brightlord Maelstrom said:

I've read it recently. And there is a scene where Shallan asks Adolin to attack a rock, proving to here (and showing Kaladin) that the rock was actually a foundation covered with crem. I'm fairly sure this wasn't central enough because it wasn't at the Parshendi home base. So it looks like the entire shattered plains could have had villages and isolated buildings, with the center being more of a city.

And that's possible, but I think the cities/villages were probably built there before the shattering. Once the event happened, people started abandoning those cities/villages, and any buildings left in tact became covered in crem over the years.

[The One Who Connects]

6 hours ago, Jonathon said:

Resonances are caused by interactions between dishardic magic systems, meaning when influence from more than one shard is present

It's actually from having multiple powers, irrespective of what Shards they are "from." The powers themselves aren't actually of any of the Shards.

You would have a resonance from having two Allomantic Powers too.

[Jonathon]

1 hour ago, The One Who Connects said:

It's actually from having multiple powers, irrespective of what Shards they are "from." The powers themselves aren't actually of any of the Shards.

You would have a resonance from having two Allomantic Powers too.

Ah, my bad it's been a few months since I've read some cosmere so my memory isn't at its finest. Thank you for the correction, and here's a free upvote!  

[Calderis]

9 hours ago, The Invested Beard said:

All true, but we don't know exactly how KR resonance works yet, so the connection could still be there.

Resonance isn't actually a canon term. It's one we've taken to using, and I personally like it because of a few variables that I think fit very well, but it's not a real Cosmere definition. 

So unfortunately, the connection to a real vibrational resonance in Cymatics can't be made. 

[Leyrann]

17 hours ago, Andy92 said:

The word resonance has a few different definitions. 

I'm referring to the mechanics/physics definition in my theory. The way resonances between two KR orders are described reminds me of the Chemistry definition of the term: two structures joining to create a single, more powerful structure. Resonance can be used to describe a few different phenomena, but I'm specifically looking at the vibrations. 

A bit of nitpicking here, but that is not actually what chemical resonance means. When you have a molecule with a double bond, in some cases there are two places this double bond can form. This then forms a resonance where sometimes, one place has the double bond, and sometimes the other. Additionally, it also works this way with, say, an acid (typically simplified to a double-bonded oxygen atom and an alcohol group on the same carbon atom) where the double bond and the hydrogen switch oxygen atoms all the time.

/nitpicking

I very much agree that we're talking about different kinds of resonances though, but that's mostly because resonance can simply be used in a variety of meanings, and just because two things are both called "resonance" doesn't mean they're similar. Just like the word "bank", for example. River bank, bank where you save your money, etc. (example blatantly stolen from Wikipedia btw)

EDIT: Also blatantly stealing an example of chemical resonance from Wikipedia:

Edited November 11, 2017 by Leyrann

[The Invested Beard]

10 hours ago, Calderis said:

Resonance isn't actually a canon term. It's one we've taken to using, and I personally like it because of a few variables that I think fit very well, but it's not a real Cosmere definition. 

So unfortunately, the connection to a real vibrational resonance in Cymatics can't be made. 

Huh. I thought Brandon had called it that at some point. Okay well I still like the idea.

[Spoolofwhool]

On 11/11/2017 at 0:04 AM, Calderis said:

Resonance isn't actually a canon term. It's one we've taken to using, and I personally like it because of a few variables that I think fit very well, but it's not a real Cosmere definition. 

So unfortunately, the connection to a real vibrational resonance in Cymatics can't be made. 

 

Quote

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

The "perks" ("secondary effect born with interaction between powers") also has not a 100% sure name, but the main one at the moment is Resonances....We will discovered a lot of the in the third trilogy where the Scientific Method would be applied to the magic.

[Source]

Quote

Argent

So, the Edgedancer's Resonance, the Perk? I think you've called it Resonance at some point, is that still accurate?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, that totally works. The powers affect each other in interesting ways.

...

[Source]

 

[Yata]

On 11/11/2017 at 4:12 PM, The Invested Beard said:

Huh. I thought Brandon had called it that at some point. Okay well I still like the idea.

I asked him at a signing.

He told It's not Canon yet but It's the main term he is using. He could change It but for now It's the best candidate ;-)

[Calderis]

@Spoolofwhool he says in that exchange that Resonance isn't 100% set. It's the accepted term for now, he's fine with it being used, but that's not canonized.