Trusk'our he/him Posted January 14, 2022 Posted January 14, 2022 In the Cosmere, Identity is a unique attribute held by an entity that separates it’s investiture from another entity’s investiture, such as with a Feruchemist’s Metalminds. However, I believe that Identity has more meaning than simply keying your investiture to you. I think that it acts as a natural separation form other spiritwebs, a natural defense from other’s control over you. We’ve seen multiple beings in the Cosmere that don’t have an Identity, and both of them can be controlled pretty easily by external influence; the Slaveform Singers and the Lifeless. Lifeless probably also have something else going on that makes them able to be controlled by others (their Awakened Commands), but here is a WoB that says if a Lifeless were to tap certain Metalminds, they may not stay a Lifeless. . . Quote AndyGranny If you used a Lifeless body, would a Lifeless be able to access an untapped metalmind... Brandon Sanderson An unkeyed type of metalmind? AndyGranny Thank you, I could not think of that word. Would they be able to access an unkeyed metalmind if the intent when the Lifeless was created, if the intent was that they could... Brandon Sanderson Right, I see what you're getting at. Yes, they could. As they could access and use any tool that is appropriate for what they're Commanded to do, they could indeed access a metalmind in the same way. In fact, doing so may, depending on the metalmind, be dangerous for keeping your Lifeless a Lifeless. With the Slaveform Singers, they just do what anyone says without resisting. I believe the reason for this is that the natural Connection that is possessed by their human slavers can “dominate” them without much resistance. It would be a similar situation to a Connector Ferring dominating a Hemalurgic construct with an enhanced version of their natural attribute of Connection, only instead of having holes left in the soul by Hemalurgic spikes, it’s that the Singers don’t have any separating attribute in the first place. Having a higher intelligence and strength of will would likely allow them to resist control, but in many cases of mind control it seems like the targets are of only simple intelligence, which makes controlling them easy. It seems as though your Identity also has an influence on your state of mind, as we can see with Listeners and Singers who take different forms, so blanking your Identity may leave you feeling with significantly reduced motivation or emotion in general. It may be possible to Feruchemically enhance your own Identity and make yourself less susceptible to outside influence, or you may be able to more easily manipulate someone actively storing it. This theory may have some holes in it, but this is how I understand it now. Thanks for reading 1
Morningtide she/her Posted January 14, 2022 Posted January 14, 2022 It makes sense to me. Since the "you" that exists in the Spiritual Realm is the perfect, all consuming idea of you, (terrible wording but I am functioning on like 4 hours of sleep) it would make sense that Identity has some connection to the spiritwebs. Identity being related to personal emotions or states of mind also makes sense. If you have a low sense of self or low self esteem, your state of mind would be different than if you had confidence in your identity.
Frustration Posted January 16, 2022 Posted January 16, 2022 Singers didn't lose thier Identity Spoiler Questioner In terms of discussing Identity, I know that in Emperor's Soul, they talk about Identity, and the Parshendi talk about losing their Identity, and then I was just rereading Bands of Mourning, and one of the kandra talks about how the spikes are their Identity. Are all of those things connected somehow or are they different forms of Identity? Brandon Sanderson They are connected, although the Parshendi losing their identity is a little more metaphorical. But yeah, the idea of these things-- Identity is an innate attribute in the cosmere that is related to your soul, your spirit, and it is one of the things that Hemalurgy can fiddle with and Feruchemy can fiddle with. It's kind of important to how the [Metallic] Arts play out, but it's important to all the magics... Identity is involved in why you can't use another person's metalminds, right, that kind of thing. And those are all related. The Parshendi is more metaphorical. Questioner I wondered because it's always capitalized, in the book. Brandon Sanderson Yep, and it's done intentionally. Peter always asks, "Are you sure this one is capitalized?" "Yeah." Orem signing (March 10, 2018)
Halyo_Alex he/him Posted January 16, 2022 Posted January 16, 2022 12 hours ago, Frustration said: Singers didn't lose thier Identity Hide contents Questioner In terms of discussing Identity, I know that in Emperor's Soul, they talk about Identity, and the Parshendi talk about losing their Identity, and then I was just rereading Bands of Mourning, and one of the kandra talks about how the spikes are their Identity. Are all of those things connected somehow or are they different forms of Identity? Brandon Sanderson They are connected, although the Parshendi losing their identity is a little more metaphorical. But yeah, the idea of these things-- Identity is an innate attribute in the cosmere that is related to your soul, your spirit, and it is one of the things that Hemalurgy can fiddle with and Feruchemy can fiddle with. It's kind of important to how the [Metallic] Arts play out, but it's important to all the magics... Identity is involved in why you can't use another person's metalminds, right, that kind of thing. And those are all related. The Parshendi is more metaphorical. Questioner I wondered because it's always capitalized, in the book. Brandon Sanderson Yep, and it's done intentionally. Peter always asks, "Are you sure this one is capitalized?" "Yeah." Orem signing (March 10, 2018) he does word it as "A little more" metaphorical, though. So there's likely something that happened to the capital-I Identity of the Singers, even if they didn't become straight-up "unkeyed" like someone storing their Identity inside an Aluminum Metalmind.
Frustration Posted January 17, 2022 Posted January 17, 2022 17 hours ago, Halyo_Alex said: he does word it as "A little more" metaphorical, though. So there's likely something that happened to the capital-I Identity of the Singers, even if they didn't become straight-up "unkeyed" like someone storing their Identity inside an Aluminum Metalmind. I think it's more that connection was lost Spoiler Cadmium (paraphrased) Would a Connection medallion accurately interpret a listener's Rhythms? Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased) Yes, it would, but not all of it, some would be lost in translation. You'd probably lose some of the nuance. It would probably be better to give the medallion to someone who couldn't understand it than someone who spoke it. Calamity Houston signing (Feb. 24, 2016) Argent Was the reason the Listeners or the parsh people turned into parshmen, was that because Ba-Ado-Mishram was imprisoned by the Radiants? That she was Connected to all of them? Brandon Sanderson Oh, yeah, yeah. That plays into what happened there. JordanCon 2018 (April 22, 2018)
Anomander Rake he/him Posted January 20, 2022 Posted January 20, 2022 Unlike the Kandra, singers don't really have a spike/blessing equivalent that can just be straight up removed, so though I think their Identity was affected in some way by what happened, it was mostly a Connection thing. That is nothing more than an assumption though. Coppermind, on BAM's page, reads "[BAM's] binding had massive effects on Roshar. It ripped out both Connection and Identity from the singers, which prevented them from being able to act independently...", "ripped out" is a bit vague given all the nuance we've seen with Connection and Identity, but it is likely that whatever happened did affect both in at least some way. Are there more WoBs like the two already linked by Frustration that touch on the topic so we have more info to go off of instead of splitting hairs? I can look later on when work quiets down.
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