So, There's No Hope. (Unhinged And Unwarranted Speculation)

[Aliroz-The-Confused]

Oh thank goodness, I thought it was canon for a second there.  Phew.

I can save the panic for if it becomes a thing in print.

[Immortal Platypus]

6 minutes ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

Wait, what?  I don't remember this ever being a thing?  Was this in a WOB?  This is absolutely terrifying and shatters what I thought I understood.

1 minute ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

Oh thank goodness, I thought it was canon for a second there.  Phew.

I can save the panic for if it becomes a thing in print.

It's confirmed via WOB (as others have stated), but it can somewhat be derived from analyzing the books, especially retrospectively. We don't really see Horneaters with the Ashynites traveling to Roshar, and I figure they would be noticeable, as IIRC, they're pretty large and distinct. Add that to the fact they have different metabolisms, as evidenced by Rock, and it makes sense. Herdazians we see a lot less of, so that one is harder to know.

And for the record, while WOBs are of a lesser canonical status, they are still canon (or pseudo-canon (as they sometimes contradict)). I understand you don't like that, and I understand your reasons for it (I believe, you might have more that I haven't read), but I would caution against ignoring them. 

[Frustration]

31 minutes ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

Wait, what?  I don't remember this ever being a thing?  Was this in a WOB?  This is absolutely terrifying and shatters what I thought I understood.

24 minutes ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

Oh thank goodness, I thought it was canon for a second there.  Phew.

I can save the panic for if it becomes a thing in print.

WoBs confirm it but there's some solid indications in the text.

1. Spark flickers - metallic pieces that Herdazians attach to their nails to light fires. You might remember Lopen telling a guard that he has special Herdazian nails at the end of OB.
2. Horneaters eating shells, they even have cool little mouth parts in some of the art iirc
3. Sighted Horneaters, individuals like Rock and Cord who can see spren the same way Singers can and have the ability to weakly bond them for strength
4. It's part of why Horneaters had to leave for the peaks as no one liked them and saw them as traitors.
5. Horneater drinks being considered strong enough to kill, and melting cups
6. Etc

31 minutes ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

If The Stormlight Archive didn't exist, I'd be writing salt about Zane/Vin/Elend content taking up pages that should have been more skaa points of view.  Mister Sanderson's biggest flaw as a writer has always been his romance subplots (outside of Raoden and Sarene, and perhaps Tess and Charlie), and his second biggest flaw as a writer has always been his inordinate fixation on characters over worldbuilding as the core of stories when worldbuilding is what he's good at and the magic systems are what made the Cosmere a success in the first place.  Guy thinks that his worlds and magic systems are enjoyable-but-not-the-point structural necessities to write stuff about characters, when the Cosmere's characters have always been the weakest part of the books and function best as enjoyable-but-not-the-point structural necessities to explore the possibilities of the imagination.

Poor mister Sanderson thinks that The Stormlight Archive became popular because of its characters.  It became popular because epic canyons with giant enemy crabs are freaking awesome.  Everybody wants to read about fossil-resembling megafauna in the fantasy equivalent of Southern Utah and Northern Arizona, but we're all just too prim and proper to admit to liking Hype Stuff That An Eight Year Old Thinks Is Cool, so we gotta smuggle it in in a crate full of Thoughtful Commentary On the Human Condition (which is also good, but the Coolest Thing I Ever Read to Good Writing ratio is far too skewed towards Good Writing in the later books of The Stormlight Archive for my taste).

All valid.

Though lets also not forget that he also thinks he's funny and keeps trying to write comedy despite not being funny.

28 minutes ago, Kansas Stormcursed said:

Quite frankly, epic universes are everywhere. Not to minimize the impact of Stormlight and the Cosmere at large, but the universe isn't what made it special. It's the stories and the characters. Without those, far fewer people would have read it or become hooked on it.

I'm afraid I must disagree.

If it wasn't for the magic and worldbuilding: there's nothing in Mistborn worth reading, WoK becomes really stale, Oathbringer loses the only reason to reread it, and not a single book Brandon has written since 2018 would be worth more than the amount of paper towels you could turn the pages into and I will die on this hill.

While on the flip side all the characters Brandon has the only really standout ones I can find are Kaladin, Szeth, and Hoid and the more Brandon spends time with Hoid the less interesting he becomes.

Edited February 7 by Frustration

[Aliroz-The-Confused]

On 2/6/2026 at 5:56 PM, Kansas Stormcursed said:

Quite frankly, epic universes are everywhere. Not to minimize the impact of Stormlight and the Cosmere at large, but thenuniverse isn't what made it special. It's the stories and the characters. Without those, far fewer people would have read it or become hooked on it.

No, the worlds and magic are what made it special, and what made it a success.  The Stormlight Archive and its characters came later.  I remember the early days, before The Way Of Kings.

Back then, the reviewers weren't ashamed to praise the setting and the fans weren't ashamed to call it the best part.  For crying out loud, Elantris was named for the setting, and Mistborn was named for its magic system (note that we haven't had actual Mistborns doing Mistborn things since 2008, which grankles my bajankles, but still).  It's the same thing as how Star Wars was never praised for its characters and script before the prequels came out and people needed some way to pretend that there was a sophisticated grown-up reason for why they didn't enjoy the prequels like they'd enjoyed the originals as kids (seriously, look up the reviews from 1977, people never praise the writing or the characters of Star Wars, they say things like "this is the most fun I've had going to the cinema... ever!" and "I've never seen anything like it.  What a phantasmagoria!" (paraphrased, not direct quotes).  When my grandpa came home from the cinema to pick up my grandma and her kids and drive them immediately to the theater so they could see it, he didn't say "wow, the characters were so memorable", he said "You've got to see it.  There were spacemen, floating cars, barfights, a giant bear-thing, it was like a western crashed into a sci-fi!").

Of course, that was before Good Writing became the absolute prison that it is today, and part of that is due to mister Sanderson teaching a generation ten million unbreakable laws for storytelling, probably as recompense for his crime of Not Being Good Enough At Prose And Characters.

  

On 2/6/2026 at 6:07 PM, Frustration said:

Though lets also not forget that he also thinks he's funny and keeps trying to write comedy despite not being funny.

My sense of humor is broken enough that I wouldn't get it if it was well-written comedy, so I give him a pass for that.

The funniest thing in the cosmere is, and will always be, the stick that is a stick, and he didn't even intend that to as funny as it was.

  

On 2/6/2026 at 6:07 PM, Frustration said:

If it wasn't for the magic and worldbuilding: ... not a single book Brandon has written since 2018 would be worth more than the amount of paper towels you could turn the pages into and I will die on this hill.

If you try to turn books into paper towels I will beat you up and stop you to rescue the books.  I will die on this hill.

On 2/6/2026 at 6:07 PM, Frustration said:

If it wasn't for the magic and worldbuilding: there's nothing in Mistborn worth reading,

Whoa, whoa, whoa, we have Kelsier and Vin's father-daughter relationship, Vin's learning to trust, and all of Kelsier and Marsh's interactions.  Also Marsh in general is great.  That bit where Marsh says "Sometimes I wish it wasn't you who returned from the pits" and Kelsier says "So do I, every day" is the best character bit mister Sanderson ever wrote, and in retrospect The Crew being not-very-deep characters means they serve their purposes well without clogging up the book.  Also Mennis is the realest hombre in the Cosmere and every page he's in is peak literature.  And Sazed is MAH BOI and deserves all the happiness and none of the suffering.  Tindwyl deserved her own book, and in talking down to Elend both her and Yomen earned permanent spaces on the Opposite-Of-Hate List.  Tensoon and Vin is well-written enough that Tensoon showing up and talking about her in the Wax and Wayne books is a highlight, same with Marsh and "he does my brother's work".  And Spook is the best portrayal of my own sensory processing issues I've ever read, though that's more the magic and worldbuilding so it counts under that umbrella.

Wait, on the other hand, we also have Elend.  Yikes, I've got to put all of that last paragraph in a parentheses and multiply it by zero.  And we have Zane, so we have to add a negative kajillion to the calculation...

Dang it!  The numbers don't lie, on the average, you're right!

 

Warbreaker has the best iteration of Hero With Bad Social Skills / Jerk With A Heart Of Gold / Brooding Loner archetype in Vasher, because he genuinely isn't endearing, charming, witty, or immediately likable, and is perfectly contrasted with Denth and his buddies.  Vasher's whatever-the-opposite-of-charisma is, especially when it comes to trying to explain what he's trying to do, is frustrating and relatable in all the right ways.  On a first read, Denth and company are genuinely more likable until the other shoe drops, and on the second read you see the warning signs.  But, on the other hand, part of this might be residual goodwill from the experience of turning the page and escaping from the Siri/Susebron situation.

 

  

On 2/6/2026 at 6:07 PM, Frustration said:

While on the flip side all the characters Brandon has the only really standout ones I can find are Kaladin, Szeth, and Hoid and the more Brandon spends time with Hoid the less interesting he becomes.

Hoid was just set up too well as a mysterious figure, and the Chapter Epigraph Letters and the "you must not trust yourself with me..." was too good for anything that follows to live up to, I think... though, we haven't really had the payoff yet, so I'm still fascinated to learn more.  If nothing else, I want to see him get wrecked kind of like how I want to see Moash, Navani, Bavadin, and Sja-anat get wrecked.  Freaking Lerasium-stealing !#%@$%@#$%.

Wait, no, I just remembered the Hoid/Jasnah chapters.... gaaaah, no.  Less Hoid is better, less Hoid is better, less Hoid is better.

Kaladin isn't written for me, he's written for my cousin, like many of The Stormlight Archive's characters are, and as much as I talk smack on them, I do so knowing that my cousin loves them in the same way that I love Mistborn's crew.  Making my cousin happy in real life > any bad thing you do in fiction, cause Real Life > Fiction.

Szeth, yes.  Szeth and Steris think in my thought-patterns sometimes in ways that no other fictional characters ever have, making them fascinating and unique.  A lot of my beef with The Stormlight Archive is that it does Szeth dirty in Wind And Truth.

On 2/6/2026 at 6:04 PM, Immortal Platypus said:

And for the record, while WOBs are of a lesser canonical status, they are still canon (or pseudo-canon (as they sometimes contradict)). I understand you don't like that, and I understand your reasons for it (I believe, you might have more that I haven't read), but I would caution against ignoring them. 

Yeah, ignoring them is a setup for getting proven wrong later.  Good point, Immortal Platypus.

Edited February 8 by Aliroz-The-Confused

[therunner he/him]

15 hours ago, Qianweilian said:

Honestly, this is an astoundingly good point. The only real struggling Radiants in negotiations are Dalinar and Jasnah, one of whom who eventually convinces everyone anyways, and the other is debated by a god who attacks her philosophy and leaves her crying (at least internally). Kaladin converts Szeth to his mental health crusade in a matter of days, something that often takes years—or at least months—in the real world. Shallan gains the service of deserters about to attack her caravan, Navani convinces the Sibling in days (although I’ll excuse that one, as it was a life-or-death situation for the Sibling), etc. 

In Mistborn, negotiation is much harder. Yeden, while bought into Kelsier’s plan, goes rogue and decimates the skaa army. Jastes is unconvinced by Elend to take the koloss away (and is later executed by Elend, but not relevant), Cett only came over after Vin forced him to swear allegiance, Zane had to be killed by Vin, Yomen only after the koloss started killing everyone, etc. Miles is never convinced by Wax, nor his uncle, nor Telsin, and only got to use the Malwish ship after showing off the Bands of Mourning. 

I mean, if you count Yeden (who barely appears on screen) going rogue as example of difficulty of negotiations, then Radiants struggle far more.

• Dalinar never convinces either Elhokar or most of the Highprinces in first two books
• Kaladin takes months to convince people in mortal danger to...try and do something about it
• Oathbringer is an entire book about Radiants negotiating to get support
  • So just on raw page count (and time spent on it in-world) there is more negotion going on than in Era 1 as whole
• Coalition then slowly fragments over the course of RoW and WAT, an example of failure to convince others
  • Herdaz joins Coalition solely because they lost on their own, and Coalition promises them support in re-taking their homeland (so not so much convinced as the only option)
  • Numerous lands of Azir leave, Shinovar is never convinced, Ishar is not convinced to support Coalition etc.

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This might be right too. Jasnah is “yay, democracy” and “we will have an elected senate and a ministerial exemplar” while doing absolute monarch mode. Elend grapples with the failures of his attempted democracy, and even respects losing until the world ending makes that impossible for a democracy to function effectively in a world that was ruled by an immortal dictator for a millennium.

I would say Jasnah is constantly portrayed as 'meaning well, but her choice of methods bites her backside', similar to Elend in book 1 and 2, except morally 'opposite'. 

• TWoK - Jasnah is the narrative antagonist for most of the book, and portrayed as a overlooking the more human aspects of people around her
• O - Jasnah is the voice of extreme action, and opposed by the moral core of the cast Kaladin and Syl
• RoW - Jasnah removes her political opposition (the duel), but in such a way that it horrifies even Dalinar (and all others present)
• WAT - we all know

So I would say that Jasnah is semi-constantly criticized by the books, for the methods she uses to get her goals. This can be contrasted with Elend:

• Where Elend was naive and overly trusting (leading to him being deposed), Jasnah is cynical and trust no one (leading to her being abandoned by her ally).
• Elend had to learn to be harsher as ruler (executing his former friend, and then ruling as absolute monarch backed by the power of Koloss armies), Jasnah has to learn the opposite how to be less harsh (IMO at least).

Basically, we saw full arc of Elend, going from naive ideologue to much harsher but effective ruler.
With Jasnah, we are at best in the middle of the arc, likely not even that (considering the relative page-time).

5 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

No, that's how modernity insists all governments work (and modernity insists that that's how all governments always worked), because if it wasn't the legitimacy of all modern governance would be threatened. 

Spoilered for tedious rambling.

  Reveal hidden contents

 

The idea that all governance is based on power and only on power is a construction invented to keep the anarchists (who would be much more of a hindrance to the powers that be if they figured out how perceived legitimacy, aesthetics, approval, and all the other things that social structures are based on actually work) and their spiritual twins the authoritarians (who would be much more of a hindrance to to the powers that be if they remembered that authority can derive from things other than power) under control.  Basically, the Neutral alignments teaming up to play the Lawful and Chaotic alignments against one another.

 

Pre-modern authorities almost invariably acknowledged greater authorities (most often God or gods).  Pre-modern cultures almost invariably had unwritten laws/customs/traditions that were beyond the capacity of any governing authority to change.

Modernity didn't invent the idea of having checks on the secularly powerful, it destroyed the idea by removing the checks that existed (often in the forms of organized religious hierarchies), placing extreme military capacity in the hands of centralized power structures to the point no resistance was possible, dissolving taboos against atrocity, fragmenting individual-based tyranny into committee-based tyranny (much harder to kill two rulers than one, and far harder than that to kill a dozen, and far harder than that to kill a hundred), inventing widespread information dispersion in easily-controlled forms, and teaching that reason was the only virtue (removing Pathos and Ethos from decision-making, leaving only Logos).  Then, after nearly destroying itself through the generations of its own nonsense, it slowly reconstructed the idea that there need to be guardrails for power structures.  Then, to spare itself embarrassment, it constructed a progress narrative where all of humanity prior to the last tiny sliver was Terrible and Less Civilized Than Us Now and Didn't Know Better, just in case anybody still had the nerve to question whether the ancients might have been on to something.

This sort of badness is the very thing that the Fantasy, the Western, and the Sci-fi are escapes from, and it has no business being in a fantasy book series.  It is also the sort of thing that the Kholins do, which is why they are so thoroughly redefining their world to no longer be a fantasy world, and their books to not be fantasy.  They enslave the fairies because the wild and free fairyland is a world that does not, on the thematic and emotional level, support their modernist desires for unchecked power and progress.  They create systems where organized religion is powerless because a world where the high priestess can tell the Emperor to go pound sand because a servant of the gods outranks a king of men is a world where something exists that is greater than the Kholins.  They renounce oaths and introduce soulless pragmatism because a world where "because I made a promise" is justification in itself is a world where there exists some transcendental Right and Wrong to which the Kholins may be found lacking.

At the end of Wind and Truth they have succeeded in getting Cultivation to scram (vanquishing the mother dragon from her hoard/treasure/world), making Honor and Odium the same enemy (a rival modernist, Taravangian, rather than the ancient mythical evil of Rayse), and banishing the Evil Spirit Of Excess Emotion (Nergaoul/the Thrill) while tentatively negotiating with the Rebellious Spirit Of Enlightenment (Sja-anat).  Truly, a masterful colonization of fairyland.

Further, they have subordinated the will of what divinity remains (the Sibling) to their own ends (so as to have free access to Towerlight without worrying about whether or not The Sibling will or can object to what they do-- no higher moral authority remains to judge the Radiants, no greater authority remains to ask anything of them, the only god remaining is the Enemy God).  They have made Roshar a world where Lift cannot remain an innocent child, where Chasmfiends are all but extinct, where the artificial machine for indoor lighting and heating replaces the hearth and the instant message replaces the single brave messenger on horseback, and where a growing bureaucracy manages the transition from the days of warrior-kings and prophecies to the days of nation-states and the scientific method.

 

I mean, it is how governments functioned historically as well. 
Ruling by 'grace of <insert relevant deity>' is nice and all, but unless you have physical means of holding on to power, you won't. Just look at numerous civilizations that no longer exist, because they got conquered by their neighbors.

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The idea that all governance is based on power and only on power is a construction invented to keep the anarchists (who would be much more of a hindrance to the powers that be if they figured out how perceived legitimacy, aesthetics, approval, and all the other things that social structures are based on actually work) and their spiritual twins the authoritarians (who would be much more of a hindrance to to the powers that be if they remembered that authority can derive from things other than power) under control.  Basically, the Neutral alignments teaming up to play the Lawful and Chaotic alignments against one another.

Anarchist though is fundamentally utopian, if those ideas worked in praxis, governments would never arise in the first place.

The world was as anarchist want it to be, back in pre-historic times, since laws and governments are invented. Our world is the natural conclusion of anarchist thoughts, they are fundamentally self-refuting.

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Modernity didn't invent the idea of having checks on the secularly powerful, it destroyed the idea by removing the checks that existed (often in the forms of organized religious hierarchies), placing extreme military capacity in the hands of centralized power structures to the point no resistance was possible, dissolving taboos against atrocity,

Most civilizations throughout history were literally theocracies, so religious power didn't exist as a check on political power it existed to support political power.

So in history religious hierarchies were the centralized power structures that possessed extreme military capacity, and suppressed any resistance with extreme prejudice and atrocity.

For atrocities, feel free to reference any number of pogroms and genocides done to members of non-dominant religions.

So claiming that religions were a guard against atrocity is a bit laughable, when often they were the drivers of atrocities.

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Or, in other words, nuh-uh!  Authority's not just power.  I got... metaphors and stuff... and feelings about fairytales.  Just wait, it's gonna be a whole thing when some cool monarchs show up instead of these Kholin upstarts.

I do agree that authority is not just power. 

But authority without power is...pointless. And by power I mean any means of convincing or coercing others to do as the entity with authority wishes. It can be brute force, it can be economic coercion, it can be economic incentive, power of personal charisma, brainwashing, etc.

But ultimately, unless you can convince other people to do as you wish, your authority is meaningless. See Elhokar, on paper the highest authority, in praxis..yeah.


EDIT:
 

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They create systems where organized religion is powerless because a world where the high priestess can tell the Emperor to go pound sand because a servant of the gods outranks a king of men is a world where something exists that is greater than the Kholins. 

Such world basically never existed, often king was the personification of gods on earth, and so outranked everyone.

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They renounce oaths and introduce soulless pragmatism because a world where "because I made a promise" is justification in itself is a world where there exists some transcendental Right and Wrong to which the Kholins may be found lacking.

Did you completely miss all the Adolin sections in WAT? 

Because they literally say that same thing, and it is a Kholin who says that. That doing something simply ' because I made a promise ' is literally said and done by Adolin.

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Further, they have subordinated the will of what divinity remains (the Sibling) to their own ends (so as to have free access to Towerlight without worrying about whether or not The Sibling will or can object to what they do-- no higher moral authority remains to judge the Radiants, no greater authority remains to ask anything of them, the only god remaining is the Enemy God). 

Alternative being that the divinity what remains would be killed. And that divinity chose to do this, instead of the alternative.

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They have made Roshar a world where Lift cannot remain an innocent child,

Roshar (and history) was never a place where Lift could remain an innocent child, such is a reality of the fact that all grow up.

And the hints we have of her past all point in the direction that LIft lost her innocence even before meeting Cultivation, and this was her attempt to get it back/hold on to it, despite all that happened to her. 

But you can't go back into the past.

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where the artificial machine for indoor lighting and heating replaces the hearth and the instant message replaces the single brave messenger on horseback,

Because more convenience and safety is bad?

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and where a growing bureaucracy manages the transition from the days of warrior-kings and prophecies to the days of nation-states and the scientific method.

How are the days of warrior-kings and prophecies better? 
Is it the wars for glory of king/god? 
Or the high infant mortality? 

 

Edited February 7 by therunner

[Qianweilian He/him]

6 hours ago, therunner said:

Such world basically never existed, often king was the personification of gods on earth, and so outranked everyone.

I mean, it arguably existed, but only because of power dynamics and less of a matter of outranking or religion. The Roman Emperor was even the Pontifex Maximus.

12 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

What do you mean, "her book"?

Afaik, Jasnah is confirmed to be the flashback character for one of the books in the back half of Stormlight.

12 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

No, that's how modernity insists all governments work (and modernity insists that that's how all governments always worked), because if it wasn't the legitimacy of all modern governance would be threatened. 

No, that's fundamentally how all governments work. Julius Caesar lost power because he lost the support of the Senate. The Roman Emperors lost the West because they didn't have the power to keep hold of it from the Germanic tribes. Every dynastic change in China, the Emperor lost support from his crucial supporters.

The supporters or even the ruler as a result of this may not always be the most pragmatic, they may care about religion and legitimacy, but power is always pragmatic, ruthless, and unforgiving. If you have enough supporters to enforce your decrees, then they are followed. If you don't, then they are not.

[therunner he/him]

1 hour ago, Qianweilian said:

I mean, it arguably existed, but only because of power dynamics and less of a matter of outranking or religion. The Roman Emperor was even the Pontifex Maximus.

True. Though emperor being also the highest religious office inherently means that high priest can't really tell emperor to go pound sand, that is just emperor changing his mind.

If the religious order was the highest power, they usually also were the highest secular power as well, e.g. Papal states.

But yes, the actual power dynamics are more complicated than these blanket statements.

Edited February 7 by therunner

[Qianweilian He/him]

2 hours ago, therunner said:

But yes, the actual power dynamics are more complicated than these blanket statements.

See the investiture controversy. (Although that’s a bit different for a lot of reasons).

[therunner he/him]

18 minutes ago, Qianweilian said:

See the investiture controversy. (Although that’s a bit different for a lot of reasons).

Interesting, I have never heard of that.
Down the rabbit hole I go! 

Thank you.

[Aliroz-The-Confused]

15 hours ago, therunner said:

Most civilizations throughout history were literally theocracies, so religious power didn't exist as a check on political power it existed to support political power.

So in history religious hierarchies were the centralized power structures that possessed extreme military capacity, and suppressed any resistance with extreme prejudice and atrocity.

For atrocities, feel free to reference any number of pogroms and genocides done to members of non-dominant religions.

So claiming that religions were a guard against atrocity is a bit laughable, when often they were the drivers of atrocities.

I'll grant that religions have been drivers of atrocities if you'll grant that they've been guards against atrocities.  I'll acknowledge the wrongs done by theocracies if you'll acknowledge the wrongs done by secular regimes.  I'll concede the flaws of the pre-modern world and credit the better qualities of the modern world if you concede the flaws of the modern world and credit the better qualities of the pre-modern world.  I'm not claiming equivalence, but if you're going to be black-and-white about this than I will as well.

I'll also point out that many of those pogroms and genocides were done by secular regimes, with an example of non-dominant religions being subjected to such under a secular regime being the expulsion of the Latter-day Saints from the United States in the nineteenth century.  Other examples may be seen in the history of many communist societies.

15 hours ago, therunner said:

Ruling by 'grace of <insert relevant deity>' is nice and all, but unless you have physical means of holding on to power, you won't. Just look at numerous civilizations that no longer exist, because they got conquered by their neighbors.

Many civilizations that were conquered lasted longer than our current civilizations have lasted.  Many of those civilizations that conquered them also ended, sometimes surprisingly quickly after such conquests.  This, I think, applies in the Cosmere as well. Recall who the last holdouts against The Final Empire were.  I'll accept that a physical means of holding on to power is necessary in order to maintain power, but I think you ought to acknowledge that it is not necessarily sufficient.

I guess my point is that power is foundational to these kinds of authority, but other things can be foundational to such authority in addition to power.  By the time of Wind And Truth, the Kholins have removed (more or less) all foundation for their own authority other than power, and thus, when faced with Taravangian's greater power, Jasnah has (essentially) nothing else to fall back on (or, at least nothing else that can compel Fen to obligation against Taravangian).

In my opinion, the Kholin monarchy is in some ways unsettlingly similar to many antagonist factions in fiction, with one of the crucial differences being that their invasion isn't against the main characters' homes.

15 hours ago, therunner said:

How are the days of warrior-kings and prophecies better? 
Is it the wars for glory of king/god? 
Or the high infant mortality? 

How are the nightmares of modernity better?

Is it the wars?  The desolation of the African, Australian, and American continents?

Or the mortality caused by the various leads, microplastics, carcinogens, and other products of progress (smoking, industrialization, pollution), as well as the mortality factor of automobile travel?

Perhaps these are less awful than the awfulness that could be found in the world that preceded our modernity, but I don't think it's inarguable.  I'd think it might be more accurate to say that as problems are solved, new problems are created (often lesser, more manageable problems, but sometimes horrors as bad as any in history).  I'll grant that the tradeoffs are worth it (I certainly wouldn't choose to go back all those centuries) if you'll grant that there were tradeoffs, but if you're going to be black-and-white with a progress narrative then I will happily be black-and-white with the opposite.

 

Besides, my point was that the transition to modernity represents something traumatic and violent, a loss of the wonder and magnificence of much of what the Creator had made, and most of all, in the context of The Stormlight Archive, a colonization of fairyland and Fantasy.  Usually the kind of stuff that Fantasy's about preventing, avoiding, or escaping from.

Edited February 7 by Aliroz-The-Confused

[Qianweilian He/him]

7 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

I'll grant that religions have been drivers of atrocities if you'll grant that they've been guards against atrocities.  I'll acknowledge the wrongs done by theocracies if you'll acknowledge the wrongs done by secular regimes.

Like any societal structure in history. Things are rarely only good or only bad. But, yes. Religion can be both.

7 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

I'll also point out that many of those pogroms and genocides were done by secular regimes, with an example of non-dominant religions being subjected to such under a secular regime being the expulsion of the Latter-day Saints from the United States in the nineteenth century. Other examples may be seen in the history of many communist societies.

Point taken, but much of that was due to religious differences. And yeah, communists did this all the time as well.

7 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

Many civilizations that were conquered lasted longer than our current civilizations have lasted.

Of course, power and support shift quickly. That's why it's important to maintain support and military power, something these ancient civilizations were very good at. (Until they weren't) Also, just because someone's rule is stable, doesn't mean it's good in the long term. Many leaders and their supporters are fine to feast on the country while leaving only scraps to their successors.

7 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

I'll accept that a physical means of holding on to power is necessary in order to maintain power, but I think you ought to acknowledge that it is not necessarily sufficient.

It's true that you don't necessarily need a big stick to rule. You just need to keep support among those that matter. If the bureaucrats are loyal to you, the tax revenue flows your way, and the army doesn't oppose you openly, your regime is safe.

7 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

I'd think it might be more accurate to say that as problems are solved, new problems are created (often lesser, more manageable problems, but sometimes horrors as bad as any in history).  I'll grant that the tradeoffs are worth it (I certainly wouldn't choose to go back all those centuries) if you'll grant that there were tradeoffs

Of course, but generally things are better. Instead of widespread poverty and strife, we have significantly less widespread poverty and strife. (But still an awful lot)

7 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

Besides, my point was that the transition to modernity represents something traumatic and violent, a loss of the wonder and magnificence of much of what the Creator had made, and most of all, in the context of The Stormlight Archive, a colonization of fairyland and Fantasy.  Usually the kind of stuff that Fantasy's about preventing, avoiding, or escaping from.

Honestly yeah. Despite being entirely fictional, fantasy has a magic to it that sucks you in. I hope the transition to sci-fi will be good, but I can't guarantee it and neither can Brandon. But change, whether traumatic and violent (as it must be sometimes), is inevitable.

A world cannot stand still and repeat the same battles over and over again. Change happens, and sometimes it's sad, but I hope that Brandon will use that change to make something better, just as our characters learn from their mistaken, prejudiced, and cruel ways to become something better.

Right now, they swear oaths, fight immortal dictators, create civilization in an abandoned city, save their planet, and become hypocrites. For a hypocrite is just a man in the process of changing.

[Nitpicking]

8 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

I'll also point out that many of those pogroms and genocides were done by secular regimes, with an example of non-dominant religions being subjected to such under a secular regime being the expulsion of the Latter-day Saints from the United States in the nineteenth century.  Other examples may be seen in the history of many communist societies.

My understanding was that the Saints fled from mob persecution, not because of an official government policy of expulsion (as the Spanish Inquisition [working with the monarchy] did to my cousins, the Jews of Spain).

[Frustration]

10 minutes ago, Nitpicking said:

My understanding was that the Saints fled from mob persecution, not because of an official government policy of expulsion (as the Spanish Inquisition [working with the monarchy] did to my cousins, the Jews of Spain).

Eh, yes and no.

While mobs were the first perpetrators the government of Missouri enabled them, defended them, and when the Saints defended themselves sent the militia in to force the saints out of the State

[Aliroz-The-Confused]

59 minutes ago, Nitpicking said:

My understanding was that the Saints fled from mob persecution, not because of an official government policy of expulsion (as the Spanish Inquisition [working with the monarchy] did to my cousins, the Jews of Spain).

Missouri Executive Order 44 fits under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide's definition of genocide, which is as Raphael Lemkin, who first coined the term, defined it.  Specifically, articles 2a, 2b, and 2c, applying in the context of a religious group.

I hesitate to elaborate further, as this crosses from history into my own family history, and people whose children later knew and were remembered by my own grandparents' generation (including my maternal grandmother, whom I grew up two houses away from, whose great-grandmother she remembered from her childhood, said great-grandmother being the daughter of individuals driven from Missouri under Missouri Executive Oder 44), and I do not wish to misrepresent such events.

This is highly sensitive ground, and, it being so, I advise that caution, discretion, and care be taken when discussing such matters.

Edited February 8 by Aliroz-The-Confused

[therunner he/him]

12 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

I'll grant that religions have been drivers of atrocities if you'll grant that they've been guards against atrocities. 
I'll acknowledge the wrongs done by theocracies if you'll acknowledge the wrongs done by secular regimes. 
 I'll concede the flaws of the pre-modern world and credit the better qualities of the modern world if you concede the flaws of the modern world and credit the better qualities of the pre-modern world. 

I'm not claiming equivalence, but if you're going to be black-and-white about this than I will as well.

I will grant you that they likely did at some point in history, as history is not black and white.
But I won't grant that religions have acted systematically as guards against atrocities.

I don't have problem acknowledging  wrongs done by secular regime, my grandparents and parents grew up under communism, my great-grandparents were killed by Nazis in concentration camps.

Were there places where pre-modern world was better? Sure maybe the smaller connectivity, slower pace most of the time, smaller disparity of power between classes. But I would never want to be born in the pre-modern world than in the modern one. I would be dead in pre-modern world few days after birth, and ~30% of people didn't live past age 15. 

Fundamentally, religion (IMO) is neither force for good or for bad, it's just a force. It depends what people do with it. 
I was never black and white about it, I was just pushing back on the assertion that religions acted as a systemic check on secular power, when that simply wasn't the case.
 

Quote

I'll also point out that many of those pogroms and genocides were done by secular regimes, with an example of non-dominant religions being subjected to such under a secular regime being the expulsion of the Latter-day Saints from the United States in the nineteenth century.  Other examples may be seen in the history of many communist societies.

I am very well aware of what secular regimes can do yes (see above about my famiily history).
That is why I never claimed they are somehow perfect, only that historically it was religions that primarily drove atrocities. 

But I would caution against thinking that in those same situations, theocracies would be somehow better. Just look at Iran.
Modern regimes have more power available, so what they can do is necessarily 'greater' in scale, than what people did in past. But that doesn't mean that past people wouldn't use those tools in the same (or simimlar) way, had they had them.

For more extreme example, would Nazis focus so much on Jews, if it were not for ~2 millennia of religious persecution?

Ultimately, we are still relatively new to the 'secular' thing as a world, as well as to equal democracies (women started to get voting rights mere century ago). So separating which woes are fully fault of secular structures, which are growing pains, and which are holdovers from more religious times, is impossible to say.
 

Quote

Many civilizations that were conquered lasted longer than our current civilizations have lasted.  Many of those civilizations that conquered them also ended, sometimes surprisingly quickly after such conquests.  This, I think, applies in the Cosmere as well. Recall who the last holdouts against The Final Empire were.  I'll accept that a physical means of holding on to power is necessary in order to maintain power, but I think you ought to acknowledge that it is not necessarily sufficient.

Yes, most things move 'slower' in the past, for better and worse. 
But this is not a point at all, point is that unless you can back authority by power, you cease to have authority.

What motivates you to hold on to power is separate question.

Note that I consider organized religions to be a form of power in and of itself, as it allows you to move and coordinate larger masses of people (see e.g. crusades).

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I guess my point is that power is foundational to these kinds of authority, but other things can be foundational to such authority in addition to power. 

I do agree with the this.

Quote

By the time of Wind And Truth, the Kholins have removed (more or less) all foundation for their own authority other than power, and thus, when faced with Taravangian's greater power, Jasnah has (essentially) nothing else to fall back on (or, at least nothing else that can compel Fen to obligation against Taravangian).

I would disagree here. 
I don't think Kholins ever had anything other than power backing their authority. 

Alethkar as united political entity is ~30 years old by the time of SA1, they are extremely new regime. And it was created by conquest, nothing else. They slightly undermined the assertion that lighteyes are better than darkeyes, but still have power inside Alethkar.

Jasnah's failure to negotiate with Fen is more her own personal failing than failing of Kholins as a whole. She never had anything that could compel Fen, she could always only ask. And since Jasnah disregards anything she deems 'irrational', she had nothing to say against Taravangian.

Quote

In my opinion, the Kholin monarchy is in some ways unsettlingly similar to many antagonist factions in fiction, with one of the crucial differences being that their invasion isn't against the main characters' homes.

The way they got power is very unsettling, though basically in line with how most monarchies got power. 
They had bigger stick. 

Even today that is the sad truth of the world.

12 hours ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

How are the nightmares of modernity better?

Is it the wars?  The desolation of the African, Australian, and American continents.

Wars that have been happening constantly throughout pre-modern times as well? 
Speaking specifically for Europe the 80 years since WW2 have been the most peaceful time ever for this part of the world. It wasn't perfect of course.

And why do you exclude Europe from the desolation of continents? It is one of the more desolate ones by some metrics (e.g. most original forests being cut down for example, though we are slowly starting to restore the wilds).

Quote

Or the mortality caused by the various leads, microplastics, carcinogens, and other products of progress (smoking, industrialization, pollution), as well as the mortality factor of automobile travel?

You mean mortality which is lowest in history in vast majority  of the world?  Pre-modern mortality was such that 30% of children never lived past 15.

Romans had lead poisoning, and likely so did many other civilizations in history. People smoked in history as well.

Microplastics, pollution are now new problems, yes.

Travel always had risks associated with it (weather, bandits, accidents), today those are immensely lesser than they were.

Quote

  I'd think it might be more accurate to say that as problems are solved, new problems are created (often lesser, more manageable problems, but sometimes horrors as bad as any in history).  I'll grant that the tradeoffs are worth it (I certainly wouldn't choose to go back all those centuries) if you'll grant that there were tradeoffs, but if you're going to be black-and-white with a progress narrative then I will happily be black-and-white with the opposite.

Again, I was never black-and-white about it, I was pushing back on your assertion that pre-modernity was somehow universally better.  If you didn't mean it like that, than I misunderstood your point, and I apologize.

I do agree that as problems are solved, some new ones are created, in exactly the way you say.

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Besides, my point was that the transition to modernity represents something traumatic and violent, a loss of the wonder and magnificence of much of what the Creator had made,

While I agree that the transition to modernity can be difficult, I would hesitate to call it traumatic and violent. 

The loss of wonder is there, which we can see even in e.g. art history, by romantic movements.

But personally, I see more wonder in today's world, than in premodern one. There I would be awed by lighting,  or by a majestic storm, which I would not understand. Today I am awed by those things, but I also posses understanding, which (again for me) magnifies the awe.  

And we know much more about universe, so there are even more things to wonder at. Pre-modern man could never wonder at photos of other planets, sound of black holes merging, etc.

So I would argue today we see (and can be awed by) more of what the Creater made, and our better understanding of the creation can bring us closer. If one believes in some form of Creator of course.

Quote

and most of all, in the context of The Stormlight Archive, a colonization of fairyland and Fantasy.  Usually the kind of stuff that Fantasy's about preventing, avoiding, or escaping from.

Well, Sanderson in many comments about Cosmere was pretty clear that his major goal is exactly this transition. 
That he dislikes how fantasy is always stuck in medieval stasis of sort, and that he wants to have the world progress. 

We see it in Stormlight, and we see it in Mistborn as well, both of these are doing the same thing. It's just that in Stormlight we get closer more intimate look on how that progress happens, whereas in Mistborn we jump over it.
 

Edited February 8 by therunner

[Qianweilian He/him]

6 hours ago, therunner said:

Were there places where pre-modern world was better? Sure maybe the smaller connectivity, slower pace most of the time, smaller disparity of power between classes. But I would never want to be born in the pre-modern world than in the modern one. I would be dead in pre-modern world few days after birth, and ~30% of people didn't live past age 15. 

Yeah, history sucks.

6 hours ago, therunner said:

Fundamentally, religion (IMO) is neither force for good or for bad, it's just a force. It depends what people do with it. 
I was never black and white about it, I was just pushing back on the assertion that religions acted as a systemic check on secular power, when that simply wasn't the case.

A religion is made up of the people in it. This can be good or bad. runner here is right.

6 hours ago, therunner said:

I would disagree here. 
I don't think Kholins ever had anything other than power backing their authority. 

Alethkar as united political entity is ~30 years old by the time of SA1, they are extremely new regime. And it was created by conquest, nothing else. They slightly undermined the assertion that lighteyes are better than darkeyes, but still have power inside Alethkar.

Jasnah's failure to negotiate with Fen is more her own personal failing than failing of Kholins as a whole. She never had anything that could compel Fen, she could always only ask. And since Jasnah disregards anything she deems 'irrational', she had nothing to say against Taravangian.

I agree with therunner here. There’s a reason why Dalinar had to go to the rift.

6 hours ago, therunner said:

While I agree that the transition to modernity can be difficult, I would hesitate to call it traumatic and violent. 

I'll agree with Aliroz here, it often is traumatic and violent. We have been thrown into modernity by revolutions, wars, battles, etc. Even the quiet march of industrialization leaves those who relied on the old world aside. Many of the technological advances we have come from the world wars. The modern concept of democracy came from the French and American Revolutions. While not as violent, many modern day fixtures only came about as a result of the Cold War. Even the internet—the foundation of modern economy, society, politics, and more—was originally a military project to address communication vulnerabilities. Transition to modernity is a good thing, but it often is “traumatic and violent."

6 hours ago, therunner said:

The loss of wonder is there, which we can see even in e.g. art history, by romantic movements.

But personally, I see more wonder in today's world, than in premodern one. There I would be awed by lighting,  or by a majestic storm, which I would not understand. Today I am awed by those things, but I also posses understanding, which (again for me) magnifies the awe.  

And we know much more about universe, so there are even more things to wonder at. Pre-modern man could never wonder at photos of other planets, sound of black holes merging, etc.

So I would argue today we see (and can be awed by) more of what the Creater made, and our better understanding of the creation can bring us closer. If one believes in some form of Creator of course.

I agree with therunner here, but I still think wizards are really cool. (even though they never existed)

6 hours ago, therunner said:

Well, Sanderson in many comments about Cosmere was pretty clear that his major goal is exactly this transition. 
That he dislikes how fantasy is always stuck in medieval stasis of sort, and that he wants to have the world progress. 

We see it in Stormlight, and we see it in Mistborn as well, both of these are doing the same thing. It's just that in Stormlight we get closer more intimate look on how that progress happens, whereas in Mistborn we jump over it.

We will see. (see my previous comment for more comments) I also think he got a some of this idea from WoT.

Wheel of Time Spoilers

Spoiler

Near the end of the series, early cannons (known as “dragons”) are developed and used. One character even has a vision of a possible future (which she resolves to prevent and is more technologically advanced). The very nature of the Wheel and the ages require some technological advancement by themselves, as we have to reach the first age somehow. (The first age is our age)

 

[therunner he/him]

1 hour ago, Qianweilian said:

I'll agree with Aliroz here, it often is traumatic and violent. We have been thrown into modernity by revolutions, wars, battles, etc. Even the quiet march of industrialization leaves those who relied on the old world aside. Many of the technological advances we have come from the world wars. The modern concept of democracy came from the French and American Revolutions. While not as violent, many modern day fixtures only came about as a result of the Cold War. Even the internet—the foundation of modern economy, society, politics, and more—was originally a military project to address communication vulnerabilities. Transition to modernity is a good thing, but it often is “traumatic and violent."

The reason I'd hesitate to call the transition to modernity 'traumatic and violent' is because historical events as a whole are often traumatic and violent.  Is transition to modernity more traumatic and violent than Crusades? Fall of Ottoman or Roman empires? Reconquista?  Any number of plagues?

So since it (IMO) doesn't fall outside of the 'trauma scope' of what happens when historical events are ongoing, I wouldn't call it traumatic and violent, at least not more so than any dozens of things that were happening in pre-modern times anyway. In fact, I would say it is much less traumatic and violent than any number of large historical events.

And if those numerous traumatic things were happening in pre-modern times, than transition to modernity is not particular noteworthy IMO. If you would call most changes in history traumatic and violent, then well, it is at that point just description of history, not a property of transition to modernity.

1 hour ago, Qianweilian said:

We will see. (see my previous comment for more comments) I also think he got a some of this idea from WoT.

Wheel of Time Spoilers

  Reveal hidden contents

Near the end of the series, early cannons (known as “dragons”) are developed and used. One character even has a vision of a possible future (which she resolves to prevent and is more technologically advanced). The very nature of the Wheel and the ages require some technological advancement by themselves, as we have to reach the first age somehow. (The first age is our age)

 

While WoT hint at these things ( and I loved those parts ), it never really explore them in particular depth, which is where I think Sanderson intends to differentiate himself.

Edited February 8 by therunner

[Qianweilian He/him]

1 hour ago, therunner said:

While WoT hint at these things ( and I loved those parts ), it never really explore them in particular depth, which is where I think Sanderson intends to differentiate himself.

It's a real shame we never got those outrigger novels. It's hard to portray advancement when the entire series is only like a year.

[Born of Mist He/Him]

On 6/11/2025 at 6:30 PM, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

NOTE:  This is all theory and speculation and opinion.

So, I realized that there is chouta on Scadrial, and I figure that those red-haired people who keep getting mentioned are Herdazians, and that means that there is a population of Rosharans living on Scadrial, and that means that there's no hope for the Scadrians, and that makes me sad.

I don't really want to see the Scadrians become slaves again.  I don't want to see species go extinct on Scadrial again.  I don't want the children of Ashyn to claim, desecrate, and then leave a THIRD world.

It's what's going to happen, though.  We're going to get Navani Kholin XVIII telling a first-generation Kandra that she's "just as native" as any Kandra.  We're going to see everything unique and interesting about Scadrial get commodified, made extinct, enslaved, exploited, trafficked, forgotten, or repurposed.  Because that's what they did to Roshar.  That's what Navani and Jasnah did to Roshar.  That's what the good guys, the honorable faction, of the Rosharan system, do.  None of what I describe is appreciably worse than what has already been done on Roshar, it's just that we never had a bunch of books to learn to care about the Listeners and the Spren in the way that we had for the Scadrians.

Slavery is no stranger to Rosharan societies.  Navani herself is innovating new ways to subordinate Spren to her whims and the material needs of humanity, and she's one we're supposed to be rooting for.

The Lord Ruler oppressed the Skaa for so, so long.  A millennia.  It has only been about three or four centuries that the Skaa have been free since then, that the Terris have not been selectively trafficking and breeding themselves just to stay alive.  And the Set, serving Bavadin, do the same thing with the ones they take.  Because that is what happens when outside Shards take an interest in Scadrial.

One can only hope that Scadrians are not interfertile with non-Scadrian humans, or else... eugh.  No way is anybody going to let them have reproductive autonomy, not when Feruchemy and Allomancy are genetically passed and the need to oppose Retribution is so great.  The Terris will probably go back to how they were in the times of the Lord Ruler, as will the Skaa.

And, honestly?  That's probably going to utterly break Kelsier and Harmony... especially Harmony, considering Tindwyl...  That's probably how we get Discord and why they will love him for it.

Because the Scadrians rejected Bavadin.  They rejected Autonomy, and stayed true to Harmony.  True to Ruin and Preservation.  And you can't reject Autonomy in favor of Harmony without repercussions, without an exploration of what it means to choose Harmony.

The Scadrians will, I predict, accept the Rosharans, as the Listeners and Spren did.  And they will end up just as the Listeners and Spren have.  Because they must.  Because it is the right thing to do.  Because the Rosharans in question are refugees, and that is worth everything.  The worth of a world, of a society, of a people, is in how they treat such.  To not accept the Rosharans would be to lose something irreplaceable and eternal.  Something worth more than freedom, more than autonomy, more than life, more than the world.  

For what shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his soul?

What if Hoid made chouta because he was bored and it caught on?

[Aliroz-The-Confused]

5 hours ago, therunner said:

The reason I'd hesitate to call the transition to modernity 'traumatic and violent' is because historical events as a whole are often traumatic and violent.  Is transition to modernity more traumatic and violent than Crusades? Fall of Ottoman or Roman empires? Reconquista?  Any number of plagues?

So since it (IMO) doesn't fall outside of the 'trauma scope' of what happens when historical events are ongoing, I wouldn't call it traumatic and violent, at least not more so than any dozens of things that were happening in pre-modern times anyway. In fact, I would say it is much less traumatic and violent than any number of large historical events.

I vehemently disagree.  And if you're going to present your views as incontrovertible truth, then so shall I.  It is tedious for me to always have to defend my views, put qualifiers on what I say, and constantly point out that my opinions are opinions, while others are allowed to express subjective appraisals without requiring such qualifiers (at least, not as often).

What you see as the norm in history is the worst nightmares of short transitional periods, well-recorded because they were exceptions.  It is like how every plane crash ever is remembered, photographed, and publicized, leading people to think that air travel is unsafe when such things are the exception.

The transition to modernity is uniquely awful, violent, and traumatic because it represents the time when after all the guardrails were removed and before the new ones were installed.  It was so terrible that modernity had to invent the Progress Narrative to justify itself, and had to demonize and regard as worthless the entirety of human history before itself by presenting the horrors of modernity's transitonal birthing period as the norm for the human condition.  It more or less constructed the progress narrative so it could say "you don't want to go back to those bad old days, do you?  Do you?  Because that's what would happen without modernity.".

The  genres of Fantasy, Western and Science Fiction are escapes from modernity, and they speak to a desire to see a world not yet stained with such sin.

Heck, a lot of the appeal of fantasy is the notion of preventing the transition to modernity inasmuch as such is possible, and preserving what was before.  That's more or less what The Lord Of The Rings is.

The only point where the Kholins could get away with their atrocities and maintain reader sympathy is in this transitional period where there are no rules and no guardrails, where the ancient taboos are gone and honor is dead, but the new rules and new guardrails don't exist yet.  It's the only point where we could go "Oh, the Kholins aren't doing anything unusually evil".

But both in real life and in the cosmere, the invasion of the Shattered Plains would be outside the bounds in any other time period or setting.  Heck, Hallandren and the Fjordell Empire are much, much less evil, and are innocent of atrocities which are evidently normative for at least the Alethi if we judge by their invasion of the Shattered Plains and Unclaimed Hills.

The Kholins are fantasy villains, the kind of people who would get stopped in any other proper fairy-story.  They and Taravangian are essentially the same people (note that Taravangian thinks in Wind And Truth that the only two people he respects are Jasnah and Dalinar).  Their modernization of Roshar is a travesty, and The Stormlight Archive is a funeral dirge for Roshar, a lamentation for Fantasy as it is colonized by nuance, an elegy for Fairyland.

Mister Sanderson might disagree, but that is because he does not understand his own work, and if he dislikes how Fantasy stays in the medieval stasis, it is because he fundamentally does not get (or rather, has forgotten) what Fantasy is or why it's good.

Which is a shame because he wrote one of the great Fantasy series, one of the great fairy-stories, in the original Mistborn trilogy (not that he probably realizes this, or if he knew he has forgotten, but that's on him).  On the plus side, once we get to the Sci-fi part, we're gonna get some awesome sci-fi.

18 hours ago, Qianweilian said:

Honestly yeah. Despite being entirely fictional, fantasy has a magic to it that sucks you in. I hope the transition to sci-fi will be good, but I can't guarantee it and neither can Brandon. But change, whether traumatic and violent (as it must be sometimes), is inevitable.

No, it is not.  This is a context in which I think I am allowed to say that it is not and not be an idiot.  Preservation is a fundamental part of existence in the Cosmere, just as much as Ruin.  Mistborn's greatest appeal to me was that Preservation was presented as something real, true, valid, and meaningful.

The idea that change is inevitable is, in my view, too often used as a way to absolve those who make it happen from any responsibility.  For example, those who deny human causes for climate change.  The whole point of Preservation, I think, is the rejection of the idea that change is inevitable, or, at least, the idea that change, even if inevitable, can and must be delayed and prevented for as long as possible.

Yes, Preservation didn't preserve himself, but it was his plan that succeeded in the trilogy, not Ruin's.  And I think he set things up for long after his death, such that there's a possibility that I'm not absolutely certain to be wrong to guess that maybe the scope of such has not been fully revealed yet.  I can hope, at least, until I'm inevitably proven wrong by new books.

Whimsy is just as fundamental as Reason.  Preservation is just as fundamental as Ruin.  I think if the message of the Cosmere was meant to be "change is inevitable", then Ruin would have won in The Hero Of Ages.

14 hours ago, therunner said:

The loss of wonder is there, which we can see even in e.g. art history, by romantic movements.

But personally, I see more wonder in today's world, than in premodern one. There I would be awed by lighting,  or by a majestic storm, which I would not understand. Today I am awed by those things, but I also posses understanding, which (again for me) magnifies the awe.  

And we know much more about universe, so there are even more things to wonder at. Pre-modern man could never wonder at photos of other planets, sound of black holes merging, etc.

So I would argue today we see (and can be awed by) more of what the Creater made, and our better understanding of the creation can bring us closer. If one believes in some form of Creator of course.

No, wonder is about appreciating that which is not understood (or at least not fully understood).  That's why they call it wonder.

The rain does not need to understand the rain to be the rain.  The sky does not need to understand the heavens to be the universe.

Understanding is unnecessary for existence, for love, for being, and for wonder.  But things that are unnecessary can be the most worthwhile things of all (art is arguably unnecessary in certain views).  It is good to understand, it is a beautiful thing to understand, it is a worthwhile thing and a sacred duty.

But wonder is something different.  An appreciation without understanding.  And that can be beautiful, good, and worthwhile as well.

Often, increased understanding leads to increased wonder, with each answer revealing more questions.  Telescopes and microscopes to see more of what the Creator has made.  But the wonder, I think, does not come from the understanding, but from that which is not (yet) understood.

I don't understand most things, or, rather, I misunderstand most of what I think I understand.  That's why my username is Aliroz the Confused.

4 hours ago, Born of Mist said:

What if Hoid made chouta because he was bored and it caught on?

This is disturbingly beievable, given Hoid's canon disregard, if not utter loathing, for all things Scadrian.

 

Edited February 8 by Aliroz-The-Confused

[Qianweilian He/him]

4 minutes ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

And I think he set things up for long after his death, such that there's a possibility that I'm not absolutely certain to be wrong to guess that maybe the scope of such has not been fully revealed yet.

“His name shall be Discord, and they shall love him for it” (Paraphrasing). I think that, clearly, the Terris prophecies still have more.

5 minutes ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

Whimsy is just as fundamental as Reason.  Preservation is just as fundamental as Ruin.  I think if the message of the Cosmere was meant to be "change is inevitable", then Ruin would have won in The Hero Of Ages.

And yet, Preservation’s favorite ruler was the immortal tyrant. Change for the sake of change is bad, but some change is always necessary.

6 minutes ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

What you see as the norm in history is the worst nightmares of short transitional periods, well-recorded because they were exceptions.  It is like how every plane crash ever is remembered, photographed, and publicized, leading people to think that air travel is unsafe when such things are the exception.

Are they well-recorded because they were exceptions? Or is it easy to believe that they were exceptions because those events are well-recorded? You can name a nearly infinite amount of tragedies, misery, death, and unfairness.

7 minutes ago, Aliroz-The-Confused said:

Heck, a lot of the appeal of fantasy is the notion of preventing the transition to modernity inasmuch as such is possible, and preserving what was before.  That's more or less what The Lord Of The Rings is.

No, I don’t believe it is. Although Tolkien denied it’s war allegory, it very much was influenced by it. LOTR, Silmarillion, everything else in Arda (I want to be cautious) Spoilers:

Spoiler

The elves leave Valinor and go to war. The Silmarils are forever lost. The Two Trees of Valinor were destroyed by Ungoliant. Eventually they leave Middle-Earth too and return to Valinor, resulting in empty forests. The ents lose the entwives, and die out. The rings lose their power or are destroyed. The shire somewhat industrializes, leaving behind the time of the hobbits’ childhoods. It’s also taken over by bandits led by Saruman, destroying much of the Shire. After LOTR, Men forced Hobbits into hiding and killed them for sport. The dwarves disappear into shadow and underground.

[Aliroz-The-Confused]

1 hour ago, Qianweilian said:

“His name shall be Discord, and they shall love him for it” (Paraphrasing). I think that, clearly, the Terris prophecies still have more.

I try not to have anticipation, hype, enthusiasm, excitement, curiosity, or predictions with regards to such things.  My predictions are always wrong, zero of my theories have ever been correct, and my expectations of interesting stuff keep getting met with more love triangles and Good Writing.

If I have only dread, pre-emptive expectation of Good Writing instead of Cool Stuff, and anxiety for the stuff I'm invested in, then either I'll get the incredibly rare satisfaction of being proven right in my guessing or I'll be the opposite of disappointed.

So my projected fulfilment of this prophecy is two paragraphs of Discord before Sazed gets killed via Nightblood and someone else takes up the shard(s).

Prove me wrong, mister Sanderson.  I dare you.

1 hour ago, Qianweilian said:

And yet, Preservation’s favorite ruler was the immortal tyrant. Change for the sake of change is bad, but some change is always necessary.

 

Some change is always necessary, yes, but that doesn't mean some preservation isn't always necessary, too.  The diffrence between "change is inevitable" and "some change is always necessary" is that the latter allows for the idea that some things can be preserved and not changed (while other things are changed and not preserved).  I think that's important.

1 hour ago, Qianweilian said:

Are they well-recorded because they were exceptions? Or is it easy to believe that they were exceptions because those events are well-recorded? You can name a nearly infinite amount of tragedies, misery, death, and unfairness.

Don't tell nobody, I've got a reputation to uphold, but I'm fundamentally optimistic about humanity, and that includes the humans who lived all those years before I did.  I'd rather believe in a nobler estimate of man, and a happier view of the human condition (within the historical and archaeological record's boundaries, of course).

I think about Holocaust memorials, and the necessity of such things (to remember that such might not happen again).  I hope that future historians don't think that that was the rule for our era rather than the exception.

1 hour ago, Qianweilian said:

No, I don’t believe it is. Although Tolkien denied it’s war allegory, it very much was influenced by it. LOTR, Silmarillion, everything else in Arda (I want to be cautious) Spoilers:

  Reveal hidden contents

The elves leave Valinor and go to war. The Silmarils are forever lost. The Two Trees of Valinor were destroyed by Ungoliant. Eventually they leave Middle-Earth too and return to Valinor, resulting in empty forests. The ents lose the entwives, and die out. The rings lose their power or are destroyed. The shire somewhat industrializes, leaving behind the time of the hobbits’ childhoods. It’s also taken over by bandits led by Saruman, destroying much of the Shire. After LOTR, Men forced Hobbits into hiding and killed them for sport. The dwarves disappear into shadow and underground.

Ah, but nothing in Arda set chronologically after The Lord Of The Rings was ever published. (spoilers for caution)

Spoiler

Tolkien left it off with The Lord Of The Rings' bittersweet ending.  The Hobbits kick the bad guys out of the Shire (though much that was lost and destroyed couldn't be fixed, like Bilbo's party tree).  As of the end of The Lord Of The Rings, the Ents are still around, and though not confirmed to be reunited with the Entwives, I always have maintained the old and beloved theory that Sam's mention of his cousin seeing something as big as an elm tree but walking can be taken as a hint that the Entwives survived and might reunite with the Ents.

I think that Tolkien intentionally let his Legendarium not go further chronologically in print than it did so the reader could maintain a sense of hope, and perhaps imagine happier futures than he was able to imagine.

And, well, the bittersweet nature of it is why I said "inasmuch as is possible".

 

Edited February 8 by Aliroz-The-Confused

[Frustration]

4 hours ago, Qianweilian said:

No, I don’t believe it is. Although Tolkien denied it’s war allegory, it very much was influenced by it. LOTR, Silmarillion, everything else in Arda (I want to be cautious) Spoilers:

  Hide contents

The elves leave Valinor and go to war. The Silmarils are forever lost. The Two Trees of Valinor were destroyed by Ungoliant. Eventually they leave Middle-Earth too and return to Valinor, resulting in empty forests. The ents lose the entwives, and die out. The rings lose their power or are destroyed. The shire somewhat industrializes, leaving behind the time of the hobbits’ childhoods. It’s also taken over by bandits led by Saruman, destroying much of the Shire. After LOTR, Men forced Hobbits into hiding and killed them for sport. The dwarves disappear into shadow and underground.

Sorry I wasn't going to get in on this but LOTR is my strongsuit.

Spoiler

The Elves left Valinor, but by the end of LOTR they return, allowing them to spend their lives in the abode of the Valar. Only two of the Silmarils are lost, Earendil still has his at the end. And they aren't lost forever, at the end of Dagor Dagoroth the three Silmarils will be reunited, and Feanor will willingly break them, the two trees will be restored and the Second song of Iluvitar will begin.  With the exception of the Three Rings all were tainted by Sauron to start with, good riddance. And the Shire was specifically off limits to normal humans, even Aragorn, who made the ban, refused to enter but waited for Merry and Pippin outside.

 

And on top of all of this there are still the Third music of the Ainur, the one untainted by Morgoth, and the eventual promise of complete victory for Eru Illuvitar.

 

Edited February 9 by Frustration

[Qianweilian He/him]

Yeah, you clearly got me beat at Arda lore. I need to reread the Silmarillion anyways.

[Aliroz-The-Confused]

See, this is why I love Tolkien, he lets me be right about stuffs sometimes, unlike mean old mister Sanderson.  Good guy John Ronald.