[WaT] What is your in-world religious outlook for the Cosmere?

[CognitiveShadow he/him]

So the topic of what happens in the Cosmere after people die, especially after passing into the Beyond, appears to be something Brandon does not want to answer. He has said that he wants to avoid a direct answer about whether there actually is an afterlife in the Cosmere or not, instead only showing the various beliefs and viewpoints that each character has and is motivated by. 

I'm curious what the fandom thinks about this topic though. We know that the Shards don't actually understand anything about the Beyond - they speculate here and there but usually with motiviations to manipulate other characters. No one comes back from the Beyond, but Dalinar (as an example) is convinced that there is some God Beyond who is at the very least influencing things in the 3 realms.

I see 3 possibilities - 

1. Characters die and go to an unknown afterlife called the Beyond, where they and/or some God Beyond (Adonalsium's soul or somethign more?) ARE able to influence the 3 realms

2. Same as 1 except there is NO influence in the 3 realms from the people and/or God in the Beyond

3. No afterlife - characters just stop existing in the normal sense of the word when their physical body dies, and their investiture/spirit web (particularly if they have excess investiture) continues to persist for a while if it can. But ultimately when that investiture stretches to the Beyond it is simply losing all identity and dispersing or being recycled back into the spiritual realm, where it will eventually pop back out in a shard or in their shardpool or split up among various shards/pools...

Let me know if you think of another alternative possibility and which ones you think are most likely the case!

[Jult]

I think the 3rd makes the most sense for me. At least for people create by Adonalsium or the Shards. There's the unusual case of the people of Dhatri who claim to be created by the Aethers. If all Investiture comes from Adonalsium, and the Aethers claim to co-date Adonalsium, then do Aethers and Aether-people even contain Investiture?

A God Beyond and an Afterlife Beyond wouldn't add anything meaningful to the story in my opinion. If anything, it would take meaning away. Plus, I like the idea of a self-sustaining universe that just keeps recycling the same matter/energy/investiture on loop. And rebirth is a very common theme in the Cosmere.

I think Brandon is for sure making the right choice by never answering questions on the Beyond. There's not an answer that's going to satisfy everyone.

[Treamayne]

6 hours ago, CognitiveShadow said:

I see 3 possibilities -

I see more than Three Possibilities.

• Plus/Minus (±) reuniting with anyone
• ± Staying or going
• ± Influence from Beyond
• ± Positive and Negative Karma in the beyond
  • Possible tertiary on this selector of Neutral (like Greek Plains of Asphodel - where neither positive nor negative afterlife)

Those four variables alone make 16 to 24 possibilites in their various configurations.

But Brandon has said we'll never have this answer, officially.

[CognitiveShadow he/him]

2 minutes ago, Treamayne said:

I see more than Three Possibilities.

• Plus/Minus (±) reuniting with anyone
• ± Staying or going
• ± Influence from Beyond
• ± Positive and Negative Karma in the beyond
  • Possible tertiary on this selector of Neutral (like Greek Plains of Asphodel - where neither positive nor negative afterlife)

Those four variables alone make 16 to 24 possibilites in their various configurations.

But Brandon has said we'll never have this answer, officially.

I mean we can also throw in whether or not there are palm trees there but I'm less concerned with those kinds of imaginary details. I'm more interested in what makes the most logical/consistent sense in-world based on what we know of the universe and what we have seen of people dying and their shadows being left behind.

I was viewing this more along the lines of whether there even is more to existence after death, when that 'death' is (when body dies or when cognitive shadow stretches to the beyond), and what the implications of each possibility has for the stories.

I strongly lean towards there being no afterlife, as the idea of Kaladin being straight up murdered by Ishar in the process of becoming a herald doesn't seem to fit within the intended mechanics of the Cosmere. So I lean towards accepting that cognitive shadows are still the same persisting entity that was 'living' before their body failed, since they hold the memories, identity, and continuity of conciousness that the original character held.

Agreed that we will never get definitive answers here, but I think we have enough to consider what would be most likely. The reuniting with others is more so out of the general purpose of expecting an afterlife - that you and the people who have died before you will continue on living somehow, ideally in a way that you can reconnect and continue to interact. It's also possible that (irl or in the cosmere) people die and get sent into a purple box for eternity where they see nothing but purple and only hear continuous brown noise... but that's a less useful thought experiment I think.

[Treamayne]

13 minutes ago, CognitiveShadow said:

I strongly lean towards there being no afterlife, as the idea of Kaladin being straight up murdered by Ishar in the process of becoming a herald doesn't seem to fit within the intended mechanics of the Cosmere. So I lean towards accepting that cognitive shadows are still the same persisting entity that was 'living' before their body failed, since they hold the memories, identity, and continuity of conciousness that the original character held.

But this didn't seem to be one of your three either, since both 1 and 2 were "go Beyond" without staying behind if invested enough. . . Hence the second of the variables I mentioned.

[CognitiveShadow he/him]

Just now, Treamayne said:

But this didn't seem to be one of your three either, since both 1 and 2 were "go Beyond" without staying behind if invested enough. . . Hence the second of the variables I mentioned.

By asking what happens after the character dies and passes into the beyond I was working off of the assumption that the cognitive shadow is still the same person by my definition. So that's why I wasn't including that distinction. My earlier response using Kaladin as an example was intended to explain that I don't consider this as a variable. I also don't think the +/- karma or +/- reuniting with people are as relevant to the core questions here (my assumption is that if we are saying there is an afterlife, we are implying there is a way to reunite with others who have passed, and karma is not something that is really addressed in the books in any meaningful way so it's also not a relevant part of the existence or nonexistence of an afterlife). Additionally, some of those points are only valid/relevant if there is a Beyond, which cuts down how many realistic options there are. Wouldn't make sense to say there is no Beyond but the people there can influence the Cosmere. So I don't see how it gets up to 10-16 realistic possibilities.

I'm also not trying to create a complete list of all possible options, so much as trying to start a conversation going that can ultimately help us narrow ourselves down to the most likely answer based on the things we do know and the hints we get in the books. Recognizing of course that Brandon is intentionally trying not to give any clear indication either way, but also understanding that the world he has built and the implications of the most likely answers can come together and paint a decent picture about what the answer 'should' be, at least for the sake of consistency and to fit thematically as well.

I've tried to summarize more completely what my stance is on the main factors and why I lean the way I do. I'm definitely more certain on the earlier parts, hence the reason I framed the question the way I did. But the last half I'm fairly split on, if slightly leaning towards the lack of an afterlife:

1. When a Cosmere character physically dies, their spiritweb continues existing for a period of time, usually very short. But if they have excess investiture they can continue persisting longer, just without any connection to the physical realm. This shadow is still that person, and if they hold or were holding enough investiture to expand their soul/spiritweb, they are able to continue persisting/existing indefinitely
   1. Argument for them continuing to exist as the same person: they hold the same memories, identity, and continuity of conciousness that the character had when holding a physical body. It is possible that the true 'soul' of the person dies/disappears when the physical body dies, but I don't accept that on the grounds that it makes Kaladin's transition to immortality actually mean that he sacrificed himself into nonexistence (or an afterlife if you believe in that) so that an investiture copy of him could take his place and be a herald that would make (hopefully) the same decisions he would have made.
2. When the person's spiritweb + any excess investiture can't continue sustaining itself, it stretches into the Beyond. No one knows anything about this because it is... well, unknowable. But I believe the most simple explanation is that the Beyond is unknowable because there is nothing to know. It is simply part of the cycle of investiture that once the physical body dies, it can't (typically) sustain itself and it is then dispersed. As the investiture loses all identity and any 'polarization' and form, it then gets absorbed back into the spiritual realm and is recycled the same as any other investiture
   1. This is where it gets harder to form much of an argument - whether or not the character then continues on into an undetectable new realm or dimension can't be proven or disproven because it's totally undetectable and unobservable by anyone in-world. We know that Shards can't reach into the beyond and can't bring people back. Sazed even healed the physical bodies of Vin and Elend but was not able to bring them back to life since they had slipped off into the beyond.
      1. The question of Identity comes into play here - is Identity creatable? Can a Shard arrange investiture in such a way that it creates a spiritweb copy of Vin or Elend? Or is Identity more unique and special than that? Memories too - can a shard recreate all of Vin's memories? That could be what we saw with Retribution and the Blackthorn Sprenlinar.. but he question remains - could Taravangian do that at any time, or was he only able to do that because Dalinar himself placed copies of his own memories into that being? I think I lean that way, but it could also be that as various shards interact in different ways with the minds of the characters, they each would have different levels of capability here.
   2. Does it make sense that there is an afterlife for the characters after they slip into the beyond? I don't think so - and the only reason I can use here is that I fully agree with what Jult had to say below:

      5 hours ago, Jult said:

      A God Beyond and an Afterlife Beyond wouldn't add anything meaningful to the story in my opinion. If anything, it would take meaning away. Plus, I like the idea of a self-sustaining universe that just keeps recycling the same matter/energy/investiture on loop. And rebirth is a very common theme in the Cosmere.

[Treamayne]

7 minutes ago, CognitiveShadow said:

By asking what happens after the character dies and passes into the beyond I was working off 

<snip>

paint a decent picture about what the answer 'should' be, at least for the sake of consistency and to fit thematically as well.

Copy all. My only real point was if the question is "When characters die and pass into the Beyond, what do you believe happens to them?" Your three provided poll answers are likley to result in a lot of "none of the above" answers - because the three possible poll options you provided are very limited in their interpretations of known story scenes (such as Kelsier/Vin/Elend scene in M:SH).

[CognitiveShadow he/him]

7 minutes ago, Treamayne said:

Copy all. My only real point was if the question is "When characters die and pass into the Beyond, what do you believe happens to them?" Your three provided poll answers are likley to result in a lot of "none of the above" answers - because the three possible poll options you provided are very limited in their interpretations of known story scenes (such as Kelsier/Vin/Elend scene in M:SH).

I guess I just think it logically falls into a few general options. I tried to add in various extra details like reuniting with people to capture a wider swath of variables that people might think of, while hoping the readers would be able to read each option and determine which general bucket most closely aligns with their personal head cannon.
 

Now if something has a very specific headcannon they can share that in the comments, but it likely falls under one of those 3 general variables already. Even the variables you called out fit within those 3 or don’t apply due to the distinction of stretching to the beyond

[Through The Living Ash he/him]

I think that they simply cease to exist. While alive, they are composed of matter and Investiture. Shortly after death, their Investiture detaches from their physical body, and replaces it, causing them to be sort of split in two: a lifeless body in the Physical Realm made of matter and a living body in the Cognitive Realm made of Investiture. The more Invested a person was, the longer they last in the Cognitive Realm, likely because their Investiture slowly seeps from Cognitive up to the Spiritual Realm. The final death is when they no longer have enough Investiture in the Cognitive Realm to continue their existence as an entity, and so they "pass into the Beyond". In the Cognitive, the Investiture is held together as them through the perceptions of people on them, but this is not the case in the Spiritual, so the Investiture would simply disperse there. A person's "soul" is their spiritweb, a complex of Connections. Those Connections exist as interception points between different concepts thought of in the Cognitive. They could describe a person, but not actually be them or serve as their thoughts at any point. The only way to bring someone back would be to use the spiritweb to imprint upon Investiture (or theoretically matter) what a person was and have it form them. This is how people long dead appear in the visions that Dalinar sees while in the Spiritual Realm.  It is possible to bring people back from the Beyond in this way, though it would be nigh on impossible. 

[CognitiveShadow he/him]

45 minutes ago, epl2 said:

I think that they simply cease to exist. While alive, they are composed of matter and Investiture. Shortly after death, their Investiture detaches from their physical body, and replaces it, causing them to be sort of split in two: a lifeless body in the Physical Realm made of matter and a living body in the Cognitive Realm made of Investiture. The more Invested a person was, the longer they last in the Cognitive Realm, likely because their Investiture slowly seeps from Cognitive up to the Spiritual Realm. The final death is when they no longer have enough Investiture in the Cognitive Realm to continue their existence as an entity, and so they "pass into the Beyond". In the Cognitive, the Investiture is held together as them through the perceptions of people on them, but this is not the case in the Spiritual, so the Investiture would simply disperse there. A person's "soul" is their spiritweb, a complex of Connections. Those Connections exist as interception points between different concepts thought of in the Cognitive. They could describe a person, but not actually be them or serve as their thoughts at any point. The only way to bring someone back would be to use the spiritweb to imprint upon Investiture (or theoretically matter) what a person was and have it form them. This is how people long dead appear in the visions that Dalinar sees while in the Spiritual Realm.  It is possible to bring people back from the Beyond in this way, though it would be nigh on impossible. 

I think I pretty much align with everything you had to say here, thanks for sharing! I think this is the most likely scenario as well.

I think it would also be interesting to gauge how a person’s real life outlook on the existence or nonexistence of an afterlife influences whether they think there is one in the Cosmere too

[Through The Living Ash he/him]

1 hour ago, CognitiveShadow said:

I think I pretty much align with everything you had to say here, thanks for sharing! I think this is the most likely scenario as well.

I think it would also be interesting to gauge how a person’s real life outlook on the existence or nonexistence of an afterlife influences whether they think there is one in the Cosmere too

I agree. I personally do not believe in the afterlife, and would be curious to see how others might view this in the Cosmere. I feel that we actually have less of a bias in world than out of world as the Cosmere lets you actually see what a person's soul is and how divinity/magic works, which allows for less areas of theorising. 

[Treamayne]

12 hours ago, CognitiveShadow said:

think it would also be interesting to gauge how a person’s real life outlook on the existence or nonexistence of an afterlife influences whether they think there is one in the Cosmere too

Mistborn: Secret History P1Ch1:

Spoiler

He was alive. Kind of.

He managed to look up. That same thick greyness shifted all around him. A nothingness? No, he could see shapes in it, shadows. Hills? And high in the sky, some kind of light. A tiny sun perhaps, as seen through dense grey clouds.

Kelsier breathed in and out, then growled, heaving himself to his feet. “Well,” he proclaimed, “that was thoroughly awful.”

It did seem there was an afterlife, which was a pleasant discovery. Did this mean . . . did this mean Mare was still out there somewhere? He’d always offered platitudes, talking to the others about being with her again someday. But deep down he’d never believed, never really thought . . .

The end was not the end. Kelsier smiled again, this time truly excited. He turned about, and as he inspected his surroundings, the mists seemed to withdraw. No, it felt like Kelsier was solidifying, entering this place fully. The withdrawal of the mists was more like a clearing of his own mind.

<snip>

The man was short, with black hair and a prominent nose. Unlike the other people—who were made of light—this man looked normal, like Kelsier. Since Kelsier was dead, did this make the man another ghost?

“Who are you?” Kelsier demanded.

“Oh, I think you know.” The man met Kelsier’s eyes, and in them Kelsier saw eternity. A cool, calm eternity—the eternity of stones that saw generations pass, or of careless depths that didn’t notice the changing of days, for light never reached them anyway.

“Oh, hell,” Kelsier said. “There’s actually a God?”

“Yes.”

Kelsier decked him.

Kelsier's disbelief didn't seem to affect his experience with dying. . . 

Edited May 8, 2025 by Treamayne
SPAG

[CognitiveShadow he/him]

21 hours ago, Treamayne said:

Kelsier's disbelief didn't seem to affect his experience with dying. . . 

Once again, we aren't talking about the physical death and what the cognitive shadow experiences as an 'afterlife'. We also aren't talking about a character's beliefs impacting what their experience is when they die.

We are talking about the Beyond - that's the only place that a true/standard afterlife experience could be. And we have no reliable indication that this is the case.

But my main point of response here is that @epl2 and I are talking about readers who believe in an afterlife in the real world and whether that makes them more likely to believe that the Cosmere would have an afterlife. My suspicion would be that there is a correllation, but I also think @epl2 is correct: observing the Cosmere as a fictional world and trying to determine whether in-world the characters get to experience a true afterlife is easier to consider from an objective perspective than when considering the real world.

Does that make more sense? Kelsier believing in an afterlife or not has no bearing on these questions. And Kelsier (as a cognitive shadow) popping into the cognitive realm after his ties to the physical realm are severed also has no bearing on the actual existence of an afterlife (or not) for characters in the Cosmere.

[Aeshdan he/him]

Okay, the first relevant point is that I subscribe to the telelogical argument for God (among others). That is to say, I believe that a world such as we exist in, a world where cause produces effect and effect arises from cause, where Things are made of Stuff and Stuff is organized into distinct Things, a world which follows consistent laws that can be learnt and comprehended, necessitates an eternal, omnipresent, omni-intelligent, and omnipotent entity like the Christian God to create and sustain such a system. Since the Cosmere likewise obeys those same fundamental rules of causality and definition, I believe it must likewise have a capital-G God ruling over it. I am less than certain whether Adonalsium could be this God. Obviously, if the God of the Cosmere could truly die the Cosmere would never have existed in the first place, but on the other hand the God of the Cosmere would have to exist outside of time, and we know that the power of Adonalsium resides in the Spiritual Realm where all places and times are one. It is possible that Adonalsium still exists despite being Shattered, or that the Adonalsium of the past and the future are sustaining the Cosmere in the present.

The key point of all of that was that if there is a God Beyond (whether or not the God Beyond is also Adonalsium), He must be able to interact with the three Realms of the Cosmere. However, there is no reason why he has to have interfered with the Cosmere via what we might call "miracles". There is nothing contradictory or illogical about a God creating a world and then leaving it to run on its own like a machine (to be clear, I don't believe that this is what God has done with the world I live in, just that he could have if he'd wanted to).

Now, on the other hand I am just about certain that those who have passed Beyond will never interfere with the three Realms again. Brandon has repeated so many times that those who pass Beyond cannot be brought back, and he has talked so often in his interviews about the narrative damage that uncontrolled resurrections can cause, that I find it hard to believe he would break his rule and bring characters back from the Beyond (other than as Spiritual Realm visions, which are more like looking into the past than anything else).

As for whether souls do pass into the Beyond... I am inclined to believe that they do. Partially this is just because I instinctively associate the idea of sapience and self-awareness with the idea of an eternal soul (and I suspect Brandon does as well). But a bigger part of it is that if souls are not eternal, if the soul falls apart and decays into Investiture as the body does, then it significantly changes the tone of certain events and aspects of this setting. It means that when Sazed failed to catch Vin and Elend's souls at the end of Hero of Ages, it was a tragedy rather than the happy ending and rest Sazed described, for example. And at the end of Wind and Truth, Retribution's description of trying and failing to catch Dalinar's soul reads 

Quote

Dalinar's soul slipped away from him. Stretched. And vanished into the Beyond.

Which certainly sounds as though souls pass intact into a Beyond rather than falling apart into Investiture. Same with Wayne's death at the end of The Lost Metal.

Quote

Wayne stretched into another place, into another time. He stretched into the wind. And into the stars. And all endless things.

All of which is to say, I think the most likely answer is that souls truly do pass into the Beyond and remain there, but that they have no ability to influence anything back on this side.

(Incidentally, how do you change your vote on a poll? I clicked before I read the thread, and I think I misunderstood the options presented).

[Through The Living Ash he/him]

4 hours ago, Aeshdan said:

Okay, the first relevant point is that I subscribe to the telelogical argument for God (among others). That is to say, I believe that a world such as we exist in, a world where cause produces effect and effect arises from cause, where Things are made of Stuff and Stuff is organized into distinct Things, a world which follows consistent laws that can be learnt and comprehended, necessitates an eternal, omnipresent, omni-intelligent, and omnipotent entity like the Christian God to create and sustain such a system. Since the Cosmere likewise obeys those same fundamental rules of causality and definition, I believe it must likewise have a capital-G God ruling over it. I am less than certain whether Adonalsium could be this God. Obviously, if the God of the Cosmere could truly die the Cosmere would never have existed in the first place, but on the other hand the God of the Cosmere would have to exist outside of time, and we know that the power of Adonalsium resides in the Spiritual Realm where all places and times are one. It is possible that Adonalsium still exists despite being Shattered, or that the Adonalsium of the past and the future are sustaining the Cosmere in the present.

The key point of all of that was that if there is a God Beyond (whether or not the God Beyond is also Adonalsium), He must be able to interact with the three Realms of the Cosmere. However, there is no reason why he has to have interfered with the Cosmere via what we might call "miracles". There is nothing contradictory or illogical about a God creating a world and then leaving it to run on its own like a machine (to be clear, I don't believe that this is what God has done with the world I live in, just that he could have if he'd wanted to).

Now, on the other hand I am just about certain that those who have passed Beyond will never interfere with the three Realms again. Brandon has repeated so many times that those who pass Beyond cannot be brought back, and he has talked so often in his interviews about the narrative damage that uncontrolled resurrections can cause, that I find it hard to believe he would break his rule and bring characters back from the Beyond (other than as Spiritual Realm visions, which are more like looking into the past than anything else).

As for whether souls do pass into the Beyond... I am inclined to believe that they do. Partially this is just because I instinctively associate the idea of sapience and self-awareness with the idea of an eternal soul (and I suspect Brandon does as well). But a bigger part of it is that if souls are not eternal, if the soul falls apart and decays into Investiture as the body does, then it significantly changes the tone of certain events and aspects of this setting. It means that when Sazed failed to catch Vin and Elend's souls at the end of Hero of Ages, it was a tragedy rather than the happy ending and rest Sazed described, for example. And at the end of Wind and Truth, Retribution's description of trying and failing to catch Dalinar's soul reads 

Which certainly sounds as though souls pass intact into a Beyond rather than falling apart into Investiture. Same with Wayne's death at the end of The Lost Metal.

All of which is to say, I think the most likely answer is that souls truly do pass into the Beyond and remain there, but that they have no ability to influence anything back on this side.

(Incidentally, how do you change your vote on a poll? I clicked before I read the thread, and I think I misunderstood the options presented).

This holds merit, but there are a few key points that I disagree with. 

1. The Spiritual Realm does not exist in all times, as you put it. Time is clearly shown to progress forwards, just at different rates rather than linearly. I am not certain what you mean by existing in all places. 

2. You are correct; if people do pass into the Beyond, they could never return. This does not mean that they could not be recreated, however. As previously stated, it is possible to look into the past exactly and see what a person was, then form them anew from that. It would be extremely difficult to do though, and Brandon is unlikely to ever have this occur (except potentially to bring Adonalsium back). 

3. Souls do not "fall apart into Investiture;" they are Investiture, if describing the Cognitive aspect like you were. As the Investiture slowly fades back into the Spiritual Realm, as Investiture in the Cognitive and Physical Realms does, there comes a point at which not enough Investiture remains in the Cognitive Realm for the person to continue their existence, and so they disband. This is why individuals who were more highly Invested in life last longer as a Cognitive Shadow. 

4. The Cognitive aspect of a person is not their soul; their spiritweb is. The spiritweb essentially describes who the person is, and remains even after final death, as the person can still hold Connections after they pass into the Beyond. If someone were to physically shift to another dimension of space, as you are saying, this would mean that the spiritweb is also not the soul, and the soul would have to be something else. If this were true, what would there be for a Shard to interact with? What is a soul if not the complete description of one's being? 

5. It is not a failure of Sazed to bring Vin and Elend back; they willingly move on, as seen in Mistborn: Secret History. Retribution seemingly could have kept Dalinar in the Cognitive, if not for some other force holding domain over Dalinar. 

6. You state that if God could die, then the Cosmere could not have existed. I do not see the reasoning why this should hold true. 

7. One cannot exist in zero dimensions of time, that would simply be nonexistence. I am not sure what existing outside of time is supposed to mean. 

That is not to say that there is no ultimate God overseeing the Cosmere; in fact, I find that likely given the current direction of the books. Maybe it was Adonalsium, which intentionally died, or maybe it is something else. People could ultimately move into the Beyond, just not how you are describing it. 

[Nitpicking]

8 hours ago, epl2 said:

1. The Spiritual Realm does not exist in all times, as you put it. Time is clearly shown to progress forwards, just at different rates rather than linearly. I am not certain what you mean by existing in all places.

It's pretty close to what Brandon and his characters say, though.

[earthexile]

I would guess at the No Afterlife option, first because that's how I hope my own reality works, and second because of 'conservation of Investiture.'

If souls and identities and such are made of Investiture, it makes sense to me that the overall distribution of energy would eventually become a problem as more and more energy moved to permanently existing as individual beings. Nature seems to abhor such imbalance, and we also know that beings in the Cosmere inevitably suffer as an effect of their lengthened lives. Instead, perhaps every last wisp of a person must eventually dissolve back into the All, so that energy can find new expressions.

[Through The Living Ash he/him]

25 minutes ago, earthexile said:

I would guess at the No Afterlife option, first because that's how I hope my own reality works, and second because of 'conservation of Investiture.'

If souls and identities and such are made of Investiture, it makes sense to me that the overall distribution of energy would eventually become a problem as more and more energy moved to permanently existing as individual beings. Nature seems to abhor such imbalance, and we also know that beings in the Cosmere inevitably suffer as an effect of their lengthened lives. Instead, perhaps every last wisp of a person must eventually dissolve back into the All, so that energy can find new expressions.

Identity is not made of Investiture, it is generally someone's spiritweb. The spiritweb is a metric manifold that describes how Investiture may move. A Connection, then, is a point at which two spiritwebs share a Tangent Space, allowing for the flow of Investiture between them. A shared Tangent Space is created when the spiritwebs have similar curvature to them, where the curvature is impacted by the perception of people. This is not important to the argument, but the main point is that souls and Identities are not made of Investiture, they are possibilities for the flow of Investiture. Thus, Investiture will not be trapped in spiritwebs as the number of spiritwebs increases, as it will only be in them when it is flowing to them through a Connection. 

[LewsTherinTelescope]

My answer to this is different depending on if we're talking out-of-world or in-world.

On a narrative level, Evi forgiving Dalinar or the whole Tien -> horse -> rock sequence with Kaladin definitely seem to me to be written with the understanding these are real people, with the alternative explanations exclusively being presented outside the text and including such proposals as "Hoid and his shenanigans".

But in-world, it seems almost... redundant to me? The scenes in Stormlight all include a Bondsmith in the process of becoming a god. Investiture is already the mechanism for consciousness. The Spiritual Realm is already the realm of essential Identity and eternal memory. The Cognitive Realm is already the realm of experience and subjectivity. What does a "Beyond soul" actually do? And what are its answers to the Ship of Theseus, Cognitive Shadows, etc independent of the existing Realmatic answers?

There's also Wayne passing on:

Spoiler

With that, Wayne stretched into another place, into another time. He stretched into the wind. And into the stars.

And all endless things.

This doesn't sound to me like an intact personality moving on to a specific place, it sounds to me like individuality fading as they spread out across the entire universe.

Emotionally, I also prefer Dalinar forgiving himself as an arc to Dalinar recieving external absolution. My preferences for the Tien scene are more complicated than it being entirely in Kaladin's head or it being entirely just real Tien, but if we remove the Beyond as a factor then the Spiritual Realm is perfectly capable of handling that complexity on its own. (I'll talk about Vin and Elend in a second.)

The one case off the top of my head where I prefer it being 100% just the person is Teft, but given the timeline that's easily justifiable by him just not having passed on yet, and Moash also references seeing Teft's spirit before he lost his sight.

On 5/10/2025 at 10:47 AM, Aeshdan said:

It means that when Sazed failed to catch Vin and Elend's souls at the end of Hero of Ages, it was a tragedy rather than the happy ending and rest Sazed described, for example.

On the other hand, Ruin and the ability to let go are just as important to Mistborn as Preservation and survival are. Characters understandably view death as tragic (and IRL I agree), but to me it feels more thematically fitting if people end while their mark on the world remains. Otherwise Ruin is just delayed Preservation and there's no point to the cost of and growth from accepting it.