Adonalsium

[Quantus]

6 hours ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

The problem with that is what I said before: the Cosmere is only a minuscule part of a much larger universe, as Brandon himself has confirmed if I’m not mistaken. So it would seem that if that explanation is correct, they were almost have to be countless other examples of it throughout the larger universe. Which could very well be the case, but there certainly isn’t any evidence of it so far, unless the ‘Other’ is a rival ‘Adonalsium’. Of course, this would be the case even if I was correct I suppose. 

When you say "problem with that" what are you referring to?  To clarify, Im not following the relevance, there hasnt actually been ANY mention of things outside the cosmere not because they dont exist but because the finite "Cosmere" boundary is specifically the part of that universe that is relevant to all these stories; Im not sure why that would disallow any of the theories presented so far. 

Edited August 8, 2018 by Quantus

[Fanghur Rahl]

13 hours ago, Quantus said:

When you say "problem with that" what are you referring to?  To clarify, Im not following the relevance, there hasnt actually been ANY mention of things outside the cosmere not because they dont exist but because the finite "Cosmere" boundary is specifically the part of that universe that is relevant to all these stories; Im not sure why that would disallow any of the theories presented so far. 

My point was just that if we assume that Adonalsium is ‘merely’ the equivalent of a star cluster-sized pool of ‘raw’ Investiture turned sapient, then what about all the other star clusters? Other galaxies? Are there other ‘Adonalsiums’ out there? I wasn’t suggesting that it disallows the theories, but I do think it at least makes them incomplete. That’s why I personally favour the ‘ascended mortal’ theory, since at least then it would make sense that Adonalsium was localized to the general Cosmere region, if we assume a rare-earth view of naturally-evolved intelligent life in Brandon’s universe.

Like I said, I’m in no way confident that I’m right, and this may well qualify as a crackpot theory stemming from not allowing for nearly enough creative licence, but still, who knows? If mortals can Ascend by absorbing splinters of Adonalsium, why not theoretically by simply absorbing a huge amount of ‘raw’ Investiture? 

[Calderis]

@Fanghur Rahl my question to that, is why do you think that Adonalsium was in any way limited to just the Cosmere?

I think that Adonalsium existed and acted elsewhere... But the limitations of the Vessels, and the portion of the investiture that they directly picked up, limited them in ways that Adonalsium never was. 

The story we see is limited to this small corner of the Cosmere universe. I don't believe that necessarily means that Adonalsium was as well. 

[Fanghur Rahl]

I think that it was limited to the Cosmere simply because it seems to me that if it truly is/was a universal entity, then I fail to see how a few uppity humans and dragons could have shattered the entirety of Adonalsium; at most I would think that they may have been able to shatter an infinitesimal fraction of its power/essence, and even then only if he/she/it deliberately allowed it. 

It just makes more logical sense to me to think of Adonalsium as being in some sense localized rather than universe-spanning. Now admittedly, we don’t have anywhere near the full story on this, but from what little information we do currently have, this just makes more sense to me.

[+Child of Hodor]

59 minutes ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

I think that it was limited to the Cosmere simply because it seems to me that if it truly is/was a universal entity, then I fail to see how a few uppity humans and dragons could have shattered the entirety of Adonalsium; at most I would think that they may have been able to shatter an infinitesimal fraction of its power/essence, and even then only if he/she/it deliberately allowed it. 

It just makes more logical sense to me to think of Adonalsium as being in some sense localized rather than universe-spanning. Now admittedly, we don’t have anywhere near the full story on this, but from what little information we do currently have, this just makes more sense to me.

The WoB below isn't a total confirmation of your idea, but gets at the idea of something else created the Universe as a whole and Adonalsium playing a much smaller role. Doesn't mean Adonalsium was strictly limited to the Cosmere. Could be that the Creator god left some residual power around somewhere else and it either gained sentience or was picked up and became Adonalsium, then it went and made the Cosmere. 

For the purposes of the story I don't know that we'll ever need to worry much about the rest of the Universe outside of the Cosmere, other than as a footnote that it exists and maybe Adonalsium came from there. 

Adonalsium was still VASTLY more powerful than any combination of mortals, so whether it was the god of everything or the god of everything in a star cluster of 50 -100 stars it is still a ridiculous mismatch. 

 

 

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  JordanCon 2018 (April 20, 2018)
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Billy Todd [PENDING REVIEW]

How closely does Adonalsium map to the gnostic demiurge?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

A little bit.

Billy Todd [PENDING REVIEW]

So, not completely? I'm not completely off?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

That's not off at all. 

Billy Todd [PENDING REVIEW]

So, not the urge, but the demiurge. 

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Oh, well I'll have to go read to make sure what I'm talking about then. Your answer is: I will go read and make sure I know. I thought I knew what I was talking about.

Billy Todd [PENDING REVIEW]

So, there's the creator, which is the urge, which is the creator of the Universe. *large hand gesture* The demiurge is actually God. The demiurge is the one that creates [its] universe, *small hand gesture inside larger gesture* and entities living within the universe need knowledge of that which is beyond what the demiurge has created.

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Okay, that matches pretty well.

 

 

[Calderis]

I agree that it's not likely to ever matter, but the Urge/Demiurge thing is kind of my point. 

I didn't claim Adonalsium was the creator. Assuming that there was one, that would be the God Beyond, which we will never get confirmation of. But Adonalsium would still be a literal God, and not an ascended mortal. 

 

[Fanghur Rahl]

Well then at some point Brandon is going to seriously have his work cut out for him trying to come up with a believable way to have a universe-spanning subordinate God effectively killed or destroyed by a group of power-hungry mortals, or some reason to allow itself to be destroyed in such a fashion in spite of the fact that at least according to Hoid the result has been that its divine plan has been royally messed up. 

Quite frankly, I think that would be quite the herculean task if that truly is what happened.

[Calderis]

I wouldn't assume that Hoid, or any of those present, knew anything about what Adonalsium's plans were. Whatever most of them believed is, presumably, why they Shattered him in the first place. 

As I've said earlier in the thread, assuming that this was not something that Adonalsium foresaw and accepted relies on Adonalsium having truly human motivations. I don't believe there is any way that Adonalsium didn't know what was coming, or was incapable of stopping it. 

Even if he had been a mortal ascended I don't see how that could be true. The only answer I can see as acceptable with that level of power is that it knew, and for whatever reason, accepted what was coming. Perhaps even planned for it and set it in motion.

Edit: if Adonalsium were a mortal ascended to the power of all 16 shards he should have been limited in the same ways as the Vessels and still had mortal motivations. Fears and location restraints and all of it... 

I just find those constraints, especially the motivational ones, to be make the Shattering far far less likely in that case. Fear of death is natural to a mortal being. 

Edited August 9, 2018 by Calderis

[Fanghur Rahl]

Well, that might well be the case, and I completely agree with you that IF Adonalsium is/was a literal God, the alternative is simply ridiculous. Though in every case we’ve so far seen, the Shattering has always been described in ways that imply that the Sixteen effectively did to Adonalsium what Odium does to other Shards (that is to say, it implies that they in some sense rose up against and killed Adonalsium). Though admittedly, I suppose Kriss and the other worldhoppers are simply going by what they themselves know, which is presumably quite limited in this particular area since only Hoid and Frost (that we know of anyway) were actually there. Regardless, I think my point still stands that Brandon is going to have to come up with a pretty extraordinary explanation for how and why all this occurred; it certainly isn’t something one would typically expect to happen to a God outside of really bad fiction, which Brandon’s works clearly are not.

Edited August 9, 2018 by Fanghur Rahl

[Weltall]

Just to throw it out there, the concept of a deity creating and then dividing itself up in its creation is an old one. It's part of some branches of Judaism that God created the universe to see Himself within it, there's tenth century Christian theologians who proposed similar ideas and there are aspects of it in Hinduism as well, just to name a few examples. The concept has been introduced in the Cosmere already with the story Ym tells about the One who knew everything but experienced nothing and so became many to experience all things. This may not be where Brandon is going exactly but it's a well-attested concept that can fit with the facts as we currently understand them, regarding why Adonalsium would allow himself to be Shattered.

[Fanghur Rahl]

The technical term for a conception of God in which it effectively transforms itself into the universe is called ‘pandeism’. And I had actually forgotten that story by Ym, that’s a pretty interesting theory, although I don’t quite see how it connects with Adonalsium and what happened to it, although I grant that there’s a pretty good chance that Ym was indeed referring to Adonalsium in at least some allegorical sense.

The only real problem is that long before it was shattered, Adonalsium had already effectively ‘divided’ itself by creating intelligent life throughout the Cosmere and possibly beyond; as I understand it, using your own Investiture to create something effectively makes it a part of you (or at least it came FROM your own essence), so it wouldn’t have needed to let itself be ‘killed’ like that if that were its goal.

[Quantus]

@Fanghur Rahl Im still struggling to see the connection you are making; I dont see how Adonalsium being from the Cosmere region of the universe or not precludes any of the various origins (an Emergent Power, an Ascendant mortal, a pure god-entity, etc). Any of those could have happened locally or have happened elsewhere before Adonalsium found/created the Cosmere, no? 

 

19 hours ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

The technical term for a conception of God in which it effectively transforms itself into the universe is called ‘pandeism’. And I had actually forgotten that story by Ym, that’s a pretty interesting theory, although I don’t quite see how it connects with Adonalsium and what happened to it, although I grant that there’s a pretty good chance that Ym was indeed referring to Adonalsium in at least some allegorical sense.

The only real problem is that long before it was shattered, Adonalsium had already effectively ‘divided’ itself by creating intelligent life throughout the Cosmere and possibly beyond; as I understand it, using your own Investiture to create something effectively makes it a part of you (or at least it came FROM your own essence), so it wouldn’t have needed to let itself be ‘killed’ like that if that were its goal.

Those are different things. Making it a part of you different from splitting it off  of yourself.  Preservation and Ruin created Scadrial whole and so are heavily invested in its substance and people, but that is a wildly different process than being Shattered. 

 

 

EDIT:

On 8/9/2018 at 11:16 AM, Calderis said:

I wouldn't assume that Hoid, or any of those present, knew anything about what Adonalsium's plans were. Whatever most of them believed is, presumably, why they Shattered him in the first place. 

As I've said earlier in the thread, assuming that this was not something that Adonalsium foresaw and accepted relies on Adonalsium having truly human motivations. I don't believe there is any way that Adonalsium didn't know what was coming, or was incapable of stopping it. 

Even if he had been a mortal ascended I don't see how that could be true. The only answer I can see as acceptable with that level of power is that it knew, and for whatever reason, accepted what was coming. Perhaps even planned for it and set it in motion.

Edit: if Adonalsium were a mortal ascended to the power of all 16 shards he should have been limited in the same ways as the Vessels and still had mortal motivations. Fears and location restraints and all of it... 

I just find those constraints, especially the motivational ones, to be make the Shattering far far less likely in that case. Fear of death is natural to a mortal being. 

I dunno, there are a lot of common human motivations for self-sacrifice, and protection of what you've Created (both living child and creative works) is one of the more common and powerful.  If he thought he was defending the Cosmere, either fomr himself or from something else, I could easily see him taking the willing stance. 

 

Though I personally tend to think it was less of a knowing acceptance and more of a blind spot to what presumably was a really long-shot attack, on the scale of me having a blind-spot for bacteria attacking me.  That sort of assuming that this kind of thing would cause sufficient multi-realm disruption and/or fallout that whatever Fortune/Prescience etc he may have had would have been unable to warn him sufficiently. 

 

Edited August 10, 2018 by Quantus

[Fanghur Rahl]

On 2018-08-10 at 0:15 PM, Quantus said:

@Fanghur Rahl Im still struggling to see the connection you are making; I dont see how Adonalsium being from the Cosmere region of the universe or not precludes any of the various origins (an Emergent Power, an Ascendant mortal, a pure god-entity, etc). Any of those could have happened locally or have happened elsewhere before Adonalsium found/created the Cosmere, no? 

Well if we’re being technical, most people would say that a big-G God would be omnipresent by definition. Regardless, I’m obviously not explaining myself well. My point isn’t that accepting the premise that Adonalsium was localized to the Cosmere region and resulted from the spontaneous ‘accretion’ for lack of a better term of raw Investiture means that any of the above-mentioned theories are false, only that they’re incomplete. Like I said, IF one assumes the above two premises, then it begs the obvious question of whether there are other similar being that arose through the same means throughout the greater Cosmere universe? And if not, why not? What’s so special about the star cluster that all the stories are part of? 

Conversely, IF we assume that Adonalsium was a universal being that arose spontaneously from the ‘accretion’ of all the raw Investiture in the entire universe, which is what most people tend to assume so far as I can tell, then this begs its own set of questions, namely the ones Calderis and I were discussing. These are all things that any complete explanation of Adonalsium must be able to provide answers for, and up until now, we simply have not been provided with these answers, mostly just RAFOs. That’s the point I’m trying to make here. We have a large puzzle with most of the pieces missing.

[Calderis]

49 minutes ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

Conversely, IF we assume that Adonalsium was a universal being that arose spontaneously from the ‘accretion’ of all the raw Investiture in the entire universe, which is what most people tend to assume so far as I can tell, then this begs its own set of questions, namely the ones Calderis and I were discussing. These are all things that any complete explanation of Adonalsium must be able to provide answers for, and up until now, we simply have not been provided with these answers, mostly just RAFOs. That’s the point I’m trying to make here. We have a large puzzle with most of the pieces missing.

See, I don't think that Adonalsium was in any way limited to the Cosmere. I only think that the Vessels are because the picked up the portion of his power designated for this area. 

I think that it did similar things throughout the universe, and the rest of those areas are just functioning on autopilot, the same way that the areas of a Shard's Investiture function just fine without their direct involvement (see the areas the Autonomy is effecting. They functioned just fine before she was consciously aware of them).

I don't believe that there is a conflict to be overcome, because I believe that the limitations we see apply only to the Vessels. 

 

[Fanghur Rahl]

I’m not entirely sure what the relevance of that is to the points I just made; I agree that that’s a valid theory in its own right, but it certainly doesn’t explain either the means by which the 16 could have shattered it, what possible motivation Adonalsium may have had for either allowing it or effectively shattering itself and making it look like the 16 ‘killed’ it (though the ‘making itself into parts of the universe’ idea is certainly an interesting one), or any of that.

Though just to clarify, Calderis, is it your contention that Adonalsium was only ‘killed’ in the Cosmere region and still ‘alive’ and whole beyond it? That seems to be what you were implying, though I could be mistaken.

Edited August 11, 2018 by Fanghur Rahl

[Calderis]

5 minutes ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

Though just to clarify, Calderis, is it your contention that Adonalsium was only ‘killed’ in the Cosmere region and still ‘alive’ and whole beyond it? That seems to be what you were implying, though I could be mistaken.

No. Adonalsium, the personality, died. It's mind was imprinted on the power and that was split everywhere. That is what the intents are. 

Outside of the Cosmere it makes no real difference though, other than the power is not going to be actively doing anything new. It's just continuing in autopilot in any systems established. 

The Vessels picked up the pieces alloted to them in the Shattering, and function as the mind of that portion of the power, but due to their finite nature, are limited to active use of the power, creation and direct manipulation, with the bounds we know of. 

Edited August 11, 2018 by Calderis

[Fanghur Rahl]

Well, like I said, Brandon’s got his work cut out coming up with a way to explain how and why that could have happened in a realistic way. On the other hand, going off that same line of thought, shouldn’t the Investiture beyond the Cosmere that the 16 weren’t able to absorb eventually give rise to other minds of their own? 

[Calderis]

8 minutes ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

Well, like I said, Brandon’s got his work cut out coming up with a way to explain how and why that could have happened in a realistic way. On the other hand, going off that same line of thought, shouldn’t the Investiture beyond the Cosmere that the 16 weren’t able to absorb eventually give rise to other minds of their own? 

In Shards that have been splintered absolutely. 

For Shards that are whole no. That investiture is still a part of the Shard Spiritually. They just aren't conscious of it. It's no different than your heartbeat being a part of your body, but something you don't consciously tell to beat. 

The areas beyond their perception are running as an automatic system. The only way that they can develop a mind is if what Autonomy has done with her Avatars is done there. 

[Ripheus23]

Or maybe the Shattering of Adonalsium sterilized/damaged/corrupted/something-baded all but the 50 to 100 Cosmere-star solar systems. Like, the twist is that the super-apocalypse already happened, and this is all actually post-apocalyptic fiction

[Fanghur Rahl]

10 minutes ago, Calderis said:

In Shards that have been splintered absolutely. 

For Shards that are whole no. That investiture is still a part of the Shard Spiritually. They just aren't conscious of it. It's no different than your heartbeat being a part of your body, but something you don't consciously tell to beat. 

The areas beyond their perception are running as an automatic system. The only way that they can develop a mind is if what Autonomy has done with her Avatars is done there. 

How exactly is the line drawn though in terms of how much of their own Investiture and the area it is infusing a Shard can be aware of though? I mean, Ruin and Preservation were supposed to be aware of the whole Scadrial system at once (or at least all of Scadrial itself) because that's where their power was invested, and yet that certainly isn't something any human being could do. If their own Investiture, effectively the Shards themselves, extend across infinity, then why doesn't their awareness as well? I mean technically speaking in the middle of all that Investiture there is still a human being, right? It seems pretty arbitrary to me to declare by fiat that a Shard has perfect knowledge of the system that they Invest, and yet despite the fact that their essence extends perhaps infinitely beyond that boundary their awareness basically comes to a dead stop at the perimeter of their domain.

[Calderis]

@Fanghur Rahl they don't have perfect knowledge? Secret History shows us pretty clearly that they have limited capacity and that where they focus their attention varies. 

[Fanghur Rahl]

You're right, I misspoke. Let me rephrase that, a Shard can acquire knowledge of anything that it is invested in, though not all at once. My point was just that a Shard can know anything about what they are invested in. Ruin didn't invest in making humans sentient, so it couldn't know their thoughts. Thanks for pointing that blatant mistake out, I have no idea where that came from. Regardless, the question of how exactly that line is drawn is still a valid one I think.

[Calderis]

12 minutes ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

You're right, I misspoke. Let me rephrase that, a Shard can acquire knowledge of anything that it is invested in, though not all at once. My point was just that a Shard can know anything about what they are invested in. Ruin didn't invest in making humans sentient, so it couldn't know their thoughts. Thanks for pointing that blatant mistake out, I have no idea where that came from. Regardless, the question of how exactly that line is drawn is still a valid one I think.

Except beyond the confines of the place they've chosen to invest, that has been shown to be completely untrue. That's why I've brought up Autonomy so much in this conversation. 

Spoilered for length 

Spoiler

ReadAndFindOut

In 2014, Brandon said First of the Sun - the planet in Sixth of the Dusk - is a minor Shardworld, in that it does not have a Shard present (https://wob.coppermind.net/events/103-salt-lake-city-comic-con-2014/#e1010). However, we've now gotten a WoB saying that Patji - the Father island - IS a Shard (https://wob.coppermind.net/events/256-oathbringer-london-signing/#e8606). Patji was a Shard, but isn't during SotD? Or did we finally get confirmation on that elusive "Survival Shard"? What do you guys think?

Brandon Sanderson

I stand by them. Though, as always, quotes and WoBs at signings aren't always as deliberately thought out as I'd like them to be. Answering questions on the fly can be challenging, and my phrasing can be bad in retrospect.

But no shard was in residence on First of the Sun during the events of that story. The investiture on that planet is residue, normal investiture from Adonalsium. Everything happening there could happen with or without a shard present. Indeed, I would say that no shard was ever "in residence" on First of the Sun.

The being called Patji still exists, and is a shard of Adonalsium. Shards in the past have been interested in First of the Sun, and have meddled in small ways there. (Like they have on a lot of shardworlds.)

Note that I might have been a little misleading in the first quote by bringing up Threnody, which is a real corner case in the cosmere because of uncommon events there.

That said, I'm sure that every story I write about a planet will bring up the quirks and unusual interactions of the magic there, because that's kind of what I do. (First of the Sun has its own oddities, as mentioned in Arcanum Unbounded.) Every planet is likely to end up as a corner case in some way, just like every person is distinctive in their own way, and never fully fits expectations.

I still consider one of the major dividing lines between "major" and "minor" shardworlds (other than Shard residence) to be in strength of access to the magic, and control over it. I intend the minor shard worlds to involve interactions with the magic as setting--coming back to spren, you could have a minor shardworld with people who use, befriend, even bond spren. (Or the local equivalent--Seon, Aviar, etc.) But you'd never see power on the level of the city of Elantris, the actions of a Bondsmith, or even the broad power suite of a mistborn.

But, as ever, the cosmere is a work in progress. The needs of telling a great story trump things I've said about what I'm planning. (I do try as much as I can to avoid having two texts contradict one another. And when they do, that's often a lapse on my part.)

Oversleep

Wait.

I'm confused.

So the Investiture on First of the Sun is associated with a Shard or is it residue, normal investiture from Adonalsium?

Cause the question was a follow up (on this) where you revealed that all Investiture in Cosmere got assigned to a Shard even if it wasn't part of a Shard.

And then you said that the one on First of the Sun is directly associated with one of the Shards (and since later you revealed Patji to be an avatar of Autonomy (also, what are avatars and how do they work?)) we took it to mean that at one point Autonomy Invested in First of the Sun.

But now you're saying it didn't?

If there was no Shard ever on First of the Sun but Patji is a Shard/avatar of a Shard then where is Patji, actually?

Could you please clarify all that?

Brandon Sanderson

So the Investiture on First of the Sun is associated with a Shard or is it residue, normal investiture from Adonalsium?"

The reason I have so much trouble answering these questions (and you'll see me struggling to get an answer in the 10-15 seconds I have when someone asks me in a signing line) is because this isn't an either or. Is this computer I'm using matter associated with Earth, the Big Bang, or such-and-such star that went supernova long ago? Well, it's probably all three.

When people ask, "What shard is this investiture associated with" it gets very complicated. Shards influence and tweak certain investiture, giving it a kind of spin or magnetism, but all investiture ever predates the shattering--and in the cosmere matter, energy, and investiture are one thing.

I always imagine investiture having certain states, certain magnetisms if you will, associated with certain aspects of Adonalsium. So it's all "assigned" to a shard--because it's always been associated with that Shard. To investiture, Adonalsium's shattering meant everything and nothing at the same time.

We generally mean the term "Invested" to mean a Shard has taken permanent residence in a location, a kind of base of operations--but at the same time, this is meaningless, since distance has no meaning on the Spiritual Realm, where most Shards are. So imprisonment of a Shard like Ruin or Odium is a crude expression--but the best we have.

Autonomy never "invested" on First of the Sun. But even answering (as someone else asked) if they created an avatar without visiting is a difficult thing to explain--because even explaining how a shard travels (when motion is irrelevant) is difficult to manage. It's a subject that I intend to be up for debate, discussion, and argument by in-world philosophers and arcanists.

You can see why I have such troubles explaining these things at signings--and why I fail when I try to, considering the time limitations and (often) fatigue limitations placed upon me. These are concepts I intend to spend entire, lengthy epic volumes explaining and exploring.

Let's say you were Autonomy, and you have--through expanding and exploring your understanding--found a gathering of investiture that has always been there, you always knew about, but still didn't actually recognize until the moment you considered and explored it. (Because even though your power is infinite, accessing and using that infinity is beyond your reach.) Were you "invested" there? No, no more than you're invested on Roshar, where parts of what were Adonalsium still exist that are associated with you (in the very fabric of mater and existence.) But suddenly, you have a chance to tweak, influence, and do things that were always possible, but which you never could do because you knew, but didn't know, at the same time.

And...I'm already into WAY more than I want to be typing this out right now. If it's confusing, it's because it's practically impossible for me to explain these things in a short span of time.

I'm going to leave it here, understanding that no, I haven't fully explained your question. (I didn't even get into what avatars are, what Patji was, and what happened to Patji the being--and how that relates to Patji the island.) But hopefully this kind of starts to point the right direction, though I probably should have just left this question alone because I bet this post is going to raise more questions than it answers...

Overlord Jebus

You've confused things so much now. We thought we had a pretty good grasp of this whole Patji situation (Autonomy visited the planet at some point, got themselves all Invested and created an avatar which is called Patji by the locals).

Now you're saying no Shard has ever visited there? And that the pool would have existed if no Shard had ever interfered? But that Patji still exists and is a Shard?

Does that mean Autonomy edited First of the Sun from afar without actually going there? And that the pool would have already existed without any intervention? Does this mean it was associated with Autonomy from the beginning? I'm really confused now.

Brandon Sanderson

I don't believe I said no Shard had visited. I said no Shard was there during the events of the story.

Investiture on First of the Sun predates any shards fiddling with it.

Shards have fiddled with it by the time of the story.

I think fandom might be going down too far a rabbit hole on this one.

Chaos

Are you saying here that Patji is an avatar of Autonomy, or is it a separate Shard and not an avatar of Autonomy?

Brandon Sanderson

When I said Patji was a Shard, I was meaning automony--but it is not quite that simple.

Take this post to mean "no, you should not be looking toward another Shard for Patji's origins. Autonomy is the one relevant." But Autonomy's relationships with entities like this (not sure entity is the right word, even) is complex. I'm not trying to confuse the issue, though.

source

Relevant portion. 

Quote

Let's say you were Autonomy, and you have--through expanding and exploring your understanding--found a gathering of investiture that has always been there, you always knew about, but still didn't actually recognize until the moment you considered and explored it. (Because even though your power is infinite, accessing and using that infinity is beyond your reach.) Were you "invested" there? No, no more than you're invested on Roshar, where parts of what were Adonalsium still exist that are associated with you (in the very fabric of mater and existence.) But suddenly, you have a chance to tweak, influence, and do things that were always possible, but which you never could do because you knew, but didn't know, at the same time.

Edit: I misread you. Yes they can acquire that knowledge... But they have to make themselves aware of it. And then basically do whatever it is that Autonomy is doing. Which... Considering so far Autonomy seems to be alone in doing this, makes me think that there is a cost to the vessel that most aren't willing to pay. 

They aren't infinite. Even if the power that they wield is. As such, I don't think many would choose to pay the price that Bavadin is. 

Edited August 11, 2018 by Calderis

[Fanghur Rahl]

Fair enough. I admit that I still have a lot to learn about the mechanics of the Cosmere, and I haven't actually gotten to the works in which Autonomy is specifically relevant. Though I still think it's a bit misleading to say that a Shard's Investiture extends potentially across infinity and yet the Shard is not invested across infinity. 

[Quantus]

On 8/11/2018 at 3:55 PM, Calderis said:

 

They aren't infinite. Even if the power that they wield is. As such, I don't think many would choose to pay the price that Bavadin is. 

Nitpicky question, but is that literally the case?  I know there are WOB's that certainly say INfinite, but there's also that one that saying that Investiture itself in not infinite in the Cosmere just like Matter and Energy are not.  Im wondering if it's another relative semantic thing like how an "Uninvested" person still does have the normal base Investiture of a living, sentient person.  

 

My own current origin for Adonalsium leans toward him being a superpowerful but technically finite god that is from Elsewhere and is actually responsible for the Creation of the Cosmere region of the wider universe; Im still undecided on whether the Three-Realm model is from Beyond him (like true Death)  or if it's a local rulebook instituted when he/it created the Cosmere area.