SchrödingerSpren

Just finished the book. First post on the shard, although I've enjoyed reading the discussions throughout the last few months. After reading I am somewhat convinced that Cultivation is set to become the big bad in the first five books rather than Odium... but in an unthinking way. She is empowering people towards growth, but it is hard to distinguish if it is either an example of blindly cultivating or truly carefully pruning. In one of the earlier books someone (I think Odium talking to Dalinar) has a line about her not caring about specific goals, but simply growth. I've held on to that line a while, and this whole book shows massive advances in understanding, in a way that seems like cultivation. There are new radiants, new technology, new singers... the world should be in a struggle between Honor and Hatred, yet cultivation maneuvers for growth for the sake of growth. It seems like a major problem that Cultivation exists outside of the seeming polarity of Honor and Odium. I would not be surprised if a major narrative in the next book is about cultivation being responsible for the continued escalations that are defining the conflict between human and singer. I also wonder if Honor and Cultivation are more at odds with each other than it might seem. In my mind they are almost counterpoints, because Honor brings with it consistency and concreteness, while Cultivation is more about growth and change. If you paired them together, I wonder how different it would be than what we read from Harmony's letter. I think Honor and Odium would almost certainly pair better together, as an honorable person may hate things that aren't honorable... It almost seems like Cultivation and Odium would be more likely to pair together well, because hatred and passion seem more likely to be grown and changed. That certainly seems to be suggested as the book comes to a close. This could all be wrong, but it seems in line with a lot of the mixing of investure as well. We shall see.