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How were Splinterworlds populated?


Oudeis

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There's a couple of different options I can think of, so there's no reason to assume every splinterworld was populated the same way. Here are my thoughts. If anyone has other thoughts, or actual citable sources, please post them!

 

The crux is, it seems to me that the cradle of humanity was Yolen. Life could have come to be on other planets, but the odds of parellel evolution producing humans is extremely slim. I suspect the listeners are native to Roshar, for example. But why does Silence seem to be human? On some planets, like Roshar, there are suggestions that Yolish people traveled to Roshar and became the seed of humanity. On others, like Scadrial, we are more-or-less flat-out told that Ruin and Preservation simply made people as they remembered them from Yolen. How did people come to be on a planet with no Shard?

 

1. Adonalsium could have sent people to different worlds, or created them there, before the Shattering.

 

2. Mass migration via worldhopping. Nazh is confirmed to be from Threnody, so we know it's possible to worldhop back and forth. However, the only mass migration we've heard of was from Yolen to Roshar. I get the impression that this has to be Shard-assisted, that a population cannot simply choose to travel the cognitive realm. Obviously, this is just my impression.

 

3. A Shard could have passed by, left a population and a Splinter, and moved on. Or, one (or more, since it's implied you need two Shards to create life) could have stopped by, created a population, and left.

 

Anyone else?

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4. The instructions for "sentient life in general" could be part of investiture itself and the human form could be the convenient/best form for sentience to take in each shardworld interpretation.
 

Proving this would be simple to start: QA with Brandon "Can worlds that have not been invested develope sentient life?"

Edited by Lord Tavash Shar
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By "Splinterworld" do you mean Shardworld? If so, this was talked about a little in Mistborn

Preservation and Ruin's pact to create humans.

But that only gives us an explanation for worlds that have shards on them. Sentient life can exist on worlds without shards. Threnody (where Shadows for Silence takes place) is an example of this.

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I posted here, in the Short Story forum, because these two stories don't take place on the Shardworld, they take place on world that, at most, have a Splinter... hence why I called them Splinterworlds. I've seen people use this term before and I was under the impression it was more widely used; my apologies for not defining it when I used it.

 

I'm aware of how humans came to be on Scadrial, and I'm aware of most of the common theories of how humans came to be on Roshar. Scadrial required the presence of two Shards. We're not sure what was required for whatever turns out to be the whole truth of how humans came to be on Roshar.

 

Tavash: Spoilers for Stormlight Archive and Mistborn.

 

Listeners and Aimians are non-human, and it's implied they were originally on Roshar. Meaning sentient life came to be that wasn't human. Also, if human was the default, it prolly would have been easier for Harmony to revert all people back to the genetic norm when he fixed the world, but he expressly only could do it because of the medical information contained in his metalminds. On balance, I'd be surprised if sentient life sprung up randomly on its own, and always defaulted to fully human just because.

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?Tavash: Spoilers for Stormlight Archive and Mistborn.?

 

 

 

Not sure what your saying here? For a thing that points to where I got my theory from though: Letter 2 which if you have not read it and want to know

 

 

"Yes, I’m disappointed. Perpetually, as you put it. Is not the destruction we have wrought enough? The worlds you now tread bear the touch and design of Adonalsium. Our interference so far has brought nothing but pain." 

Note he says "Touch of Adonalsium" Meaning that Roshar was designed/invested before the shards honor and cultivation arrived. We also that the listeners are native to Roshar and humans are not. 

 

​Its a stretch. But not a long one. easy and well within reach. To assume that Investiture if not give a channel will channel it self and form sentience. Not necessarily Humans but sentience. Hence listeners, Dragons, Spren ext.

Edited by Lord Tavash Shar
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  • 6 months later...

I imagine that Worldhopping was very easy, pre-Shattering. Adonalsium's mega-Investiture was probably something extremely powerful (else why would be threatened enough to break the thing?), and thus Worldhopping may have been the Yolish equivalent of NASA. Maybe, pre-Shattering, tiny colonies of human settlers could be found throughout the Cosmere. The Shardworlds and Splinterworlds are the lucky ones, in that they still magic, to one degree or another.

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