Deus Ex Biotica Posted December 16, 2011 Report Share Posted December 16, 2011 This came to me as I was contemplating a few oddly-specific details of the various Cosmere worlds. First, and famously, the number 16 shows up in a lot of places. Speaking of numbers, we know that the Well of Ascension refills not every 1000 years, but every 1024, which is an amusingly specific number to get. And then, there are the focuses of the different Shards: metal, language, commands, and electrical charge trapped in crystalline structures. Suddenly, it hit me. I saw the true face of the Cosmere: It is a massive, malfunctioning, computer. What really likes to work in base sixteen (hexadecimal)? Programmers. Where have I seen the number 1024? Kibibytes. After that, putting the rest together became trivial: Andolsium was a supercomputer, but with a wide variety of different non-compatible security programs installed on it at once. They all recognized the others as attacks, and quarantined each other, resulting in a random but harsh partition of the system. Roshar got one of the solid-state memory devices (electricity stored in silicone - I assume that the files on this driver included a report on crustacean biology, and a description of an epic fantasy world in which the Heralds fought the Voidbringers, which is why confused remmants of those two things for the backdrop of events there), but managed to short out the nearest capacitor, leaving it vulnerable to power surges. Awakening is the old user interface, but without sanitized inputs. Sel seems to have a lot of the CPU, given that it has several languages for accessing its system. And Scadrial is the RAM and a bunch of wiring, given that metal is power, but the even the security programs can alter things once they are in the metal. I cannot wait until we see the Shardworld which got the Graphics power - I'm sure it shall be epic! But how could a computer get so dramatically confused? It would need to be broken quite strangely. This was my second breakthrough - the computer belongs to Alcatraz! And what, I hear you ask, is the rationale for Hoid? That's someone hired to sort out the glitches, but who is getting increasingly testy and snarky, because it's so hard to fix things Alcatraz has broken. Personally, I find everything much clearer now. -- Deus Ex Biotica 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tulir Posted December 16, 2011 Report Share Posted December 16, 2011 Wow. Just wow. I think, you just made my head explode. Wow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
discipleofhoid Posted December 16, 2011 Report Share Posted December 16, 2011 (edited) Does that make shadesmar the system bus? And lightweaving the framebuffer? Edited December 16, 2011 by discipleofhoid Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WeiryWriter Posted December 17, 2011 Report Share Posted December 17, 2011 This is seriously mind-trippy... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Musicspren Posted December 17, 2011 Report Share Posted December 17, 2011 So is Hoid trying to make Adonalsium 2.0, which will run on an Apple and won't crash again? I cannot wait until we see the Shardworld which got the Graphics power - I'm sure it shall be epic! Nalthis? Think what happens around Susebron. Or how any Returned can change form if they know how. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deus Ex Biotica Posted December 17, 2011 Author Report Share Posted December 17, 2011 (edited) Good point, actually... I had considered Nalthis to be related to the User Interface pretty directly due to how Commands work, but I guess every part of a computer works by obeying specific commands, and in Nalthis, power is determined, quite literally, by your ppi and fidelity. Graphics, it is! Edited December 17, 2011 by Deus Ex Biotica Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tulir Posted December 17, 2011 Report Share Posted December 17, 2011 I was thinking more along the lines of the world where Lightweaving comes from, because it deals with illusions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aiken Frost Posted December 17, 2011 Report Share Posted December 17, 2011 (edited) Ok, this is the theory I officially support now. So is Hoid trying to make Adonalsium 2.0, which will run on an Apple and won't crash again? Pfff, of course it will NOT be a Mac! What kind of games people will play if they make Adonalsium 2.0 in a Mac? Edited December 17, 2011 by Aiken Frost Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CrazyRioter Posted December 17, 2011 Report Share Posted December 17, 2011 obviously it will be on a Linux machine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tulir Posted December 17, 2011 Report Share Posted December 17, 2011 I agree with CrazyRioter. The original copy was Mac and that's why it crashed in the first place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deus Ex Biotica Posted December 17, 2011 Author Report Share Posted December 17, 2011 I choose to assume it was AROS (recalled as "Andolsium" due to glitches), and Hoid is upgrading to Haiku (hence all his literary references). Normal system wars are boring! -- Deus Ex Biotica Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Musicspren Posted December 17, 2011 Report Share Posted December 17, 2011 Pfff, of course it will NOT be a Mac! What kind of games people will play if they make Adonalsium 2.0 in a Mac? Scadrial, pre-Hero of Ages: Ruin: Kill them! Kill them! Preservation: What? Ruin: I'm playing Angry Birds, can't you tell? I'm going to kill those pigs! Centuries later on Nalthis: Lightsong: Tell Allmother it's her turn in Words with Friends. Llarimar: I believe she told you not to bother her. Lightsong: I'm developing a new skill: Irritation by app! Centuries later, on Roshar: Szeth: Is this the next person you command me to kill? Taravangian: No, that's the high score I want you to get on Fruit Ninja. Szeth: I suppose this is one of your low-IQ days... Taravangian: I have no idea what you're talking about. Szeth: Exactly. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CrazyRioter Posted December 17, 2011 Report Share Posted December 17, 2011 Odium: I hate apps, I hate the people that wrote the apps, and and I hate the people that play them, I also hate the people that don't play them." Cultivation: "I bet you can get a better high score then that, come on, let me see you get a better high score! and while you are doing that, I will be playing FarmVille." Honor: "Take that evil titans!" 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tulir Posted December 18, 2011 Report Share Posted December 18, 2011 Amazing!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arcanist Lupus Posted December 19, 2011 Report Share Posted December 19, 2011 I choose to assume it was AROS (recalled as "Andolsium" due to glitches), and Hoid is upgrading to Haiku (hence all his literary references). Normal system wars are boring! -- Deus Ex Biotica Haiku? Ketek! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Jacob Santos Posted December 20, 2011 Report Share Posted December 20, 2011 I seriously hope this is not the case. The man in the machine has to be the second least satisfying ending, second only to dream endings. If man in the machine is a punch to the kidney, dream endings have to be the place they sent the Radiants when there aren't any desolations. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Commander Spoonface Posted December 20, 2011 Report Share Posted December 20, 2011 Perhaps it's that when humans construct a "universe" of sorts, we naturally do it in a logical way. Thus, an advanced computer and a fictional universe may well share a number of principles, and maybe if we understood more of our own universe we could see similarities there as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Captain.Kaulu Posted December 21, 2011 Report Share Posted December 21, 2011 While I'm not personally a big Apple fan, I have to admit that making Adonalsium 2.0 an Apple product (especially a tablet) would work well with trying to incorporate Brandon's non-Cosmere writings into the whole theory a la the Alcatraz connection ... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chicken Posted December 22, 2011 Report Share Posted December 22, 2011 This is awesome. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deus Ex Biotica Posted December 22, 2011 Author Report Share Posted December 22, 2011 I seriously hope this is not the case. The man in the machine has to be the second least satisfying ending, second only to dream endings. If man in the machine is a punch to the kidney, dream endings have to be the place they sent the Radiants when there aren't any desolations. Things like The Matrix and Tron are deeply ingrained enough in me, I don't see the similarities. If it was all a dream, nothing actually mattered (unless you could have died for real in the dream, or dreaming is another universe, or something, but that doesn't count). But the computer is just another location. Sentient beings fighting and dying in a computer means no more or less to me than them fighting and dying on Earth, Scadrial, or the head of a pin. If everything is real in the context of the story, what's the difference? -- Deus Ex Biotica Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Jacob Santos Posted December 22, 2011 Report Share Posted December 22, 2011 Things like The Matrix and Tron are deeply ingrained enough in me, I don't see the similarities. If it was all a dream, nothing actually mattered (unless you could have died for real in the dream, or dreaming is another universe, or something, but that doesn't count). But the computer is just another location. Sentient beings fighting and dying in a computer means no more or less to me than them fighting and dying on Earth, Scadrial, or the head of a pin. If everything is real in the context of the story, what's the difference? -- Deus Ex Biotica You misunderstand, partly because I didn't explain well enough. The Matrix and Tron were fine, because the setting and story itself is man in the machine. I would likewise have no problem with a story completely set in a dream world. The problem is in the reveal that the man was in the machine the whole time. The dissatisfaction is in the author basically slapping me repeatedly across the face and telling me that I wasted my entire time while laughing and pointing at my face. It is completely "easy" ending saying that basically that the journey was completely pointless, because none of it happened. I mean to say, if it is a metaphor for the whole book reading itself, that I can slightly understand, since the story itself is a work of fiction. I don't think that is the case when the endings are used. Alas, also the fact that if it was in fact a dream, then the characters should have been able to do all kinds of really awesome stuff and is also completely unrealistic since dreams are often fragmented transitioning to different scenes. My point, is that if you are writing a story about the man in the machine, then you should have the decency to at least build a time machine and write it before all the other 10 or so authors who have already done it. It was fine the first time, but it just seems pretty weak after the 3rd time. Any mature reader probably has come across it multiple times, so including such an "reveal" in a book with a mature audience is asking your audience to rage ironically against the machine, with the machine being you, the author. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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