Cosmere space travel

[PinkPlasma she/her]

So, I just watched(listened to?) the SP4 shardcast, and the discussion has me thinking about cosmere space travel, and how it will work.

first off, its hard for me to imagine that any merchant, military, or travel in general, would opt for the danger of the voids of space, lightyears of travel, over what takes a few months to walk in shadesmar. but then that got me thinking about what shadesmar really is. As far as I understand it, shadesmar is a reflection of the collective cognitive view of the world, sort of inverted or abstracted in some ways. right now, the common knowledge of the regular people of the cosmere, not our min charcters but the normal citzens, doesn't entirely understand space and planets as a concepts yet.

and, I think notably, we haven't seen shadesmar in any of the storys where they do. the general concept is that if you walk far enough in a direction, you'll get to a location. oceans are also a concept, a barrier to that physical travel, and their raw concept is also included in pretty much every place in shadesmar we have seen. so, I guess what I'm asking, is do we think it's possible, that once the majority of the cosmere understands space travel, that shadesmar will start to reflect that in its physical reflection of the world?

and while i think, even if this did occur, the "space" in shadesmar wouldn't reflect the same distance as the physical world, it would explain why they would need to start using space travel instead of some elsecalling connection perpindicularty shenanigens. and i know that its hard to get between realms, but its also really hard to travel between solar systems. even with any kind of time dilation bullcrap they could pull, shadesmar, in the way it is right now, would be to convenient a avenue to not explore, and attempt to find easy ways to travel to and from the physical plane in any location. 

 

 

my second question is, propulsion. we have seen a few spaceships now, but we really don't know how they work, because the pov's we see them from are for the most part from a distance. do we expect several types of space travel, for each culture, or one type of fuel, some sort of pure raw investiture? I could see some sort of engine based of steel pushing or iron pulling labor to generate energy, or them doing some electromagnet propulision, and on the rosharan side, I'm sure there re some conection or elsecalling, maybe even fabrial stuff that they base everything off of, because i can't imagine lashings work efficiently when there's no gravity to redirect. elantris side (can't remember the planet name) will almost certainly go the raw investiture route, and awakening can really do some crazy things so i can imagine them being self sufficient.

I kinda wanna steer clear of space fight discussion because... that is just a whole other beast entirely, but im really curious to hear other poeples thoughts on this cus i don't hear it talked about often

Edited December 20, 2023 by PinkPlasma
broke up the big paragraph so it's easier to read

[First of the Dun he/him]

I find your Shadesmar theory interesting — I expect perhaps it will change as perceptions do. Will be fun to see how that plays out if it’s the case.

As to space flight, I’ll let others more knowledgeable than I weigh in but would suggest reading Sixth of the Dusk if you haven’t already. There are some big clues in there. Keep an eye out for The Ones Above mentioned in that novella!

Edited December 20, 2023 by First of the Dun
Misremembered title

[alder24]

11 hours ago, PinkPlasma said:

I guess what I'm asking, is do we think it's possible, that once the majority of the cosmere understands space travel, that shadesmar will start to reflect that in its physical reflection of the world?

Yes, CR will grow, but it won't be that big of a difference:

Spoiler

Nico Bufasassa

If everyone in the Cosmere begins to understand that there is space travel, does that change the distance needed to travel around in Shadesmar considering it's made up of the beliefs of the people?

Brandon Sanderson

What's going to happen is it is going to make the travel distances longer. However, people cannot conceive the immensity of space. The amount different it's going to make it is not going to be so vast that it's insurmountable. It's not going to come one fractional piece of what the actual distance is.

YouTube Spoiler Stream 5 (Dec. 2, 2022)

 

Spoiler

Questioner

In the Cosmere, as space becomes more developed...*inaudible* outer space.

Brandon Sanderson

It's an interesting question that I've had to ponder. Would the space race happen more slowly because there's an alternative, or would it happen more quickly because you know other planets are inhabited. I'm not going to answer what I came up with, because it's a plot point in the books. So I'll give you a RAFO card, but that's the question to ask yourself.

Questioner

That wasn't my question! My question was, in the Cognitive Realm, with the gap between planets...

Brandon Sanderson

Oh! Will the gap between planets get larger as more people travel in between it. So, barring things like space stations, there's going to be so few minds in between, that I don't expect space to become larger because of that.

I don't expect it to be a factor, except--barring--there will be possibilities of certain regions popping up.

Legion Release Party (Sept. 19, 2018)

 

11 hours ago, PinkPlasma said:

my second question is, propulsion. we have seen a few spaceships now, but we really don't know how they work, because the pov's we see them from are for the most part from a distance. do we expect several types of space travel, for each culture, or one type of fuel, some sort of pure raw investiture? I could see some sort of engine based of steel pushing or iron pulling labor to generate energy, or them doing some electromagnet propulision, and on the rosharan side, I'm sure there re some conection or elsecalling, maybe even fabrial stuff that they base everything off of, because i can't imagine lashings work efficiently when there's no gravity to redirect. elantris side (can't remember the planet name) will almost certainly go the raw investiture route, and awakening can really do some crazy things so i can imagine them being self sufficient.

Riina's spaceship, based on the image in Tress, looked like a typical thrust rocket.

SotD2 spoilers (you can read it here):

Spoiler

Future Mistborn spaceships rely only on Allomancy to take them into the orbit:

Quote

The male did the same, and together they left, climbing aboard their sleek flying machine, which was in the shape of a triangle pointed toward the sky. It soon took off, streaking toward the air without a sound. Its ability to land and take off baffled explanation. The only thing the Dusk's people knew about the process was that the Ones Above had requested the launchpad be made entirely out of steel.

The smaller ship would supposedly meet with the larger one that was in orbit around the planet. A ship larger than even the greatest of the steam-powered behemoths that Dusk's people had used here on First of the Sun.

 

But that's how they make it off the planet, not between stars. I suspect that the Mistborn FTL engine will work like Alcubierre Drive (warp drive), using A-cadmium and A-bendalloy to warp spacetime around the spaceship and achieve FTL. 

Spoiler

Steeldancer (paraphrased)

Have you ever heard of the Alcubierre Drive? 

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Yes, I know about the Alcubierre drive. 

Steeldancer (paraphrased)

So, if we took two speed bubbles--mechanized, because Allomancers aren't powerful enough to pull it off--could we create a functioning Alcubierre drive?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

You are theorizing in the right direction. 

FanX Spring 2019 (April 19, 2019)

[+Oltux72 he/him]

16 hours ago, PinkPlasma said:

first off, its hard for me to imagine that any merchant, military, or travel in general, would opt for the danger of the voids of space, lightyears of travel, over what takes a few months to walk in shadesmar. but then that got me thinking about what shadesmar really is.

Shadesmar is dangerous. It is a desert. Shadesmar is horribly clunky. travelling Shadesmar involves land transport. Compare the freight rates for trucking and shipping.

[Green Hoodie Mistborn he/him]

19 hours ago, PinkPlasma said:

first off, its hard for me to imagine that any merchant, military, or travel in general, would opt for the danger of the voids of space, lightyears of travel, over what takes a few months to walk in shadesmar. but then that got me thinking about what shadesmar really is. As far as I understand it, shadesmar is a reflection of the collective cognitive view of the world, sort of inverted or abstracted in some ways. right now, the common knowledge of the regular people of the cosmere, not our min charcters but the normal citzens, doesn't entirely understand space and planets as a concepts yet.

Well, if you are "C" Connected to a planet, it is almost impossible to leave that planet's area of the CR (with all known methods currently), but presumably physical travel in space is not limited in the same such way

If you can do it safe and fast enough, the Connection can't hold you back in the physical Realm. I think we've seen indications of that in some of the info in the Year of Sanderson stories

[LewsTherinTelescope]

On 12/19/2023 at 10:22 PM, PinkPlasma said:

and i know that its hard to get between realms, but its also really hard to travel between solar systems.

I wouldn't be surprised if this varies by planet. Roshar has Radiants who can transition between the Realms pretty simply, but Scadrial's magics could be better suited to screwing around with spacetime (the time bubble Alcubierre drive theories mentioned above). We also don't know the limits on Elsecalling objects/other people, so it might be you can send individuals through Shadesmar but have to use space if you want a big vehicle.

I think you're right that the perception-shaped nature of the Cognitive could cause issues that drive people to prefer Physical Realm FTL though, both by expanding but also by just making things really unstable over the long term. More and more people viewing their planets as round will affect things too, for example:

Spoiler

Shining Silhouette

If people started viewing their worlds as doughnut-shaped, would the Cognitive Realm change as well?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, the Cognitive Realm would shape to that if the general group on the planet all were viewing anything, but particularly something like that. It would influence the how the Cognitive Realm manifests.

Shining Silhouette

As technology develops and people start seeing the world as spheres, will that change…?

Brandon Sanderson

It will have an effect.

Dragonsteel 2022 (Nov. 14, 2022)

 

On 12/20/2023 at 6:00 PM, Green Hoodie Mistborn said:

but presumably physical travel in space is not limited in the same such way

It is:

Spoiler

Rangsk

Is the difficulty of moving Investiture offworld specific to Cognitive Realm travel, or does it affect travel in the Physical Realm (for example space travel)? For example, if Kaladin summons Syl as a Shardblade, could he take her on a spaceship and travel to another system?

Brandon Sanderson

They would have the same difficulty.

YouTube Spoiler Stream 4 (June 16, 2022)