Autonomy's plans

[Elsebreaker]

Autonomy is a very strange Shard. They are placing avatars all over the place for seemingly no apparent reason. I was wondering what their plan could be, and I came up with a plausible theory.

There are two ways to become autonomous; you can either completely isolate yourself from outside influence, or you can bring everybody into your nation and all have the exact same view on everything. I think that Autonomy is trying to spread their influence throughout the Cosmere. They have also most likely aided Odium in splintering Dominion, another Shard that would like to conquer. Autonomy is currently trying to destroy Harmony through Trell, one of their avatars. They also have influence on First of the Sun (Patji), Obrodai (unknown Avatar), and Taldain (the Sand Lord). My theory is that in era 4 Mistborn, Odium will already have been dealt with, and Autonomy will be the villain. The Scadrians will have already dealt with Autonomy in era 3, and will know how bad they are. The plot of era 4 could be Scadrial recruiting the other two major Shardworlds, Roshar and Sel, and then they will clear out Autonomy in every planet.

Other crackpot theories about Autonomy are that Jaddeth, the god that the Shu-Dereth worship on Sel, is actually an avatar of Autonomy. This is how their priest is getting his visions, and the point is to convert all of Sel to Shu-Dereth so that they can worship Jaddeth/Autonomy.

Well, that's my crazy theory. Go ahead and completely tear it apart. I want to know what you guys think.

[Elegy]

Autonomy talk is always cool. 

39 minutes ago, Elsebreaker said:

There are two ways to become autonomous; you can either completely isolate yourself from outside influence, or you can bring everybody into your nation and all have the exact same view on everything.

So, I don't really get the second one, that's actually the concept of Unity or Dominion, which I see at cross-purposes with Autonomy. From what we know, Autonomy seems to want nations seperated, as showcased with Patji's attempts to keep the Ones Above from First of the Sun, possibly Skathan's politics of isolation on Taldain's darkside (if he's involved with Autonomy, we do not know), the Sand Lord's (probably called Nalt?) apparent scheme to extinguish the Sand Masters since they have too much power, Autonomy's isolation of Taldain itself from the rest of the cosmere, and - assuming that Trell is indeed an avatar of Autonomy - the "Faceless Immortal"'s words about invading Scadrial because it has developed too far - probably because they don't want to risk a planet developing faster than light travel and colonize other worlds, degrading their "autonomy" (as will eventually happen from what we see in Sixth of the Dusk, although we don't know whether those are Scadrians or not). I personally think that Autonomy places avatars so those can oversee development on the respective world and intervene (directly or indirectly, given the situation) as soon as a certain line is crossed.

That said, that theory has a flaw, and this flaw applies to every theory about Autonomy's grander scheme: The avatars don't work together. As the second letter in Oathbringer (written by Patji) states: "As the waves of the sea must continue to surge, so must our will continue resolute. Alone. Did you expect anything else from us? We need not suffer the interference of another." Of course, this is also in line with Autonomy's intent: Even the avatars are autonomous and work alone.

Yet, they all are still Autonomy's Investiture and have a certain tendency, so maybe she just knows (possibly taking future sight into account) that they will eventually help her purpose, even though each of them has their own preferences and assessments.

In general, I agree that Autonomy will become a huge deal for the Cosmere at one point or another. Don't know about her as a main villain in Era 4 though, I still kind of believe that we haven't even heard of the things that will be the core conflicts in that story. Knowing Brandon ... 

Edited June 19, 2020 by Elegy

[Elsebreaker]

1 minute ago, Elegy said:

I don't really get the second one, that's actually the concept of Unity or Dominion, which I see at cross-purposes with Autonomy.

The reason that the second one fits with autonomy is that you can have an autonomous group of people, just as long as everybody has the same beliefs. Autonomy could view being autonomous as turning the Cosmere into basically a hive-mind, where everybody thinks the same way. That is probably why Autonomy helped Odium splinter Dominion, because the shard's intent would make it difficult to conquer the Cosmere that way. If everybody has the same philosophy as Autonomy, then there can be no outside influence and everything will be autonomous. If everybody is basically you, nobody can alter you. But I think it really boils down to the perception of Bavadin.

And again, odds are the main villain will be a huge plot twist and end up being Kavez Kholin from Oathbringer anyway.

[Elegy]

3 minutes ago, Elsebreaker said:

The reason that the second one fits with autonomy is that you can have an autonomous group of people, just as long as everybody has the same beliefs. Autonomy could view being autonomous as turning the Cosmere into basically a hive-mind, where everybody thinks the same way. That is probably why Autonomy helped Odium splinter Dominion, because the shard's intent would make it difficult to conquer the Cosmere that way. If everybody has the same philosophy as Autonomy, then there can be no outside influence and everything will be autonomous. If everybody is basically you, nobody can alter you. But I think it really boils down to the perception of Bavadin.

I see. But in that case, Autonomy would basically unite in order to divide, so to speak, which, as far as I know, does not seem to be the way the Shardic intents work - Preservation is about preserving, yet he could never destroy to preserve. Instead, he just can't destroy, even if it's in order to preserve. So, following that logic, I don't think Autonomy's goal would be uniting anything, because she just couldn't, even in order to create more autonomy by doing it. That's at least my perspective on it. Maybe things like that indeed change via perception, but all I can do at the moment is going off from the examples we have.

My personal theory about why Autonomy (possibly) helped getting rid of the Sel Shards would be basically two seperate things, the first one more likely than the second: The first one, maybe they just despise those Shards that have settled on the same planet, since they don't want too much interaction between them and instead wants them to be independent. The second one ... As soon as a Shard is Splintered, many Splinters are created, and with time (because Investiture), they become sapient, "autonomous" individuals. So Autonomy would principally prefer one thousand Seons over Devotion/one thousand Skaize over Dominion, because it just adds up to more autonomy. Maybe it's both at the same time. Again though, that's all guessing on my part.

[Eternal Khol]

41 minutes ago, Elsebreaker said:

Autonomy could view being autonomous as turning the Cosmere into basically a hive-mind, where everybody thinks the same way.

 

WinespringBrother

So, would Unity be a natural enemy of Autonomy?

Brandon Sanderson

Um... Possibly. You say "natural," and so I--

WinespringBrother

Well, would one eliminate the other one? But more towards Autonomy trying to break up--

Brandon Sanderson

To break up Unity. It's so hard to say, because Autonomy is a bit of a strange duck. Like, what counts as being Autonomous? Is absorbing everything and becoming one again Autonomous or not? That's kind of your question that you get into. And the way Autonomy looks at it right now, is no. Autonomy wants to remain Autonomy. Autonomy does not want to be corrupted by anything else. And Autonomy would think the Shards are better on their own. But is this a natural effect, or part of the-- Does that make sense?

JordanCon 2018 (April 20, 2018)  

[Elsebreaker]

16 hours ago, Elegy said:

I see. But in that case, Autonomy would basically unite in order to divide, so to speak, which, as far as I know, does not seem to be the way the Shardic intents work - Preservation is about preserving, yet he could never destroy to preserve. Instead, he just can't destroy, even if it's in order to preserve. So, following that logic, I don't think Autonomy's goal would be uniting anything, because she just couldn't, even in order to create more autonomy by doing it. That's at least my perspective on it. Maybe things like that indeed change via perception, but all I can do at the moment is going off from the examples we have.

Okay, that's a really valid point about Shardic intents. I wholeheartedly agree now about them not being able to remove autonomy at all, even to create more of it. The one thing that still confuses me, however, is Trell on Scadrial. If Autonomy can't remove any autonomy, then why are they trying to transform and influence Scadrial?

 

15 hours ago, Eternal Khol said:

 

Brandon Sanderson

To break up Unity. It's so hard to say, because Autonomy is a bit of a strange duck. Like, what counts as being Autonomous? Is absorbing everything and becoming one again Autonomous or not? That's kind of your question that you get into. And the way Autonomy looks at it right now, is no. Autonomy wants to remain Autonomy. Autonomy does not want to be corrupted by anything else. And Autonomy would think the Shards are better on their own. But is this a natural effect, or part of the-- Does that make sense?

JordanCon 2018 (April 20, 2018)  

This WoB clarifies a lot, thanks. Although like most things with Brandon, it also raises much more questions, like why they would work with Odium if the Shards are better alone.

[Elegy]

On 20.6.2020 at 6:29 PM, Elsebreaker said:

The one thing that still confuses me, however, is Trell on Scadrial. If Autonomy can't remove any autonomy, then why are they trying to transform and influence Scadrial?

I don't think Trell necessarily wants to conquer Scadrial or something like that. He could just destroy enough so it's not as close to modern civilization anymore. Of course, that would indirectly take a lot of people's autonomy away, but Preservation giving Rashek the power of the Well also caused a lot of destruction, so the restriction seemingly only apply to direct actions. It should work as long as the intent is not explicitly to unite.

That said, the WOB above does seem to imply that this other interpretation of Autonomy would very well have been possible, Bavadin just didn't interpret it that way.

[TheOneKEA]

On 6/19/2020 at 8:13 PM, Elegy said:

As soon as a Shard is Splintered, many Splinters are created, and with time (because Investiture), they become sapient, "autonomous" individuals. So Autonomy would principally prefer one thousand Seons over Devotion/one thousand Skaize over Dominion, because it just adds up to more autonomy. Maybe it's both at the same time. Again though, that's all guessing on my part.

I think this is Autonomy's eventual goal, the ultimate interpretation of their Intent: divide and diffuse their Investiture, and the Investiture of the Shards, widely throughout the Cosmere, and give everyone the same level of power and control and influence over the Realms and over themselves.