Shards, and gaining sentience

[Tador]

So we know that any investiture left lying around for "a while" will gain sentience eventually, my question is if somebody killed a shard holder but didn't splinter the shard would the sentience the shard gained: 

a) then act as a separate entity (i.e. could you then kill just the sentience and restart the cycle) and 

b) would the sentience be an amalgamation of the cosmere wide ideal of the 'core intent' of the shard (like if the general cosmere idea of say ruin was a terrible force wanting to destroy everything and inflict suffering then would you end up with something worse than Ati's version of Ruin) 

and for fun c) if the answer to both of these is yes, could you kill the sentience and if the cosmere wide idea of that concept has changed end up with a totally different sentience after the shard 'remakes' its mind

[Agent34]

This might help

Quote

Questioner

Can holders of Shards give them up voluntarily? If so, what would happen?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, a Vessel for a Shard of Adonalsium can give up their power if they wish.

As for what would happen...well, there are some variables in there. Kind of like the variables in what happens to a bucket of water if you dump it out. Depends on where it falls, how strong the wind is, what the air is like.

Power dropped like this, if left alone, could end up Splintering and turning into something like spren/seons. It could become something more like the Stormfather--a large, self-aware entity. It could become something like the Dor or many of the Unmade--something proto-aware, but not truly an individual. There are other possibilities as well, depending on lots of factors. (Are sapient beings involved? what is being done with the power--is it concentrated in the Spiritual Realm as normal, or is it being pushed somewhere else?)

source

 

[The One Who Connects]

3 hours ago, Tador said:

a) then act as a separate entity
(i.e. could you then kill just the sentience and restart the cycle)

This is the prevailing theory about Adonalsium, that he attained sentience due to the sheer mass of Investiture.
I don't know what you're on about with this "kill the sentience" business though. Mind clarifying?

3 hours ago, Tador said:

b.) would the sentience be an amalgamation of the cosmere wide ideal of the 'core intent' of the shard
(like if the general cosmere idea of say ruin was a terrible force wanting to destroy everything and inflict suffering then would you end up with something worse than Ati's version of Ruin) 

I don't see why not. The Shard limits it's vessel to acting within that "Core Intent" region, so nothing should change just because the shard created a "vessel" for itself.
I don't see why not, since everything is probably limited by the perception of concepts. That said, I don't see your idea happening in practice. You'd have to alter the meaning of a word on a galactic scale, and the individual planets are as separate as they'll ever be. Maybe once FTL is an established thing and there's more of a sense of connectivity, but until then, it's just not practical.

3 hours ago, Tador said:

c) if the answer to both of these is yes, could you kill the sentience and if the cosmere wide idea of that concept has changed end up with a totally different sentience after the shard 'remakes' its mind

Depends on how quickly the Shard regains sentience. Shifting the perception of a term on a Cosmere-wide scale would.. take time, and I think it'll take too long.

Edited March 6, 2018 by The One Who Connects

[Wandering Investor]

I've gotten the impression that a shard can't get full sentience, just direction. Its mentioned that the power of preservation was smart enough to realize it wasn't smart enough to do the job. So I could see the power either splintering into pieces as the growing sentience fought itself, just sitting there, or actively searching for a vessel. I suspect the proto-awareness is the most likely, but hard to say beyond that.

[Tador]

@The One Who Connectsto be fair I wasn't particularly clear on the issue of sentience I guess, I meant that the Shard essentially 'creates' a cognitive shadow to act as its vessel, and could you then kill the cognitive shadow and then would the Shard 'create' another one 

and I believe that there's a WoB out there where a sharder claims "we do not concern ourselves with the practical", I'm just throwing hypothetical situations around because the actual mechanics of the Shards and how exactly investiture would become self aware fascinates me 

[Landis963]

15 minutes ago, Tador said:

@The One Who Connectsto be fair I wasn't particularly clear on the issue of sentience I guess, I meant that the Shard essentially 'creates' a cognitive shadow to act as its vessel, and could you then kill the cognitive shadow and then would the Shard 'create' another one 

and I believe that there's a WoB out there where a sharder claims "we do not concern ourselves with the practical", I'm just throwing hypothetical situations around because the actual mechanics of the Shards and how exactly investiture would become self aware fascinates me 

Here it is:  

 

Quote

 

Mr. Suit

Can spren - like Syl - be pierced by hemalurgic spike? Will it give some effect?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. A spren can be pierced by Invested metal…

Oversleep

Could it be spiked?

Brandon Sanderson

Could a spike be used to give abilities to spren? That’s not going to work really well.

Oversleep

Could you steal from a spren?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, you could steal the Investiture of a spren. Any Investiture can be used in a spike if you know what you’re doing. It’s actually not that hard to use one on a spren.

Oversleep

Because I thought you said Hemalurgy needs moving blood.

Brandon Sanderson

It needs, uh, yeah… there are places where spren have more physical form, more tangible form.

Questioner

Roshar?

Brandon Sanderson

No, no, no, not Roshar.

Questioner

The Cognitive Realm on Roshar?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, if you go to the Cognitive Realm on Roshar the spren act differently than they do.

Oversleep

So you could spike in the Cognitive Realm?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah I’ll leave a RAFO with you on that. That’s your fifth one. So there are ways to get any Investiture into Hemalurgy if you know what you’re doing. But yeah this is not something that would be a common use for Hemalurgy. Let’s just say that.

Oversleep

We do not concern ourselves with common uses.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, I know you don’t. But yeah Hemalurgy, when you’re spiking into somebody you… you’ll see when we get around to it.

source

 

 

[Tador]

@Landis963 Yep thats the one, Thanks 

 

[Calderis]

I personally think that when a Shard attains sapience on its own, the mind would itself be a part of the power, and in that case could not be separated from that power. 

I believe this is what happened with Adonalsium. And though he was killed, and the power splintered, the mind is still imprinted on the power. The intents are fragments of that mind Reconnecting all of them would not restore Adonalsium as an individual, and the power would not regain sapience, but all of the parts that composed that mind are still there. 

Edited March 6, 2018 by Calderis

[Dawnshard]

I think that the difference between a Shard that gained sentience by itself, and a Shard that is controlled by a vessel is about the same as artificial intelligence (ie. a robot) and human consciousness.

[Yata]

3 hours ago, Dawnshard said:

I think that the difference between a Shard that gained sentience by itself, and a Shard that is controlled by a vessel is about the same as artificial intelligence (ie. a robot) and human consciousness.

But this tell us almost nothing as what is the difference between an AI and a human consciousness ?

[RShara]

The way I see it is like this (forgive me, I've never organized my thoughts properly so this is going to be a little bit like spitballing):

If you're born a normal person, you develop with your own personality and mind, with only other people as outside influences.  So you learn about emotions, history, culture, and other people with direct experience.  You see, hear, feel, taste, touch, and think and decide and wonder all on your own.

 

As an AI or a chunk of investiture that has gained sapience, from the moment the first spark flickers, you're influenced by the magic's purpose.  Everything you experience is affected by that purpose.  You might eventually channel it to your own desired, but you never were and never will be free of it.

And you may or may not ever have had direct experience of actually living.  You've observed, you've speculated, you've run simulations.  But you've never had the direct experience of growing up, learning, feeling emotions, tasting food, etc etc.

 

So tl;dr, the difference is context.  With a mortal life behind you, you have context and experience free of the influence that you've taken up.

Does that rambling mess make sense?

[Tador]

@Yata As far as I am aware the main difference between a human and an AI is that they don't necessarily share any of the same kind of values as we do, like almost everyone views taking human/sentient life as a BAD THING, but an AI wouldn't necessarily. 

Also a side note we, and most of the characters in the cosmere, are natives of the physical realm, and we've seen natives of the cognitive realm (spren) who see life fairly differently than we do. If a shard (or other investiture, a shard seems the best candidate for it though as they are the only thing we know that is mostly in the spiritual realm) manifested its own consciousness it could be a native of the spiritual realm, which would be interesting to see