Splinters have their own Intent

[Mad_Scientist]

Welcome to part 2 of my Universal Theory of Everything! Previous theory threads of mine can be found in the spoiler.

I think Skai is Unity/Cohesion(Early work, will refine later)

The reason the Returned need breath to live

Something's been bugging me for a while now: just what the heck is a Splinter? Based on what we've read and had hinted to us by Brandon, they are a piece of a Shard's power, it seems, but there is more to them than that.

Afterall, in Mistborn, everyone has pieces of Preservation and Ruin in them. But they are not Splinters. The mists themselves are parts of Preservation. Is each individual particle of mist a Splinter? Of course not. We know that we haven't seen any Splinters in Mistborn.

So then is the thing that makes a Splinter a Splinter an issue of quantity, or perhaps quality? Assume for the moment one of those is the case. Where is the cutoff point? In Warbreaker, we have the only 100% confirmed Splinters, the divine breaths. We also have regular breaths. Assume for the moment that regular breaths are also a part of Endowment. If one combined 10,000 of them together, would that make a Splinter? 10,001 maybe? And does the difference between a-piece-of-Endowment-that's-almost-a-full-Splinter-but-not-quite and a Splinter of Endowment even matter, if it's only a difference in quality/quantity?

None of this made sense to me, I just couldn't fathom what made a Splinter so special, until I saw that someone had made a new post in Chaos's Principle of Intent thread. And then it hit me, the obvious answer as to what makes a Splinter special: Intent.

Every Splinter has its own Intent. This is different from other pieces of a Shard's power, which are related to the overall Intent of the Shard and influenced by it, but lack their own unique individual Intent.

If you think about something like Endowment, aka giving, there are many different possible variations. Variations in what to endow: knowledge, money, life, hope, courage, laughter, sadness, leadership. Differences in how to endow: give someone money directly, or give them the skills to earn money, endow courage by inspirational example, or by making jokes that take the sting away from fears. Endowment the Shard encompasses all that, every form, every variation. Splinters of Endowment represent more specific, exact things. For example, Lightsong could have the Splinter "endow courage by using humor to make situations seem less scary and cheer people up." (Though I'm not sure the Splinters get quite that specific)

And just like a Shard's Intent influences its bearer, so to does a Splinter's Intent. Of course, a Splinter is much slower and weaker, and so the effects are less drastic and noticable. But over time, they will have an effect. The Seons, likely Splinters of Devotion, are all incredibly devoted to their masters as we can see. The effect on them is obvious, as they have been around for hundreds of years.

The effect on the Returned is less visibile, it is the reason all the Returned eventually give up their breaths. Even the most selfish Returned is slowly driven to follow his specific aspect of Endowment, and if he ignores it, the desire builds to the point where it drives him nearly mad, and he has to do something, anything, that is at least vaguely close to his Splinter's Intent.

Ironically enough, the Returned that could live the longest would not be the selfish ones, but the unselfish. Those who give to others and fufill their Intent will not be so driven to give up their lives just to finally do something inline with it.

So there you have it: every Splinter contains an Intent, representing an aspect of the larger Intent of the Shard. This is the difference between a Splinter and another piece of a Shard's power, not quality/quantity of power.

[Chaos]

Hmmm. This is interesting.

From a very high level view, it's plausible. You have Adonalsium which Shattered into specific intents, and then when you Splinter a Shard, those Splinters get their own intent atop of the basic Shard's power. And in fact, aside from the mists, it explains why lerasium and atium are not Splinters. So this is a plausible definition.

Intents are peculiar things on Nalthis, however. When you think about it, Nightblood acts in accordance with the intent of his Commands. In fact, all the Commands feel very much based on this idea of intent. The visualization makes the intent clearer. So my only qualm with this idea is that Awakened objects essentially have a second intent--their Commands.

This poses a problem for this theory, because for one thing, that means that there is still a matter of "quality" to Splinters. An Awakened rope is not really a Splinter. But by this idea, Nightblood would, for practical purposes, be a Splinter. I haven't heard that Nightblood is explicitly a Splinter, though.

I'm rambling, so I'm going to stop now. Don't think that I don't like this theory, however. This is freaking awesome.

(By the way, I am now making "intent" lowercase, because the one time Brandon references intent in the Hero of Ages annotations, it was lowercase. Oops. I probably need to edit the Principle of Intent to follow that. I do prefer it capitalized, but unfortunately, that may not mean it is right...)

[Mad_Scientist]

Hmmm. This is interesting.

From a very high level view, it's plausible. You have Adonalsium which Shattered into specific intents, and then when you Splinter a Shard, those Splinters get their own intent atop of the basic Shard's power. And in fact, aside from the mists, it explains why lerasium and atium are not Splinters. So this is a plausible definition.

Intents are peculiar things on Nalthis, however. When you think about it, Nightblood acts in accordance with the intent of his Commands. In fact, all the Commands feel very much based on this idea of intent. The visualization makes the intent clearer. So my only qualm with this idea is that Awakened objects essentially have a second intent--their Commands.

This poses a problem for this theory, because for one thing, that means that there is still a matter of "quality" to Splinters. An Awakened rope is not really a Splinter. But by this idea, Nightblood would, for practical purposes, be a Splinter. I haven't heard that Nightblood is explicitly a Splinter, though.

I'm rambling, so I'm going to stop now. Don't think that I don't like this theory, however. This is freaking awesome.

(By the way, I am now making "intent" lowercase, because the one time Brandon references intent in the Hero of Ages annotations, it was lowercase. Oops. I probably need to edit the Principle of Intent to follow that. I do prefer it capitalized, but unfortunately, that may not mean it is right...)

I think I can explain why Nightblood and awakened ropes aren't Splinters. The way I see it, a Splinter is a piece of a Shard's spiritual power with a specific intent that is an everpresent, intrinsic part of the Splinter. The intent is attached to the spiritual part of the Splinter, and is always with it, exerting influence, regardless of who or what possesses the Splinter.

An awakened rope is different. The rope cannot be a Splinter, because the rope is a physical object. And the breaths inside the rope cannot be a Splinter, because their intent, such as they have, is not an intrinsic parts of the breaths themselves. It is an ephemereal, temperary quality. Tell a rope to hold a person, and it will hold him. Take your breaths out, use the rope to tie that person up the old fashioned way, then put the very same breaths back in with a command to untie, and the rope will untie the person.

Assuming you know the right commands, you can use the same rope, and the same breaths, to tie someone up, untie him, give him a relaxing message, tortue him with friction burns, lift him up to a high place, lower him down to a low place, etc, etc.

For a Splinter, the intent must be permanent, always there, always a part of the power. Any intent a breath has changes according to the current command of its master.

As for Nightblood, the issue with him is that he is a sword, not a fragment of Endowment's power. I think he is closer to a Sliver than a Splinter.

The Lord Ruler was a Sliver, someone who once held a lot of Preservation's power, and was forever influenced by it. He always had the desire to preserve, like Preservation, even after he lost the power. Nightblood is a sword who once held a bunch of breaths. Those breaths held the temperary intent of "destroy evil." Even though those breaths were neither a Shard nor a Splinter, and the intent of destruction was a temperary quality, it was still enough to influence Nightblood's mind. Those breaths are now gone, but Nightblood still wants to destroy, just like the Lord Ruler wanted to preserve even after losing the Shard.

I'm guessing that oweing to the fact that Nightblood is a sword, not even completely sentient, he is much weaker of mind than a human, and easier to influence in such a drastic fashion. In addition, Nightblood is a sword, and we've seen evidence that everything has a cognitive aspect, albeit a weak one in most cases. I imagine that all swords, by virture of what they are and are used for, want to destroy things, in their own primitive way.

[Chaos]

Okay, I was imprecise. Objects are never Splinters, the power is a Splinter. So Nightblood is not really a Splinter, but what I meant to say is that he could, in fact, hold a Splinter.

The Sliver of Splinters idea is something that occurred to me when I read your initial post (they may even have a cosmere-specific name), but Nightblood still has those initial thousand Breaths in store. Brandon's said he is an Invested object, so he must still have those Breaths. To him, it acts similarly to a Shardholder, with that intent coloring everything about him.

I suppose the real question is if Nightblood's BioChromatic Investiture is permanent. One would think that if Nightblood could be destroyed, Vasher would have done it.

Hmmm. Idea.

There's nothing to say that you can't Awaken with your divine Breath. It just would be an extremely bad idea. I suppose, assuming this theory is true, that this is because those Splinters are still of Endowment, so you can use their normal magic with them. But, since you can Awaken with Splinters (the Command "my Breath become yours" is, as far as I'm concerned, the most basic Awakening, for it is the basest way to Endow. Thus, you can Awaken with Splinters), there would be a secondary intent influencing whatever you Awakened. As you say, that Splinter's intent is never changing, and I agree with that logic. You can't change a Shard's intent, so likewise, it should be extremely hard to change a Splinter's intent.

[Mad_Scientist]

Hmm.

Nightblood is a tricky one then.

Perhaps the difference between the intents of Splinters and the commands used to control Awakening is the direction in which the thought flows.

A Splinter is spiritual, and the intent of a Splinter originates from the spiritual realm. From there, the intent influences the mind of anyone holding the Splinter. So a Splinter's intent is the spiritual realm influencing the cognitive realm.

A Command is cognitive, and the "intent" of a command originates from the mind of the Awakener. From there, the Command influences the nature of the breath he has commanded. So an Awakener's Command is the cognitive realm influencing the spiritual realm.

[FellKnight]

Welcome to part 2 of my Universal Theory of Everything! Previous theory threads of mine can be found in the spoiler.

I love it. IIRC, it was stated somewhere (annotations?) that the Court of the Gods is constantly filled with Returned who display particular attributes, e.g. Lightsong the Brave. Perhaps there are only a certain number of said sub-attributes for Endowment. I think I may have to espouse this theory.

Fell

[Mad_Scientist]

I love it. IIRC, it was stated somewhere (annotations?) that the Court of the Gods is constantly filled with Returned who display particular attributes, e.g. Lightsong the Brave. Perhaps there are only a certain number of said sub-attributes for Endowment. I think I may have to espouse this theory.

Fell

Thanks!

Interestingly, I discovered another theory thread, this one regarding Honor, that has a fair amount in common with my theory.

Definitely some differences, as that theory's specific to Honor and doesn't deal with the nature of all Splinters, but it does involve pieces of a Shard having their own intents, so I thought I'd mention it.

[Zas678]

Hmm.

Nightblood is a tricky one then.

Perhaps the difference between the intents of Splinters and the commands used to control Awakening is the direction in which the thought flows.

A Splinter is spiritual, and the intent of a Splinter originates from the spiritual realm. From there, the intent influences the mind of anyone holding the Splinter. So a Splinter's intent is the spiritual realm influencing the cognitive realm.

A Command is cognitive, and the "intent" of a command originates from the mind of the Awakener. From there, the Command influences the nature of the breath he has commanded. So an Awakener's Command is the cognitive realm influencing the spiritual realm.

I think the reason why Nightblood is not a Splinter is because he is powered by Human Power instead of by Shard Power. I believe that Breaths come from the people, not from Endowment. Sure, they wouldn't be able to give them away without Endowment, but they are independent of Endowment in the same way Allomancy is independent of Preservation.

I tihnk that Splinters are inherently tied to the Cognitive Realm. Creating Lifeless isn't that hard. Creating intelligent Lifeless able to interact with society is very hard. That is what the Uber-Breath mostly provides for- the tie to the Cognitive Realm. Although the breath itself isn't intelligent, the investiture of power from Endowment allows for the sentinence of the previously departed to reconnect to the Physical Realm.

Seons are also intelligent, and it has been noted that they seem to "need" a master. I believe that without a master, their Sentinence disapeers. When the Elantrians lose their connection to the Dor, the Seons that are tied to them go mad- because they themselves can no longer connect to their masters, even though they should be able to.

[Mad_Scientist]

Yah, we disagree on the nature of breaths. If you're right and breaths aren't pieces of Endowment, merely something inherent to humanity that has been influenced by Endowment, then that would easily explain why Nightblood doesn't possess a Splinter. But... since I think that breaths are a part of Endowment, I need to come up with some explanation for what Nightblood is if I'm going to claim Splinter have intent. I think I'm mostly satisified with what I've come up with, though Nightblood is still quite mysterious.

I'm not sure if the nature of Seons has anything to do with their Splinter status or not. I have a bunch of different ideas related to that bouncing around in my head, but haven't come up with anything I definitely like yet.

[Emeralis00]

Interesting, and it reminds me of my own theory.

I may Espouse this in the future.

[Chaos]

This hasn't been mentioned in relation to this theory, but I'd say that it is relevant:

"People are discord," Syl said.

"What does that mean?"

"You all act differently and think differently. Nothing else is like that -- Animals act alike, and all spren are, in a sense virtually the same individual. There's harmony in that. But not in you -- it seems that no two of you can agree on anything. All the world does as it is supposed to, except for humans. Maybe that's why you so often want to kill each other."

Emphasis mine.

The reason spren could be considered the same individual is that they each have the same intent. Or, at least, each type of spren. I don't know if that's true, but it is possible.

[Mad_Scientist]

This hasn't been mentioned in relation to this theory, but I'd say that it is relevant:

Emphasis mine.

The reason spren could be considered the same individual is that they each have the same intent. Or, at least, each type of spren. I don't know if that's true, but it is possible.

I remember that passage. I don't think it means what you're speculating here, though. Of course, that's because it doesn't fit in with my theory about what the spren are (which I'll post once I finish my WoK re-read and post another theory that provides some foundation for it). For now I'll say that I think only a few spren, like Syl, possess Splinters.

I think the reason why all other spren are virtually the same individual has to do with the nature of sentience in the cosmere. The closer you are to sentience, the more individual you are, and the farther away from sentience, the more you're just a copy of another. "Animals all act alike," Syl said, but that's not quite true. The more intelligent animals behave in unique ways, such as those special horses whose name I cannot remember how to spell at the moment. But the less intelligent animals do pretty much act alike, and of course something like grass is not unique at all. And one piece of rock is pretty much the same as another. Likewise, most of the spren are all the same.

[Chaos]

I now have the audio for the interview at the signing, so I am going to answer this question directly. It will be up Monday or Tuesday (maybe). We have people working on transcribing it.

(This is a direct quote from part of the transcript)

Josh: Do Splinters have their own Intent, in addition to their Shards?

Splinters often have their own intent.

So there you have it. I'm pretty excited for what this implies. However, it seems that they don't always do this.

Edited August 15, 2011 by Chaos