speculation [OB]The Dangers of Seeing the Future

[RShara]

On Roshar, the people believe seeing the future is evil.  The few instances we've seen of foresight are associated with Odium.  At a recent signing, Brandon said this: 

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Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

Second question:  So voidbinding is...one part of voidbinding is seeing the future. And atium is also seeing the future.  And I notice annotations for Elantris, you said something about seeing the future could go weird... sends assassins.  Is that a running..

Brandon [PENDING REVIEW]

It is a running theme in the Cosmere.  And it's...whatever path you take to do it is dangerous in the Cosmere.  It's kind of a sign of...you are in dangerous territory, and drawing upon a Shard that is...

Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

Potentially <indistinguishable>?

Brandon [PENDING REVIEW]

Potentially...yes...I mean to say...dangerous territory.

I find the bolded part where he trails off to be amazingly fascinating.  Given the rest of the conversation, I propose that seeing the future is dangerous because of the following possibilities:

1.  It draws the attention of the Shard (or its agents as explained below) that is powering the foresight. 

2.  It is heavily influenced by the intent or motives of the Shard that's powering it.

3.  It's an ability granted by the Shard on purpose in order to manipulate events toward a future that the Shard (or its agents) desires.

4.  It aligns you to the intent or motives of the Shard.  This can be short-term (see atium below) or long-term.  Repeated uses may cause a more lasting efect.

5.  There's also the always-present conundrum of trying to change the future after you've seen it.  Without context, you have no idea if changing your actions will cause that future or if not changing your actions will cause that future.

The true answer could be any of the above, none of the above, or some combination of the options I've given.

 

In order to evaluate possibilities, I've discussed the instances we've seen of people seeing the future, either as a summary, or as specific text, or links.

Atium:  We know how atium fuels Allomancy.  It lets you see a few moments into the future.  It also increases your mental and physical capabilities in order to take advantage of that knowledge.  Sazed speculates in one of the HoA epigraphs that

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When people burned atium, then, they were drawing upon the power of Ruin—which is, perhaps, why atium turned people into such efficient killing machines.

This appears to correlate to possibility 4--That seeing the future via atium temporarily aligned a person toward Ruin, the essence of entropy toward destruction.  It might also explain why, after using atium as a metal mind and burning it for so long, TLR had such Ruinous impulses--mass slaughters, willingness to let the nobility destroy each other, etc, etc.  After a thousand years of compounding atium, it's likely that he was very Connected to Ruin.  It might also tie into possibility 3, assuming the possibility of Ruin wanting Rashek to become such a despot that he's overthrown just as the Well is about to fill, opening the way for Vin to take and release the power.

 

Endowment:  Endowment appears to be able to see some of the future, and sometimes her Splinters, the Returned, can pick up on this as well.  We see this in Warbreaker, when Lightsong has his dreams and visions of T'Telir burning.  She appears to send her Returned back in order to do a specific task (or set of tasks) based on what she sees, giving rise to possibility 3. Endowment apparently wanted the Hallandren and Idrians to persist, and sent back some of her Returned to help prevent the coming destruction.  She probably has multiple contingency plans for if one of them dies before his or her task is accomplished.

 

Wyrn:  In the Elantris Annotations Brandon says:

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The second is to set up Wyrn as a more mysterious, and more powerful, character. I definitely meant to imply that Wyrn managed to see, limitedly, into the future and sent Fjon to the place where he’d be able to slay an important traitor to Fjorden.

And

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(Oh, and if you caught the reference to the word ‘Skaze,’ then good for you. The Skaze are a group that will appear in the sequel, when and if I get around to writing it. They’re pretty much evil Seons.)

Given that the Seons are Splinters of Devotion, (Love)  and the Skaze are Splinters of Dominion,  it seems like the Skaze are manipulating Wyrn in order to achieve their goals (Goals hinted at in the new epilogue in the 10th Anniversary Edition of Elantris) , tying back to possibility 3.  Devotion and Dominion are both splintered, but the Skaze may retain enough of Dominion's intent to want to have complete dominion over the world (or maybe re-assemble Dominion?).

 

And we come to the Stormlight Archive!  We have more examples of foresight in SA than we have in any other book.  There are three primary examples of it:

Moelach:  On the bridge between life and death, Moelach grants visions of the future, that the person utters in a cryptic and strange way, a phenomenon coined as Death Rattle.  We don't really understand much about how this works, but the Death Rattles have been startlingly accurate, if incredibly obscure, so far.

However.  Moelach is a Splinter of Odium (along with the other Unmade).  The Death Rattles we've seen so far all seem to be related either to the conflict between Odium and most of Roshar, or related to the people that are in that struggle.  I have no absolute proof of this, but it's not a wild assumption (imo) to think that Odium, via Moelach, is using the Death Rattles to affect people's behavior.  I realize this is putting conclusion before evidence, but I feel that it's a credible conclusion.  Moelach is one of the mindless Unmade, as far as we know, so he's unlikely to have motives of his own.  As a Splinter of Odium, Odium must have created him for a reason.  We know Odium has a pretty good grasp of possible futures.  Creating an Unmade to give people glimpses of the future (in a rather morbid way) to get them serving his purposes isn't beyond the realm of possibility.

 

Renarin:  We know very little about how Renarin's abilities work, and what types of things he can see, or how they will affect events. We know that his spren, Glys, is a Truthwatcher spren corrupted by Sja-Anat, another Splinter of Odium, and that Glys is likely what grants Renarin the ability to see the future.

Renarin has seen Jasnah killing him.  This would end him as a Radiant and as a Kholin.  I confess, I am unsure what purpose his death would serve in Odium's cause.  However, Renarin also saw Dalinar turning into Odium's champion.  This would obviously be quite a desirable outcome for Odium.  Given that Renarin has done a few things in order to try and warn about or prevent the things he sees, did he, consciously, or subconsciously, take actions that helped to bring that set of events into reality?

We don't know yet what effects this might have, so I'm unsure which of the above categories this could fit into.

 

The Diagram:  Taravangian believes that he wrong the Diagram out of pure human capability and insight, rather than foresight.  However, according to this WoB:

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Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

Taravangian: When he made the Diagram he said it was "his brightest day". Would you say that he was more towards the Cognitive realm or more towards the Spiritual realm?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Spiritual.

As we know, in the Spiritual Realm, all times and places are essentially one.  Seeing into the future in all other instances has been seeing into the Spiritual Realm.  If Taravangian was closer to the Spiritual Realm than the Cognitive Realm, then he's likely incorporating at least some parts of what he sees in the Spiritual Realm into the Diagram.  What we've seen him do so far has seemed to align him toward Odium's desires and motives.

However, he was granted this ability by Cultivation, who is at odds with Odium.  There was a lively discussion in this thread about the Diagram being a plant (pun intended) put in place by Cultivation.  That T's actions, although they seem at odds with Dalinar+co, actually are meant to help them; and that T himself is unaware of this.  As you can tell, I subscribe to this theory myself.  This would fit in  with possibilities 2, 3 and 4 above.  Cultivation seems very crafty and careful, playing the long game with Dalinar, with Lift, and probably with T.

 

And finally, we have Hoid.  He has an ability to know where he needs to be at any given time.  We don't really know most of his motives, so there's no way to determine what "where he needs to be" means, exactly.  We're also very unsure as to how he knows to be in those places.  We do know he uses something similar to Chromium Feruchemy in order to tap Fortune, but possibly isn't Feruchemy itself.  We don't know what Shard he draws on, what intent that Shard might have, or if it's even a Shard at all.  If someone can manage to tap directly into the Spiritual Realm without intervention from a Shard, it seems like Hoid would be the one.  I'm also sure he's self-aware enough to know when/if he's being manipulated by whatever power he's using.  So in short, I have no conclusions to draw about Hoid's abilities, other than a reiteration of his own speech to Shallan:

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“Be wary of anyone who claims to be able to see the future, Shallan.”

“Except you, of course. Didn’t you say you can see where you need to be?”

“Be wary,” he repeated, “of anyone who claims to be able to see the future, Shallan.”

 

There's always the risk, in seeing the future, of bringing about the exact consequence you want to prevent.  That might be the simple answer to this entire question.  Won't my face be red if it is!

 

So, there is my long winded theory about the dangers of seeing the future.  Please feel free to add to it or rip it to pieces, and thanks for reading!

[Stormlightning]

I was thinking about making pretty much this exact same thread last night, so bravo on getting to it first! I really want to study Fortune in the Cosmere more, after recently wandering across this WoB:

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Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

So, in Allomancy, most of the metals are in pairs, they’re equal and opposite, pushing and pulling, Rioting, Soothing, that kind of thing. The god metals, lerasium and atium, have always struck me as kind of unbalanced in a way. Like, lerasium gives you the power to use all these metals, plus <inaudible> . Is there a reason for that?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Yes, there is, and it kinda has to do with snapping and some of the fundamental rules of the Mistborn world and the fact that people have Preservation and Ruin inside of them and all these sorts of things. So, the answer is yes.

Partially, narratively, I built that in partially just ‘cause I wanted atium to seem odd in the placement, right, when people got to it it’s like “What? Why is this one… This one doesn’t match the others. This doesn’t really work.” When I was building Mistborn, one of the things I wanted was this idea of a periodic table that was, kind of a flawed construct, that, as you read the books, you came to understand better and better. And that was something I executed. I don’t think I executed that 100% right, but I’m pleased with the general concept and how it plays out. And so I wanted atium to stick out like a sore thumb.

The other thing is, I knew I needed some good foreshadowing for Fortune, for people being able to kinda see the future or versions of the future, for the whole cosmere to work. And, so, I built in atium specifically to do those things. And I built in lerasium to have, kind of, the ultimate sort of benevolent endowment sort of thing. (Not Endowment the Shard, you know what I mean.) But I also wanted to show these two magics were intrinsically tied together on Scadrial because the way that humankind was created. We’re getting into some deep stuff, I’ll just leave it there. But that was what was going through my mind as I was building those things all out. 

As in, Fortune will be critical to how this whole thing comes together, or at least that's how I interpret it. So I definitely think that Fortune is bigger than the Shards, perhaps it can be keyed to the different Shards in the same way Investiture is. I'm leaning heavily toward your "Reasons it's Dangerous" #2 and #4.

I think this is part of what makes Renarin so fascinating, and also part of what will give him such power. He's accessing Fortune, theoretically keyed to Odium, but (probably) being channeled through a being that no longer shares Odium's Intent. Whether that means his use of fortune will push him toward another Intent, or simply give him access to the power without the 'taint', per say, I'm not sure. This makes him a wildcard to Odium/Mr. T., who usually would be able to use their own power/genius to interpret how people will behave according to how they interact with different Intents. I think the theory about Cultivation powering Mr. T's Diagram makes a lot of sense when considering that there's not really any way "Genius" Mr. T could have anticipated "one who makes no sense". That would have had to have been something that [someone's] Fortune gave him, and he assumes they are blacked out because they act erratically or can't be predicted. In actuality, it may be something more like the idea that he isn't being influenced by the Shard he gets his ability from.

TL;DR Renarin's unique use of Fortune makes him [a whole new kind of] awesome. 

[Varion]

8 hours ago, RShara said:

Moelach:  On the bridge between life and death, Moelach grants visions of the future, that the person utters in a cryptic and strange way, a phenomenon coined as Death Rattle.  We don't really understand much about how this works, but the Death Rattles have been startlingly accurate, if incredibly obscure, so far.

However.  Moelach is a Splinter of Odium (along with the other Unmade).  The Death Rattles we've seen so far all seem to be related either to the conflict between Odium and most of Roshar, or related to the people that are in that struggle.  I have no absolute proof of this, but it's not a wild assumption (imo) to think that Odium, via Moelach, is using the Death Rattles to affect people's behavior.  I realize this is putting conclusion before evidence, but I feel that it's a credible conclusion.  Moelach is one of the mindless Unmade, as far as we know, so he's unlikely to have motives of his own.  As a Splinter of Odium, Odium must have created him for a reason.  We know Odium has a pretty good grasp of possible futures.  Creating an Unmade to give people glimpses of the future (in a rather morbid way) to get them serving his purposes isn't beyond the realm of possibility.

I just posted a scenario that relies upon this exact theory over on a thread about Death Rattles less than an hour ago:

This was all based on my idea that three particular death rattles (below) refer directly to Taravangian, and some critical choice in his future. I have a few different ideas about what that choice may be, and whether it has already happened or not, but in the scenario in the post above I posit that it must not be a simple prediction of the future, but a deliberate attempt by Odium/Moelach to push T towards a choice counter to the future presented in the rattles. Pure speculation of course, and based on far more assumptions than strong evidence, but it demonstrates how your ideas for 3, 4 and 5 might work in theory.

Here are the rattles I was referring to:

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17. “I hold the suckling child in my hands, a knife at his throat, and know that all who live wish me to let the blade slip. Spill its blood upon the ground, over my hands, and with it gain us further breath to draw. ”

— Collected on Shashanan 1173, 23 seconds pre-death, by the Silent Gatherers. Subject was a darkeyed youth of sixteen years. Sample is of particular note.[24]

35. “So the night will reign, for the choice of honor is life... ”

— Observed circa Ishi 1173 by Taravangian. Subject was King Valam of Jah Keved.[4]

4. “A man stood on a cliffside and watched his homeland fall into dust. The waters surged beneath, so far beneath. And he heard a child crying. They were his own tears. ”

— Collected on Tanatesev 1171, 30 seconds pre-death, by the Silent Gatherers. Subject was a cobbler of some renown

 

Edited January 2, 2018 by Varion
clarity

[JPark317]

Something perhaps worth considering in conjunction with items 2 and 3 from OP’s list of possibilities, is that all investiture/powers in the Cosmere were “assigned” to a different shard upon the splintering if Adonalsium. Relating to points 2 and 3 from OP concerning the Shard who “powers”/ was “assigned” Fortune, I think it’s entirely possible, if not likely, that said Shard can influence what is seen of the future or what is NOT seen of the future. I think this has far-reaching implications, and I view it similarly to the Chthaeh (sp?) from The Kingkiller Chronicles by Pat Rothfuss. I’d go into more detail about what that means in The Kingkiller Chronicles, but I’m at work and can’t type a long post on my phone. Suffice it to say that a being with power over seeing the future/granting that power to others could, potentially, really influence what is seen and cause whatever outcome they so desire. 

[Storms!]

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However, he was granted this ability by Cultivation, who is at odds with Odium.  There was a lively discussion in this thread about the Diagram being a plant (pun intended) put in place by Cultivation.  That T's actions, although they seem at odds with Dalinar+co, actually are meant to help them; and that T himself is unaware of this.  As you can tell, I subscribe to this theory myself.  This would fit in  with possibilities 2, 3 and 4 above.  Cultivation seems very crafty and careful, playing the long game with Dalinar, with Lift, and probably with T.

First, thanks for the shout out about my Diagram post.

Second, a question. Do we know for certain that Odium is better at telling the future than Cultivation? We know that the Vorin religion is full of holes/misinformation, and Honor says to Dalinar in one of the visions something along the lines of "I'm not great at seeing the future, Cultivation is much better."

Completely ascribing this to Odium seems exactly the sort of thing that would have been changed during the Theocracy, when the Radiants were described as evil as well. Basically, current Vorinism says Honor/Almighty=good, everything else=bad. When Shallan sees the image of Cultivation in Urithiru, she expresses surprise at seeing a "pagan image."

My point is, we really shouldn't put too much stock in anything we learn from the Vorins. So far, foresight from Odium has basically amounted to wishful thinking: i.e. Dalinar as Odium's champion and Renarin's murder (which would have caused CHAOS amongst the Radiants- think how protective Adolin and Bridge 4 are of him).

Cultivation seems like the real fortune teller here (pun not intended, even though it made me chuckle), and as Hoid reminds us, "be wary of anyone who claims to be able to see the future." 

[RShara]

1 hour ago, Storms! said:

First, thanks for the shout out about my Diagram post.

Second, a question. Do we know for certain that Odium is better at telling the future than Cultivation? We know that the Vorin religion is full of holes/misinformation, and Honor says to Dalinar in one of the visions something along the lines of "I'm not great at seeing the future, Cultivation is much better."

Completely ascribing this to Odium seems exactly the sort of thing that would have been changed during the Theocracy, when the Radiants were described as evil as well. Basically, current Vorinism says Honor/Almighty=good, everything else=bad. When Shallan sees the image of Cultivation in Urithiru, she expresses surprise at seeing a "pagan image."

My point is, we really shouldn't put too much stock in anything we learn from the Vorins. So far, foresight from Odium has basically amounted to wishful thinking: i.e. Dalinar as Odium's champion and Renarin's murder (which would have caused CHAOS amongst the Radiants- think how protective Adolin and Bridge 4 are of him).

Cultivation seems like the real fortune teller here (pun not intended, even though it made me chuckle), and as Hoid reminds us, "be wary of anyone who claims to be able to see the future." 

I don't have any data about which of them is better than the other.  We know Odium can.  We know Cultivation can.  We don't know which is better or worse.  I really can't say at this point which one is likely better.  I'm not ascribing anything to Vorinism's belief system, though in this one case, they seem to have gotten some of it right.  I'm going 95% off of what Brandon and Wit said about seeing the future as treading on dangerous ground.

[+Hoiditthroughthegrapevine]

Great post @RShara!

52 minutes ago, RShara said:

I don't have any data about which of them is better than the other.  We know Odium can.  We know Cultivation can.  We don't know which is better or worse.  I really can't say at this point which one is likely better.  I'm not ascribing anything to Vorinism's belief system, though in this one case, they seem to have gotten some of it right.  I'm going 95% off of what Brandon and Wit said about seeing the future as treading on dangerous ground.

I think this gets to the heart of point 5 mentioned in the OP (that visions of the future might be a causal feedback loop), and there's also the potential that option 3 is in play (future sight be granted for the purposes of manipulation) even for shards.

@The One Who Connects amazing comment in the [OB] Mr T thread has this to say about the mechanics of Future-sight:

On 12/23/2017 at 5:18 PM, The One Who Connects said:

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Jeremy (paraphrased)

When Honor speaks of his inability to see the future, he likens it to a shattering window. Is this related to the fact that in the not-too-distant future, he himself will be splintered? Or is it more a matter of Intent; e.g., Cultivation (and Preservation?) is geared toward future development, whereas Honor is geared toward current behavior.

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

This is not related to his impending Splintering, it is a matter of differing Intents.

Thanks to this WoB, I think future-sight works like this: The future is like a shattering window, big pieces fragmenting into smaller pieces the further you go. It's like this because of the sheer number of possibilities and variables. Imagine that each potential future is a piece of that broken glass. The better you are at future-sight, the further you can see before it devolves into endless tiny pieces of shattered futures.

So Honor sees a million tiny fragments peering 5 years ahead, while Cultivation is still only seeing large chunks 250 years in. She's still gonna hit the million fragments point eventually, but Preservation was skilled enough to plan at least 2-4 millennia ahead.

There will still be the odd small fragment early on because that's how glass breaks, but there will be less of them. And it's likely that one of these small futures got overlooked, which is why even the Shards can be surprised.

Brandon explicitly states that in the above WoB that the Intent of the shard determines their level of future-sight, or access to Fortune. I think the reason that this would be the case is that the future is composed of Action, and actions are determined by intents. So actions that are motivated by certain intents are more likely to be perceived if the intent of those actions are inline with the Intent of a given shard. We know from OB that Odium is the self-described God of Passions, this is because passions are often the predicate of Hatred. Given that acts of hatred are usually motivated by strong passions (of a very particular type) Rayse being the holder that filters that intent is able to determine future outcomes based on those motivations. He is still blind to other things (like I think the reason Renarin is invisible to him is that Renarin's life was spared by Jasnah's compassion, that is a motivation that is outside of his purview). Also, I think certain acts of passionate hatred have a very large time scale (revenge is a dish best served cold) and require planning and foresight, so these too would be in his purview. Cultivation is obviously a long term process with reinforcing feedback as the process continues. I think the way her future-sight might work along possibly with her Investiture is that she has a plan and sets it up to be self-correcting. The motivations of actions that are most likely in her purview would be planning (shared with Odium), infitesimal adjustment and better prediction over time, and other complex motivations that likewise take planning and infinitesimal adjustments to accomplish (so revenge might also be in her purview).

So if each of the shard's view of the future is colored by their intent, and if they have special access to visions of the futures based on the intent of the aggregate group of actors they are watching and influencing, it stands to reason that one shard's future-sight could manipulated by another shard. They could grant access to the vision of particular motivations that make up the Fortune that is solely (or more completely) inline with their intent and that is invisible to the other shard.

So really if you have two shards with a nearly equal capacity to predict the future, the struggle then becomes one of 3-Dimensional chess. The permutations, possibilities, stratagems and counter-stratagems expand exponentially. The nexus of the future is now, where all possibilities collapse into the singular present, this is the point where reality is a pane of glass. Everything in the future stretches out from this single point in time like the cracks in a shattered pane of glass, and each moment in time the pane of glass is reset to a whole and unbroken pane. The ability to predict, manipulate and out-maneuver your opponent might be exactly what your opponent was setting you up for the whole time (like with Preservation tricking Ruin), because this is a recursive self-altering phenomena.

I really like @The One Who Connects extension of the shattering glass analogy, here's a video by the Slow Mo guys shattering Pyrex in super slow motion. It's amazing to see how nearly instantaneously the cracks spread across the whole surface of the glass, with pretty amazingly rad destructive results. (If you just want to skip to the actual shattering bits they are at 2:18, 3:29 and 5:39):

 

 

 

[Song]

Thanks for posting this topic. It is good to get the wider picture, as I am only just getting my head around the cosmere, and being very attached to Renarin this post makes me very nervous.

I am not sure whether he has been actively trying to prevent the future before this point (because he seemed resign to it being set in stone). Now that others know about his 'gift' they might try to use it to work against Odium, and given this post I am starting to feel that is a very dangerous idea.

 

[Tiak]

We've gotten a good bit of insights of shardic future-vision from the various holders and actions of Preservation/Ruin.  One might speculate that Preservation in Mistborn era 1 was able to pull things off either because he was slightly better at seeing the future, slightly better at influencing unlikely outcomes in order for them to occur, or slightly better at making those outcomes seem unlikely until they do occur.

If it is a matter of shardic intent then ruin and preservation are both much more future-looking in intent than passion/hatred-leaning-passion, and, for that matter, cultivation is also more future-looking than passion.  It seems plausible that Odium is actually among the poorest shards at determining the future, despite seeing into the spiritual realm, though he may be the shard most motivated to try.

Still, Odium was not able to foresee Dalinar's resistance to him, while Cultivation recognized it as a possible result of her work.  Odium was not able to detect Lift in the vision.  Odium was not able to see and expand upon Renarin's portion of the Diagram, when even Taravangian could (through cultivation).

Odium actually seems to have quite a few flaws and blindspots in his vision of the future, though he seems more likely to use what he does see to influence people.

[Tiak]

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There. Behind where the bed had stood. A section of words that had faded from golden to black. What was that? As he drew near, Taravangian saw that the words were blacked out into eternity starting from this point on his wall. As if something had happened here. A ripple in what Odium could see . . . At its root, a name. Renarin Kholin.

Maybe the combination of Honor's powers with those of other shards creates blindspots in the possibility-tree?  The three blindspots we see (Renarin, Lift, Dalinar) all seem to have a heavy influence from multiple shards

[RShara]

2 hours ago, Tiak said:

Maybe the combination of Honor's powers with those of other shards creates blindspots in the possibility-tree?  The three blindspots we see (Renarin, Lift, Dalinar) all seem to have a heavy influence from multiple shards

My personal theory is that Renarin is a black spot because he was supposed to die, but is still alive and kicking.  Since his probability line was supposed to end, any actions he takes from that point on are completely unanticipated.

[Varion]

10 hours ago, RShara said:

12 hours ago, Tiak said:

Maybe the combination of Honor's powers with those of other shards creates blindspots in the possibility-tree?  The three blindspots we see (Renarin, Lift, Dalinar) all seem to have a heavy influence from multiple shards

My personal theory is that Renarin is a black spot because he was supposed to die, but is still alive and kicking.  Since his probability line was supposed to end, any actions he takes from that point on are completely unanticipated.

What does it mean that he was "supposed to die" though. Was he supposed to die in all potential futures? Or just the futures that Odium could see? I feel it's relevant that Renarin's access to Fortune comes from Odium, and therefore, so did his vision of dying at the hands of Jasnah. Renarin's takeaway from Jasnah's decision not to kill him is that the visions do not have to come true -- that it's possible to change them. I suspect this is because there are infinite possible futures, but Fortune only gives limited access to all those possible futures, or more likely, individuals, even Shards, only have a limited capacity to observe all those possible futures.

And what does he fact that the words behind Renarin had been blacked out, but were still present for Taravangian to see, in the Diagram in the scene with T and Odium? Did Odium originally have access to this future, but has discounted it because he thinks Renarin died? Or did he only ever see futures where Renarin died, and therefore never knew about this possibility? And if that's the case, is this evidence that the Diagram was written with access to Fortune granted by Cultivation? This would imply that the Shards all have slightly different pictures of the future.

[Stormblessed Son of Thrain]

Awesome theory! The only problems I have with it are points 1 and 3. In Hero of Ages, Ruin doesn't realize what is going on when Elend and the others burn the atium. I don't think that seeing the future by drawing on a shard grants the Shardbearer any knowledge about the user. Also, I'm pretty sure Odium was wrong about seeing the future. Unless he's super-meta manipulating, the way he acted when interacting with Dalinar at the end showed that he was absolutely confident that Dalinar would join him. Which, is EXACTLY what Renarin saw in the future. Since Renarin is maybe seeing the future through Odium, by his corrupted spren, wouldn't that show that Odium, and through him Renarin, can only see one, or a few versions of the future? Maybe the infinite possibilities are too much, or the Shards intent distorts the future, letting the Shardbearer only see the future based on their intent? That seems like that fits with the Cultivation and Endowment future-seeing as well.

[RShara]

On 1/3/2018 at 10:50 PM, Stormblessed Son of Thrain said:

Awesome theory! The only problems I have with it are points 1 and 3. In Hero of Ages, Ruin doesn't realize what is going on when Elend and the others burn the atium.

So when I discussed atium up above, I mentioned that it only let you see a few seconds into the future.  I'm theorizing that because it's a limited use of Ruin's power that it's relatively free of Shardic influence, unless, say, you've been storing, tapping, and burning it for oh...1000 years.

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I don't think that seeing the future by drawing on a shard grants the Shardbearer any knowledge about the user.

You mean the Vessel, here, right?  Sorry, just making sure you don't mean a person with a sprenBlade. 

The reason I think this is because of what Brandon said about it, "Drawing on a Shard that is...." then concludes that it's dangerous territory.  And we have seen that people with future-seeing being influenced by the Shard it comes from.  Also, remember that Preservation did something to separate and hide the atium from Ruin, making it more difficult for him to sense it.

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Also, I'm pretty sure Odium was wrong about seeing the future. Unless he's super-meta manipulating, the way he acted when interacting with Dalinar at the end showed that he was absolutely confident that Dalinar would join him. Which, is EXACTLY what Renarin saw in the future. Since Renarin is maybe seeing the future through Odium, by his corrupted spren, wouldn't that show that Odium, and through him Renarin, can only see one, or a few versions of the future? Maybe the infinite possibilities are too much, or the Shards intent distorts the future, letting the Shardbearer only see the future based on their intent? That seems like that fits with the Cultivation and Endowment future-seeing as well.

Seeing the future can clearly be wrong, because we have free will.  With the more encompassing intelligence that comes with Shardic power, they are able to weigh probabilities and percentages and chances far better than we can.  But they can still be wrong.  Even a Shard can't encompass infinite possibilities.  Even short-term future sight can be wrong or tricked.  Witness Vin figuring out how to beat Zane in WoA.

Anything that a Shard do is going to be colored by the flavor of their power.  Anything that a person does with Shardic power is also going to be flavored by the type of power.  My theory is that drawing more on a Shard's power brings you closer to the Shard, to the power's motivations, as well as possibly the Vessel.

The Vessel can also be self-deluded.  I believed that Odium saw very high chances of Dalinar becoming his champion and had been herding him in that direction for a long time.  But no future sight will ever be perfect, and Cultivation snuck Dalinar in past Odium's guard.  Witness Preservation's long game regarding the HoA, and even the Kandra.

We don't know how Odium's future-sight compares to Cultivation's, or Harmony's or Endowment's.  All we know is that Honor thought he was bad at it, and Cultivation was better.  Cultivation, as change-toward-growth, might be able to weigh and judge the probabilities better, or hide her agents from others' future-sight better.  I'm not willing to make a guess on that at this time.

 

Also, I still need to update the OP for electrum and Aviar.  Getting to it, I promise.

Edited January 5, 2018 by RShara

[animalia]

There is something META I want to point out. Renarin changes HIS future by ACCEPTING it. BUT it SEEMS like he does not accept the future he sees for OTHERS. Like when he inspired Dalinar to seek the Nightwatcher. I COULD be wrong but this is MY take on it.

Edited August 15, 2018 by animalia

[animalia]

4 hours ago, animalia said:

There is something META I want to point out. Renarin changes HIS future by ACCEPTING it. BUT it SEEMS like he does not accept the future he sees for OTHERS. Like when he inspired Dalinar to seek the Nightwatcher. I COULD be wrong but this is MY take on it.

Another possibility is that when he succeededs in changing the the future it isn’t by giving warnings, such as of the Everstorm, but by inspiring HOPE. If this the case Kelsier would be proud.

[Fatikis]

Just a thought. If there is no distinction in time or location in the spiritual realm. Opening yourself up enough to view the spiritual realm may allow more powerful or experienced beings power over you. Suddenly you go from something barely noticeable in the spiritual realm to an active player in the Spiritually realm that a shard may notice. It may also open you up to manipulation. A being with more experience might be able to tamper with what you see.

[animalia]

Continuing with Cultivation’s long game. Could the idea be to pry the more intelligent spren of Odium free from his grasp by offering something he can never give them? Empathy?

 

I know it sounds crazy but it goes back to the idea that Someone had of Glys being a Nightform Voidspren and Venli being able to bond both voidspren and regular spren despite the fact that parshendi hadn’t been able to bond with regular spren before because their minds were to similar to the realm of spren for them to find it attractive. Yet things have changed enough in the system for regular spren to be able to bond to them despite their RELATIVELY static minds.

So I thought the opposite might be true and what it might mean Odium because he is good at lieing to himself convinces himself that he is passion so he probably creates his spren to be passionate creatures yet all HE does is eat up their emotions. He is incapable of giving them what they need.

 

This makes me wonder why Renarin might be so important

Tony Atwood who did alot of the founding research on autism and Asperger’s helped describe them (at least Asperger’s I am not sure where Renarins part on the spectrum covers EXACTLY) as “barriers against negative emotions” That were never kinda happy were totally happy, were never kinda bummed were totally bummed. More importantly people on the autisic spectrum once they NOTICE someone in pain tend to be MORE empathetic then the average person.

So here’s the thing wether Glys is a void spren or a corrupted truthwatcher spren who was corrupted so Sja-Anat could have a way to talk to the radiants. Odium is NOT going to offer them empathy and Renarin will. If ANYTHING can get the void spren to defect it simply this. Someone who gives a damnation about them. And THAT will be more important than all the visions of the future.

[Ripheus23]

I would guess that there's a relationship between the question of foreknowledge and free will on the one hand, and the idea that seeing the future is evil on the other. That is, in an "agency/personal integrity-and-responsibility is a fundamental good/value" system of ethics, something like "seeing the future" that might damage/limit/contradict/w/e agency, would be evil, or close to it, or something like that.

[scudalarm]

On 1/3/2018 at 9:43 AM, RShara said:

My personal theory is that Renarin is a black spot because he was supposed to die, but is still alive and kicking.  Since his probability line was supposed to end, any actions he takes from that point on are completely unanticipated.

I have a question about that, I think it was mentioned that Renarin was at the "root" of the black out section, so was the branch black because of Future sight interference? or was is black due to Odium not being able to see Renarin's branch, I'm thinking the letters golden glow might be due to Odium being able to see the those possibilities? and since Odium cannot see Renarin's line it became black (just a wild speculation).

[RShara]

13 minutes ago, scudalarm said:

I have a question about that, I think it was mentioned that Renarin was at the "root" of the black out section, so was the branch black because of Future sight interference? or was is black due to Odium not being able to see Renarin's branch, I'm thinking the letters golden glow might be due to Odium being able to see the those possibilities? and since Odium cannot see Renarin's line it became black (just a wild speculation).

Brandon has since revealed that it's because Renarin can also see the future, so that messes with Odium's seeing the future, similar to atium vs atium.

[Thanatos]

What if future sight comes from one of the unnamed shards?

He does not want tell us what shard this ability draws from but does say some shards have the ability. 

What if all shards share the same abilities, just that one shard is the owner of ability a-d and shard two owns abilities e-h and so on. 

And it matters not which shards investiture is used to access say future sight as it is mearly a conduit to the shard who owns future sight 

[Wander89]

6 hours ago, Thanatos said:

What if future sight comes from one of the unnamed shards?

He does not want tell us what shard this ability draws from but does say some shards have the ability. 

What if all shards share the same abilities, just that one shard is the owner of ability a-d and shard two owns abilities e-h and so on. 

And it matters not which shards investiture is used to access say future sight as it is mearly a conduit to the shard who owns future sight 

I'd say that if all shards had the same abilities, "evil" Shards like Ruin or Odium would be using those abilities to get what they want instead of limiting themselves. I think that each Shard is a "personality" of Adonalsium which is why they are all separate.

[Necessary Eagle]

On 6/13/2019 at 5:57 PM, RShara said:

Brandon has since revealed that it's because Renarin can also see the future, so that messes with Odium's seeing the future, similar to atium vs atium.

Interesting, i'd thought it was Cultivation's doing somehow. So if the ancient Truthwatchers had some sort of future-sight (who knows?), that would have let them sneak-attack Odium's forces.