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OK, this power is a bit weird. Apparently sand mastery works through lichen or something in the sand that feeds on sunlight (recharging it between uses) and water from the Sand Master (at the time of Sand Mastery being used). This lets the Sand Master manipulate the white sand physically. So far this seems like a very biological, ecological, "cycle of nature" kind of magic system. But then there's Slatrification. Really powerful sand masters can turn white sand into water. How does that work? Does the lichen die upon transformation? I suppose that in itself wouldn't be problematic, since as a living thing presumably it can multiply and spread back into areas it's been killed out of. But... does the water ever turn back to sand? If not, will the Dayside eventually run out of white sand, or sink into the ocean as its land is slowly transformed into water?

The title is in reference to @RShara's Physics of the Taldain System thread. This is a sort of counterpart of that thread that we can use to speculate on Taldain's Cognitive Realm. Just as in the Physical Realm, the binary star system around Taldain leads to interesting questions in the Cognitive Realm. First, there is the general question of whether the Cognitive Realm's sun corresponds to the sun in the Physical Realm. Like, are Worldhoppers seeing the soul of the sun? If so, then Darkside Worldhoppers will see a different sun from Dayside Worldhoppers. The Darkside Cognitive Realm sky would probably be free of the "particulate ring" that Khriss mentioned, so they'd see their "sun" unhindered. I really like @Glamdring's theory that the "white dwarf" is actually a black hole and that the particulate ring is the accretion disk. If that's true, I wonder what a black hole looks like in the Cognitive Realm.

Question about the physics of the Taldain system. It was complicated enough with one sun, one tidally locked planet, and one moon that always rotates around the light/dark terminus. How does a binary system work with this? From what I understand, the L1 point (aka the barycenter) between the two stars is extremely unstable. Any kind of jiggle to the rotations or gravity of the system and the planet spins off into space or crashes into one of the stars. Judging from the sketch of the system, we have the two suns in a near-circular orbit (very difficult). And Taldain in the gravitational center of the binary system, with a rotational period that exactly matches the orbits of the stars? And that still doesn't explain the orbit of the moon, which should stay the same no matter which direction the planet itself is facing. It seems to be an extreme balancing act. I suppose Investiture could account for it, but I kinda hate to see this hand-waved away as "magic," since from what I understand of Brandon, he tries to keep as close to actual physics as possible (red/blue shifts not withstanding ). Does anyone smarter than me have a good explanation?

Let it be known that I'm so excited about the essays that I haven't even read Edgedancer yet (even though Stormlight is my favourite series). We got some lovely information from Khriss that clarifies so many old questions. I have a few main theories that I want to bring up, that I know some people have already tossed a few of these around, but well, I'm just so excited I needed to make my own thread. Sorry, not sorry. Selish Observations Scadrian Observations (Secret History spoilers as well as Arcanum Unbounded) Taldain Observations Threnodite Observations Drominad Observations I have to go for now, I'll continue later tonight with the Rosharan system, Silverlight, and some theories I've got about all this new info. Thanks for listening to my ramblings. Time to do a complete cosmere reread and hunt for clues.

This might better fit in Theory, but as the book just got released, I figure this is a safer place to put it to avoid spoilers. I was looking at the map and thinking about it. We have a sun-like deity at the top and center with flaming hair and the symbol of a sun. Willing to bet this is Autonomy/ Bavadin. Note that the same symbol of the sun appears in the centre of the map at KraeDa, A sacred site and the space where the fertile lands radiate southward from.I'd be willing to bet that's where we'll find the perpendicularity. As Taldain is tidally locked, the centre of the Dayside continent is always pointed at the sun. Which is worshipped as a god. How far does a perpendicularity reach? All the way to the star? Or perhaps the reverse? All the way from the star? EDIT: Fixed Title

Last May, Tempus posted something that he/she called "Shardic Number Theory." Tempus included a section that discussed Bavadin (now known as Autonomy), the shard on Taldain, but had to censor most of the White Sand-Specific words. Here is the section: Bavadin - Five, Eight, Nine We don't know much about Bavadin, but there are a few options. There are five shshshshsh, and a shshshshsh can have five shshshshsh. The religious texts on shshshshsh are five hundred years old. There are eight shshshshsh, who elect eight shshshshsh, and shshshshsh spent eight years training. The shshshshsh religion sends eight shshshshsh at shshshshsh per day. There are also nine ranks of shshshshsh, nine people in shshshshsh's expedition, a maximum of nine shshsh without over-shshshshsh, and nine shshshshsh if you count the beggars. This paragraph brought to you by the Librarians. Now that we have a forum on which we can talk about white sand, who wants to fill this in? EDIT - I think that it was actually May 2014.