Crackpot (probably) theory about Autonomy

[Fanghur Rahl]

I'm going to just say right off the bat that I am by no means convinced that this is even likely to be true much less that it actually is, and it only just finished coming together in my head a few minutes ago in another one of my posts in which Autonomy was brought up. So for all I know, this is demonstrably false, but I thought I'd just put it out there.

So for a while now, I've been trying (and failing) to wrap my brain around just what the heck is going on with Autonomy and why she seems to be acting so contrary to at least reasonable conceptions of what her intent would seem to indicate. What we seem to know about her is that 1) she's 'spreading' from planet to planet and installing avatars of her Investiture on them, whatever exactly that means, 2) she tends to discourage if not outright forbid in the case of Taldain any access to or from the planets under her dominion (pun definitely intended), and 3) that she tends to inspire or deliberately set herself or her avatars up as objects of worship among those on her planets. This has always struck me as extremely bizarre behaviour for the Shard of Autonomy, for which really only (2) could be argued as unsurprising. But then I remembered that there was a WOB in which someone had asked Brandon whether Autonomy was involved in the splintering of Devotion and Dominion, and Brandon answered in the affirmative, albeit only after they rephrased the question to be extremely broad to prevent him from RAFOing it on the spot ("was Autonomy involved in any way), which is so vague as to be compatible with practically anything, but oh well, just consider that one of the unproven assumptions of this theory.

What occurred to me is that it almost seems like Autonomy is displaying behaviour consistent with and expected by Dominion and Devotion (albeit interpreted in the sense of 'subservience' and 'sycophantism' rather than 'love and compassion' as Aona seems to). That is to say, I don't think any of us would have been at all surprised to have learned that Dominion liked to spread from planet to planet and claim them for itself, or that a less benevolently-interpreted Devotion would like to set themself up as an object of worship and reverence, but that Autonomy would do those things is, at the very least, somewhat more surprising simply by virtue of it not being as expected given that Shardic intent.

So my question is this: IF we assume for the sake of argument that Autonomy was in some way involved with the deaths of Devotion and Dominion, or of disposing of their 'remains' afterward so to speak, is there any chance that the uncontained Investiture of Dominion and Devotion could have in some sense 'contaminated' Autonomy's own Investiture (and maybe even Odium too for all we know, since he's really no different, just even worse) to some extent and instilled into her these tendencies that would be more expected for those two Shards? I mean she clearly doesn't hold their full Shards, that's not what I'm suggesting, but it doesn't seem entirely outside the realm of possibility that when the Investiture of two Shards comes into contact, for lack of a better term, some limited degree of melding occurs (it certainly did in Harmony's case, admittedly through completely different means).

Looked at in this way, Autonomy's behaviour would no longer seem quite so counter-intuitive. She'd effectively be a single Shard in terms of power, but possess in addition to her primary attribute, a limited extent of two other Shards as well. Though admittedly, an obvious inconsistency with this theory is that Ruin and Preservation's Investiture had clearly been 'in contact' before and yet neither of them displayed any sort of 'intent blending', so clearly if this has any merit at all it would require the additional assumption that something different and possibly unique occurred on Sel that simply hasn't occurred since. Exactly what this is, I don't know.

Does anyone have any thoughts?

 

[+Invocation]

Autonomy is one of those Shards whose Intent is variable (I'm 90% sure I read that somewhere here), depending on the Vessel, so theoretically there wouldn't require any blending of D + D with Autonomy if whoever is holding Autonomy has the right influence upon the power itself via their perception on what Autonomy is. For all we know, it could be that they are viewing Autonomy as being the only major power left in the cosmere, so doing anything to help D + D get obliterated would benefit that. I don't think we'll really know much about that until we can get some more direct focus on Autonomy.

Edited September 2, 2018 by Invocation

[Fanghur Rahl]

 Yeah, maybe. It’s just always seemed really incongruous to me for a Shard who by all rights would naively be assumed to be a promoter of freedom and independence to instead go around subjugating worlds, stopping them from expanding, and manipulating them into worshipping her. My gut says that something else must be at play here, even if it isn’t this particular theory, and like I said, I’m by no means convinced that this is correct.

[Ripheus23]

Maybe Autonomy is a Shard whose variable Intent is what the avatars come from? Like, the other Shards could have represented other Intents: Autonomy does represent them, and each avatar is keyed to a different sub-Intent.

[Fanghur Rahl]

To quote Oromis from ‘Eldest’: “You cannot gainsay a word’s [concept’s] inherent meaning. Guide it? Yes. Shape it? Yes. But not contravene its definition to imply the very opposite.”

In my opinion at least, that very well might be what one would have to do to reconcile Autonomy’s action with the intent itself; there’s only so far you can stretch the concept of pure autonomy before it turns into something else entirely.

[Ripheus23]

IDK, Autonomy-as-an-Intent might be "the concept of Intent, used autonomously," as in having an autonomous/independent/self-sovereign Intent rather than a further Intent to make things autonomous. In other words, Autonomy would be the Shard with the most variable Intent of all, the Intent that involves the most leeway, as it were. Like "the Shard that wants to survive" versus "a Shard of Survival," sort of.

Edited September 2, 2018 by Ripheus23

[Fanghur Rahl]

Just now, Ripheus23 said:

IDK, Autonomy-as-an-Intent might be "the concept of Intent, used autonomously," as in having an autonomous/independent/self-sovereign Intent rather than a further Intent to make things autonomous. In other words, Autonomy would be the Shard with the most variable Intent of all, the Intent that involves the most leeway, as it were. Like "the Shard that wants to survive" versus "a Shard of Survival," sort of.

Wouldn’t that essentially make Bavadin a Shard who lacks an intent, for all intents and purposes (no pun intended)? 

[Ripheus23]

Just now, Fanghur Rahl said:

Wouldn’t that essentially make Bavadin a Shard who lacks an intent, for all intents and purposes (no pun intended)? 

To an extent, maybe. We could parse it to, "The Shard with the most variations on the theme," like Ruin decodes pretty simply (entropy or explosions, say) whereas Autonomy decodes to Liberty, Freedom (if those words differ significantly enough), Independence, Self-control, etc. However, this sounds to me like it would require what you're saying about Bavadin holding part of the Shard of Dominion; or maybe it means the holder of Autonomy is the one who can best handle other Intents. (Maybe this is why Autonomy is going after Harmony's world: she wants to "show him how it's done," so to speak.)

[Fanghur Rahl]

Well, I admit I never thought of it that way, But I have a hard time believing that Brandon would put something like that in the series. I think it would go against the over all theme of the Shards as a concept.

[Calderis]

I think we get too hung up on the names of the Shards. They are not perfect. 

The intents are not able to be represented in a word, but we require words for categorization because we're human. 

Quote

WinespringBrother [PENDING REVIEW]

Given that Shards, and perhaps, Ascended beings, have intents similar to their names.

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

More that they have names similar to their intents.

-snip-

source

Personally, I think that the names we see are more in line with the Vessels interpretation in addition to this... But regardless, the name "Autonomy" is one, not a perfect fit, and two, not self directed at Autonomy. 

So let's look at just the intent of Autonomy as presented for a moment, and how she seems to be "subjugating worlds." I think this hypocrisy is explainable, even within the intent as presented. 

Autonomy views the interference of Shards in people's lives as an oppressive force, but the lack of self direction means she doesn't see her own influence as problematic. So she interferes. Closes down her borders to worldhoppers "contaminated" by other shards. Sets up religions to undermine people from the influence of other Shards. 

It's completely hypocritical, and makes sense as long as you remember that a Shard's intent is not directed at itself. 

Quote

Chaos

It's a little odd that Preservation would inherently give up its power to fuel Allomancy, because you'd think he would preserve himself, you know? Does that make sense?

Brandon Sanderson

Preservation, as a Shard, is about preserving life, people, and the like. Not about self. No more than Ruin is about destroying self, or Cultivation is about growing herself.

source

 

Edited September 2, 2018 by Calderis

[Fanghur Rahl]

Well, actually, in the case of the Shards that seem to embody various aspects of humanity, like Honour, Devotion, and presumably Ambition, the intents ARE self-applied as well. Honour couldn’t break oaths, Devotion was by all accounts a very benevolent, loving being herself, and Ambition was presumably, well, ambitious. I don’t really know whether Autonomy would be in the same class as these other kinds of Shards, but if so, I don’t see any real reason to a priori assume that she wouldn’t object to herself violating others’ autonomy. I mean, maybe she wouldn’t, but I don’t think we can just assume it. And even if she didn’t, wouldn’t just interdicting the planets be enough?

[Calderis]

4 minutes ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

Honour couldn’t break oaths,

This is an attribute of Shards in general. That's a point in OB concerning Rayse. It's also a point of argument considering Preservation and Ruin's "agreement," though Preservation explains that in SH. 

4 minutes ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

Devotion was by all accounts a very benevolent, loving being herself, and Ambition was presumably, well, ambitious.

I think these are traits of the Vessels themselves that is what drew them to take those shards in the first place. 

I've yet to see anything that contradicts the WoB. I don't think any shards intent is self directed. 

Edited September 2, 2018 by Calderis

[Fanghur Rahl]

Well, perhaps. Like I said, I don't rule out the possibility that there might be some kind of contrived way of explaining away her counter-intuitive behaviour simply within the framework of the intent of 'Autonomy', but I don't see any problem in exploring alternative possibilities. Autonomy is certainly the weirdest Shard we know of so far after all, I think. Brandon definitely has something weird up his sleeve with regard to her. Honestly, I'd be quite disappointed if he didn't after all the hype.

Edited September 2, 2018 by Fanghur Rahl

[Draginon]

I had to look up the definition of autonomy and one is 'a self-governing country or region' and one way to explain Autonomy's 'off' behavior is this: if all planets are considered one region it wouldn't go against her behavior at all and if she considers the whole of the Cosmere her autonomous region then the other Shards are the intruders and transgressors and her closing off Taldain would be more 'my body is there, I must prevent assassination attempts on my person' than anything in this situation

[Fanghur Rahl]

1 minute ago, Draginon said:

I had to look up the definition of autonomy and one is 'a self-governing country or region' and one way to explain Autonomy's 'off' behavior is this: if all planets are considered one region it wouldn't go against her behavior at all and if she considers the whole of the Cosmere her autonomous region then the other Shards are the intruders and transgressors and her closing off Taldain would be more 'my body is there, I must prevent assassination attempts on my person' than anything in this situation

The only problem with that line of reasoning is why would she exclude the other Shards from that logic? Having multiple Shards technically wouldn't make an interconnected Cosmere any less 'autonomous', not unless they were doing the kind of thing Bavadin is doing. That and I can't fathom how she would think allying herself with Odium (or at least being sympathetic toward his goal) would support that goal.

[Draginon]

1 minute ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

The only problem with that line of reasoning is why would she exclude the other Shards from that logic? Having multiple Shards technically wouldn't make an interconnected Cosmere any less 'autonomous', not unless they were doing the kind of thing Bavadin is doing. That and I can't fathom how she would think allying herself with Odium (or at least being sympathetic toward his goal) would support that goal.

If she's using the logic of 'Get off my lawn you whippersnappers!' and thinks an autonomous region only needs one overseer. Also since she is making avatars, maybe to replace the Shards?, she can still have a ruler for each planet.

If she's keeping her body on Taldain, using most of her power to keep others off Taldain and using power to make her avatars I doubt she'd be powerful enough to actually 'fight' off the others hence teaming up with Odium out of convenience but with the intend of backstabbing him when he's weakened himself 'killing' the other Shards.

[Fanghur Rahl]

Maybe, although I still think that theory has a number of problems with it, not least of which being Odium actually being naive enough to fall for it. Frankly, from what we know about him, I think he probably would have turned on her the instant he was finished with her. Not let her go off to start spreading across the Cosmere like a virus and making it all the more inconvenient when he eventually turns his shardicide against Autonomy.

[Draginon]

9 hours ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

Maybe, although I still think that theory has a number of problems with it, not least of which being Odium actually being naive enough to fall for it. Frankly, from what we know about him, I think he probably would have turned on her the instant he was finished with her. Not let her go off to start spreading across the Cosmere like a virus and making it all the more inconvenient when he eventually turns his shardicide against Autonomy.

Well I haven't gotten to Oathbringer yet so I don't know what his personality is like yet, but we do know that Odium has a hit list and for all we know Autonomy might be at the bottom and since he's more or less stuck on the Roshar system how much of the other Shards would he really know about, especially if they changed. Harmony I can counter on what I just said by saying that the impact of someone ascending probably is felt everywhere at once if you know what to look for and since Odium was there at the Shattering... Also she doesn't have to wait for him to take out the other ~10 Shards for her, just enough that there's a couple left before she shanks him so to speak.

[Ripheus23]

On 9/2/2018 at 2:38 PM, Fanghur Rahl said:

the intents ARE self-applied as well.

True, because the Intent of the Shard tries to take over the mind of the holder, or something, does it not?

On 9/2/2018 at 2:42 PM, Calderis said:

I think these are traits of the Vessels themselves that is what drew them to take those shards in the first place. 

True, because Rayse desired the Shard of Odium, after all, and won't pick up the Shards he defeats, because he likes the Intent of his Shard.

These two lines are where our understanding of Autonomy is faltering. First, if she, as Bavadin, does not support autonomy, why did she choose the relevant Shard? Was it just a last-pick matter, or what? Secondly, if the Shard's Intent is affecting her, then why is she interfering with other Shardworlds? So we can at least infer that it seems as if the Shard's Intent is much weaker than her own mind, or something along that line. I think this points to this specific Shard's nature being such that its Intent tries to avoid imposing itself on the holder. It tries to leave its holder as an autonomous being, so to say. This might even explain Rayse's relationship (such as it has been indicated) with Autonomy: he is not worried that her Intent could ever seek to dominate his. Perhaps the Shards are naturally being drawn towards each other, and Rayse dislikes this because usually it means that in the long run, if he leaves this or that Shard intact, the result will be that his favored Intent would come to be dominated by other ones.

[Slimy_Slider]

On 9/4/2018 at 2:20 PM, Draginon said:

Well I haven't gotten to Oathbringer yet so I don't know what his personality is like yet, but we do know that Odium has a hit list and for all we know Autonomy might be at the bottom and since he's more or less stuck on the Roshar system how much of the other Shards would he really know about, especially if they changed. Harmony I can counter on what I just said by saying that the impact of someone ascending probably is felt everywhere at once if you know what to look for and since Odium was there at the Shattering... Also she doesn't have to wait for him to take out the other ~10 Shards for her, just enough that there's a couple left before she shanks him so to speak.

I wonder, if we take the "Trell as Autonomy" theory and look at her fight with Harmony, if we can make a little assumption. Quick theory, Trell is stalling for help from Odium. Harmony is a powerful shard and while Autonomy might be better practiced at using the power, she is still likely worried about a direct confrontation. So, she has two options.

1. Don't fight face-to-face and use proxy agents to work against Harmony. We see her do this with the Set and as Trell.

2. Call in some backup. Autonomy and Odium have worked together against shards before, in some way. There is a WoB somewhere that Odium is worried about the potential threat of Harmony, so taking an alliance to deal with him would benefit both shards.

If we look at both these ideas, we can see that "Trell" is definitely pursuing option 1. However, there's no reason not to do both. Miles' words during his executions are particularly interesting.

AoL Spoilers:

Spoiler

[Paraphrased]

"The men of red and gold will come for you"

(I don't have my AoL copy with me right now)

Red seems to be a colour that Trell is representing, at least, we see that the image Harmony shows Wax is red. Gold is the interesting part, though. Nowhere, at least as far as I know, is there a link between Trell and the colour gold.
Who does like to be seen as golden? Odium. Throughout parts of OB, we see Odium wearing gold, appearing golden. His (presumed) God Metal is gold-like. And if you believe the theory that the 'Monster' ReLuur saw was a singer, then it could indicate that Odium has an involvement or is at least considering one.

 

For the record, I do not believe that we will see Odium show up in The Lost Metal. That would reveal far too much about the events of Stormlight, which has been going on parallel to the whole Era 2. But I do think that there could be a few hints towards this hiding in the book.

[Draginon]

I had a shower theory about this, what if there's a Shard in the remaining 6 that's actively pitting the others against each other but does it by impersonating the offender? Like Trell could be this Shard trying to pit Harmony, and possibly Odium, against Autonomy for their own reasons. Maybe we could call this Shard Discord.

[Scion of the Mists]

On 9/4/2018 at 1:41 PM, Ripheus23 said:

Secondly, if the Shard's Intent is affecting her, then why is she interfering with other Shardworlds?

We know that a Vessel has some latitude to interpret the Intent of the Shard that they hold.  Bavadin's interpretation of "Autonomy" (which is really just a close approximation of the full Intent) is clearly different from yours. 

Bavadin has stated that "No good can come of two Shards settling in one location" (in her letter to Hoid in Oathbringer).  It's safe to assume that she would be opposed to Harmony, literally two Shards merged together.  She also may be opposed to Shards meddling with humans in general, and is attempting to subvert their control over their respective worlds (i.e. preserve their autonomy).  Intents are not self-directed, so she has no need to restrict her own meddling.  

[Fanghur Rahl]

1 hour ago, Draginon said:

I had a shower theory about this, what if there's a Shard in the remaining 6 that's actively pitting the others against each other but does it by impersonating the offender? Like Trell could be this Shard trying to pit Harmony, and possibly Odium, against Autonomy for their own reasons. Maybe we could call this Shard Discord.

Or ‘Conflict’.

[Draginon]

1 hour ago, Fanghur Rahl said:

Or ‘Conflict’.

Chaos, Eris, Loki, anything that implies that

[animalia]

Question: Do we know what species Bavadin is?