Hemalurgy and Cancer

[Trusk'our he/him]

We know that infections aren't caused when a Hemalurgic spike is implanted in the body- the Investiture seems to act as a kind of antiseptic. Does this mean that a Hemalurgist would be immune to cancer forming around the site of a spike as well?

Or, could a person spike out the Spiritweb of a tumor growing in someone to completely destroy it?

And what if you implanted a spike in a tumor? Would it have a different spiritual makeup due to its corrupt nature? Could spiking Investiture into a tumor make it turn into a separate being, perhaps more symbiotic in nature than parasitic?

[Mr. Misting he/him]

This is a fascinating series of questions. I just read a nonfiction article that kind of skirted around cancer, so I'm about to make a couple of uneducated claims. 

3 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

Does this mean that a Hemalurgist would be immune to cancer forming around the site of a spike as well?

I would think that the spikes would negate cancer, if the spike is placed over it. Yes, the spike would make the body grow around it differently, and would prevent any harm that it would cause. But I doubt it was prevent other harm, such as cancer, which is not inherently damaging, or caused by the spike. 

3 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

Or, could a person spike out the Spiritweb of a tumor growing in someone to completely destroy it?

Spiking the tumor out of a person feels terribly challenging. It's magic, so I don't see why you couldn't, but it feels like it would require an advanced practitioner. 

3 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

And what if you implanted a spike in a tumor? Would it have a different spiritual makeup due to its corrupt nature? Could spiking Investiture into a tumor make it turn into a separate being, perhaps more symbiotic in nature than parasitic?

I don't think cancer would be read as inherently corrupt. It's obviously detrimental and can kill humans, buts it's just a type of cell growth, which happens all the time. I'm not sure how adding investiture to a tumor would change anything. Do we have an example of investiture making body parts into more separate beings? Like, if I spiked my hand and put in a bunch of investiture, I can't see why it would become separate. It's still me, just as a spiked tumor would be. Also, to the questionable science claims, I read something along the lines that cancer sometimes gets in the blood stream or whatever, but in some way it migrates. So even if you get the main source, other tumors could still grow. 

On the topic of spiritual ideals and cancer, I'm not sure how effective cosmere healing would be against cancer. We know that when someone has internalized an injury, it changes how they view themselves, and they can no longer be healed (at least by radiants). But again, cancer is just a certain form of growth. And I would imagine a teenage radiant could grow acne, which is certainly not helpful growth. So how would that be any different for cancer? Again, with Lift, she is very actively opposed to growing up, but her fancy progression surge isn't helping, even if how she wants to grow is opposed to how she is growing. Is cancer immune to cosmere healing?

[Trusk'our he/him]

3 hours ago, Mr. Misting said:

This is a fascinating series of questions

Thanks! 

3 hours ago, Mr. Misting said:

Spiking the tumor out of a person feels terribly challenging. It's magic, so I don't see why you couldn't, but it feels like it would require an advanced practitioner. 

Yeah, it wouldn't be an easy task, particularly if you want to do as little harm as possible. But if you could target only cancerous cells, perhaps it would be a viable option when Unsealed Goldminds and other forms of Invested healing fail due to the self-perception of the patient.

3 hours ago, Mr. Misting said:

I don't think cancer would be read as inherently corrupt. It's obviously detrimental and can kill humans, buts it's just a type of cell growth, which happens all the time. 

Sorry, I didn't mean corrupt like as in the sense of Cosmere corruption but corrupt as in your cellular machinery is failing and breaking in ways that cause it to act in direct competition with the rest of the body. Its natural purpose has been corrupted, but only due to the flaws of biology.

3 hours ago, Mr. Misting said:

I'm not sure how adding investiture to a tumor would change anything. Do we have an example of investiture making body parts into more separate beings? Like, if I spiked my hand and put in a bunch of investiture, I can't see why it would become separate. It's still me, just as a spiked tumor would be.

I also may have miscommunicated here; what I meant to say is, what if you were to take an Invested Hemalurgic spike and use it to rewrite the spiritual code of the tumor to act in a beneficial way instead of a parasitic way (I apologize for this error on my part. I was trying to type it up on my mobile account at the time)?

3 hours ago, Mr. Misting said:

Also, to the questionable science claims, I read something along the lines that cancer sometimes gets in the blood stream or whatever, but in some way it migrates. So even if you get the main source, other tumors could still grow. 

Yeah, that's one of the issues that can occur with some types of cancer; it can sometimes hitchhike in your bloodstream and can spread and pop up everywhere in your body. That would certainly make it harder to get rid of, but I wonder, if Hemalurgic excision can target a general "cancerous" cell type, maybe it could still purge those cells from your body even after they spread.

3 hours ago, Mr. Misting said:

On the topic of spiritual ideals and cancer, I'm not sure how effective cosmere healing would be against cancer. We know that when someone has internalized an injury, it changes how they view themselves, and they can no longer be healed (at least by radiants). But again, cancer is just a certain form of growth. And I would imagine a teenage radiant could grow acne, which is certainly not helpful growth. So how would that be any different for cancer? Again, with Lift, she is very actively opposed to growing up, but her fancy progression surge isn't helping, even if how she wants to grow is opposed to how she is growing. Is cancer immune to cosmere healing?

It probably depends on the specific person's self-perception and how they view the cancer, as with most forms of Cosmere healing. Hence the reason Hemalugic excision may prove useful in this case; if it counts as natural and can't be healed through traditional forms of Invested healing, this is a way to force the body to function as you wish.

Edit: I suppose that it's also worth mentioning. . . 

Warbreaker spoilers;

Spoiler

Having heightened amount of Investiture, such as from Breaths, can stop disease from ever coming and can even cure diseases you already have. I suspect you could mimic this effect by adding enough Investiture to a Hemalurgic nicrosil spike, but it would be very, very costly compared to excising cancer instead.

 

Edited February 22, 2024 by Trusk'our

[alder24]

14 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

We know that infections aren't caused when a Hemalurgic spike is implanted in the body- the Investiture seems to act as a kind of antiseptic. Does this mean that a Hemalurgist would be immune to cancer forming around the site of a spike as well?

I think yes. A Hemalurgist is more invested, the more invested you are the better your immune system is, therefore you will develop fewer cancerous cells. It's entirely possible that cancer won't form around spikes, or rather won't form as a result of spiking. 

15 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

Or, could a person spike out the Spiritweb of a tumor growing in someone to completely destroy it?

I think it's not possible, or rather highly unlikely. Not to mention that you would suffer more from Hemalurgy than from this tumor. Cancer would be an effect of your reduced health attribute - stealing more health won't stop cancer, giving more health might, but that's possible only with Lerasium. And if you have Lerasium it's better to just burn it to become a Mistborn, becoming more invested with better immunity, which would deal with cancer quickly, with a little help from A-pewter.

Trying to steal cancer with a spike would be like trying to steal a hand with a spike. That won't work.

[Crow he/him]

That is actually really interesting to think about!

[Duxredux he/him]

To answer if Cosmere healing can heal cancer, the answer is probably with the same Cognitive limitations.

Quote

Questioner

Stormlight, I know it heals wounds and stuff like that but can it heal illnesses like colds?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes it can.

Questioner

So if Kaladin suddenly contracted brain cancer...

Brandon Sanderson

It's plausible-- it depends, see what it does is it takes your body and makes it align with your spirit, and partially through the filter of how you view yourself. So if you view yourself as sickly, then you won't.

Salt Lake City Comic-Con 2014 (Sept. 4, 2014)

Looks like cancer is not part of the Spiritual Ideal and the right healing can naturally filter out cancerous cells so long as the Cognitive aspect is in alignment. Most of the trouble with cancer is how hard it is to differentiate and target the cancerous cells while differentiating between the types of cancers, particularly if cancer bypasses the immune system, so this looks like it should be pretty easy to heal.

Now... it's possible that for most humans in the Cosmere won't ever deal with cancer, depending on the mechanism that allows humans to have less diseases anyway. If the bit of innate Investiture in all souls means regular healing is aligning towards the Spiritual Ideal (which is a bit of a stretch), then something on the scale of the beginning of cancer probably isn't much of an issue. Cancer is difficult to treat once starts rapidly growing and developing, particularly if it's started spreading (the term you're looking for is metastasized) but if the body naturally catches that handful of cells that had damaged genetic code and didn't terminate properly, that's much less healing then say a massive viral load from someone sneezing in your face with the common cold. I'd actually guess that if the body could as consistently identify cancerous cells as it can the common cold, then the cold would cause more of an strain to the immune system (barring cancer of the immune system like leukemia). Cosmere humans are weird because they have something like a spiritual limiter to their life span - an actual allotted time of life (on average) or a predetermined decline of physical health directly linked to their age as viewed by their Spiritual Ideal as seen with Rashek. So while heart disease and cancer are big killers in our world, they may not be an significant issue in the Cosmere, or as likely to kill the elderly as any disease that can target a weakened immune system. 

Now that's for normal unaltered humans. If we look at Drabs (apologies, yes this is the Mistborn board, but this isn't much of a spoiler that there are members of the Cosmere that have lost that innate Investiture) or those who have been non-lethally Hemalugically spiked, then yes, they may be more susceptible to cancer and for the next bit I'll just assume that cancer is a problem to at least some people in the Cosmere. Hemalurgy can do some pretty wild things, so I'm not going to discount the possibility of healing someone via Hemalurgy, but for spiking it out we're talking literal excision from their soul. For cancer that has metastasized, you'll never target the individual cells well enough, that's the whole reason why we can't remove them via surgery IRL, and I can't imagine a scenario that would let you so carefully target a single class of specifically cancerous cells (though hemalurgy can target physical strength for what it's worth). This would be like trying to spike out the spiritual web representing the liver, but somehow avoiding all non-cancerous cells. By definition, the cancer is growing from mutated cells that you really want to keep functioning, so you can't just remove all related cells. If it did work, it would probably be as traumatic to the body as IRL cancer treatment if not more so. That chunk of soul you punched out ain't coming back, and if did, they gained access to healing that would have cured the cancer in the first place. Injuries in the Spiritual Realm are so much harder to heal than injuries in the Physical Realm, so it seems like you're going to have a pretty extreme use case scenario to justify breaking out the spikes and mallet. Unless you know exactly what you're doing, I'd guess that you're more likely to cause cancer by excising pieces of the soul and creating gaps in the Spiritual Ideal. I'm having a hard time imagining a case when you would want a big ol' tumor enhanced with a Hemalurgic spike over just getting the spike in a tried and tested location that we know isn't going to have complications. If you can think of a symbiotic instance which is better than just getting the benefit yourself, let me know.

Long story short, break out the Gold medallion, not the spikes.

Edited February 22, 2024 by Duxredux