taravangian development: is it a good or bad thing?

[Aspiring Writer]

On 12/6/2020 at 6:16 PM, Necessary Ookla said:

It sounds to me like he's following Rayse's plan to "kill shards, conquer universe". Just for your own good rather than Rayse's more honest murder is fun!!!1!

Well, the wording of 'broken gods' makes me wonder if he is going to try and take up all the Shards and try and become Adonsilium. Which concerns me, as the only person I trust holding a shard right now is Sazed.

[Shob the Voidbringer]

i think that tod and cultivation will start working together for one reason or another, because it's extremely unlikely that cultivation will just sit around. she obviously has some kind of plan, and is going to put it into action

[jamesbondsmith]

I had a thought while reading this thread, and it may tie together a few viewpoints. 

Dalinar accuses Taravangian of wanting to be the one to save Roshar. Taravangian went to the Nightwatcher to ask for the capacity to save humankind, which Cultivation granted. I don't recall if there's an exact wording for what he asked, but from what I can gather it was 'give me the capacity to save people'., as opposed to 'give us the capacity to survive'. It's a fairly innocuous distinction if you aren't a fantasy literature nerd with too much time on their hands, but it can suggest a desire to be a saviour, rather than be part of a group who was saved. It seems innocuous enough that Cultivation could take it as a desire to protect, rather than being the one to do the protecting (this is arguably also a major difference between Kaladin and Amaram. The former wants to protect people and simply pushes himself to do it all because of his desire to protect, while the latter wants to be the one to do it with less concern for those he's actually protecting). It ties into Dalinar's concerns about his motivations, and Taravangian may have been telling the truth about wanting to save people. 

 

Infinity War/Endgame spoilers, since we're using Thanos as an equivalent, as well as Mistborn spoilers:

Spoiler

2018 Thanos seemed pretty sincere (if utterly nuts) about his desire to save the universe, but as we saw he was also in little to no danger of actually failing. 2015 Thanos sees the Avengers trying to undo what his future self did. He can't accept that people would be so ungrateful as to fight back and decides to destroy everything.

Perhaps TOdium wins but people still resist him, so he goes full tantrum and goes off into the Cosmere (whether he breaks Roshar in said tantrum is TBD) in order to find another planet to 'save'. A certain Shardworld with a harsh Southern hemisphere who were largely abandoned, a heavy class divide between the metropolitan and rural areas, the leader of the Ghostbloods and a Shard nearly paralysed by opposed Intents might be a good candidate.

 

[Honorless]

"For the greater good" has become a rather scary line in literature but also a cliché stance for characters to take and be proved wrong about, when real life isn't so clear-cut. I'd be rather unsatisfied if Taravangian is simplified into simply becoming the next villain, bigger and badder.

I want more of morally grey Taravangian.

 

When I got to that chapter, I honestly wanted the Shard of Odium to be without Vessel. I've said this before multiple times and I'll say it again, I would love to see this series be a war against hatred itself rather than another "we have to forget past issues to unite in the face of the greater threat" because just ugh. Less pow-wow, more problem solving please.

[Aon Tia]

I don’t think that it is going to be one of those good or bad things. I think things are going to be more complicated then that. 
Rayse wanted to stay odium because he was more controlled by the power but Tod is supposed to be more in control of the shard. So would he contemplate taking up other shards? Change the rules for himself? May be. Too predictable though. 
Is he on Team Cultivation now in the upcoming war of gods ? 
Is he going to continue killing other shards?

I think he will continue to be a controversial God. 

[Truthless of Shinovar]

I mean, I feel like if Todd really wants to save the Cosmere, he would ask Cultivation to splinter him right then and there. Of course, they may run counter to Cultivation’s plans, Todd’s plans, or even just the nature of the investiture, so maybe Todd’s got some sort of long game going where he can try to do as much good as he can before kamikaze-ing and destroying Odium once and for all.

[Elegy]

I don't think he plans to give up the Shard, ever. The point he has been making for a few books now was him deliberately choosing the maximum of power and the maximum of responsibility, so he can bear that burden and suffer being the terrible person who has to do what "needs to be done" for the best possible outcome. And he is sad doing that, but he's never been reluctant. I believe he got so used to the idea that he is the bearer of the wrongness he has to commit to in order to reach the greater good, he is entirely dedicated to that cause now.

And his last POV is kinda explicit about him thinking that the Cosmere would be better off without the other Shards. He might even want to take those to become a new Adonalsium.

"You must become king. Of everything." - Words of Radiance Chapter 80 epigraph

[afidavid of truth]

Taravangian will actually be the weakest version of odium.  Like kelsier when he took preservations shard Taravangian lost his connection to the physical realm moments before he took odiums power.   Thus, he is weaker.

[Leuthie]

On 12/27/2020 at 11:01 AM, Honorless said:

"For the greater good" has become a rather scary line in literature but also a cliché stance for characters to take and be proved wrong about, when real life isn't so clear-cut. I'd be rather unsatisfied if Taravangian is simplified into simply becoming the next villain, bigger and badder.

I want more of morally grey Taravangian.

Real life evil starts with "for the greater good" and "ends justify the means" morality. Those two statements are used to justify every evil ever committed. It's cliche because it's so consistent.

Taravangian was never morally grey. From WOK he was taking healthy people off the streets and killing them just to hear what Moelach would make them say, "for the greater good". Mass murder is not morally grey.

[Honorless]

2 minutes ago, Leuthie said:

Real life evil starts with "for the greater good" and "ends justify the means" morality. Those two statements are used to justify every evil ever committed. It's cliche because it's so consistent.

Taravangian was never morally grey. From WOK he was taking healthy people off the streets and killing them just to hear what Moelach would make them say, "for the greater good". Mass murder is not morally grey.

I agree completely for irl situations, but on Roshar, he really was facing the choice of doing evil or facing human extinction, as far as he knew.

[Leuthie]

1 hour ago, Honorless said:

I agree completely for irl situations, but on Roshar, he really was facing the choice of doing evil or facing human extinction, as far as he knew.

I read ROW and heard all of his and Dalinar's arguments. I believe all problems (narrative and IRL) are caused by the means that people employ to reach their ends, so it makes me side with Dalinar that Taravangian did not need to commit evil to save everyone. No matter what he felt or what his big day told him, assassinations and killings are never anything but evil.

We can blame Cultivation, but it was Taravangian and his friends that decided to not allow compassionate (dumb) Taravangian to make any decisions, removing any possibility that compassionate decisions could be made in the name of the Diagram. Morally grey Taravangian was smothered by his belief that high intelligence without compassion would save the day. Evil was a choice based on hubris, not a requirement imposed by Cultivation. 

And it's guaranteed that Taravangian will continue with his hubris with the addition of more power. There's too much setup to make him just another big bad, but there's no doubt he isn't going to help the Cosmere without causing significant pain.

Edited January 20, 2021 by Leuthie

[Honorless]

47 minutes ago, Leuthie said:

Real life evil starts with "for the greater good" and "ends justify the means" morality. Those two statements are used to justify every evil ever committed. It's cliche because it's so consistent.

I read ROW and heard all of his and Dalinar's arguments. I believe all problems (narrative and IRL) are caused by the means that people employ to reach their ends, so it makes me side with Dalinar that Taravangian did not need to commit evil to save everyone. No matter what he felt or what his big day told him, assassinations and killings are never anything but evil.

I mostly agree... but I also think it's entirely possible irl that a situation happens where you have to choose the lesser evil, or where trying to abide by your morality isn't you doing good but rather simply not wanting your own hands to be dirty, as a matter of convenience & clean conscience, allowing bad things to happen via inaction, neutrality, leaving things to god or fate to decide... 

Though of course, this might result in situations where you're demanding that others "make their sacrifice", "do their duty", and decide which ones are "the few" that should be sacrificed for the sake of "the many"...

I can just see Taravangian's side of the argument too

[king of nowhere]

3 hours ago, Leuthie said:

Real life evil starts with "for the greater good" and "ends justify the means" morality. Those two statements are used to justify every evil ever committed. It's cliche because it's so consistent.

 

well, not exactly. sure, those two arguments were used to justify a lot of evil.

but a lot more evil was justified on stuff like "god wants it", "they are a lesser race", "they are enemies", "they started it", "it's us or them". "for the country/clan/family/whatever affiliation" is a personal favourite because it's so often argued like it was right. A lot of arguments in the "lirin hate thread" devolve around "lirin should support his son, even if he disagrees with him". Do we want to talk about how many times prioritizing one's family or clan enabled crimes? heck, it's the whole foundation of the mafia. and yet a lot of people aare arguing it like it was perfectly right to ignore murder (as seen from lirin's perspective) just because it's your son committing it.

 

more to the point, though, the opposite argument "the greater good does not justify evil" has also been used countless times to turn a blind eye on evil. I may point out how the nazis were allowed to grow strong because everybody thought attacking them would be bad?

 

and furthermore, it's not even clear what are the ends and what are the means. you can have the same argument on both sides. Take the contemporary covid lockdowns: proponents of lockdown would say that "protecting personal freedoms (the greater good) does not justify letting more people die of epidemics (the evil means)". On the opposite side, opponents of the lockdown would say that "reducing the death toll (the greater good) does not justify restricting personal freedoms (the evil means)". so which one is the evil done for the greater good?

If you analyze it closely enough, the whole motto about not justifying the means loses meaning. ultimately, it's about not compromising your ideals for what seems like an easier gain. Well, szeth was all about not compromising. nale was about not compromising look where it brought them.

and if morality was as easy as quoting a few meaningful sentences, it wouldn't be a hot topic.

actually, the best argument against taravangian, and the one that also works most for the real world, is the one of ignorance, brought out by dalinar at some point. you don't know that doing this will help. you don't know that we'll fail. you don't know that you'll win, or that you winning would help. and you are undermining everyone else's effort on the long shot that you may be correct. when in doubt, better be safe.

it's not an argument of lofty ideals. it's an argument about unforseen consequences. and evil actions are much more likely to have evil unforeseen consequences than good actions.

 

now, back on taravangian, i don't believe him to be right. but i'm still calling him morally grey, for the simple reason that, unlike many proponents of his morality, he actually wants to help, and he is actually self-sacrificing more than many other more heroic character. and this is a hallmark of good. "will sacrifice himself for others". "will put the well being of strangers in front of his own". taravangian fits those completely. having him just be evil would completely undermine the characterization.
 

 

[mathiau]

On 20/01/2021 at 1:29 AM, afidavid of truth said:

Taravangian will actually be the weakest version of odium.  Like kelsier when he took preservations shard Taravangian lost his connection to the physical realm moments before he took odiums power.   Thus, he is weaker.

He did not, otherwise his body would have stayed in the physical realm like Kelsier's one did.

[Honorless]

13 hours ago, king of nowhere said:

well, not exactly. sure, those two arguments were used to justify a lot of evil.

but a lot more evil was justified on stuff like "god wants it", "they are a lesser race", "they are enemies", "they started it", "it's us or them". "for the country/clan/family/whatever affiliation" is a personal favourite because it's so often argued like it was right. A lot of arguments in the "lirin hate thread" devolve around "lirin should support his son, even if he disagrees with him". Do we want to talk about how many times prioritizing one's family or clan enabled crimes? heck, it's the whole foundation of the mafia. and yet a lot of people aare arguing it like it was perfectly right to ignore murder (as seen from lirin's perspective) just because it's your son committing it.

 

more to the point, though, the opposite argument "the greater good does not justify evil" has also been used countless times to turn a blind eye on evil. I may point out how the nazis were allowed to grow strong because everybody thought attacking them would be bad?

 

and furthermore, it's not even clear what are the ends and what are the means. you can have the same argument on both sides. Take the contemporary covid lockdowns: proponents of lockdown would say that "protecting personal freedoms (the greater good) does not justify letting more people die of epidemics (the evil means)". On the opposite side, opponents of the lockdown would say that "reducing the death toll (the greater good) does not justify restricting personal freedoms (the evil means)". so which one is the evil done for the greater good?

If you analyze it closely enough, the whole motto about not justifying the means loses meaning. ultimately, it's about not compromising your ideals for what seems like an easier gain. Well, szeth was all about not compromising. nale was about not compromising look where it brought them.

and if morality was as easy as quoting a few meaningful sentences, it wouldn't be a hot topic.

actually, the best argument against taravangian, and the one that also works most for the real world, is the one of ignorance, brought out by dalinar at some point. you don't know that doing this will help. you don't know that we'll fail. you don't know that you'll win, or that you winning would help. and you are undermining everyone else's effort on the long shot that you may be correct. when in doubt, better be safe.

it's not an argument of lofty ideals. it's an argument about unforseen consequences. and evil actions are much more likely to have evil unforeseen consequences than good actions.

 

now, back on taravangian, i don't believe him to be right. but i'm still calling him morally grey, for the simple reason that, unlike many proponents of his morality, he actually wants to help, and he is actually self-sacrificing more than many other more heroic character. and this is a hallmark of good. "will sacrifice himself for others". "will put the well being of strangers in front of his own". taravangian fits those completely. having him just be evil would completely undermine the characterization.

I agree with a lot of this but I think you're completely misrepresenting what people not arguing in favour of Lirin's actions are trying to say. Regardless, probably better not to mix these two threads. I'm not even touching the lockdown argument.

Edited January 21, 2021 by Honorless

[Kingsdaughter613]

18 hours ago, Honorless said:

I mostly agree... but I also think it's entirely possible irl that a situation happens where you have to choose the lesser evil, or where trying to abide by your morality isn't you doing good but rather simply not wanting your own hands to be dirty, as a matter of convenience & clean conscience, allowing bad things to happen via inaction, neutrality, leaving things to god or fate to decide... 

Though of course, this might result in situations where you're demanding that others "make their sacrifice", "do their duty", and decide which ones are "the few" that should be sacrificed for the sake of "the many"...

I can just see Taravangian's side of the argument too

I can give you a RL situation. My husband’s grandmother was an infant during the Holocaust. Her mother was part of a group fleeing and they wanted to leave the baby behind so her cries couldn’t give them away. She promised them that if the baby began crying she would kill her and they agreed to let her take the infant.

She stuffed a pair of socks in the baby’s mouth and they ran. Miraculously, the baby never cried through all the hours they ran.

But if she had, my husband’s great-grandmother would have snapped her neck to save everyone else.

So there’s your RL situation of a necessary act of evil. A part of the Holocaust you don’t hear of often. There were infants and young children murdered by their parents in bunkers or forests because their cries would have given away everyone else and then they would all have died.

Can you really tell me there was a right choice?

[+Oltux72]

On 27.12.2020 at 8:01 PM, Honorless said:

"For the greater good" has become a rather scary line in literature but also a cliché stance for characters to take and be proved wrong about, when real life isn't so clear-cut. I'd be rather unsatisfied if Taravangian is simplified into simply becoming the next villain, bigger and badder.

I want more of morally grey Taravangian.

You got Jasnah. If she deemed surrender a reasonable option, she would consider it.

Taravangian is a traitor. There is no way around that. In fact he admits that. It is very difficult to be a bit of a traitor. The choice is quite binary.

 

[Honorless]

8 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

You got Jasnah. If she deemed surrender a reasonable option, she would consider it.

Taravangian is a traitor. There is no way around that. In fact he admits that. It is very difficult to be a bit of a traitor. The choice is quite binary.

and that is why so many people like Jasnah, she's the least shounen anime protagonist-y character we're getting when it comes to representation of different philosophies of morality, with a hopefully low chance of being shown the correct path™ by a random improbably apolitical lawful good protag.

37 minutes ago, Kingsdaughter613 said:

I can give you a RL situation. My husband’s grandmother was an infant during the Holocaust. Her mother was part of a group fleeing and they wanted to leave the baby behind so her cries couldn’t give them away. She promised them that if the baby began crying she would kill her and they agreed to let her take the infant.

She stuffed a pair of socks in the baby’s mouth and they ran. Miraculously, the baby never cried through all the hours they ran.

But if she had, my husband’s great-grandmother would have snapped her neck to save everyone else.

So there’s your RL situation of a necessary act of evil. A part of the Holocaust you don’t hear of often. There were infants and young children murdered by their parents in bunkers or forests because their cries would have given away everyone else and then they would all have died.

Can you really tell me there was a right choice?

Well that was horrifying... I don't know what to say... 

[mathiau]

38 minutes ago, Kingsdaughter613 said:

I can give you a RL situation. My husband’s grandmother was an infant during the Holocaust. Her mother was part of a group fleeing and they wanted to leave the baby behind so her cries couldn’t give them away. She promised them that if the baby began crying she would kill her and they agreed to let her take the infant.

She stuffed a pair of socks in the baby’s mouth and they ran. Miraculously, the baby never cried through all the hours they ran.

But if she had, my husband’s great-grandmother would have snapped her neck to save everyone else.

So there’s your RL situation of a necessary act of evil. A part of the Holocaust you don’t hear of often. There were infants and young children murdered by their parents in bunkers or forests because their cries would have given away everyone else and then they would all have died.

Can you really tell me there was a right choice?

There's a difference between killing a baby because it's about to accidentally kill you and killing hundred of people because a handful of them could become a problem to your master plan, the first is the saddest form of legitimate defence while the latter is murder.

[Kingsdaughter613]

16 minutes ago, mathiau said:

There's a difference between killing a baby because it's about to accidentally kill you and killing hundred of people because a handful of them could become a problem to your master plan, the first is the saddest form of legitimate defence while the latter is murder.

I wasn’t comparing them. Honorless mentioned the possibility of RL examples, so I thought I’d provide one.

29 minutes ago, Honorless said:

and that is why so many people like Jasnah, she's the least shounen anime protagonist-y character we're getting when it comes to representation of different philosophies of morality, with a hopefully low chance of being shown the correct path™ by a random improbably apolitical lawful good protag.

Well that was horrifying... I don't know what to say... 

The Holocaust was. Genocide always is. And, as usual, the world is pretending it’s not happening because it doesn’t concern them.

A picture is worth a thousand words, so here’s one of every genocide in the 20th century. Guess how many the people proclaiming ‘Never Again’ bothered to stop?

It seems I need to add another now. Possibly two. And, once again, the world does nothing.

So there’s a great example of people choosing NOT to act to stop evil because of their distaste for war. Sanctions and recriminations have yet to prevent genocide.

[+Oltux72]

On 21.1.2021 at 4:05 PM, Honorless said:

and that is why so many people like Jasnah, she's the least shounen anime protagonist-y character we're getting when it comes to representation of different philosophies of morality, with a hopefully low chance of being shown the correct path™ by a random improbably apolitical lawful good protag.

Well and here we come back to Taravangian. Jasnah acted like surrender to Raysse was impossible. Peace negotiations with Taravangian are a completely different matter.

Good or bad? For whom?

[Aleph-Naught]

On 12/3/2020 at 9:48 PM, Aleph-Naught said:

...one thing I am very curious about (and can't help but wonder if Cultivation built it in as a fail-safe) is if his "capacity" has changed: does Cultivation's boon/curse still afflict him?

This was on my mind again after seeing a couple of WoBs and re-reading Oathbringer to my wife. The WoBs went like this:

Quote

VioletSoda

When Taravangian picks up Odium's Shard, how smart is he? Is he more intelligent or compassionate? And now that he has the Shard, is he still subject to his intelligence/compassion fluxuating every day, or is he locked into whatever he was at when he picked up the Shard? Does the intelligence/compassion trade off still affect the plot, is that the loophole or system cheat that will allow Cultivation, Dalinar, etc. to overcome Odium in the end?

Brandon Sanderson

This is indeed a huge RAFO--but you should expect me to be trying to answer these questions in the next book.

General Reddit 2020 (Nov. 30, 2020)

Quote

Edwin Tyson

Does the Nightwatcher's boon and curse still affect Taravangian, now that he is Odium?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO. Good question.

YouTube Livestream 23 (Dec. 17, 2020)

In Oathbringer, when Dalinar goes to meet with the Nightwatcher but Cultivation takes over she makes a curious statement:

Quote

"IN DOING THIS, I PROVIDE FOR HIM A WAPON. DANGEROUS, VERY DANGEROUS. YET, ALL THINGS MUST BE CULTIVATED. WHAT I TAKE FROM YOU WILL GROW BACK EVENTUALLY. THIS IS PART OF THE COST. IT WILL DO ME WELL TO HAVE A PART OF YOU, EVEN IF YOU ULTIMATELY BECOME HIS..."

(emphasis added)

I think this provides a small but not insignificant piece of evidence that, even after his ascension, Taravangian is still vulnerable to Cultivation's boon/curse in some way--she has a piece of him, and that makes him vulnerable to her. So it could be that Taravangian will genuinely work with Cultivation--either willingly, or because she will make it clear to him that she has some power over him, even though they are both shards now--or he may try to destroy her and find himself unable to because of his prior deal with her.

Edited March 31, 2021 by Aleph-Naught

[Waffles]

On 12/3/2020 at 11:29 PM, trav said:

that was my first thought to. it should. Sazed, afaik, is still a Feruchemist for example.
wether thats a good thing or bad thing remains to be seen. smart day T is completely void of empathy. pair that with pure hatred...
smart day T would be Odium on steroids.

he knows this. so... kill Renarin. problem solved.

 

Dalinar said that he can not know Taravagnians heart and therefor can not answer him.
I suppose we now get to see his real heart and I doubt its going to be like he said it is.

I believe Branderson had noted that Sazed was able to bring together the shards because of his own personal ability to align the shards and failing to do that might "eject" the less compatible shard(s)

So I think what this means is that Tar-Odium will likely lose any part of the boons that conflict with the shard's intents, which to me I'm guessing that means losing smart detached T in favor of impulsive slow T.

[Vissy]

It would be supremely disrespectful writing towards Cultivation as a character (and turn her into the ultimate jobber of the Cosmere) if Taravangian beats her when she has a complete upper hand on him. So I think there's a lot more to this than just "TOdium will become the next big bad of the Cosmere". It's the reason why I don't think he will survive Book 5, in fact, or if he does, it'll be different than what most people think it is.

[Letryx13]

I re-read ROW recently, and the Taravangian and Dalinar chapter always gets me thinking.  One thing that I noticed that doesn't get mentioned much on this thread is another possible motivation for Taravangian. I think he legitimately wanted to save people, but another, and more powerful, driving force for him was a desire to prove to everyone how smart he really was, and how foolish and weak everyone else was. 

In an interlude chapter in Oathbringer, an intelligent Taravangian asks for the words the surgeon said when he was born.  And Adrotagia says that he asks for them frequently.  I think this is one of the real reasons he did everything he did. I think he feels (still) a very deep seeded anger at everyone for thinking him to be of "diminished capacity" and wants to prove that it's really everyone else who is really of diminished capacity. Or at least, everyone else is according to his standard.  A lot of people point to his pride as Taravangian's greatest flaw, and I agree, but I think this is connected to his pride.  He wants to prove he's the only one smart enough to see that his way is the only choice, the right way, what is needed, etc.

Rayse's flaw was his vanity. He didn't just want to win, he wanted to win in a flashy way that shows his brilliance. Taravangian is slightly different. His pride (and desire to prove he's the smartest) will probably make him want to prove to everyone else that he's the best, that his way is the logical option. I picture Rayse's version as someone who puts on a parade to display their victory, but Taravangian doesn't need a big performance; he just needs people recognize how smart he is.  But I think this will also be his downfall.  I think he will end up being forced to confront a mistake, and not being able to admit it or even acknowledge it will be what brings him down.  I can't say how that might happen, but it seems likely to me.