Can Cosmere Healing Hurt You

[The Stick]

Let's say you are suffering from a long term disease, genetic in nature. Let's say cystic fibrosis for simplicity here. If you then bonded a radiant spren after having and knowing about the condition for years and years, what would happen. If you do indeed perceive yourself as having severe cystic fibrosis, assuming this was part of your life since birth, would you actually hurt yourself? 

The thinking here is if you simply perceive yourself as having it, you would grow further scar tissues in the lungs to match your Spiritual ideal.

Any thoughts?

[Treamayne]

28 minutes ago, The Stick said:

Let's say you are suffering from a long term disease, genetic in nature. Let's say cystic fibrosis for simplicity here. If you then bonded a radiant spren after having and knowing about the condition for years and years, what would happen. If you do indeed perceive yourself as having severe cystic fibrosis, assuming this was part of your life since birth, would you actually hurt yourself? 

The thinking here is if you simply perceive yourself as having it, you would grow further scar tissues in the lungs to match your Spiritual ideal.

Any thoughts?

I do not think that your condition would become worse than it was when you developed the bond, though it may progress after the bond instead of healing it. However, if what you mean is "Potential Radiant knows they have it but are not yet symptomatic - would "Healing" make them symptomatic" then I would have to say no. While Healing is IAW  the spiritual ideal - it is directed by the Cognitive Lens (Identity? it's been called both) and your Cognitive Lens, at the time of Bonding would not show you as more symptomatic as you were at the time of bonding (though it likely includes the disease progressing through further stages - unless your self-perception changes). 

I would guess that psychological conditions (Munchausen, Hypochondria, etc.) would be far more likely to produce negative physical affect from healing than a normal Chronic Disorder. 

Edited May 9 by Treamayne
SPAG

[The Stick]

So as a logical continuation for this, there are also both forgery and F-Gold to worry about.

I think Forgery performed to change someone to have the condition would almost certainly lead to them developing the symptoms, largely because Forgery is a tad more aggressive.

F-Gold is tough. I think it probably would not hurt you necessarily, as you said above, but I think there is greater potential of something bad happening with no spren to keep things in check.

[Treamayne]

12 minutes ago, The Stick said:

F-Gold is tough. I think it probably would not hurt you necessarily, as you said above, but I think there is greater potential of something bad happening with no spren to keep things in check.

Well, F-Gold is still going to have to work through the Cognitive Lens. I could see some differences being possible, but not likely to be significantly different. But then, a Bloodmaker, invested since birth, is unlikely to have genetic maladies of that nature. 

18 minutes ago, The Stick said:

I think Forgery performed to change someone to have the condition would almost certainly lead to them developing the symptoms, largely because Forgery is a tad more aggressive.

The problem is that we don't know much about ReSealing (up to and including if it is just a branch of Forgery, or a truely separate art). On the one hand, we know Forgery can make significant changes, but they will last only a day or less, unless you continue to be restamped. And we know sweeping physical changes can be undone in seconds when a Stamp is removed or expires.

On the other hand, we know that ReSealing can make permanent physical changes, but only if they are in-line with the patient's Spiritual Ideal for healing the physical self. But, we also have never seen it in action on-screen.

[Quantus]

2 hours ago, Treamayne said:

Well, F-Gold is still going to have to work through the Cognitive Lens. I could see some differences being possible, but not likely to be significantly different. But then, a Bloodmaker, invested since birth, is unlikely to have genetic maladies of that nature. 

The problem is that we don't know much about ReSealing (up to and including if it is just a branch of Forgery, or a truely separate art). On the one hand, we know Forgery can make significant changes, but they will last only a day or less, unless you continue to be restamped. And we know sweeping physical changes can be undone in seconds when a Stamp is removed or expires.

On the other hand, we know that ReSealing can make permanent physical changes, but only if they are in-line with the patient's Spiritual Ideal for healing the physical self. But, we also have never seen it in action on-screen.

That's not true, specifically.  Re-sealing is the only (known) form of Cosmere healing that is not Spiritual in nature at all.  ReSealing more like magical surgery, its doing it at a physical manipulation level only and required intense anatomical knowledge to accomplish, but it cant heal cognitive or spiritual damage and it doesnt engage the spiritual/platonic Ideal.  That's the whole reason they needed to bring MaiPon in on that thing with the emperor.  

[Treamayne]

48 minutes ago, Quantus said:

That's not true, specifically.  Re-sealing is the only (known) form of Cosmere healing that is not Spiritual in nature at all.  ReSealing more like magical surgery, its doing it at a physical manipulation level only and required intense anatomical knowledge to accomplish, but it cant heal cognitive or spiritual damage and it doesnt engage the spiritual/platonic Ideal.  That's the whole reason they needed to bring MaiPon in on that thing with the emperor.  

You'll need to source that interpretation, because that was not the impression I had from the Novella at all. It's explained that ReSealing needs anotomical knowledge to fill the same 'niche' that a Forgery needs to know Origins and History. This is also echoed in Elantris, when Raoden is trying to heal Roial.

Spoiler

TES Day 2 :

Quote

“You are familiar with resealing?” Gaotona asked.

“Vaguely,” Shai said. Her people called it Flesh Forgery. Using it, a surgeon of great skill could Forge a body to remove its wounds and scars. It required great specialization. The Forger had to know each and every sinew, each vein and muscle, in order to accurately heal.

Resealing was one of the few branches of Forgery that Shai hadn’t studied in depth. Get an ordinary forgery wrong, and you created a work of poor artistic merit. Get a Flesh Forgery wrong, and people died.

Elantris Ch 53:

Quote

“Raoden!” Duke Roial gasped. “You have returned to us!”

“Be still, Roial,” Raoden said, stabbing the air with his finger. Light burst from its tip as he began to draw.

“I should have known it was you,” the duke rambled. “All of that silly talk about trusting the people. Can you believe I started to agree with you? I should have sent those assassins to do their work the moment they arrived.”

“You are too good a man for that, Roial,” Spirit said, his voice taut with emotion.

Roial’s eyes focused, perceiving for the first time the Aon that Spirit was drawing above him. He breathed out in awe. “Have you returned the beautiful city as well?”

Spirit didn’t respond, instead concentrating on his Aon. He drew differently from the way he had before, his fingers moving more dexterously and quickly. He finished the Aon with a small line near the bottom. It began to glow warmly, bathing Roial in its light. As Sarene watched, the edges of Roial’s wound seemed to pull together slightly. A scratch on Roial’s face disappeared, and several of the liver spots on his scalp faded.

Then the light fell away, the wound still belching blood with each futile pump of the duke’s dying heart.

Spirit cursed. “It’s too weak,” he said, desperately beginning another Aon. “And I haven’t studied the healing modifiers! I don’t know how to target just one part of the body.”

Roial reached up with a quivering arm and grabbed Spirit’s hand. The partially completed Aon faded away as the duke’s movement caused Spirit to make a mistake. Spirit did not start again, bowing his head as if weeping.

“Do not cry, my boy,” Roial said. “Your return is blessed. 

 

The Dor being in the Cognitive Realm means there is likely to be a heavier burden on the Cognitive Aspect of healing; but that does not mean that the Spirit Web/Spiritual Ideal is not involved at all - it's just likely to be more significantly influenced by the Cognitive, and the healing needs detailed knowledge to Command the investiture to the right place in the right way.

ReSealing is implied to use a stamp to make a change in the physical by applying investiture to the person's SR/CR "self." If it did not interact with the Realms in a similar way, it's unlikely that it would be considered so close to Forgery for MaiPon to call it "Flesh Forgery." 

[Sythrin]

This gives me the idea, that if you could pair a healing power for example "regrowth/growth" with an external intent or identity. Could you theoreticlly enforce your intent on the healing progress of a person that you heal and give them for example cancer?

[alder24]

2 hours ago, Sythrin said:

This gives me the idea, that if you could pair a healing power for example "regrowth/growth" with an external intent or identity. Could you theoreticlly enforce your intent on the healing progress of a person that you heal and give them for example cancer?

No, altering their identity isn't enough because their perception of themselves will always filter your healing to match their mental image. Even if you knock them unconscious, the way they view themselves is still saved in their spirit web. To do that you would need to mess with their spirit web first and that can be done with Hemalurgy. 

Spoiler

Questioner

We know that magical healing has a lot to do with Identity, like Lopen and Rysn. Suppose someone was tapping Identity from an unkeyed metalmind, and then you tried to heal them with any kind of magical healing. What would happen?

Brandon Sanderson

Most likely, that person’s perspective of themself is going to filter that unkeyed metalmind, and so what’s going to happen is what would normally happen to that person. In most instances. There are ways to get around that, but the vast majority, that’s what you’re gonna see.

Questioner

And if they were storing Identity instead?

Brandon Sanderson

Then you’re gonna go back to their Cognitive picture of themselves, which is going to be what’s filtering this, how they see themselves. If you knock them unconscious, they can’t see themselves, you’re blanking them of Identity, and things like that. They still, basically, will have… it’s gonna be really hard to get that all separated. The mental picture of themselves still exists on the Spiritual Realm. Remember, Realmatics is based on Plato’s theories of the forms, but your perspective is what’s shaping that. So there’s still gonna be, like, on the Spiritual Realm, there’s gonna be some version of yourself that is deeply influenced by how you view yourself that is going to be what that Investiture is trying to match, it’s trying to bring your body into alignment with that. So you’ve gotta replace that thing if you want it to do something different. Which you can do with Hemalurgy.

Dragonsteel 2022 (Nov. 14, 2022)

 

[Sky Breaker]

I mean it healed Renarin’s eyesight and epilepsy but it didn’t heal galadons dad’s sickness so it could probably go either way