The Dor and the Sibling

[Ixthos he/him]

This is something percolating for a while now, but I think the Dor - or rather, the Dor's impact on Sel - and the Sibling are very similar. Both have a strong tie to the land, and both are the combination of two shards, albeit the Dor is more polarised and in opposition. I think each region on Sel is likely the equivalent of the Sibling, and so each is either self aware of semi-self aware, and likely trying to absorb their own neighbours. I think Elantris and the surrounding regions of Arelon were probably one of the more mature regions, and the Chasm formed when another region tried to wound or weaken it. That also could have a tie to a Fisher-king scenario, with Wyrn being the equivalent of a Bondsmith for the nation and assimilated regions of Fjorden.

[mathiau he/him]

If they're modifying the land to modify the people, wouldn't that be a fisher-kingdom and not fisher-king?

[Ixthos he/him]

23 hours ago, mathiau said:

If they're modifying the land to modify the people, wouldn't that be a fisher-kingdom and not fisher-king?

It depends - the links between language, location, and magic on Sel are weird, so it could be that, if someone is linked to the land, they both affect one another. The Fisher king's wound was the cause of harm to the land in the legend. On Sel it could be that one is the cause of the other, or - as was noted - cause and effect on Sel can be strange and inverted. For all we know the chasm wasn't the cause of the damage to AonDor, but the result - a fisher king or fisher kingdom connection could be likewise.

[Lunu’anaki he/him]

30 minutes ago, Ixthos said:

It depends - the links between language, location, and magic on Sel are weird, so it could be that, if someone is linked to the land, they both affect one another. The Fisher king's wound was the cause of harm to the land in the legend. On Sel it could be that one is the cause of the other, or - as was noted - cause and effect on Sel can be strange and inverted. For all we know the chasm wasn't the cause of the damage to AonDor, but the result - a fisher king or fisher kingdom connection could be likewise.

I'm not convinced... The solution to fixing AonDor was as simple as writing it properly-- this seems to be evidence that the cause of the damage to AonDor WAS the shifting of the land, and couldn't have been the opposite.

 

The Sibling, along with spren like the oathgates, do seem to be location locked and that seems to be similar to the magics of Sel in some ways, so I like the connections you are drawing here... especially considering that the deadeyes (and potentially the Siblings slumber) are somehow similar to The Reod. Ba-Ado-Mishram might be similar to the AonDor in the sense that they might be some kind of focus for the "Pure-Tones of Roshar"?

[Ixthos he/him]

On 1/25/2021 at 11:13 AM, Lunu’anaki said:

I'm not convinced... The solution to fixing AonDor was as simple as writing it properly-- this seems to be evidence that the cause of the damage to AonDor WAS the shifting of the land, and couldn't have been the opposite.

 

The Sibling, along with spren like the oathgates, do seem to be location locked and that seems to be similar to the magics of Sel in some ways, so I like the connections you are drawing here... especially considering that the deadeyes (and potentially the Siblings slumber) are somehow similar to The Reod. Ba-Ado-Mishram might be similar to the AonDor in the sense that they might be some kind of focus for the "Pure-Tones of Roshar"?

Fixing it required a single line, yes, but that doesn't mean the chasm came first. Consider, if the magic was damaged that would immediately cause damage to the land due to the link (I am not saying the magic WAS damaged first, only consider, what would happen if one Dor-entity representing one land attacked another Dor-entity representing another land), and that then caused a wound to the land, reflecting the wound to the magic. At that point then one still has to incorporate the damage from the land into the new Aon.

 

That is good take on it, the deadeye relationship. I think a view of Sel's cognitive realm would reveal a lot about other relations.

[mathiau he/him]

1 hour ago, Ixthos said:

Fixing it required a single line, yes, but that doesn't mean the chasm came first. Consider, if the magic was damaged that would immediately cause damage to the land due to the link (I am not saying the magic WAS damaged first, only consider, what would happen if one Dor-entity representing one land attacked another Dor-entity representing another land), and that then caused a wound to the land, reflecting the wound to the magic. At that point then one still has to incorporate the damage from the land into the new Aon.

 

That is good take on it, the deadeye relationship. I think a view of Sel's cognitive realm would reveal a lot about other relations.

Pretty sure there's only one Dor, like there's only one Stormfather

[Leuthie]

First, the Sibling and Oathgates are "land-locked" because the things they represent don't move. Urithiru and Oathgates are stationary objects so the spren representing them are stationary. Since we don't know exactly why the Dor results in location dependent magic systems, we can't say whether there's a relation or not. I suspect the Dor is reforming to represent the perceptions of the land it finds itself in, resulting in large nebulous spren-like entities.

The Dor and Stormlight will probably become more alike over time. The Dor is free Investiture made up of the splintered remains of Devotion and Dominion in the Cognitive Realm of Sel. Over time it will gain/has gained sapience and will act more and more like spren. Stormlight is free Investiture on Roshar, part of a regular cycle of the High Storm. Due to the thin veil between Cognitive and Physical on Roshar, some of this Stormlight leaks into the Cognitive Realm and results in small, sapient and non-sapient Cognitive entities. Honor and Cultivation Invested into these spren in several ways.

One of the spren created on Roshar was the result of the size and permanence of Urithiru. The spren of Urithiru was Invested by both Honor and Cultivation and gained sapience to become the Sibling (they may have had sapience prior to Honor and Cultivation, but they're Invested nonetheless).

So The Sibling (and all other spren on Roshar) is what the Dor could be if there were an Intelligence and Will available to shape it, and a thinner veil into the Physical Realm to allow for a larger variety of things to attract it.. As it is now, the Dor just picks up on what's going on on Sel and shapes itself accordingly. In the case of Arelon, the Dor responds to the Intent of Aons and shapes that mimic the land. In the case of Fjorden, the Dor responds to sacrifice and pain, and Aons made through the twisting of souls and bone. These responses are reflections of the land and cultures found in these areas; the result of free Investiture defining itself by the Cognitive perceptions of millennia of beings living in those areas.

1 hour ago, mathiau said:

Pretty sure there's only one Dor, like there's only one Stormfather

Dor is just free Investiture. Over the several thousand years it's been on its own, it's changed. The area dependent magic systems suggest it isn't a single, monolithic piece of Investiture, but that there are several "large spren" tied to specific areas in Sel's Cognitive Realm.

[Rushu42 she/her]

I like the parallels here, and I agree that there's a lot of similarity between these concepts. I wonder, though, at how sentient these forces really are. As @Leuthie said, it's possible that over time the Dor could gain a form of sentience. However, we have a WoB that states that it doesn't currently have that [emphasis added]:

Quote

Questioner

Shards. Is it possible for them to think outside-- without having a person they're working through?

Brandon Sanderson

The power left alone around people will eventually gain a kind of sentience.

Questioner

Kind of like the Stormfather?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. So it is possible. It doesn't always happen, and sometimes it takes a while. For example, the Dor? Basic, rudimentary, feeling only. It's not-- you know.

It also seems like the Dor isn't nearly as divided as your theory would imply. All descriptions of it seem to be talking about it as one entity, and we know that the two Shards are combined:

Quote

ParadoxicalZen

And can you describe the Dor? Is it like a-- Are the two Shards kind of mixed or is more one--

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, it is the two shards mixed. And it is very dangerous because of that.

Obviously, the magic manifests differently in different places, but I suspect that that's instead being shaped by the consciousness of the people there. I mean, the power is completely in the Cognitive Realm, so it seems reasonable that the way it works is driven by the ideas of that place. So in Fjorden, where it's very much driven by the Dominion aspect of things, it could have been a self-reinforcing cycle; some people there form a religion that leans towards Dominion, so the Intent of the Dor there shifts toward Dominion, which affects the practitioners of the magic so they're more inclined toward Dominion, and so forth.

[LewsTherinTelescope]

3 hours ago, Rushu42 said:

and we know that the two Shards are combined:

Additionally:

Quote

Brightlord Maelstrom

If you were to somehow use a receptacle to gather some part of the Dor, say there was a way of doing that. And you were to do one on both extremes of the planet. Would it be the same thing?

...Say, you have a container than can contain part of this plasma? ...Theoretically? You do that, taking one part of the planet, say Elantris, seal it up. And then you were to take another one, and fill it up in MaiPon and compare them, would it be the same Investiture?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, it would.

Oathbringer release party (Nov. 13, 2017)

 

3 hours ago, Rushu42 said:

which affects the practitioners of the magic so they're more inclined toward Dominion

Which, really, I would say is debatable. Does it not require a large amount of devotion on behalf of the priests?

3 hours ago, Rushu42 said:

some people there form a religion that leans towards Dominion

Probably heavily influenced by the skaze hanging around there and being important in their politics.