Mechanical Hemalurgy

[Young Bard]

I thought I'd better post some Mistborn theories before Shadows of Self/ Bands of Mourning came out, in case they were confirmed or debunked. The first of these: MECHANICAL HEMALURGY.

 

These are some separate facts in my head which caused me to believe that Hemalurgy can somehow be transferred to machines. While I haven't exactly worked out how, I am fairly confident it can be done. Here are some of the things that caused me to start thinking about this.

 

Exhibit A: The machine built by the Ones Above in Sixth of the Dusk.

 

Sharders seem increasingly certain that the Ones Above in Sixth of the Dusk are the Scadrians, who have gained access to space travel. We do know that it is set shortly prior to the sci-fi Mistborn Trilogy. One of the only things we know about them is that they built a machine that detects Avian (or the Investiture inside the Avian). This sounds almost like the capabilities of bronze, being able to detect the metals inside someones bodies. We have WoB that bronze can detect non-Scadrian magic in it's radar as well. So, I believe that this is one such machine that can convert Hemalurgy from a human into a mechanical operation.

 

Exhibit B: The Southern Continent of Scadrial.

 

We have WoB that they have magic there, but he has said it is used 'quite differently'. I believe that this is due to the presence of mechanical objects. They would have discovered it long before the northern continent, because they didn't have a stagnant 1000 years when the Lord Ruler took over. This means they would have had 1000 extra years to tinker around with this, and see how it works, as I believe they have done.

 

Why Hemalurgy?

 

Well, we know that inanimate objects don't have Investiture by natural means (Brandon has stressed quite strongly that metals don't contain Investiture, they merely 'unlock' the ability to access the Investiture inside yourself). Therefore, it must be 'given' to the machine somehow. So... Hemalurgy.

 

What do you guys (and girls) think? Have I finally gone stark-raving mad? Or is there something salvageable to this theory?

 

I'll get sources for the WoB's mentioned as soon as I can be bothered.

[coppercloud]

I agree . blessings are hemal charged and when inserted into a mistwraith it becomes a kandra . if a human and in the right spots a kolos.

So the spike holds the power and its fule is metal . like for a bronz investure detector its core cpu of the sensor is a Hbronz spike.

The Hspike is like the type of gem in a fabril and the metal a spren.

Edited September 15, 2015 by coppercloud

[Voidus]

I think it's pretty widely accepted as how the Southern Scardirans make their mechanical allomancy.
 

 

 

NEPENE ()

You've said you want to write a book set in the southern continent. I did enjoy The Emperor's Soul a lot, so I am curious about you writing that future book. How do they use magic differently, and why should we be excited about reading a book set there?

BRANDON SANDERSON

The southern continent is where people have discovered how to harness the metallurgic arts in a more mechanical method. (I've hinted several places that this is possible. I've been holding off doing it until we go here.)

NEPENE

Ooh, cool, ferugolems? Do you have any hints for us where we should look for these hints of how you can use it in a mechanical fashion? I haven't reread the Mistborn books in a while.

BRANDON SANDERSON

The hints are things I've said in interviews, not so much in the stories. (Sorry for not being clear about this.)

CHAOS2651

About the southern continent, would it be possible for other Scadrians to discover this method of using the Metallic Arts, or is it unique to the southern Scadrians?

BRANDON SANDERSON

It is technology-based rather than genetics based.

[natc]

Check your body for holes, Coppercloud, I think someone stole your ability to spell. . .

joking, joking.

Wouldn't a machine that can burn bronze technically be closer to mechanical allomancy than hemalurgy? Hemalurgy can only make things (the irony), while allomancy is what the thing actually does.

Edited September 15, 2015 by natc

[Yata]

I agree . blessings are hemal charged and when inserted into a mistwraith it becomes a kandra . if a human and in the right spots a kolos.

So the spike holds the power and its fule is metal . like for a bronz investure detector its core cpu of the sensor is a Hbronz spike.

The Hspike is like the type of gem in a fabril and the metal a spren.

The Hemalurgy work with stealing and innesting piece of SpiritWeb between beins.

The result of this, cloud be something more or lesser similar to a Human Bein (Koloss and Kandra).

But the requirement is that both the "donor" and the "reciver" have a Spiritual Web (or sDNA).

It very like to "Magical Genetic Engineering".

[Oudeis]

Eh... you've got two examples of mechanical metallic arts. What you've failed to do is explain the link, why you think hemalurgy specifically is the way it will be done. It's possible, certainly. But not necessarily the only way, or even a way with a good indication of being correct. Recall that the Southern Scadrians have a mechanical method, and they lack Lerasium-bred mistings to use to fuel hemalurgic spikes. Since hemalurgy requires that one person already have a talent before it can be taken and given elsewhere, in a society without the original resource, hemalurgy won't let you transfer a thing you haven't got to a machine.

 

I'm also going to take this opportunity to plug one of my own favorite theories. I don't think the Southern Scadrians had a thousand years. It makes no sense. This was meant to be his fallback plan in a millenium, a genetic reserve in case things went poorly. Why would he assume they would survive on their own for a thousand years? And as you've pointed out, they would almost certainly have advanced quite far in that time, which we know he didn't want.

 

My theory, which I will try to find the actual thread for and link to, is that with Preservation's knowledge in his head, he knew how to work mechanical allomancy, set up a God-powered cadmium machine, and the Southern Scadrians have only lived like fifty years. I also think studying this machine is why they know how to access the metallic arts mechanically; if it were as simple as wondering, "say I wonder if we can..." it makes no sense that a culture without obvious allomancy would figure it out on their own, while a society which clearly studies the metallic arts (Marasi references this) does not.

 

While I admit I have little actual support for my theory, it does neatly explain a half-dozen gaping plotholes which otherwise require a metric ton of handwavium.

[Yata]

My theory, which I will try to find the actual thread for and link to, is that with Preservation's knowledge in his head, he knew how to work mechanical allomancy, set up a God-powered cadmium machine, and the Southern Scadrians have only lived like fifty years. I also think studying this machine is why they know how to access the metallic arts mechanically; if it were as simple as wondering, "say I wonder if we can..." it makes no sense that a culture without obvious allomancy would figure it out on their own, while a society which clearly studies the metallic arts (Marasi references this) does not.

 

Well I like it. Or at least I like the Foundamental Idea behind it.

I am not sure about the Great-Cadmium-Machine (GCM from now). It's could work, but not alone. The GCM isn't enaugh alone to explain the survival of the Southerns. Everyone will die in minutes or hours from the Sun's heat and radiation.

Maybe the GCM with some couisins of yours(like steel or iron) could be used to create an Abitable Ecosystem, from a standard Humans.

The GSM and GIM together could keep a cloud of metal in the air like a shield from the sunlight.

 

Or maybe more complex system working together (something like the Matrix's survivor).

[DreamEternal]

Well I like it. Or at least I like the Foundamental Idea behind it.

I am not sure about the Great-Cadmium-Machine (GCM from now). It's could work, but not alone. The GCM isn't enaugh alone to explain the survival of the Southerns. Everyone will die in minutes or hours from the Sun's heat and radiation.

Maybe the GCM with some couisins of yours(like steel or iron) could be used to create an Abitable Ecosystem, from a standard Humans.

The GSM and GIM together could keep a cloud of metal in the air like a shield from the sunlight.

Or maybe more complex system working together (something like the Matrix's survivor).

Has anyone ever asked how big was the southern scandrian civilization? For all that we know it could be just a couple of cities under cristal domes connected by tunnels. If the domes were big enough they could even have weather patterns. Edited September 17, 2015 by CognitivePulsePattern

[Voidus]

Eh... you've got two examples of mechanical metallic arts. What you've failed to do is explain the link, why you think hemalurgy specifically is the way it will be done. It's possible, certainly. But not necessarily the only way, or even a way with a good indication of being correct. Recall that the Southern Scadrians have a mechanical method, and they lack Lerasium-bred mistings to use to fuel hemalurgic spikes. Since hemalurgy requires that one person already have a talent before it can be taken and given elsewhere, in a society without the original resource, hemalurgy won't let you transfer a thing you haven't got to a machine.

 

I'm also going to take this opportunity to plug one of my own favorite theories. I don't think the Southern Scadrians had a thousand years. It makes no sense. This was meant to be his fallback plan in a millenium, a genetic reserve in case things went poorly. Why would he assume they would survive on their own for a thousand years? And as you've pointed out, they would almost certainly have advanced quite far in that time, which we know he didn't want.

 

My theory, which I will try to find the actual thread for and link to, is that with Preservation's knowledge in his head, he knew how to work mechanical allomancy, set up a God-powered cadmium machine, and the Southern Scadrians have only lived like fifty years. I also think studying this machine is why they know how to access the metallic arts mechanically; if it were as simple as wondering, "say I wonder if we can..." it makes no sense that a culture without obvious allomancy would figure it out on their own, while a society which clearly studies the metallic arts (Marasi references this) does not.

 

While I admit I have little actual support for my theory, it does neatly explain a half-dozen gaping plotholes which otherwise require a metric ton of handwavium.

That would give them a day that's 20x quicker* than normal and some pretty freaky weather patterns.

Edited September 17, 2015 by Voidus

[DreamEternal]

That would give them a day that's 20x quicker* than normal and some pretty freaky weather patterns.

Unless they live under a dome...

[Yata]

Without a cover of some kind (the CognitivePulsePattern's Dome or my Metalcloud) the People will burn in minutes. The time compression alone isn't enough and much more inside the bubble they wil burn faster because the sunlight will enter into the bubble anyway.

 

PS: I found a new use of the Cadmium Allomancy, it could be use to gain a great tan XD

[DreamEternal]

Without a cover of some kind (the CognitivePulsePattern's Dome or my Metalcloud) the People will burn in minutes. The time compression alone isn't enough and much more inside the bubble they wil burn faster because the sunlight will enter into the bubble anyway.

PS: I found a new use of the Cadmium Allomancy, it could be use to gain a great tan XD

But the time bubbles don't cause red/blueshift for some weird realmatic reason, so can we really expect them to change how much sunlight reaches the peolle inside?

Time bubbles are weird :/.

Edited September 17, 2015 by CognitivePulsePattern

[Yata]

But the time bubbles don't cause red/blueshift for some weird realmatic reason, so can we really expect them to change how much sunlight reaches the peolle inside?

Time bubbles are weird :/.

I used just a bit of Psysics, if you could see through a Bubble, this mean that the Bubble is trasparent to the Light (at least to the visible light).

 

Maybe it could deflect a bit of light, I am not 100% sure.

[DreamEternal]

I used just a bit of Psysics, if you could see through a Bubble, this mean that the Bubble is trasparent to the Light (at least to the visible light).

Maybe it could deflect a bit of light, I am not 100% sure.

Remember that in the cosmere the laws of physics are more like agreements between friends when realmatics are concerned. For exemple, the color-draining in awakening is generaly considered to be spiritual in nature, not physical. Edited September 17, 2015 by CognitivePulsePattern

[natc]

I used just a bit of Psysics, if you could see through a Bubble, this mean that the Bubble is trasparent to the Light (at least to the visible light).

Maybe it could deflect a bit of light, I am not 100% sure.

The thing is, even Wayne's bubble would kill him if it works that way. We don't know why it doesn't work that way, but it doesn't. Strangely.

[Yata]

The thing is, even Wayne's bubble would kill him if it works that way. We don't know why it doesn't work that way, but it doesn't. Strangely.

Actually inside the Wayne Bubble every outer manace are less dangerous. Maybe you though at Marasi.

[natc]

Increased light frequency frying you is not the only way a bubble can kill you. Having not enough energy in the system due to reduced light frequency is probably just as bad. The temperature should be dropping as much as the light red shifts, but it doesn't.

[Left]

The Southern Scadrians don't live at the equator, where in deed Brandon has confirmed it is too hot to live or even survive for long. They live at the south pole, just as the Final Empire is located on the north pole. While the climate of the south pole may be hotter than the north, it isn't like the Equatorial region and there's no reason for the Southern Scadrians not to be able to survive without living underground or with cadmium bubbles.

[natc]

But do they even have ashmounts down there?

[Oudeis]

The Southern Scadrians don't live at the equator, where in deed Brandon has confirmed it is too hot to live or even survive for long. They live at the south pole, just as the Final Empire is located on the north pole. While the climate of the south pole may be hotter than the north, it isn't like the Equatorial region and there's no reason for the Southern Scadrians not to be able to survive without living underground or with cadmium bubbles.

 

1. I think people were talking about the fact that you'd get an entire day's worth of solar radiation in, at most, half an hour. As we're discussing, even though that makes logic, it's clearly not what happens, or every time bubble/speed bubble would kill you.

 

2. There is a reason they wouldn't be able to survive; they were Rashek's control group. Unmodified, unchanged. Not designed to breath an atmosphere of ash, or to eat plants brown and pathetic with few nutrients. Even if there were ashmounts, the ashmounts create more problems, which the Southern Scadrians were expressly not modified to be able to deal with. Beyond which, anything could happen in a thousand years. Famine. Drought. War. Pestilence. People not figuring out in time how to farm in a world that no longer makes any kind of sense.

 

And even if they weren't going to die, they were going to advance. They were going to develop technology, they could do anything. It only took the Scadrians we know three centuries to stitch the land with railroads. Rashek didn't want them to die, and he didn't want them to grow as a civilization/culture; left alone for a thousand years, they would do one or the other.

 

Maybe he simply pulled a Sleeping Beauty and put them all to sleep for a thousand years, but that doesn't explain how people with so little allomancy that they don't even know they have it would think to innovate allomancy machines. A Giant Cadmium Machine neatly addresses all extant issues. It skips them ahead, preventing them from dying or advancing, using a type of magic we already know exists, instead of generic "god puts people to sleep" which I'm sure is possible but feels like a kludge. It lacks elegance. In addition, by spending however long with the great machine, it would give the people the inspiration to design their own allomancy machines.

 

Just my two cents. I see it as a simple and elegant solution that explains a great many things currently unexplained. Other options are all possible, but they leave a lot of loose ends to be tied together another way.

[Kaymyth]

The Southern Scadrians don't live at the equator, where in deed Brandon has confirmed it is too hot to live or even survive for long. They live at the south pole, just as the Final Empire is located on the north pole. While the climate of the south pole may be hotter than the north, it isn't like the Equatorial region and there's no reason for the Southern Scadrians not to be able to survive without living underground or with cadmium bubbles.

 

The location of the Final Empire is a common misconception - magnetic North is at Kredik Shaw because of the the location of the Well.  But they are not anywhere near the geographical north pole.  If they were, they'd have a badly skewed day/night cycle and extreme weather during the seasons.  The ashmounts were raised specifically to make the latitude habitable, so it's quite possible that the Southern Scadrians were surviving at the south pole without frying.

[Yata]

Oudeis the "Bubble kill you faster" is just an extra.
My main point was about the GCM alone as Survival System. If also we have a GCM*1000 (the people inside are older less than two year from the Rashek's Ascension). The people can't survive one year in the Final-Empire's Scadrial.

 

I think that your idea could works really, but not with the GCM alone, maybe together with other Allomantic Machine (like the Steel&Iron Machine of previous post).

[Oudeis]

Oudeis the "Bubble kill you faster" is just an extra.

My main point was about the GCM alone as Survival System. If also we have a GCM*1000 (the people inside are older less than two year from the Rashek's Ascension). The people can't survive one year in the Final-Empire's Scadrial.

 

I think that your idea could works really, but not with the GCM alone, maybe together with other Allomantic Machine (like the Steel&Iron Machine of previous post).

 

Your point is valid, but something simple like being underground could help. After all, that was Rashek's plan if he couldn't beat Ruin. Stick people underground with a lot of food, just let them survive. They couldn't survive even a year in the Final Empire... but underground? With a huge lake? With some of the fungus the kandra eat, and herds of goats to eat the fungus and provide meat? That seems do-able.

 

Yes, it takes SOMETHING more than the GCM. But it doesn't have to be more magic (I'm not sure how steel/iron would help, anyway). Just getting a population to scrape by for a few years is difficult, but not something impossible without arcana.

[Yata]

Your point is valid, but something simple like being underground could help. After all, that was Rashek's plan if he couldn't beat Ruin. Stick people underground with a lot of food, just let them survive. They couldn't survive even a year in the Final Empire... but underground? With a huge lake? With some of the fungus the kandra eat, and herds of goats to eat the fungus and provide meat? That seems do-able.

 

Well this is a sustainable Ecosystem to me, really.

 

My example with a StealGM and IronGM is to keep a metallic dust in the air above the "living zone", like a dense cloud that could block part of the Sunlight.

 

But this was only an example to how an Allomantic machine could help the Ecosystem of the Southern.

[Rockbud]

Re: mechanical allomancy; Rosharian Fabrials are investiture powered devices that in a limited way imitate the native surges. Why couldn't there be an equivalent technology for other magic systems that works on the same principles?