What was the theme tied to Shallan's moment with Hoid in WoR as a child

[Zxevicus M. Cortillius]

In WoR Hoid asks shallan what beauty is. What is the meaning of their conversation? What is the theme?
My Theory

-Hoid talks about what true beauty is, people give him simple answer that hoid is beyond.
-Hoid asks if you take away a man's vision, his hearing, his sense of touch, taste and smell can he not feel beauty?
-I'm theorizing that Wit means that beauty is perceptive like how the Mona Lisa is known as a masterpiece but a fake copy is dismissed as fake and forgery. For if beauty were inherently tied to the object or human than it would not matter first or second fake or real.
-Beauty is also relative since a high lighteyes would see many things that to him are average and only something of extraordinary to impress them.
-In contrast what is average to a highlord would be of splendor to a darkeyes even of high ranking.
-One may also find beauty in some things and not others.

Bascially TL;DR Beauty is Relative and is not inherently tied to an thing but to the human perspective.

[PanLin they/he]

1 hour ago, Zxevicus M. Cortillius said:

Bascially TL;DR Beauty is Relative and is not inherently tied to an thing but to the human perspective.

Yup! And I mean, this is true in the real world anyway, but especially in the Cosmere; Sanderson pulls heavily from the philosophy of Plato's Forms (the theory that the physical world is only an imitation of the real world, which is composed of Forms, or in the Cosmere, Spiritwebs) and Animism (the idea that every person, animal, object, location, and even concept has its own identity and soul).

Both are really interesting to read about and imo help to explain and give context to how the Cosmere fundamentally works, and why some concepts in the Cosmere are the way they are. A good example is Progression—being unable to heal old or otherwise notable wounds sounds like a weird implementation of a healing power to start with, until you realise that what it's actually doing is reshaping someone's physical form to better represent their cognitive Identity and Spiritweb (or Form, as in Plato's definition).

I'm getting carried away, but I bring this up because that story about beauty really leans into these concepts without fully stating them. Perception holds sooo much weight in the Cosmere, from which vessels hold which Shards, to the creation and evolution of spren, to so much more outside the Stormlight Archive (which I won't bring up here obvs). I really think Sanderson intentionally used Hoid talking about beauty here as a sort of proxy to get us, the readers, to really internalise those questions and to think about what it means to love or enjoy or appreciate something.

In the Cosmere, the spiritual realm is where divinity lives, and it's also where people (and animals and objects and concepts) are truly defined. Those true, divine concepts are conceptualised in the cognitive realm, and represented with context in the physical.

In a setup like that, the most important thing someone can do is simply be themselves. Art, beauty, Identity, Connection, Fortune, Investiture, pride, guilt, love, loss—it's all the same thing, and to live is to define what your Identity is as an individual within that while navigating your Connections with everyone and everything else that's doing the same.

Edited March 19 by PanLin

[Nitpicking]

As I understand it, the LDS Church teaches things that look a lot like animism. One can't help but be influenced by one's upbringing.

[Zxevicus M. Cortillius]

On 3/19/2026 at 1:46 PM, PanLin said:

Yup! And I mean, this is true in the real world anyway, but especially in the Cosmere; Sanderson pulls heavily from the philosophy of Plato's Forms (the theory that the physical world is only an imitation of the real world, which is composed of Forms, or in the Cosmere, Spiritwebs) and Animism (the idea that every person, animal, object, location, and even concept has its own identity and soul).

Both are really interesting to read about and imo help to explain and give context to how the Cosmere fundamentally works, and why some concepts in the Cosmere are the way they are. A good example is Progression—being unable to heal old or otherwise notable wounds sounds like a weird implementation of a healing power to start with, until you realise that what it's actually doing is reshaping someone's physical form to better represent their cognitive Identity and Spiritweb (or Form, as in Plato's definition).

I'm getting carried away, but I bring this up because that story about beauty really leans into these concepts without fully stating them. Perception holds sooo much weight in the Cosmere, from which vessels hold which Shards, to the creation and evolution of spren, to so much more outside the Stormlight Archive (which I won't bring up here obvs). I really think Sanderson intentionally used Hoid talking about beauty here as a sort of proxy to get us, the readers, to really internalise those questions and to think about what it means to love or enjoy or appreciate something.

In the Cosmere, the spiritual realm is where divinity lives, and it's also where people (and animals and objects and concepts) are truly defined. Those true, divine concepts are conceptualised in the cognitive realm, and represented with context in the physical.

In a setup like that, the most important thing someone can do is simply be themselves. Art, beauty, Identity, Connection, Fortune, Investiture, pride, guilt, love, loss—it's all the same thing, and to live is to define what your Identity is as an individual within that while navigating your Connections with everyone and everything else that's doing the same.

Soooo ooo oo ooooo true even though i tend to lean more into nihilism. Plus i dont really believe in animism its a good idea since everything has a physical manifestation even concepts. Its like how the cognitive realm exists to hold the idea of something like the spiritual realm holding the spirits and the physical realm being the world of these ideas and spirits manifest into a deity.

On 3/20/2026 at 9:26 AM, Nitpicking said:

As I understand it, the LDS Church teaches things that look a lot like animism. One can't help but be influenced by one's upbringing.

A lot of religions have animist parts in them. Similarly like alethi believing in a dead man's spirit going to the tranquilline halls which i think is a metaphysical manifestation of peace or something in the cognitive or spiritual realms

[Atlas333]

In addition to what has been said about beauty and perception. I think there's an added layer that refers to the heralds.

Quote

“What think you? Can beauty be taken from a man? If he could not touch, taste, smell, hear, see . . . what if all he knew was pain? Has that man had beauty taken from him?”

“I...” What did this have to do with anything? “Does the pain change day by day?”

“Let us say it does,” the messenger said.

“Then beauty, to that person, would be the times when the pain lessens.

Something about how all heralds (or more specifically Taln) only knows pain, but Shallan's answer implies that he's still able to find beauty in some way. It might be some crazy foreshadowing for when the back half focuses more on the heralds.