Why Silver AND Salt?

[Zibus]

So after some thinking this seems interesting.

Silver makes some sense as being useful at destroying investiture since it is used to combat shades on Threnody. That potentially ties these planets together, since we haven't YET seen magical applications of silver on other worlds. In another thread someone (I think Pagerunner) suggested that silver might be useful specifically against corrupted investiture and that since these are spin-offs of the og Aethers they might have been corrupted or affected by alien investiture in some way.

But why salt?

My first thought is that if these Aether spores are some conjunction of an organic and inorganic matter, then perhaps silver kills the spores by affecting the the investiture, while the salt kills the organic portion. There are parallels in the real world where salt is used to preserve meat or in the pickling process - killing off or at least retarding the growth of microbes. Some salts can be used to kill weeds. Thus the salt portion may suggest this is how the spores are formed.

This makes a lot of sense for something like Verdant which grows vines, but how not as much sense for other Aethers. Especially something like Amberite which creates rock/crystal. So that might count against the theory.

Another possibility is that its not salt in general, but the specific form of salt found in/near the Rock. This might explain why the King has to order people to stay there, and why a war hero was assigned this place as duke. He wants to continue mining the salt and using it without letting other kingdoms know whats going on. This might tie into how even the air near the Rock is salty enough to kill the spores, which seemed really strange to me when I first read it. If its something other than the salt involved, perhaps even some form of investiture, that might explain how this works.

I have trouble figuring out how salt can be used to negate investiture, since its such a common and easily obtained substance on every world. Someone else would have figured something out by now if this was a general rule. Therefore there must be something specific about either the spores or the salt that allows this.

[Mazman]

There is this phenomenon, where water will be sucked through a diaphanous membrane to the side with less concentration of water. (I forgot the name, so if someone could post it, that would be much appreciated.) I suspect something similar is happening here. We also know that all spores react with water, suggesting they are all living, not necessarily associated with living things.

Edited March 10, 2022 by Mazman

[Halyo_Alex]

The real teller would be if White Sand becomes inert if you salt it. It reacts to water because of the lichen growing on the sand grains, like the spores do.

[Zibus]

5 hours ago, Mazman said:

There is this phenomenon, where water will be sucked through a diaphanous membrane to the side with less concentration of water. (I forgot the name, so if someone could post it, that would be much appreciated.) I suspect something similar is happening here. We also know that all spores react with water, suggesting they are all living, not necessarily associated with living things.

Osmosis.

4 hours ago, Halyo_Alex said:

The real teller would be if White Sand becomes inert if you salt it. It reacts to water because of the lichen growing on the sand grains, like the spores do.

For sure. I wonder where you find salt on Dayside?

[CryoZenith]

The writerly answer (which is different from the in-world answer) is that if you left silver as the only weakness of the spores, you would have a vastly depopulated Lumar, possibly even extinct. In a way, Threnody works the same. It's just that in Threnody the "number two method" is not a substance, but a behavior (following of the Simple Rules). If, writerly speaking, having silver available was the only way to deal with Shades on Threnody, and they would be enraged regardless if you followed any rules or not, then that planet would be vastly depopulated too. The in-world answer I'm not sure about.

By the way, here is a fun culinary thing to get you (potentially) disturbed. The human body is 0.5% salt by mass. That is a decently high amount of salt. That is *not enough* to deactivate the verdant spores, not even approximately enough. Which means that the salted tea they drink on the rock is 1% salt by mass or more. I just want everyone to be aware of just how SALTY that is, how much of an acquired taste it would need to be.

[+Oltux72]

7 hours ago, Zibus said:

This makes a lot of sense for something like Verdant which grows vines, but how not as much sense for other Aethers. Especially something like Amberite which creates rock/crystal. So that might count against the theory.

We have no idea what salt does to an already sprouted aether.

7 hours ago, Zibus said:

Another possibility is that its not salt in general, but the specific form of salt found in/near the Rock. This might explain why the King has to order people to stay there, and why a war hero was assigned this place as duke.

But not why it is guarded with only five soldiers. Everybody would have to know about that island. It has a ring of dead spores around it. Sailors dock there and go on to foreign isles. It would be a fortress, because it would be one of the most valuable places in the world.

38 minutes ago, Zibus said:

For sure. I wonder where you find salt on Dayside?

At the coasts. You'd make it by evaporation.

35 minutes ago, CryoZenith said:

By the way, here is a fun culinary thing to get you (potentially) disturbed. The human body is 0.5% salt by mass. That is a decently high amount of salt. That is *not enough* to deactivate the verdant spores, not even approximately enough. Which means that the salted tea they drink on the rock is 1% salt by mass or more. I just want everyone to be aware of just how SALTY that is, how much of an acquired taste it would need to be.

Massively unhealthy. You could make a fortune selling medication against high blood pressure. I suppose strokes are the most common cause of death.

[CryoZenith]

Just now, Oltux72 said:

Massively unhealthy. You could make a fortune selling medication against high blood pressure. I suppose strokes are the most common cause of death.

Possibly. But I would guess with 12 massive blobs of sentient investiture chilling around Lunar humans are innately invested to near Rosharan levels, which presumably comes attached with some cardiovascular protection.

[Adonalsium's Eigenbasis]

8 hours ago, Zibus said:

So after some thinking this seems interesting.

Silver makes some sense as being useful at destroying investiture since it is used to combat shades on Threnody. That potentially ties these planets together, since we haven't YET seen magical applications of silver on other worlds. In another thread someone (I think Pagerunner) suggested that silver might be useful specifically against corrupted investiture and that since these are spin-offs of the og Aethers they might have been corrupted or affected by alien investiture in some way.

 

That was me, thanks for the shoutout!

 

Also yes, it's a pretty interesting question on why salt affects the spores -- I tend to agree that it's likely more biological and less Realmatic in nature, but will be interesting to keep an eye out for hints throughout the book!

[apepi]

Been looking through the coppermind for salt.

Kabsal used salt for Cymatics.
Denth robbed most of T’Tellir 's salt.
Emul likes salty food.
Yeddaw has a salty pancake.
Roshar having salt water fish.

The robbing could be more than it appears, maybe he was afraid of salt being used against him, or maybe the salt was stolen to be sold off world to this planet? His reasoning did seem a bit off to me.

But I am not sure how important that any of these actually are.

[Frustration]

2 hours ago, apepi said:

The robbing could be more than it appears, maybe he was afraid of salt being used against him, or maybe the salt was stolen to be sold off world to this planet? His reasoning did seem a bit off to me.

The stealing was to cripple T'Tellir's ability to store meat, and thus hamper their war effort.

[i’m in the details]

I think it could be as a simple as there are magical beings that come from Ado and those who are separate. The Aethers and shades are part of a “fae” like magical family and are completely separate from Ado. So they each have different weaknesses. Be cool to see a Witcher type character with one silver sword and one aluminum one. 

[NameIess]

18 minutes ago, i’m in the details said:

I think it could be as a simple as there are magical beings that come from Ado and those who are separate. The Aethers and shades are part of a “fae” like magical family and are completely separate from Ado. So they each have different weaknesses. Be cool to see a Witcher type character with one silver sword and one aluminum one. 

Shades are made from Ambition's corrupted Investiture. So they aren't completely separate from Adonalsium.

[i’m in the details]

8 hours ago, Nameless said:

Shades are made from Ambition's corrupted Investiture. So they aren't completely separate from Adonalsium.

Is that confirmed?

[NameIess]

2 hours ago, i’m in the details said:

Is that confirmed?

Yes. during Odium and Ambition's battle in the Threnodite system, Pieces of Ambition "twisted both the people and the planet of Threnody" (From Arcanum unbounded). There's no other explanation that makes sense. Before Ambition and Odium fought, there was no evil and no shades, and after they fought there was.

[+Oltux72]

4 hours ago, Nameless said:

Yes. during Odium and Ambition's battle in the Threnodite system, Pieces of Ambition "twisted both the people and the planet of Threnody" (From Arcanum unbounded). There's no other explanation that makes sense. Before Ambition and Odium fought, there was no evil and no shades, and after they fought there was.

I am sorry, but that cannot be the whole truth.The timing would be hopeless. The battle happened before the First Desolation. That was thousands of years ago. Yet the Evil had not arrived at the time of Secret History, yet Threnody already created Cognitive Shadows in numbers sufficient to make an army out of them.

In this case we need to give the full quote:

Quote

Judging by the records Nazh has provided, I have concluded that some measure of Investiture must have existed on this planet before the battle between Shards. However, the waves of destruction - carrying ripped-off chunks of Ambition's power - twisted both the people and the planet of Threnody.

 

6 hours ago, i’m in the details said:

Is that confirmed?

Sort of. Ambition changed something. Yet something else is reported to predate that. And yet other things happened so late that they must be either attributed to an unknown entity or immediate stages must be assumed. Threnody is complicated. Whence the power comes is unknown.

[Zibus]

I always figured the Evil and the shades were separate. They just had the bad luck to flee the Evil to shade-land.

[NameIess]

5 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

I am sorry, but that cannot be the whole truth.The timing would be hopeless. The battle happened before the First Desolation. That was thousands of years ago. Yet the Evil had not arrived at the time of Secret History, yet Threnody already created Cognitive Shadows in numbers sufficient to make an army out of them.

In this case we need to give the full quote:

 

Sort of. Ambition changed something. Yet something else is reported to predate that. And yet other things happened so late that they must be either attributed to an unknown entity or immediate stages must be assumed. Threnody is complicated. Whence the power comes is unknown.

Why do you think the evil hadn’t arrived during the time of SH?

[+Oltux72]

5 hours ago, Nameless said:

Why do you think the evil hadn’t arrived during the time of SH?

Because the Threnodites were still powerful enough to send out armies through the CR.

[NameIess]

18 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

Because the Threnodites were still powerful enough to send out armies through the CR.

And how would the evil stop that? How do we know that whatever "powers of Threnody" the Ire were worried about aren't directed by the evil?

[Stormlit-man]

I suspect that there is a great significance about silver that is being built up as to its multiple references. I am going to make a guess and say that invested things are affected by silver because it breaks or tampers with bonds in the spiritual realm. Like the shades on Threnody being weakened/destroyed because the silver unmakes them in some way. I wouldn't be surprised if Hoid has a weakness to silver that  we don't know about because he predates the shattering and the significance of silver probably predates the shattering and doesn't seem to be invested. If a weakness to silver stems back before the shattering maybe Adonalsium was harmed in some way by silver.

[+Oltux72]

11 hours ago, Nameless said:

And how would the evil stop that? How do we know that whatever "powers of Threnody" the Ire were worried about aren't directed by the evil?

• The Evil made them evavuate the main continent
• Nazh knows the rituals to become a Shadow abd he calls Kelsir a Shadow, not a Shade. People in Silence's time so not.
• Nazh cannot describe the Evil. He did not operate under the Evil.

1 hour ago, Stormlit-man said:

I suspect that there is a great significance about silver that is being built up as to its multiple references. I am going to make a guess and say that invested things are affected by silver because it breaks or tampers with bonds in the spiritual realm. Like the shades on Threnody being weakened/destroyed because the silver unmakes them in some way.

We'd know. Shardbearers and some Radiants were surely rich. As are the Returned. And the Fused are elite. Of they have a problem with fine cutlery oe jewelery we'd know. If defeating a Fused were as easy as stabbing them with a silver dinner knife, that would have been discovered.

 

[Frustration]

7 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

• The Evil made them evavuate the main continent
• Nazh knows the rituals to become a Shadow abd he calls Kelsir a Shadow, not a Shade. People in Silence's time so not.
• Nazh cannot describe the Evil. He did not operate under the Evil.

And that prevents the Evil from being a sentient entity with its own goals?

[+Oltux72]

59 minutes ago, Frustration said:

And that prevents the Evil from being a sentient entity with its own goals?

That it does not prevent. But then the people who know how to make shadows would know details about the Evil.

[NameIess]

9 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

• The Evil made them evavuate the main continent
• Nazh knows the rituals to become a Shadow abd he calls Kelsir a Shadow, not a Shade. People in Silence's time so not.
• Nazh cannot describe the Evil. He did not operate under the Evil

The Evil is related to Adonalsium:

Quote

Sweetness

Since the evil on Threnody isn't a Shard, can you tell us anything about its nature? Is it an actual being, and is it related to Adonalsium?

Brandon Sanderson

Everything is related, in the Cosmere, to Adonalsium. Most of the magic you're seeing is a just a natural outgrowth of Cosmere-related magic, you're seeing Cognitive Shadows. The Evil is similarly related.

Words of Radiance Philadelphia signing (March 21, 2014)

 

[iceblade44]

20 minutes ago, Nameless said:

The Evil is related to Adonalsium:

 

And? That doesn't really tell us much. All the Shards have a similar relationship so its unclear whether the Evil was made by Adonalsium or by Ambition, since it is technically the same