Expansion of the universe

[Ripheus23]

One time, years ago, I attended an LDS service and one of the official speakers made an unusual remark, that the dark energy believed to be accelerating the expansion of the universe was nothing less than the Light of Christ itself. Without going into any sort of detail on the nature of that Light otherwise, I will say that some other posters here (I can't seem to find the actual threads ) got me to thinking, well, if Adonalsium was a superconcentration of Investiture, and if Sanderson has said that Investiture is third with matter/mass and energy...

Not only did Sanderson draw some inspiration from The Wheel of Time but he was, after all, tapped to finish the series, so I suspect there might be clues, in there, to some of the... cosmological... aspects of the Cosmere. In The Shadow Rising there is a vision shown of when the Dark One was unbound from its prison. Scientists had done this, by building a machine to "drill" through spacetime itself, into some other plane of existence in which the Dark One dwells.

So I also was thinking, what event IRL does the Shattering of Adonalsium remind me of?

Now, if Adonalsium had all the magic, then those who Shattered it didn't use magic to do so. I mean, if they did what they did to get that entity's power, yet they already had magic power enough to kill the source of the same thing, it'd be kind of like letting a man forge two swords, dueling him with one, winning, and then breaking the loser's sword into 16 pieces and replacing your winning weapon with one of those pieces. Besides which, why would Adonalsium have granted them the power to kill him?

However, let's suppose that there was a civilization powerful enough to affect gravity on a vast scale. I mean technologically powerful enough, using electrons and photons and gluons and all that jazz, in whatever way gravitons would be manipulated by those. So, this civilization notes that there's a third thing, in the universe, like matter and energy, only this thing didn't start expanding outward during the initial inflation of the universe. Or, it did, but once the initial inflation ended, it remained otherwise supercondensed. This thing is alive, and it's made of magic, so it's a God after all, and so 16 people in this supercivilization cause the space-time in which God is condensed to start expanding with the rest of the universe, resulted in Adonalsium's Shattering. Like a "Big Rip" scenario but only for 1/3rd of the matter/energy/magic triad. 

And, incidentally, this Shattering, because it requires an action involving cosmic levels of gravity, results in the acceleration of the rest of the universe's expansion...

QED!!!

[Wandering Investor]

First, I would note that Brandon's ideas for the cosmere were created before he finished Wheel of Time. While there are probably influences in the cosmere from his experience writing the WoT, I'd be surprised if the Adonalsium part wasn't already solidly created.

Second, the civilization on Yolen, where the shattering occurred, only possessed medieval technology at the time.

Third, magic was different, but still available pre-shattering, so it could have been used. You wouldn't have to match Adon strength for strength, instead you could strike at a vulnerable spot. 

[Farnsworth]

2 hours ago, Wandering Investor said:

You wouldn't have to match Adon strength for strength, instead you could strike at a vulnerable spot. 

My personal theory was that he was killed by Aluminum.

Also, while Brandon's writing is likely influenced by his religion, not much of it seems to be directly tied to religious concepts.

[Weltall]

3 hours ago, Ripheus23 said:

Now, if Adonalsium had all the magic, then those who Shattered it didn't use magic to do so. I mean, if they did what they did to get that entity's power, yet they already had magic power enough to kill the source of the same thing, it'd be kind of like letting a man forge two swords, dueling him with one, winning, and then breaking the loser's sword into 16 pieces and replacing your winning weapon with one of those pieces. Besides which, why would Adonalsium have granted them the power to kill him?

As mentioned, magic was still available and while we have no idea how the Shattering actually happened we can safely assume that equal power is not required. Consider that all the Shards began equal in power but Odium has managed to kill four of them (including instances where he had two Shards to contend with and we know Cultivation wasn't sitting idle while Odium went after Honor) and Brandon has said that he would beat Harmony in a fight despite the latter being literally twice as powerful as him. So as long as the Vessels had enough power and Adonalsium had some vulnerability, there's no contradiction in the Vessels being able to kill him.

As for why Adonalsium would have granted this power, he probably didn't have a choice. Brandon has said that a Shard can't refuse to fuel someone's magic once they have it. They can interfere in certain ways but they can't just say 'No, I'm not going to let you use this power at all'. Adonalsium would probably have the exact same restriction. In other words, this isn't like magic in Slayers where one character found out the hard way that you literally can't use offensive magic against the entity that empowers a given spell and expect it to work.

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This thing is alive, and it's made of magic, so it's a God after all, and so 16 people in this supercivilization cause the space-time in which God is condensed to start expanding with the rest of the universe, resulted in Adonalsium's Shattering. Like a "Big Rip" scenario but only for 1/3rd of the matter/energy/magic triad.

Interesting idea but we know from Word of Brandon that all of the Vessels were from Yolen and the planet was technologically inferior to all of the worlds we've seen so far. Brandon has described Yolen during the time of Dragonsteel Prime as being essentially Bronze Age in its development and the sample chapters we've seen support this, with humans largely using bronze and only elite troops having access to steel, though the Sho Del make more use of it.

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And, incidentally, this Shattering, because it requires an action involving cosmic levels of gravity, results in the acceleration of the rest of the universe's expansion...

Given that the Cosmere is a dwarf galaxy (star cluster might be a more precise term given the apparent size, but the former's what Brandon uses) any expansion centered around Yolen wouldn't have noticeable effects on the rest of the universe within anything remotely approaching the timeframe of the series. And this is your random astronomy throught for the day. xD

[DrakeMarshall]

A few things on the cosmology side of things:

-Unlike dark matter, dark energy is uniformly distributed across all space in the universe. This is distinguishable from a localized expansion effect that is radiating outwards.

-Dark energy was part of the universe since day one. The original expansion was primarily inertial, but dark energy accounts for the continuation and accelerarion of said expansion in spite of gravity.

I like how you are thinking though.

[Ripheus23]

Re: Yolen's tech level, I read the source and I found:

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Yet, Dragonsteel Prime had a fairly standard fantasy world (though one set in the bronze age) with magic that didn't really get used all that much in the first book. 

 

I am not sure if this Prime text is the one he's saying is unnecessary/will never be published. It seems as if the "Prime" books are the ones that later evolved into something else, e.g. Mistborn Prime. If so, then Yolen being technologically deficient would not be canonical, though.

Besides which, if "magic [] didn't really get used that much in the first book," then presumably the Shattering wouldn't be in the first book, since other than technology, magic would be required to accomplish the Shattering, wouldn't it? But by some later book, maybe the tech would be more advanced.

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Dark energy was part of the universe since day one. The original expansion was primarily inertial, but dark energy accounts for the continuation and acceleration of said expansion in spite of gravity.

 

To my knowledge, the accelerated expansion supposedly began 5 billion years ago, not "in the beginning," and contrariwise the initial expansion is attributed to a hypothetical "inflaton field," i.e. a field in which gluons, photons, W+/-&Z bosons, and gravitons were all fused as particles of expansion called "inflatons."

[Leyrann]

10 hours ago, Ripheus23 said:

I am not sure if this Prime text is the one he's saying is unnecessary/will never be published. It seems as if the "Prime" books are the ones that later evolved into something else, e.g. Mistborn Prime. If so, then Yolen being technologically deficient would not be canonical, though.

It doesn't mean it's canon, but it does mean a bronze age civilization is able to cause the Shattering.