Why Nightblood can read thoughts, and a whole bunch of Cognitive Aspect stuff

[Mad_Scientist]

So, over in the thread discussing Alloy of Law sample chapter 3, there was quite a bit of talk about how Harmony can possibly read Wax's mind. And since mind-reading was a feat Ruin could not accomplish, Harmony doing so seemed like it had very important cosmere applications.

But then I realized something odd: we've seen mind-reading before. Nightblood, from Warbreaker, can read minds easily. And he's not even the only thing capable of reading minds. Some spren from Way of Kings can also read minds. They do so with Shallan near the book's end.

Creatures, she said in her head. Can you hear me?

Yes, always, a whisper came in response

And if one considers the various emotion related spren such as fearspren and gloryspren, which may not be created from such emotions but merely attracted to them, then there's the possibility that even those weak, not-anywhere-near-sentient spren are at the very least capable of reading minds enough to recognize strong emotions.

So why can't Ruin read minds? Is it because of his Shard nature? I doubt it. Even if that made it difficult to understand the minds of more "normal" people, wouldn't he still be able to at least read the minds of people driven towards ruining things themselves? Now, perhaps he can, and this is just never mentioned in the books because it would be an irrelevent detail that would merely confuse things. Maybe that's the case. But I'm not sure. And even if that was the reason Ruin can't read minds, we still need to answer why Nightblood can read minds. Afterall, Nightblood has a pretty alien nature, yet he can still read the minds of anyone, good, evil, or inbetween.

So I think there's another explanation as to why Nightblood can do what Ruin cannot. But before I can get into that, I need to discuss another idea of mine that provides the groundwork for my Nightblood idea. This idea is based on some concepts that have already been proposed by another 17th Sharder: Power generates sentience

The basic concept of that thread, that spiritual power can increase the sentience of something, is one I agreed with at first. But I had a lot of issues with some of the specifics given. For one thing, if breaths are the spiritual energy of Endowment used to grant sentience (and thus capable of bringing Nightblood to near sentience), why don't Drabs lose their sentience? If the reason Hemalurgic spikes bring sentience to Kandra is because they are empowered with spiritual energy, why do they cause Koloss to lose sentience? If constant, everpresent spiritual energy is needed to maintain sentience, how did a temporary influx of breaths make Clod more sentient?

I think I have found the answers to these questions. Here are my main ideas:

_____

Spiritual power can enhance a cognitive aspect, increasing both the sentience and power of said cognitive aspect. This can some sometimes happen accidentally when something is infused with spiritual power. Regardless of how this happens, it results in some of the spiritual energy being transformed into cognitive energy and added to the cognitve aspect.

A cognitive aspect does not require anything else in order to maintain it's sentience and power. A sentient cognitive aspect that has had its physical or even spiritual counterparts stripped away will still be sentient.

A cognitive aspect is affected by whatever "body" it inhabits, whether it be spiritual or physical or both. This can cause a sentient cognitive aspect to cease to effectively function as such, and can also cause a sentient cognitive aspect to temporarily gain greater mental abilities. In such cases, the cognitive aspect itself remains largely unchanged, and if its body is quickly returned to normal, the cognitive aspect will be able to continue to function as normal. Thus, even lifeforms that have seemingly lost their sentience like Koloss and Kandra-turned-mistwraiths still have a sentient and potentially fully functioning congnitive aspect, it's just that it's being prevented from working right by other factors.

The only known way for a cognitive aspect to truely lose sentience and power itself is for the owner of said aspect to sacrifice the cognitive power he possesses. Doing this may allow one to accomplish unexpected things, and it is how Preservation trapped Ruin.

____

I think those four points explain things much better, and provide answers to all the apparant issues something like "power generates sentience" causes. Why can Drabs still be sentient after giving away their breaths? Because their cognitive aspects are already sentient, and don't need a constant supply of spiritual power. The breath people have is essentially the "leftover" spiritual energy used in their creation (remember everything has a spiritual aspect, even things not sentient).

Why did Clod gain enhanced sentience from a termporary infusion of breaths? Because a little of the spirtual energy of those breaths got turned into cognitive energy, permanently enhancing the cognitive aspect of the corpse. Even though that spiritual energy is now gone, the cognitive aspect remains enhanced.

Why do humans seem to lose sentience when they get spikes and become Koloss, since the spikes are (hypothetically) increasing their spiritual energy? Because the spikes twist their bodies, and therefore their brains, in strange ways. And their cognitive aspects are influenced by their brains, of course. The Koloss have sentient cognitive aspects still, they just are held back by the twisted bodies they inhabit.

And then we get to the Kandra, which provide the best evidence for my theories. Some might say, "Wait, don't the Kandra provide evidence against these theories? When they lose their spiritually charged spikes, they lose sentience, so that would mean that cognitive aspects do depend on spiritual energy to maintain their sentience." But that's actually not what is happening. Consider that the original Kandra were human. They were already sentient, but then lost their minds when they became mistwraiths, and then regained them when they were turned into Kandra. And they retained their memories of when they were human even after all this had occurred.

If we assume for the moment that I am wrong about the way cognitive aspects work, and that the Kandra lost their ability to think because they lost their spiritual energy and this made their cognitive aspects devolve, and the spikes then restored their spiritual energy and then caused the cognitive aspects to evolve, then one has to ask: how did they keep their memories and personalities? Mistwraiths have no brains. And according to the hypothesis we are using, the mistwraiths have lost their spiritual energy. So where are the memories and personalities being stored? The only answer is the cognitive realm. But that would mean that even after being stripped of spiritual energy and given a physical body with no brains, the cognitive aspects maintained some functon and power. They didn't devolve to that of beasts. They preserved memories and personalities even after losing their spiritual aspects and being stuck in useless bodies.

That would prove one of my points, that the cognitive aspect can still maintain sentience even when stripped of an associated spiritual aspect. And if one then says, "ok, maybe the Kandra lost sentience for different reason, and still kept their spiritual aspects," then that clearly means that something else is going on with them and the reason the spikes give them sentience isn't because they are adding a spiritual aspect.

So, what do I think is going on with the Kandra? Body influence. Mistwraiths have no brains, cognitive aspects are influenced by the bodies they are attached to. Thus, they are obviously influenced by being attached to a body with no brain. The reason why the spikes let Kandra think is because hemalurgic spikes can mimic the effects of organs, including the brain. This is made apparant by the fact that Inquisitors can still function despite having spikes driven into their brains and many other organs. Most likely, the Lord Ruler designed the mistwraith bodies to be able to instinctively use spikes to replace their missing brains.

But wait, don't spikes still give sentience to new Kandra, those that were never human? Yes and no. I'd say that whatever process Preservation put in place to allow new humans to continue to be born with sentience continued to work for the mistwraiths, even though they no longer had human bodies. Thus, the new mistwraiths already had sentient cognitive aspects even before they were given spikes. To put it another way, even new mistwraiths were always human souls stuck in the body of an animal.

Now, let's consider what happened to Vin when she took up the power of the Well of Ascension. She temporarily gained massively increased mental abilities and perceptions. Yet she then lost it as soon as she gave up the power. Then she gained even greater understanding when she took up Preservation completely.

What exactly was happening to her, on a realmatic level? The counterpart to what happened to the Koloss and mistwraiths. They were sentient, human cognitive aspects that were stuck in bodies that hindered them due to twisted or nonexisting brains. Vin was a sentient, human cognitive aspect stuck in a body that greatly helped it, due to the fact that it was partially or completely composed of something incredible, the power of creation itself.

This makes a lot more sense than Vin's cognitive aspect itself being instantly changed by the power. If it had been altered to such a degree, she surely would have already become a preservation freak. She wasn't. She was still Vin. Her cognitive aspect was still Vin's.

So why do Shards ultimately change the way their holders think? Well, I think there's probably a little bit of a power leak of sorts from holding a Shard. Basically, as you hold a Shard a small amount of the spiritual power of the Shard is constantly turned into cognitive power and added to your cognitive aspect, increasing the power of your cognitive aspect. (More on what exactly cognitive "power" means later) Over time, a Shard-god develops an insanely strong cognitive aspect.

Unfortunately, it also develops an insanely unbalanced cognitive aspect. Because so much of the power of the cognitive aspect comes from an unbalanced Shard, it starts to twist the cognitive aspect, altering it so that it thinks along the lines of the Shard's intent.

That is why Shards effect people the way they do, first drastically increasing all their mental capabilites but leaving their minds intact, then slowly twisting their minds over the ages. The first effect is not a direct change in the Shard-god's cognitive aspect, just the cognitive aspect being able to work better thanks to being in a Shard body. The second effect is the cognitive aspect itself actually being enhanced/changed by a slow stream of the Shard's power.

Now, I have talked about congitive aspects being enhanced, and them possessing both power and sentience. I should explain exactly what I mean by those things.

In the Mistborn annotations, it mentions that Preservation didn't use his power to imprison Ruin: he used his mind, in other words, his cognitive aspect. His mind had a power of its own, and by attacking Ruin in such a fashion, Preservation caught him off guard. Most of my references to cognitive "power" are based on this. It's clear that the cognitive aspect of something does more than just determine how smart/sentient it is.

I also think that Preservation must have had a more powerful cogitive aspect than a normal human. Afterall, would a normal human have been able to sacrifice his mind and trap Ruin like that, even if he knew exactly how it was done? I doubt it. Preservation must have had more cognitive power. As I stated earlier, I think this is a result of him holding the Preservation Shard for so long.

Now, what is the difference between congitive power and cognitive sentience, if there is any difference? I'd say that there is, though generally they go hand in hand. I'd say cognitive power is the amount of "substance" a cognitive aspect has, the amount of cognitive energy or whatever it is that makes up a cognitive aspect it has. Cognitive sentience is related to the amount of "complexity" a cognitive aspect has.

So usually they go together. If you don't have enough cognitive energy, then the energy is of limited complexity. Can't make a painting with a single drop of paint, can't build a mansion with a single lego, can't write a computer program with a single byte of data.

Occasionally, there will be aberrations. I'd say that Shard-gods, by virtue of possessing a Shard for so long, have hundreds if not thousands of times more cognitive power than a human. But are they hundreds of times more sentient? Once something has reached sentience, is it even possible for it to become "more sentient"? I don't really think so. So in that case, I'd say he had a lot more cognitive power than a normal person with the same level of sentience would have had.

Thinking about all this, one realizes just how insane Preservation's sacrifice was. In a world where things have physical, cognitive, and spiritual parts, figuring out what exactly would be the "soul" of something can be difficult. But based on the interactions between the realms we've seen so far, I'd say the true soul of a person is their cognitive aspect, their mind, the core of who they are.

Which means that Preservation essentially gave up his soul. Vin and Elend are happy in their afterlife now, they are fine, but what about Laras? The very core of his being has been damaged and reduced to a state of near mindless instinct. Can he recover from that, in whatever the place that lies beyond the three realms is?

Wow, I still haven't even gotten to Nightblood being able to read minds yet. I guess I didn't quite realize how much space my thoughts on the cognitive aspect would take up. I think I'll actually explain Nightblood in a second post in this thread.

[Mad_Scientist]

Ok, let's finally get to Nightblood. If you've followed along with my above post, you will perhaps have realized that Nightblood seems to contradict one of my points. Nightblood has a physical body that consists of a sword, a mere piece of metal. Yet he can clearly think, and is almost sentient.

Shouldn't Nightblood's cognitive aspect be influenced by his physical body too? It's not like his sword is a hemalurgic spike with a proven ability to mimic brains. So how does he function?

One possible answer to this is that cognitive aspects are tuned to certain body types, and since Koloss and Kandra were human cognitive aspects they expected human brains, and thus can't function when tied to bodies without functioning human brains. This is a possible answer, but I don't think it's quite why Nightblood is the way he is.

The main answer, I think, lies in the strength of the bond between cognitive and physical aspects. We know that a normal person with brain damage will have trouble thinking clearly. That is obvious. Physical influences cognitive in that case. But Kelsier could think after dying, even though his body was soon reduced to nothing but bones. Talk about brain damage. Obviously this was possible because the link between his old physical body and his cognitive aspect was gone, so the physical was no longer influencing the cognitive.

But does this link have to be all or nothing? Completely unconnected, or connected so strongly that the phsical has complete control over the cognitive? Or is it possible that whatever connects the physical and cognitive together can be of varying power? I say yes. Like a person having an out of body experience, who is still somewhat tied to his body but not completely. It is possible for a cognitive aspect to be only lightly bound to a physical body. So to add on to my earlier theories:

The cognitive aspect is affected by a body it is bound to, be it spiritual or physical. This bond can be of varying strength. The stronger the bond, the more the cognitive aspect will be affected by its physical or spiritual body. The weaker the bond, the less the cognitive aspect will be affected.

Nightblood has a weak bond, and thus, can still think even though he is a sword. Now, what evidence do I have for Nightblood having a weak bond? Nightblood's behavior, specifically, the fact that he sometimes forgets he's a sword.

Nightblood isn't stupid. He's almost sentient, and getting closer to sentience despite what Vasher thinks. Some of his quirks (such as still thinking that certain people are alive) were explained in an annotation as being the result of his initial moments of life strongly imprinting on him certain things. But that imprinting wouldn't explain why he forgets he's a sword sometimes.

Now, you may think I'm reading too much into this, but it's not just that Nightblood sometimes forgets he's a sword, it's that his entire attitude and the apparant way he perceives the world ignores this a lot. We never got a Nightblood viewpoint and thus don't know how exactly he perceives things, but he definitely gives the impression that his mind isn't that strongly connected to his sword body, or he wouldn't complain about things like being left in the dark.

So, that's my answer as to how Nightblood can think and be a sword. And that is also my answer as to how he can read minds.

What do I mean? Well, I think that the stronger the bond between a cognitive aspect and it's physicial and/or spiritual body, the less of a presence said cognitive aspect has in Shadesmar, and the harder it is for it to perceive, influence, or be influenced by the cognitive aspects of others.

Ruin is strongly bound to his Shard, his spiritual body. He has to be strongly bound to it, or else his cognitive aspect won't be able to use the Shard's vast power. But this also means that his ability to influence, to see, or to be influenced by the cognitive realm is very limited. He can still influence things somewhat, but he can't read thoughts, and he can only influence those with damaged minds unless he uses something like hemalurgic spikes (which have physical and spiritual components) to give him an opening into the cognitive aspect of that person.

Nightblood, being much more loosely bound to his physical body, perceives the world differently. He can freely see the cognitive aspects of those things around him, and even read the thoughts of those close to him. And he can influence them. I talked before about cognitive power vs cognitive sentience, and how a Shard-god like Preservation had a ton of power, but mostly normal sentience. I think we have something similiar with Nightblood. His creation resulted in a very powerful cognitive aspect, but it didn't quite make him sentient. So even though he's not as sentient as a human, his cognitive power is higher than a human, and thus he can easily influence nearby minds.

Now, if this explains why Nightblood can read thoughts, then what about spren? Well, I'll get to that in my spren post, but I'd say they can read thoughts for very similiar reasons that Nightblood can read thoughts.

As for Harmony, I don't know. As a Shard-god he should be very tightly bound to his Shards. Perhaps it is related to the earings his followers put on before praying. If hemalurgic spikes creating an opening in the cognitive aspects of those they were imbedded in, perhaps those Pathisim earings create something similiar, an opening strong enough to allow Harmony to actually read their thoughts. Perhaps he's also just better at understanding human minds than Ruin, and that also helps him use the opening.

Also, I didn't mention them in my above post, but I should explain why Seons lose their minds when their master is taken by the Sheod. I'd say that for Seons, they don't have much if anything of a physical body, but that they do have a spiritual body that they are very title bound to (a Splinter of the Shard of Aona)? Thus, they are strongly influenced by their spiritual bodies, and their spiritual bodies seem to require some link to a master in order to function correctly.

Final note: How is "Shard-god" for the official 17th Shard term for a person holding a Shard of Adonalsium? I saw someone else on these boards use it, and I love it, as it clearly distinguishes things like "Ati, the person holding Ruin" from "Ruin, the Shard anyone can hold." And it won't be confused with people in Way of Kings who just have Shardblades, or Shardplate, or whatever the Dawnshards are.

[Chaos]

I'm going to make a very quick reply to your extensive theory, because I need to get some real writing done. So expect to see a more in depth analysis later.

How is "Shard-god" for the official 17th Shard term for a person holding a Shard of Adonalsium? I saw someone else on these boards use it, and I love it, as it clearly distinguishes things like "Ati, the person holding Ruin" from "Ruin, the Shard anyone can hold." And it won't be confused with people in Way of Kings who just have Shardblades, or Shardplate, or whatever the Dawnshards are.

I personally think Shard-god is clunky. I prefer Shardholder, and that's been much more common here. Yes, it has the possibility of getting confused with Shardbearers, and Brandon doesn't like it because of that. However, Brandon says that when a person takes up a Shard, they become the Shard, so he probably wouldn't like Shard-god much more, either. We obviously need a term to distinguish between the Shard and its holder for theorizing. I like Shardholder because of the symmetry with Shardbearer, so aesthetically, it feels better to me. That hyphen in Shard-god bugs me.

So why do Shards ultimately change the way their holders think? Well, I think there's probably a little bit of a power leak of sorts from holding a Shard. Basically, as you hold a Shard a small amount of the spiritual power of the Shard is constantly turned into cognitive power and added to your cognitive aspect, increasing the power of your cognitive aspect. (More on what exactly cognitive "power" means later) Over time, a Shard-god develops an insanely strong cognitive aspect.

I have a direct quote which is related to why a Shardholder's mind is changed over time which you may like to see.

“Ruin knows how to play off the lusts of mankind. Lust makes sense to Ruin, as he has lusts himself. He needs to destroy. It's part of who he is and what makes him function. It's the driving force of the power upon which his consciousness feeds to remain alive.”

I think you actually explained why Sazed can read minds right here, though inadvertently:

Ruin is strongly bound to his Shard, his spiritual body. He has to be strongly bound to it, or else his cognitive aspect won't be able to use the Shard's vast power. But this also means that his ability to influence, to see, or to be influenced by the cognitive realm is very limited. He can still influence things somewhat, but he can't read thoughts, and he can only influence those with damaged minds unless he uses something like hemalurgic spikes (which have physical and spiritual components) to give him an opening into the cognitive aspect of that person.

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As for Harmony, I don't know. As a Shard-god he should be very tightly bound to his Shards.

His mind hasn't been molded to the Shard's intent yet, so in that respect, he is less "bound" to his Shard. So if that was the reason why Sazed can read minds, it would have helped if we saw Kelsier or Vin read minds. Vin, I am pretty sure, had not, but she was kind of busy. There may be a quote where Kelsier says some words of encouragement, and that would bolster this idea.

I also thought in discussion of Power generates sentience that power can generate it, but it isn't needed to maintain the Cognitive aspect.

Anyways, I'll make a bigger analysis later. Knowing the two of us and our conversations, it will probably be pretty big My gut reaction is that some things are a bit overly complex and it can be simplified, but there are a lot of good ideas here.

Really, if Nightblood can read minds, Shards--having much more Spiritual energy--should be able to as well, so that was a good catch.

[Mad_Scientist]

My gut reaction is that some things are a bit overly complex and it can be simplified, but there are a lot of good ideas here.

Yah, I wouldn't be surprised if I did overcomplicate things a bit, as I tend to come up with fairly convolted explanations for things sometimes. So if there are ways to express some of the same concepts in a more refined, simple form, I'd be very interested in reading it.

Oh, and I just posted another big theory thread.

[happyman]

Yah, I wouldn't be surprised if I did overcomplicate things a bit, as I tend to come up with fairly convolted explanations for things sometimes. So if there are ways to express some of the same concepts in a more refined, simple form, I'd be very interested in reading it.

Oh, and I just posted another big theory thread.

I hate to put it this way, but I'm certain you've made things more complicated that they really are.

I can't help but remembering Chaos' theories about Hemularugy in this context. The real system was way more elegant than anything we came up with.

I've always thought it was telling that no Allomantic/Feruchemical/Hemalurgic power allows you to read either minds or emotions, although some powers allow you to affect both. I thought it was inherent to the system. If Harmony can do it differently, I, personally, would attribute it to the combined power of both shards being inherently more balanced than any more cognitive-realm interactions. But maybe that's just me.

[Mad_Scientist]

I've always thought it was telling that no Allomantic/Feruchemical/Hemalurgic power allows you to read either minds or emotions, although some powers allow you to affect both. I thought it was inherent to the system. If Harmony can do it differently, I, personally, would attribute it to the combined power of both shards being inherently more balanced than any more cognitive-realm interactions. But maybe that's just me.

That might explain Harmony, but the fact that both Nightblood and at least one type of spren are able to read minds makes me wonder. Especially since Nightblood doesn't seem to be a particularly "balanced' entity. And we were told something about Nightblood being similiar to the spren (I should dig up the exact quote) which makes me wonder if there's some connection there that explains why both have been shown reading minds.

As for the rest of my thoughts on the cognitive realm and it's interactions... yah, I definitely probably could have stated it in a more elegant, less complicated manner and preserved all the essential points I wanted to make. But I'm still pretty strongly convinced in those essential points.

[Asha'man Logain]

That might explain Harmony, but the fact that both Nightblood and at least one type of spren are able to read minds makes me wonder. Especially since Nightblood doesn't seem to be a particularly "balanced' entity. And we were told something about Nightblood being similiar to the spren (I should dig up the exact quote) which makes me wonder if there's some connection there that explains why both have been shown reading minds.

As for the rest of my thoughts on the cognitive realm and it's interactions... yah, I definitely probably could have stated it in a more elegant, less complicated manner and preserved all the essential points I wanted to make. But I'm still pretty strongly convinced in those essential points.

Nightblood was created to destroy evil. That was his Command, his entire purpose of being. Whether they knew it or not when they made him, they probably thought he'd have to know what was in someone's head to know if they were evil or not. This was likely (either consciuosly or unconsciously) in their heads while they gave the Command. I think that is why Nightblood can read minds.

Chaos, in the annotations of Mistborn 3, Brandon does directly say that right after Spook removes his accidental spike, that Kelsier does in fact speak to Spook. I cannot recall right now what the exact circumstances were, if Kelsier read his mind or not, but Kel did speak into his mind.

[happyman]

That might explain Harmony, but the fact that both Nightblood and at least one type of spren are able to read minds makes me wonder. Especially since Nightblood doesn't seem to be a particularly "balanced' entity. And we were told something about Nightblood being similiar to the spren (I should dig up the exact quote) which makes me wonder if there's some connection there that explains why both have been shown reading minds.

As for the rest of my thoughts on the cognitive realm and it's interactions... yah, I definitely probably could have stated it in a more elegant, less complicated manner and preserved all the essential points I wanted to make. But I'm still pretty strongly convinced in those essential points.

Well, my original theory (when I first read Mistborn and then Warbreaker) was that some Shards could read minds and others couldn't; it was simply the nature of the powers. Mistborn made such a persistent point of saying that Allomancers (or Ruin or Preservation) can't read minds or emotions that I thought it must have some significance, but in Warbreaker, reading minds is a natural part of the magic. (In principle, all Awakened objects read the Awakeners mind, and Nightblood does it very flagrantly.)

I haven't read the "Allow of Law" chapters (personal preference), so I don't know much about Harmony's powers, but I find it odd that he can read minds (if he can). My best guesses at this point are:

(1) Some Shards have easy access to the cognitive realm by their nature (intent?), and others don't. Neither Ruin or Preservation has easy access, but together, they are powerful enough to reach it (or another way, their combined Intent is capable of accessing what either power alone would find difficult). Endowment, on the other hand, has very easy access, presumably because it relates more naturally to his (her?) powers.

(2) Sazed is really good at observation and reading people from the outside, and can insert ideas from the outside, even though he can't read minds directly. After all, changing emotions (and by extension, thoughts) is something Allomancy can do.

[Mad_Scientist]

Nightblood was created to destroy evil. That was his Command, his entire purpose of being. Whether they knew it or not when they made him, they probably thought he'd have to know what was in someone's head to know if they were evil or not. This was likely (either consciuosly or unconsciously) in their heads while they gave the Command. I think that is why Nightblood can read minds.

Well, that might explain to some extent why Nightblood can read minds, but not how he can read minds.

To illustrate what I mean, let's say they gave Nightblood a completely different Command. Perhaps "bring peace to and unite the cosmere." And said Command caused Nightblood to transform into an all-powerful god stronger than any Shard, one that served as a loving god and changed the base nature of all mankind, bringing about unity and peace to every world.

Now, would that make sense? It would fit with the Command. But how could a mere thousand breaths and a Command cause that strong an effect?

That's a very extreme example, but it shows the problem I have. Even if a "destroy evil" Command is well served by Nightblood being able to read minds, I just don't think it should have to power to give him that ability. A mere thousand breaths? I think either that Command should not have worked right or instead given Nightblood the ability to "destroy evil" some other way, or that there is something other than just the Command that explains why Nightblood can read minds/why Ruin can't read minds.

Well, my original theory (when I first read Mistborn and then Warbreaker) was that some Shards could read minds and others couldn't; it was simply the nature of the powers...

...Some Shards have easy access to the cognitive realm by their nature (intent?), and others don't. Neither Ruin or Preservation has easy access, but together, they are powerful enough to reach it (or another way, their combined Intent is capable of accessing what either power alone would find difficult). Endowment, on the other hand, has very easy access, presumably because it relates more naturally to his (her?) powers.

I don't know. Maybe that's why, but Brandon said that both Ruin and Preservation could fuel each other's magic systems, despite them being rather against each other's nature, and both can just directly use the Power of Creation itself to do drastic things. I could see it being harder for them to read minds than other Shards, taking more power maybe, but impossible? I just don't see why Endowment would that much of easier ability to read minds, so much that a mere fraction of her power could be used to let others do so.

In principle, all Awakened objects read the Awakeners mind, and Nightblood does it very flagrantly.

I don't think that's the way Awakened objects work at all. Rather then them reading a person's mind, I'd say the person control's the object's mind. It's like when someone hears the voice of Ruin in their head and is forced to do stuff because of it. Are they reading Ruin's mind? Nope. Same for Awakened objects (normal ones), just on a smaller scale. Or at least that's what I think.

Another thing to remember is that Nightblood is not the only thing we've seen capable of reading minds, and I'm not even talking about Harmony, who some believe didn't actually do so. That spren that Shallon talked to near the end of Way of Kings also read her mind.

Brandon said that Nightblood and the spren share some important similiarties. And Nightblood and a spren are the only things 100% confirmed to have read someone's mind. It's possible that there may be no connection between those two things, but a part of me suspects that there is, that one of the things that makes them similiar is also the thing that allowed them to read minds.

Edited August 2, 2011 by Mad_Scientist

[dyring]

Hello.

Now, this wasent the easiest thread to follow(and I might have skipped a small part in the middle, hope that parts I will take up wasent in it;), and adding to that I also ressurect it from some month´s ago, but atleast it was still on the first page;)

Just one thought.

Ruin could read the mind of those with Hemalurgic spikes right? And Hemalurgy is Ruin´s power.

Then, logically, Preservation should be able to read the mind of any mistborn or mistings, as allochemy was preservations power?

Sazed could then do both?

Quite possibly, he can also read the mind of any feruchemist, or feruchemic misting(forgot the word for it:p), as that came from both preservation and ruin right?

Nightblood is more difficult. However, he was created from 1000 breaths. I wonder if that is a connection? He can pull breath´s from people while wielded. Is it possible, that he could not read the mind of a drab, one not possessing a breath?

Also, would continuing to wield nightblood kill a person? It would kill Vasher, as it would drain his returned breath. But would a normal individual just become a drab?

Oh well. First post, so be gentle in pulling it apart;)

//dyring

Edited October 9, 2011 by dyring

[Mike]

Ruin could not read anyone's mind. He could project his (or someone else like Reen's or God's) voice into someone's mind, but he only "heard" anything that the person said aloud, wrote down on non-metal, or stored in a coppermind.

[Zas678]

Here's a quote to back it up from Marsh in HoA

Chapter 6:

Ruincouldn't read his thoughts, of that he was fairly confident.

[Chaos]

If Ruin could read minds, Vin's gambits with the atium at the end would not have mattered.

[dyring]

True enough, forgot Vin´s spike in my hurry. But it felt like it fitted, damnation facts that won´t go along;)

Still, even if its not read mind, there seems to be some sort of a connection between the shards and those using their magic. If Ruin had a contact with those spiked by hemalurgic spikes, should not the other shards have something simular with those who holds theyr magic?

But alas, no bearing on the read mind discussion I guess .

[discipleofhoid]

Is there a quote saying that Preservation is unable to read minds? I can find the things for Ruin but I am not finding anything saying Preservation cannot.

[Chaos]

Is there a quote saying that Preservation is unable to read minds? I can find the things for Ruin but I am not finding anything saying Preservation cannot.

There is not an explicit refutation of that. If we can find an instance where Preservation can read minds, we are golden.

[lordofsoup]

Is it possible that the opposite Shard to Endowment could also be fueling Nightblood giving him(it?) extra power? All the Shards fit into categories like the allomantic metals, like Ruin and Preservation. While the Shards will not line up so conveniently on any one planet, Endowment must still have an opposite somewhere in the Cosmere, and it must be able to power Endowment's magic system, like Ruin and Preservation. Because this Shard would be in favor of whatever is the opposite of Endowment, it seems to me that it would be willing and perhaps unknowingly powering Nightblood. This would work out extremely well if it happened to be Aona or Skai, or any other possibly disembodied Shards that happen to be floating around, with nothing to control their power, except their intent.

[Zas678]

We have been told, back before the days of WoK, that besides Ruin and Preservation, we have seen 4 shards. We were told that we had interacted with 2 directly, we had seen the influence of another, and the power of yet another.

Now we have those 4. We've interacted with the Pool in Elantris (Aona), the Voice in Warbreaker (Endowment), the influence by the killing of Aona and Skai (Odium), and the power of the Dahkor monks/Skaze (Skai).

That's all four, and Brandon has said that not every planet has two shards. See: Roshar, with Odium, Honor, and Cultivation.

Edit: Formatting

[Chaos]

We have been told, back before the days of WoK, that besides Ruin and Preservation, we have seen 4 shards. We were told that we had interacted with 2 directly, we had seen the influence of another, and the power of yet another.

Now we have those 4. We've interacted with the Pool in Elantris (Aona), the Voice in Warbreaker (Endowment), the influence by the killing of Aona and Skai (Odium), and the power of the Dahkor monks/Skaze (Skai).

That's all four, and Brandon has said that not every planet has two shards. See: Roshar, with Odium, Honor, and Cultivation.

Edit: Formatting

This.

There's no indication of an additional Shard on Nalthis.

[happyman]

This.

There's no indication of an additional Shard on Nalthis.

Double this. As far as I can tell, all the religions on Nalthis seem to have common elements as well, likely due to the presence (and active involvement) of exactly one shard.

[lordofsoup]

I was more going for Nightblood is getting this from another Shard, who is not on Nalthis, but is still drawn to Nightblood because of his perversion of Endowment's magic system, which this theoretical Shard is be the opposite of. Maybe somehow indirectly taking power from it. Ok now I am just making things up, and really should get back to my research paper.

Edited October 13, 2011 by lordofsoup

[Zas678]

I was more going for Nightblood is getting this from another Shard, who is not on Nalthis, but is still drawn to Nightblood because of his perversion of Endowment's magic system, which this theoretical Shard is be the opposite of. Maybe somehow indirectly taking power from it. Ok now I am just making things up, and really should get back to my research paper.

The only trouble with that is that his Source of power is Breath- just like Awakening, & Returned. No where in the Cosmere have we seen one Shard use another's source, unless they were on the same planet. Breath are of Endowment, and in order to use Breath, you must be of Endowment. Nightblood still is of Endowment because he was Endowed with Breaths to be made.

EDIT-Didn't make sense first time.

[dyring]

My next try then;)

Zas678

Its not like shards can only do theyr primary thing.

As was said somewhere(not good with searching quotes;)), Both Ruin and Preservation would be able to fuel allomancy, but preservation would be better at it, since it was that shard´s power(if noone else remembers that quote, ill try agian to find it).

So endowment/endownments magic should be able to power things that arnt exaktely his/her thing, just not quite as well. Right?

*edit:

Found the one I thought of, figured I´d better add it:

"1. Both gods could, if they wanted, fuel all of the metallic arts. Preservation is stronger at fueling Allomancy, Ruin stronger at fueling Allomancy or Feruchemy when it has been given via a spike. Both are balanced when it comes to Feruchemy. But this rarely comes up in the books, as it required expending power in a way that the gods were hesitant to do."

Edited October 13, 2011 by dyring

[Zas678]

True. But I think there's a difference between partnered Shards (like Ruin and Preservation), and other shards. They have been partnered together, and they both use metal for their magic.

I guess it would be possible for Nightblood to be from another Shard (magic wise- I mean look at the Shardblades), but I still don't think so. It still runs off of Breath, like other Awakened objects, it was made by Breath by a Returned in Nalthis, and Vasher considers it an Awakened Sentinent Non-Living Creation (or something to that affect).

[dyring]

True. But I think there's a difference between partnered Shards (like Ruin and Preservation), and other shards. They have been partnered together, and they both use metal for their magic.

I guess it would be possible for Nightblood to be from another Shard (magic wise- I mean look at the Shardblades), but I still don't think so. It still runs off of Breath, like other Awakened objects, it was made by Breath by a Returned in Nalthis, and Vasher considers it an Awakened Sentinent Non-Living Creation (or something to that affect).

I don´t think nightblood is from another shard. My point was that Endowment(the shard, not the holder) could do something that would seem to be going against it´s intent. It was not the shard itself that stopped Leras, it was his mental conditioning by the shard right?

Take Vin as preservation. She could attack Ruin. She could "destroy to protect" I think was the quote straight from the book. Leras could not after holding the shard for millennia.

And as it was Leras mindset, his mental conditioning if you will, that stopped him from destroying, not the shard´s magic itself, then endowments magic, controlled by someone else, someone without the conditioning, should be able to create something that goes very much against the shard´s intent.

Wich would allow nightblood to wield Endowments magic(as commanded in his creation), to do something that goes against the shard´s intent, something the shard(holder) itself could not do.

Edited October 14, 2011 by dyring