aemetha Posted December 16, 2017 Report Share Posted December 16, 2017 (edited) 1 hour ago, Vortaan said: why does bonding with Venli not destroy Venli like the other Fused do to their hosts? Right. People on Roshar call all entities of investiture spren. There is a distinction though. The spirits of the ancient singers are not splinters as are the spren, they are cognitive shadows. The singers are adapted to form symbiotic bonds with splinters, not with cognitive shadows. So with the forms of power - facilitated by splinters - the person retains their mind and identity. With the fused, they aren't splinters so such a symbiotic relationship isn't possible. Instead the original inhabitant of the body is cast out and replaced by the cognitive shadow. People can't become splinters, it is a requirement that they never have been a living being, so Eshonai can only become a cognitive shadow (and with great difficulty without the intervention of a shard, see mistborn: secret history) and so cannot coexist in a symbiotic relationship designed for splinters. Edited December 16, 2017 by aemetha Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Calderis Posted December 16, 2017 Report Share Posted December 16, 2017 1 hour ago, aemetha said: Right. People on Roshar call all entities of investiture spren. There is a distinction though. The spirits of the ancient singers are not splinters as are the spren, they are cognitive shadows. The singers are adapted to form symbiotic bonds with splinters, not with cognitive shadows. So with the forms of power - facilitated by splinters - the person retains their mind and identity. With the fused, they aren't splinters so such a symbiotic relationship isn't possible. Instead the original inhabitant of the body is cast out and replaced by the cognitive shadow. People can't become splinters, it is a requirement that they never have been a living being, so Eshonai can only become a cognitive shadow (and with great difficulty without the intervention of a shard, see mistborn: secret history) and so cannot coexist in a symbiotic relationship designed for splinters. Yeah... Brandon has walked back that explanation of splinters. https://wob.coppermind.net/events/259/#e8757 Quote Questioner [PENDING REVIEW] Do Spinters require proximity to their Shards? Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW] Do they require it for what? Questioner [PENDING REVIEW] Function-- Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW] Function. It's very hard for most Splinters to leave the realm where they were Splintered, but this gets into tricky stuff because the Shard mostly occupies the Spiritual Realm, but what do you mean by the Shard? Because the essence of the Shard is in the Physical Realm, it's all across the cosmere, and things like this. Usually once something is Splintered it is difficult for them to leave that area, so yes. Questioner [PENDING REVIEW] And in the system-- Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW] You see it with the-- I would call most Cognitive Shadows a Splinter in some ways. And you see it when Kelsier tries to leave, right. And spren would have the same trouble, and seons would have the same trouble. But at the same time is that a proximity to the Shard? Kind of. Things get very wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey when you start dealing with the nature of the Spiritual Realm in the cosmere. It makes sense as well. If a Cognitive Shadow is able to remain because they have gained enough investiture from a single shard... There's not a lot of differences between them and a Splinter functionally. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aemetha Posted December 16, 2017 Report Share Posted December 16, 2017 20 minutes ago, Calderis said: Yeah... Brandon has walked back that explanation of splinters. Well, that muddies the waters. I think there is a distinction between the type of splinter a spren is and a cognitive shadow though. A spren is an embodiment of an idea that has developed an identity. A cognitive shadow is a human intelligence that includes many ideas with far fewer restrictions on its behaviour (aside from the limitations of moving to other worlds) as per what we've seen with a certain other persons cognitive shadow. Human intelligence is much more flexible than a spren. Splinter may be a wider category of entities now, but there is a definite difference in how they can behave. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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