Cognitive Shadows and LDS Theology?

[CognitiveShadow he/him]

So, to preface - I'm not trying to come at LDS beliefs in any way. I grew up very Mormon and did all the things through age 30, so I'm very familiar with the theology and it is something that I draw a lot of parallels to now even though my current worldview is very different.

Now - we talk in the Cosmere about Cognitive Shadows and how the person is replaced by (potentially) a copy of the original made purely of investiture. There is no, and likely never will be any, consensus or confirmation about whether the copy should be considered as a continuation of the original or not. It's possible that when a cognitive shadow is made, the 'soul' of the person moves on to some afterlife or something, and that maybe the 'stretching to the beyond' is just the recycling of investiture as the cognitive shadow is absorbed back into the spiritual realm. We just don't know all the details with that stuff and Brandon has so far suggested he plans to keep the mystery alive there forever.

One thing that many have pointed out on this topic is the continuity of consciousness - if the character 'feels' as though they are the continuation of the same person, with the same memories that the person had... maybe it just doesn't matter if they are an investiture copy. They are sapient, have all those memories, emotions, motivations, etc. That's enough to count them as 'same' in my book. 

Now, as my username suggests, I have always found this concept fascinating. And when I was Mormon, I found the Plan of Salvation fascinating as well. In that plan, it is proposed that we existed as spirit children, living with God for (likely) millennia before we were ready to come down to earth and live as mortals. But why don't we remember that? Well, because a veil of forgetfulness was placed over our minds, hiding those memories and therefore giving us the chance to be tested - to see whether we would obey all of God's commands or if we would choose to be separated from him.

My recent realization: If we came down to earth and had our memories removed, would that not create two separate identities? There is the 'Premortal Me' (PM) who lived for centuries or millennia before coming down to earth. Then there is the 'Mortal Me' (MM) who will - at best - live up to like 90 years old or something. 

If you've seen Severance, you likely know where this is going. But ultimately, my existence as MM is completely separate to PM's existence. It's totally possible that MM and PM would not even get along as friends. And the ultimate goal for this plan was for me to prove that MM would follow all of the commandments, experience suffering and pain and hunger and all that fun stuff (along with, yes, joy and fun and taco Tuesday's)... just so that PM would be able to go on and live eternally - eventually even being exalted to become like God, too.

But when those memories merge... would the 90 years of memories from mortal existence be given the driver's seat of the new 'merged' identity? Somehow, it seems to me that the ancient spirit child would simply absorb the memories and the reward, leaving behind nothing but a shadow of the Mortal Me.

Anyway, super interesting topic, I think. And it comes with plenty of questions - is mortal death then, the 'end' of existence for the MM? It's kind of like how some have suggested there could be (a) a separate 'Beyond' for authentic souls vs cognitive shadows or (b) that both authentic souls and cognitive shadows could both be sent to the Beyond and could even exist together.

Wouldn't that be neat? If we got to continue existing as ourselves when we died instead of being absorbed into the mind of an older being?

But yeah, sorry for the rambles and let me know if you guys have any thoughts! I hope this is ok to post here - I don't have many Sanderson fan friends that I can talk about these ideas with lol

[Returned he/him]

I have zero insight into the particulars of LDS theology, so please forgive any basic errors I might make in that area. But continuity of identity, "self", and personhood are pretty common ideas in fiction and philosophy and I've done some amount of (layperson and therefore not especially impressive) thinking on the topic.

I've always found, when there is a theological base for the questions, the concept of personhood and "self" is presumed by the asker to be arbitrary, complete, and defined by God's creation of a being. These leave the concept of "self" entirely separate from issues like continuity of thought or consciousness, personal growth, etc. The usual phrasing I see is that a person is, in a fundamental sense, their soul (typically undefined in the conversation), and that changes in circumstance, attitude, experiences, personal philosophy/outlook have no impact at all on their fundamental identity. They tend to treat the soul as inimitable, immutable, and indivisible, and accept varying degrees of possible differences in behavior based on circumstance.

This would address the PM and MM versions of a person: there is no conflict of identity because there is only one person. If you saw a movie and liked it, quoting it to friends for a while, etc., but then forgot every detail about it over a period of years, then saw it again and remembered both the movie and your previous relationship with it (as well as your experiences while you did not recall the movie), it might be hard to argue that you were 2-3 different people just because of the differences in your recollection. You simply remember the first time you saw the movie and your activity around it afterwards, you remember the time when you didn't recall the movie, and you also remember the time when you re-remembered it. No conflict, no identity destruction or merging.

The Cosmere setting is arbitrary in how it defines some element of a person as existing continuously (a "soul", perhaps) but also specifically refuses to explain that dimension and so I don't think we can come to a conclusion about what a Cosmere soul really is or what it means. What we do see is a (seemingly) persistent, singular element of a "person" that exists from their birth at the latest and lasting forever.

Evi died all the way, but still exists in some sense as herself in the spiritual realm to which "she" presumably went after death. No identity issues there. Vasher's (literal!) predecessor died, possibly all the way, but his "soul" was pulled back/allowed to come back into a constructed body. No identity issues here, either: there was only ever one Vasher, always defined by the presence of his "soul". Kelsier died but not all the way, and his "soul" remains as a cognitive shadow with no transition period nor intermediate states. Again, no confusion, as there was only the one and he never went anywhere we didn't see. The Heralds and Fused don't die in any meaningful sense and persist indefinitely, sometimes with bodies and sometimes without. No conflict, as they never stop continuously existing.

I, personally, think that the Cosmere is pretty clear about what a "person" is. People exist in all three realms at all times while living (or "living") regardless of other factors. When a person dies they stop existing physically and mentally, so they stop existing in the physical and cognitive realms, but they still exist spiritually and so still exist in the spiritual realm. This is implied by Evi's forgiveness of Dalinar at the end of Oathbringer (assuming that that event actually happened, which I'm not sure was confirmed). It's less like traveling from one place to another, or changing from one state to another, and more like climbing out of a lake. Your feet were in the mud, most of your body in the water, and your head and shoulders in the air. Once you climb out of the lake you're no longer in the mud or water but still in the air.

So because the persistent presence of a "soul", or something to that effect, has been represented as constant and meaningful I suspect that the Cosmere is similar to questions of identity that begin from a theological base: the soul (whatever that is, exactly) is what counts for something being "you", and the rest is mostly just décor. Even a person highly Invested enough to leave a cognitive shadow behind can be evaluated this way: the person existed as themselves, then upon death the "soul" continues to exist in the spiritual realm alone, and the remaining concentration of Investiture kept the shape, memories, mindset, etc. of the person but lacks that foundational element and so it must be a different entity, even if the shadow experiences perfect continuity of identity and consciousness. Whether or not that new entity has any properties besides being person-shaped magic, especially with regard to the afterlife, hasn't been addressed even obliquely yet (unless I'm forgetting something, which I might be!).

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

A question that might open another avenue of thought: do you consider Hoid's representation in the spiritual realm visions during Wind and Truth to be a real person? It was purely a construct of Investiture, in a "place" where only spiritual energy really exists, but it was also a perfect representation of Hoid as he was during those ancient events. This includes his memories, but also included enough of his nature and reasoning to comprehend the situation and his own iteration as being a vision only-- a truly perfect representation of Hoid while the "real" Hoid was definitely elsewhere doing different things, and apparently unaware of his SR-doppelganger. Was this a soulless, theologically irrelevant automaton, albeit a very complex one? Was Hoid's "soul" "in" both representations of himself at once, making both real?

Edited October 21, 2025 by Returned

[Nitpicking]

21 hours ago, Returned said:

Evi died all the way, but still exists in some sense as herself in the spiritual realm to which "she" presumably went after death. No identity issues there. Vasher's (literal!) predecessor died, possibly all the way, but his "soul" was pulled back/allowed to come back into a constructed body.

Nitpick (See my user name): the Returned are "stapled" back into their original bodies.

[Returned he/him]

2 hours ago, Nitpicking said:

Nitpick (See my user name): the Returned are "stapled" back into their original bodies.

Are they? Interesting, I missed that explanation. If you have a link to it handy that would help me remember for next time; the major thing I always remember about Returned bodies is their plasticity.

[Nitpicking]

From the Arcanum (spoiler):

 

Spoiler

Argent

When you say that the Returned are Cognitive Shadows, are they shadows of the people they were pre-death? In other words, is Lightsong Llarimar's Cognitive Shadow stapled to his body with a Divine Breath?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, they are. (The evidence in the books is Lightsong obtaining some of the memories his pre-death soul had.)

Footnote: It’s likely that “Llarimar” is supposed to be “Stennimar”
Stormlight Three Update #6 (Jan. 20, 2017)

 

[Returned he/him]

Thanks!

Spoiler

I'm not 100% sold ("his" might mean Lightsong's body, not necessarily Stennimar's original body, the syntax isn't clear enough to resolve the antecedent of the possessive pronoun). Either way, Vivenna can also change her appearance and as far as we know she's always been alive in the normal sense. So a "normal" body can do the same thing, depending on how narrowly we want to define "normal". I seem to recall something about that being due to being a descendent of a Returned, but still...

Though I just re-read a section of Rhythm of War to check something and I have to amend my earlier post:

Vasher's current "soul" isn't his original one but a power-wrought duplicate created quickly at his death. So, fitting into my previous outline, Vasher is still a person but one individual and distinct from the original as his "soul" is specifically not the one he started with (and regardless of whether or not his body is). The theological question in the Cosmere is: if/when Vasher is permanently destroyed, will he continue to exist in the spiritual realm in any sense? Or will the power constituting his "soul" disperse, and his memories and identity along with it? I'll wager that he will-- I don't think that Sanderson will want to dive into sapient but soulless beings, especially with so many heroic characters as cognitive shadows. But who knows?

[Nitpicking]

15 hours ago, Returned said:

Vasher's current "soul" isn't his original one but a power-wrought duplicate created quickly at his death ...

Vasher says that. I don't think he's correct in any useful sense. I am sure Brandon will never finally settle the question, though.

[Duxredux he/him]

Well, for starters it's worth acknowledging that any mental model and framework aren't universal. Let me ask a few questions that people can chip in if they want to dealing with memory and identity.

When you "think" how would you describe that experience? Do you hear your native language in your head or with a flip of a switch can you start thinking in a secondary language? If so, now ask what framework you would expect a person born deaf to use?

When asked to visualize something, like a favorite childhood toy, a favorite memory, a first car, do you see an image in your head? I don't have that. Despite having fairly good spatial awareness, I don't see a picture in my head. It's really hard to explain it, but while I'll know that my first car was silver with grey seats, the body style and the layout of the engine and can describe it to you, I don't really see it in my head. 

My father is red/green colorblind and I've had to get used to the idea that the way he perceives the world is fundamentally different from me.

So how much of you're identity and perception is tied to input and your mental model? Maybe consider reading accounts that look at memory. I did a quick search and Clive Wearing has no long-term memory, only a short-term memory recall of nine seconds. Nine seconds. That's longer than reading from the beginning to this part of my post. Despite that he could still play and conduct music and devoted to his wife despite not being able to recall the context of their relationship. 

I get that continuity of self is sometimes a spooky or uncertain topic. External depictions aren't quite the same as someone trying describe it in their words. I have some older family friends, a married couple where the the wife had either a head injury or an illness, I can't remember the specifics and her personality changed dramatically. Her husband had to think long and hard if he wanted to stay with her since she didn't really act like the girl he had married despite retaining her memories. If you're interested I could probably ask what that was like for them, they ended up staying together. My suggestion is if this is a topic you want to seriously think about, maybe do some research.

[clowncarcrash]

Like Severance, this is effectively the plot of Kingdom Hearts II. 

 

Ultimately either the thousand of years of memory would overwhelm the pitiful amount of memories of mortal you. Or maybe the mortal you's memories would be incredibly strong because of all the mortal constraints it would be way "stronger" than the pre mortal you. 

[Qianweilian He/him]

I think we can look for the answer in the Wheel of Time, of which Brandon wrote the last three books.

Wheel of Time Spoilers

Spoiler

All the characters have souls and life after life, are "rewoven into the pattern." In other words, they are reincarnated. Rand and Mat, two of the protagonists, eventually gain memories of their past lives, which are countless, and still maintain their identity, despite the sheer volume of past lives. Rand especially, has harmony with his previous live as Lews Therin Telamon, but his personality doesn't significantly change, he's still Rand. Because of this, I think that Brandon is unlikely to declare that the cognitive shadows have no souls or continuity of self, even if individual characters do say that.

 

[CognitiveShadow he/him]

On 10/25/2025 at 12:47 PM, Duxredux said:

When you "think" how would you describe that experience? Do you hear your native language in your head or with a flip of a switch can you start thinking in a secondary language? If so, now ask what framework you would expect a person born deaf to use?

When asked to visualize something, like a favorite childhood toy, a favorite memory, a first car, do you see an image in your head? I don't have that. Despite having fairly good spatial awareness, I don't see a picture in my head. It's really hard to explain it, but while I'll know that my first car was silver with grey seats, the body style and the layout of the engine and can describe it to you, I don't really see it in my head. 

My father is red/green colorblind and I've had to get used to the idea that the way he perceives the world is fundamentally different from me.

I'm aware that the way we interact with reality, the way our brains are structured and function, etc. is all individual and unique. I would categorize these differences as part of the identity of the individual, though. Part of what makes you 'you' is that you don't see the images in your head. I have a friend with the same physical brain setup. I do see the images in my head, and that's just part of what makes me 'me'.

I have done a lot of digging into consciousness and what we can/do and can't/don't know about it. It's a fun mystery to toy with, and my fascination with the topic is a large part of why I find the cognitive shadows bit in the cosmere so interesting.

On 10/25/2025 at 12:47 PM, Duxredux said:

I have some older family friends, a married couple where the the wife had either a head injury or an illness, I can't remember the specifics and her personality changed dramatically. Her husband had to think long and hard if he wanted to stay with her since she didn't really act like the girl he had married despite retaining her memories. If you're interested I could probably ask what that was like for them, they ended up staying together. My suggestion is if this is a topic you want to seriously think about, maybe do some research.

This, to me, is just further evidence of physicalism / emergentism as the most likely explanation for consciousness. That our conscious experience is an emergent property of the physical workings of our brain, collection of sensory input data, the extreme complexity of our physical make up. When physical changes occur, the 'self' is impacted significantly.

I'm not too worried about the real life implications of all of this. I just view it all as par for the course as living organisms that are lucky enough to have gained sapience through hundreds of millions of years of evolution.

But what I do find interesting is looking back at the religious ideology that I used to embrace, and then recognizing that the 'me' I am aware of would necessarily be completely different from the 'me' that would have existed prior to birth. That was the main point of my post. Our sense of self does tie in with our memories. The guy who only had 9 seconds of memory? Doesn't matter - that was part of his sense of self. However you are, whatever makes you tick, however you perceive reality... that's your reality. And if you die and then remember thousands of years of existence prior to your birth, those thousands of years will override the 90 or X years of mortal life that you experienced here. This is essentially the death of the 'you' that you know and identify as. 

It would be the same for your friends - the wife lost her sense of self and started acting completely different. She effectively transitioned into a new identity through the brain trauma. 

It all highlights the fragility (and almost arbitrary) nature of self and ego and conscious experience. Which in turn points me away from the idea of dualism, which would suggest that our consciousness is separate from our physical bodies, usually arguing for the existence of a soul or something else, maybe with the brain as a kind of antenna or something. Too many question marks and unfalsifiable claims for my taste.

[Returned he/him]

On 10/28/2025 at 1:29 PM, CognitiveShadow said:

It all highlights the fragility (and almost arbitrary) nature of self and ego and conscious experience. Which in turn points me away from the idea of dualism, which would suggest that our consciousness is separate from our physical bodies, usually arguing for the existence of a soul or something else, maybe with the brain as a kind of antenna or something. Too many question marks and unfalsifiable claims for my taste.

This seems like begging the question. You're making some unfalsifiable assertions about what egos and conscious experiences are, how they work, and what they mean with regard to the concept of identity and personhood. All in a highly presentist-materialist frame and responsive to your "taste" in assessing the truth or value in a claim.

Do you feel that "your" (sorry for the scare quotes but I think they're necessary here!) identity has no persistence? That identity changes meaningfully over time? How do you respond to my movie example?

I'm not trying to prod you into addressing anything I've written, just to keep discussion going.

[CognitiveShadow he/him]

18 hours ago, Returned said:

This seems like begging the question. You're making some unfalsifiable assertions about what egos and conscious experiences are, how they work, and what they mean with regard to the concept of identity and personhood. All in a highly presentist-materialist frame and responsive to your "taste" in assessing the truth or value in a claim.

Do you feel that "your" (sorry for the scare quotes but I think they're necessary here!) identity has no persistence? That identity changes meaningfully over time? How do you respond to my movie example?

I'm not trying to prod you into addressing anything I've written, just to keep discussion going.

Materialism is literally the only theory on consciousness that can be tested, has been tested, and has been used to make successful predictions. If my brain changes, the way 'I' am is going to change. That's just how things work.

It's the only non-unfalsifiable option. Dualism is 100% unfalsifiable and untestable. Panpsychism is 100% unfalsifiable and untestable. Choosing to accept either of these as your default worldview can only be done by saying that it is what you hope or want to be true.

On 10/21/2025 at 2:06 PM, Returned said:

This would address the PM and MM versions of a person: there is no conflict of identity because there is only one person. If you saw a movie and liked it, quoting it to friends for a while, etc., but then forgot every detail about it over a period of years, then saw it again and remembered both the movie and your previous relationship with it (as well as your experiences while you did not recall the movie), it might be hard to argue that you were 2-3 different people just because of the differences in your recollection. You simply remember the first time you saw the movie and your activity around it afterwards, you remember the time when you didn't recall the movie, and you also remember the time when you re-remembered it. No conflict, no identity destruction or merging.

In your movie example I still maintain continuity of consciousness. If I suddenly got total amnesia or a brain injury that altered my personality and behavior and preferences, then yes - you could say that the next time I watched the movie it was a completely different identity watching said movie, experiencing it completely different, and having absolutely no connection to the person or the memories of the prior 'me' who watched the movie.

In your example, I forget details, but then recall them as I re-live the experience of watching the movie. Maybe I've changed a lot in the time since I last watched it, and I'm an evolved version of 'me', but the memories and continuity of consciousness that I still retain are part of what makes the new me who I am. So the memory connection is part of what shapes the future 'us' even if we are different, which means we are the same identity just at a different point in time.

To make your analogy actually line up with the LDS theology I was referring to:

You live a normal life until age 30, you watch a movie with friends at some point during those 30 years and have all these good feelings and memories tied up with it. You then get amnesia and forget who you are entirely. Then you watch the same movie with zero recollection of the previous time(s) you watched it. You watch this with friends, too - but these are friends you made in the amnesia ward and they all have the same circumstances. None of you remember who you were before entering the amnesia ward. You are in this amnesia ward for like 2 months. It's all you know, you never leave, it's all you (as the amnesiac) have ever experienced. You learn a couple games, maybe have a crush, whatever. You aren't allowed to interact with family or anyone from your previous existence and have no idea what your life was like before losing your memory.

Then, one day, all of your memories return. You now have both sets of memories, but which version of you takes over? My bet is that you will fall back on being the version of yourself that has 30 years of memories. The version of you that was in the amnesia ward will be nothing more than a brief memory of a short period of time that the old/revived 'you' will think of as an interesting and unique part of their life.

My argument is that the prior 'you' continues - they get the memories and can piece together the continuity of consciousness, but only through the perspective of being the older and more established version of the identity. You might pick up the game you learned in the hospital for fun, or maybe you decide it's dumb and it seems crazy to you that you liked it when you were a blank slate. 

But I think it's fair to say that you will not come out on the other side as the amnesiac who integrates the 30 years of memories into their worldview, viewing themselves primarily as the person who lived in the hospital. That identity and worldview dies. It lives on only as a memory. Just like (in LDS theology) the mortal 'you' no longer matters and is consumed by the premortal 'you'. (even though it is taught as the other way around very often). I'm highlighting the absurdity and incompatibility of the ideas.

[Returned he/him]

3 hours ago, CognitiveShadow said:

Materialism is literally the only theory on consciousness that can be tested, has been tested, and has been used to make successful predictions. If my brain changes, the way 'I' am is going to change. That's just how things work.

It's the only non-unfalsifiable option. Dualism is 100% unfalsifiable and untestable. Panpsychism is 100% unfalsifiable and untestable. Choosing to accept either of these as your default worldview can only be done by saying that it is what you hope or want to be true.

I'm not suggesting that materialism is incorrect (I am a materialist), only that being falsifiable is not the same as correct. Lots of things were true before we had any ability to observe them, and the falsifiable positions people held in ignorance of those unobservable elements were sometimes both (1) consistent with what they were able to observe, and (2) incorrect. It's less that dualism is likely to be correct (which, again, I do not believe) and more that the specific properties of what you think might underlie consciousness and identity are not particularly likely to be correct just because they are consistent with materialism. Phrenology was all the rage, once, and was preferred by some to religious explanations for behavior.

3 hours ago, CognitiveShadow said:

In your movie example I still maintain continuity of consciousness. If I suddenly got total amnesia or a brain injury that altered my personality and behavior and preferences, then yes - you could say that the next time I watched the movie it was a completely different identity watching said movie, experiencing it completely different, and having absolutely no connection to the person or the memories of the prior 'me' who watched the movie.

In your example, I forget details, but then recall them as I re-live the experience of watching the movie. Maybe I've changed a lot in the time since I last watched it, and I'm an evolved version of 'me', but the memories and continuity of consciousness that I still retain are part of what makes the new me who I am. So the memory connection is part of what shapes the future 'us' even if we are different, which means we are the same identity just at a different point in time.

Well, except for the time you spend sleeping your consciousness is continuous . But I know what you mean. However, I find your "evolving version of me" to be a something of a cheat. It suggests that your identity changes over time as you accrue and lose memories, but that those changes don't really count as being different because of the continuity of consciousness. If that's the case, wouldn't the continuity of consciousness be the thing that matters? Maybe I'm not getting what you're describing.

3 hours ago, CognitiveShadow said:

Then, one day, all of your memories return. You now have both sets of memories, but which version of you takes over? My bet is that you will fall back on being the version of yourself that has 30 years of memories. The version of you that was in the amnesia ward will be nothing more than a brief memory of a short period of time that the old/revived 'you' will think of as an interesting and unique part of their life.

I don't understand your basis for insisting that one "version" of a person takes over-- it seems to me that upon integration neither previous version even exists in your framework. This ties directly back to my first section of this post, above. What you describe is consistent with materialism but also makes very strong statements about specific elements of identity in a materialist frame, and those strong statements seem arbitrary to me.

If, in the description I quoted just above, all of the memories exist, are recalled, and integrated into the same person with (let's presume) continuity of consciousness, how would that not give rise to a third, different person? What is the basis, materialist or otherwise, for that inviolable and immiscible segmentation?

If I'm understanding your position correctly (a shaky assumption!), it's that identity is based on a being's perceived, continuous experience of consciousness which is represented as an amalgam of memories which exist in any present moment. Full separation from that amalgamation of memories shatters the continuity, which is not recoverable, and few (if any) traits will persist through that separation, none relevant to identity.

I'll hold off on more maundering until I feel more confident that I'm getting what you're saying.

Edited October 30, 2025 by Returned

[nehalem]

On 10/23/2025 at 9:06 PM, Returned said:

Thanks!

  Reveal hidden contents

I'm not 100% sold ("his" might mean Lightsong's body, not necessarily Stennimar's original body, the syntax isn't clear enough to resolve the antecedent of the possessive pronoun). Either way, Vivenna can also change her appearance and as far as we know she's always been alive in the normal sense. So a "normal" body can do the same thing, depending on how narrowly we want to define "normal". I seem to recall something about that being due to being a descendent of a Returned, but still...

Though I just re-read a section of Rhythm of War to check something and I have to amend my earlier post:

Vasher's current "soul" isn't his original one but a power-wrought duplicate created quickly at his death. So, fitting into my previous outline, Vasher is still a person but one individual and distinct from the original as his "soul" is specifically not the one he started with (and regardless of whether or not his body is). The theological question in the Cosmere is: if/when Vasher is permanently destroyed, will he continue to exist in the spiritual realm in any sense? Or will the power constituting his "soul" disperse, and his memories and identity along with it? I'll wager that he will-- I don't think that Sanderson will want to dive into sapient but soulless beings, especially with so many heroic characters as cognitive shadows. But who knows?

I think Vasher is just wrong.

At this point we have 2 major characters that were originally human for us and have now become cognitive shadows.

And I think especially Kaladin can't be a copy.  Kind of a let down if Kaladin returns in the 2 arc of Stormlight, but wait its actually not the *real* Kaladin but a copy of him that is exactly like him.

Also interesting what impact having a copy of Kaladin would have on Syl and their bond?  Shouldn't Syl notice if Kaladin is replaced by a copy?

Its also pretty funny that Vasher had whole fossil-soul CS conversation with Kaladin who ended up becoming a cognitive shadow.

[Returned he/him]

58 minutes ago, nehalem said:

I think Vasher is just wrong.

At this point we have 2 major characters that were originally human for us and have now become cognitive shadows.

And I think especially Kaladin can't be a copy.  Kind of a let down if Kaladin returns in the 2 arc of Stormlight, but wait its actually not the *real* Kaladin but a copy of him that is exactly like him.

Also interesting what impact having a copy of Kaladin would have on Syl and their bond?  Shouldn't Syl notice if Kaladin is replaced by a copy?

Its also pretty funny that Vasher had whole fossil-soul CS conversation with Kaladin who ended up becoming a cognitive shadow.

Maybe Vasher is wrong. But he's one of the most knowledgeable people in the entire Cosmere on the subject, studying it for centuries, and one of the only ones we've heard say anything on the topic at all. If there is any clear, in-text basis for thinking that he's wrong here it's not coming to mind for me, and without that nothing about his description seems obviously incorrect (by not matching anything else we've seen or known). The only counterpoint I can think of is a description in Warbreaker which I could not find while typing out this post and might not be authoritative. I will say that the annotations for chapter 47 in Warbreaker do suggest to me that Vasher is wrong (the way Sanderson describes Calmseer's motivations for returning, and indeed the entire concept of "returning", suggest the "soul" departs and then returns). But at the same time I think that a perfect copy of a person's mind could do the same things in the same ways for the same reasons.  Could you expand on the reasons you think he's wrong?

I don't think that Kaladin would be a copy of his original self. Like the other Heralds his "soul" never passed on to the spiritual realm, even if only because he hasn't died yet. I imagine it's like what we saw with Kelsier: the "soul" could pass on to the spiritual realm (which is something we saw Vin, Elend, and Rashek do) but doesn't do that and instead remains. It seems more like the "soul" becomes bound to a mass of Investiture in the same way it was previously bound to the physical body (and metaphysical mind?), so it's more of a state change than a copy-and-paste. Very similar to what happened to Szeth and Hoid, except they were re-bound to physical bodies rather than an accumulation of magical power.

The idea of a perfect copy that is substitutable for the original is one that I think is pretty clearly shut down by what we've seen in the Cosmere so far. The description of a "soul" as a thing which exists in a person and leaves for the spiritual realm upon (proper) death suggests that any copy would be just that: a copy, and not in any sense the original. I am curious to see or read about what effect a Herald's death has on a bonded spren. That will provide a lot more substance for our guessing.

As for the conversation between Vasher and Kaladin, maybe we should call it fore-cognitive-shadowing?

Edited October 31, 2025 by Returned