dawnshard Let's make groups of four, RoW edition

[Zepto she/her]

20 minutes ago, LewsTherinTelescope said:

Quote

The power to change.

 I don't see how this can be interpreted as a command to not change.

I’m interpreting this as the power can change things or not, so preservation is just choosing not to change. 

[mathiau he/him]

4 minutes ago, Zepto said:

Mostly I was just coming up with 4 possible dawnshard names that might make sense (with it being change) and then slotting things in where they seemed to fit best thematically.  

I like your idea of changing these placements, as I said, this is just what I came up with a while ago and I don’t have strong evidence for it other than what seemed related. 

Thanks

Just now, Zepto said:

I’m interpreting this as the power can change things or not, so preservation is just choosing not to change. 

Please don't double post.

Choosing not to change correspond to not using the Dawnshard, which is not something a Shard whose intent was base of a Dawnshard would do

[LewsTherinTelescope]

12 minutes ago, Zepto said:

I’m interpreting this as the power can change things or not, so preservation is just choosing not to change. 

I can't see how "the will of a god to remake things, to demand they be better." (emphasis mine) would lead to a Shard diametrically opposed to the basic idea of the "demand". 

[Waffles]

Change and "Leave a mark" seem like the same concept to the point we could rename "leave a mark" into "Change 2". Cultivation and Ruin certainly  "leave a mark" etc. I think conceptually something even like "altruism" or "sacrifice" may be a better fit thematically with valor and other shards.

I think part of this is a problem with Brandon's dawnshard categories, singular words are probably going to apply in a meaningful way to every shard and depending on how the dawnshards divided up the powers it may be a 4x4 punette square situation where each shard is influenced by 2 dawnshards and each dawnshard correlates to 7 shards (with 4 being heavily aligned to a dawnshard)

Actually given the two change categories totalling 7 its possible that a punette square dawnshard pairing makes more sense than 4 groups of 4.

Edit: Pairing each shard to up to two dawnshards each does allow additional dawnshard names such as "antithesis" or "opposition" where the shard is a subverted version such as "opposition to change" resulting in preservation and "opposition to survival" resulting in ruin but it would have to have an ordered quality or else it would create pairs of identical shards (eg opposition/change cannot mean the same thing as change/opposition, the first property would have to be more influencing than the second - the first would be preservation, the latter whimsy)

Edited July 29, 2021 by Waffles

[Call me a friend]

Hi, I'm new. Have had a idea and this seemed a good place to share. 

 

First off let me apologize for odd formatting since I am on my phone and don't have my notes. 

 

I have an odd feeling that the Dawnshards are along the order of: Change, Be, Think, Feel.

"Be" is a term I use since I don't know a good word for the physical aspects. Examples could be Honor (if viewed as combine/unite), Endowment (Divide), Preservation (could be interpreted as exist).

"Think" would be aspects of the cognitive. Looking at Google I've seen the mind broken into Self, Creativity/Problem Solving, Memory, and Senses. I can see Invention, Autonomy, and maybe Whimsy fitting some of those positions.

 

"Feel" covers the emotional spectrum. We have many Shards the fill in as emotional aspects. Odium, Mercy, and Devotion all come to mind.

 

"Change" is change I guess. Cultivation could be one, Dominion could be another. Ruin makes an obvious appearance here as well.

My reasons for thinking they are broken into these groups is that we know one Dawn shard is different, I think that's Change. It isn't what we call part of a person.

Many people would say a person is a "Mind, Body, and Soul". Those would be the other 3 Dawnshards. One each for each realm and one that is different. 

Many western religions say that man was made in the image of god or something similar, so it's not a huge leap to say Big Ado broke into the aspects of what would make up a person. Or at least what would be the fundamental building blocks for a singular sapient entity. Depends on your definition of "person" in the Cosmere.

I am very far down the rabbit hole on this. 

 

[Halyo_Alex he/him]

6 hours ago, Call me a friend said:

Hi, I'm new. Have had a idea and this seemed a good place to share. 

Welcome!

6 hours ago, Call me a friend said:

First off let me apologize for odd formatting since I am on my phone and don't have my notes. 

No worries. As long as it's not a total spaghetti jumble of incoherence, you're fine.

6 hours ago, Call me a friend said:

I have an odd feeling that the Dawnshards are along the order of: Change, Be, Think, Feel.

"Be" is a term I use since I don't know a good word for the physical aspects. Examples could be Honor (if viewed as combine/unite), Endowment (Divide), Preservation (could be interpreted as exist).

"Think" would be aspects of the cognitive. Looking at Google I've seen the mind broken into Self, Creativity/Problem Solving, Memory, and Senses. I can see Invention, Autonomy, and maybe Whimsy fitting some of those positions.

"Feel" covers the emotional spectrum. We have many Shards the fill in as emotional aspects. Odium, Mercy, and Devotion all come to mind.

"Change" is change I guess. Cultivation could be one, Dominion could be another. Ruin makes an obvious appearance here as well.

My reasons for thinking they are broken into these groups is that we know one Dawn shard is different, I think that's Change. It isn't what we call part of a person.

Many people would say a person is a "Mind, Body, and Soul". Those would be the other 3 Dawnshards. One each for each realm and one that is different. 

Many western religions say that man was made in the image of god or something similar, so it's not a huge leap to say Big Ado broke into the aspects of what would make up a person. Or at least what would be the fundamental building blocks for a singular sapient entity. Depends on your definition of "person" in the Cosmere.

I am very far down the rabbit hole on this.

I generally agree with these points. The specific shards might be a bit different imo. But for the most part I do think you're on the right track.

[Waffles]

On 7/30/2021 at 1:10 AM, Call me a friend said:

Hi, I'm new. Have had a idea and this seemed a good place to share. 

 

First off let me apologize for odd formatting since I am on my phone and don't have my notes. 

 

I have an odd feeling that the Dawnshards are along the order of: Change, Be, Think, Feel.

"Be" is a term I use since I don't know a good word for the physical aspects. Examples could be Honor (if viewed as combine/unite), Endowment (Divide), Preservation (could be interpreted as exist).

"Think" would be aspects of the cognitive. Looking at Google I've seen the mind broken into Self, Creativity/Problem Solving, Memory, and Senses. I can see Invention, Autonomy, and maybe Whimsy fitting some of those positions.

 

"Feel" covers the emotional spectrum. We have many Shards the fill in as emotional aspects. Odium, Mercy, and Devotion all come to mind.

 

"Change" is change I guess. Cultivation could be one, Dominion could be another. Ruin makes an obvious appearance here as well.

My reasons for thinking they are broken into these groups is that we know one Dawn shard is different, I think that's Change. It isn't what we call part of a person.

Many people would say a person is a "Mind, Body, and Soul". Those would be the other 3 Dawnshards. One each for each realm and one that is different. 

Many western religions say that man was made in the image of god or something similar, so it's not a huge leap to say Big Ado broke into the aspects of what would make up a person. Or at least what would be the fundamental building blocks for a singular sapient entity. Depends on your definition of "person" in the Cosmere.

I am very far down the rabbit hole on this. 

 

This is a refreshingly different idea of the dawnshards than what we usually see and also manages to incorporate the "one is different" hint we've gotten.

Plus it fits into wider cosmere themes and worldbuilding such as the three realms. I have the feeling this line of logic might actually be close to what we might get. 

Very insightful!

[Call me a friend]

I'll leave some of my notes here in case anyone wants to do their own research.

The physical aspects would probably relate to the 4 fundamental forces from general relativity: The Strong Force, Weak Force,  Electromagnetism, and Gravity. Personally I have had issues relating these in a manner that makes sense, since explanations of these forces is a bit out of my league. Any help here is appreciated.

Mental aspects could match up to a Indian philosophy regarding parts of the mind. Buddhi (Intellect), Ahankara (Identity), Manas (Memory), and Chitta (Chitta has no English translation. "Intelligence unsullied by memory" is how I saw it explained. So maybe instinct, or creativity?)

Emotional aspects I think would relate to range of emotions. Plutchik’s Wheel of Emotions looks very similar to some shards we already know if you quarter it into sections. Bottom left looks alot like Odium, top right is essentially Devotion, and I can see Whimsy in the bottom right if I do a bit of mental gymnastics.

Change is probably the easiest to define. We know what change is and there are some easy obvious choices that will fill this section without issue.

I would bet some serious spheres that a few are gonna be adjusted for narrative purposes. The more I look into real world inspirations, and read old WoBs about his liking of physics, chemistry, and philosophy the more it starts to make sense to me. 

Just thought I would share a bit more since my first post lacked any real support. I know none of this is in text support, but we don't have much text in general about this, so I'm metagaming.

[Sanguine Cavalier]

So, first post here, but I just finished Dawnshard (bringing me up to date on all the published cosmere stuff), and I wanted to share my initial thoughts about what the Shard quartets relating to each Dawnshard might be.

I'll explain what speculations I'm taking as axiomatic for this theory, before I get into the weeds:
1. The two unknown shards are pseudo-Wisdom and pseudo-Prudence, based off what I could see in a quick search of the WoBs. This is uncertain, particularly the latter, but these seem like our best current guesses, and I think it's better than treating them as total unknowns.

2. Taking Nikli at face value, the Dawnshards are the four primal commands used to create the Cosmere. Based on this I do not think there is a Dawnshard of "Destruction". It overlaps too much with Change, and I don't really see any need for it during the process of creation if you have Change as well.

So with that out of the way, onto the 4 Shard Quartets:

Dawnshard of Creation (Command: Be)
Shards: Invention, Whimsy, Endowment, Autonomy.

I think Invention and Whimsy both represent different approaches to creativity, whilst Autonomy allows for the creation of new, separate individuals, and Endowment allows for the gifting of life/investiture/probably other things.

Dawnshard of Change (Command: Change/Improve/Progress)

Shards: Ruin, Cultivation, Preservation, Ambition

It always struck me in Mistborn Era 1 that Ruin and Preservation aren't really opposites. If one wants stasis and the other wants destruction then the outcome is, eventually, going to be destruction, if the contest is even. Ruin and Cultivation, however, are opposites, as well as being complementary. Cycle of life and death and all that. If you add in the influence of Preservation I think you end up with a dynamic equilibrium: things are changing constantly at the micro level but at the macro level things are actually very stable. So the fourth shard's Intent for this quartet needs to be Ambition in order to explain Rsyn's feeling that the Dawnshard of change is "the will of a god to remake things, to demand they be better". I considered Whimsy for this but decided that didn't fit as well with the "be better" aspect.

Dawnshard of Personality (Command: Think and Feel)
Shards: Honor, Wisdom, Odium, Mercy
 

Less sure about the name/command for this Dawnshard, so feel free to suggest alternatives. The reasoning for this group of Shards by Intent was that they all symbolise internal qualities or principles rather than external ones. To put it another way, I think these are all explanations for why someone acts in a certain way, what motivates them and how they think, rather than simple descriptors of their actions, which I think is what separates them from the next group.

Dawnshard of Behaviour(Command: Act)
Shards: Valor, Prudence, Devotion, Dominion

Again, unsure of what to call this Dawnshard, but I've grouped these intents together because I think these are all more external behaviours than internal mindsets/motivations. They prescribe specific actions (fight, hide/retreat, submit, conquer) regardless of circumstances. Retreating is always against valour even if it is the honourable thing to do in a situation.

 

So, that's my current theory! Let me know what you guys think- am I missing something obvious? Is this already considered established? Do you mostly agree but think I've got one or more small details wrong?

Edited August 17, 2021 by Sanguine Cavalier

[LewsTherinTelescope]

6 hours ago, Sanguine Cavalier said:

Dawnshard of Creation (Command: Be)

Personally, I feel this overlaps a bit much with Change as well, but I can see why a lot of others disagree, I guess. I do feel Endowment doesn't quite fit in that category, if we do take it to exist, though, because the others are about things, well, being, while Endowment is more Change-y almost. Brings me to my next point:

6 hours ago, Sanguine Cavalier said:

Preservation

I agree that Pres makes for a nice balance with Ruin and Cultivation, but I don't really feel Pres belongs under Change. If you Command something to Change and become better, why would that result in something with the Intent of stasis?

I think swapping Endowment to be under Change and Preservation to be under Be makes a bit more sense, but perhaps you're just viewing the Shards differently from how I do. Otherwise, those make sense, though I definitely don't agree with putting Wisdom and Prudence as two separate Shards (but I get your reasoning with "probably not the case but better than a blank spot").

[Sanguine Cavalier]

6 hours ago, LewsTherinTelescope said:

15 hours ago, Sanguine Cavalier said:

Dawnshard of Creation (Command: Be)

Personally, I feel this overlaps a bit much with Change as well, but I can see why a lot of others disagree, I guess. I do feel Endowment doesn't quite fit in that category, if we do take it to exist, though, because the others are about things, well, being, while Endowment is more Change-y almost. Brings me to my next point:

I agree that it's possible to view Change as entirely encompassing Creation, but the way I'm thinking of Creation is that it is the Command that creates life and consciousness from nothing, which is what Endowment and Autonomy are the Intent behind. Otherwise you'd just be changing Investiture into matter, not really creating anything, if it couldn't live or think. This is also why I don't think Preservation fits here; I'll go into more detail about why in the section on Change, but I just don't see any role for it in Creation.

 

6 hours ago, LewsTherinTelescope said:

 

15 hours ago, Sanguine Cavalier said:

Preservation

I agree that Pres makes for a nice balance with Ruin and Cultivation, but I don't really feel Pres belongs under Change. If you Command something to Change and become better, why would that result in something with the Intent of stasis?

I think swapping Endowment to be under Change and Preservation to be under Be makes a bit more sense, but perhaps you're just viewing the Shards differently from how I do. Otherwise, those make sense, though I definitely don't agree with putting Wisdom and Prudence as two separate Shards (but I get your reasoning with "probably not the case but better than a blank spot").

So I don't think I'm necessarily viewing the Shards differently from how you are: I agree that Preservation on its own would not be a useful Intent to pair with a Command to "change". However, I believe the combination of Intents is key. Preservation as 1/4 of the Intent to Change, the way I view it, does not result in stasis: the other 3/4 of the Intent is for change to occur. Why include Preservation at all? In order to limit and control the change. Ruin and Cultivation without Preservation would probably end up with a dynamic equilibrium, but it would likely be a bit too dynamic. Useful, constructive change requires the ability to restrain both damage and growth, as well as some sort of goal, or at least a metric to judge progress. Hence, Preservation and Ambition making up a part of the Intent.

In terms of the text: We do know that Preservation and Ruin together have been used by both Leras + Ati and Harmony's vessel to create, or change constructively.

As for Wisdom and Prudence....yeah, I'm pretty much with you on that. I think it's possible they're both Shards, but not particularly likely. Do we have a next best guess?

Edited August 17, 2021 by Sanguine Cavalier

[LewsTherinTelescope]

4 minutes ago, Sanguine Cavalier said:

the way I'm thinking of Creation is that it is the Command that creates life and consciousness from nothing, which is what Endowment and Autonomy are the Intent behind. Otherwise you'd just be changing Investiture into matter, not really creating anything, if it couldn't live or think.

Is it really "from nothing"? I mean, these things are still made of Investiture and all that. (I don't dislike the Command Be, though, just think that focusing it specifically on Creation isn't something I agree with, and feel it should be more focused on, well, Being. So I like Autonomy, Preservation, etc there, if it does indeed exist.)

1 hour ago, Sanguine Cavalier said:

So I don't think I'm necessarily viewing the Shards differently from how you are: I agree that Preservation on its own would not be a useful Intent to pair with a Command to "change". However, I believe the combination of Intents is key. Preservation as 1/4 of the Intent to Change, the way I view it, does not result in stasis: the other 3/4 of the Intent is for change to occur. Why include Preservation at all? In order to limit and control the change. Ruin and Cultivation without Preservation would probably end up with a dynamic equilibrium, but it would likely be a bit too dynamic. Useful, constructive change requires the ability to restrain both damage and growth, as well as some sort of goal, or at least a metric to judge progress. Hence, Preservation and Ambition making up a part of the Intent.

I agree it is a useful Intent to counterbalance the change, but personally, I don't feel it'd fit under the Dawnshard of that name. Like, the Dawnshards are Commands, so to me, it wouldn't make much sense for the Command to Change to produce Preservation, but instead for a Command that works alongside it to produce it. (But this is a debate that comes up very often, so I'm not gonna harp on it much more than this, there are a lot of people who agree with you.)

So I guess it's less we view the Shards differently, and more we view how the Dawnshards interact with the Shards differently, then.

[Sanguine Cavalier]

10 minutes ago, LewsTherinTelescope said:

Is it really "from nothing"? I mean, these things are still made of Investiture and all that.

Is the matter and energy coming into being from nothing? No. Is the spark of life, and the individual consciousness coming into being from nothing? Yes.
The analogy I would use to explain this, if you've read the Silmarillion (which I feel is a safer assumption here than most places ) is that of Aulë and the first Dwarves. He's able to create bodies which are seemingly able to simulate all the external signs of life, but they don't think or feel, or even have a sense of self, until Eru Iluvatar gets involved. So to translate that over to Cosmere terms, it's the Cognitive and Spiritual aspects of a being that are being created from nothing, not the Physical. (I agree that the Physical alone probably could be achieved by Change, rather than Creation)

 

22 minutes ago, LewsTherinTelescope said:

I don't dislike the Command Be, though, just think that focusing it specifically on Creation isn't something I agree with, and feel it should be more focused on, well, Being

This is a valid point, but I think it comes down to word choice in English. I chose Be for simplicity, because "Become" is too ambiguous (could very easily mean change), and "Be Made" is rather clunky and odd in English- but it's much closer to what I'm thinking of. I'd use Latin "Factus Es" (which translates as either Become, Be Made or Be Done depending on the context) but a dead language isn't the best choice for trying to explain myself to others.

 

29 minutes ago, LewsTherinTelescope said:

So I guess it's less we view the Shards differently, and more we view how the Dawnshards interact with the Shards differently, then.

That seems very plausible. I basically think of Preservation being 1/4 of the Intent used with the Command to Change something like this: it's performing much the same function as brakes in a car. The purpose of the car is still to take you from Point A to Point B, but you can actually achieve this faster with brakes than without them, as you don't have to either A: go very slowly to maintain control or B: crash.

 

(Ambition is the steering wheel in this analogy)

 

36 minutes ago, LewsTherinTelescope said:

Like, the Dawnshards are Commands, so to me, it wouldn't make much sense for the Command to Change to produce Preservation, but instead for a Command that works alongside it to produce it.

I'm not entirely sure I follow. Do the Commands produce the Intents? I don't think the Dawnshards created the Intents of the Shards directly, based on this from the novella: "To make such Commands, one must have the reasoning—the breadth of understanding—of a deity. And so, the Dawnshards. The four primal Commands that created all things." This implies that Adonalsium created the Dawnshards, right? And the Shards are part of Adonalsium. So whilst the act of using the Dawnshards may have helped to define different aspects of his Intent, making it easier for A to be Shattered, the Intent has to come into being prior to or alongside the Dawnshards for them to be useful. 

I like your last point in and of itself, but with only 4 Commands it seems... inefficient to need to use 2 of them for useful change.

[LewsTherinTelescope]

(Replying to the parts kind of out of order because it's easier to organize my thoughts on some parts than others.)

18 minutes ago, Sanguine Cavalier said:

I'm not entirely sure I follow. Do the Commands produce the Intents? I don't think the Dawnshards created the Intents of the Shards directly, based on this from the novella: "To make such Commands, one must have the reasoning—the breadth of understanding—of a deity. And so, the Dawnshards. The four primal Commands that created all things." This implies that Adonalsium created the Dawnshards, right? And the Shards are part of Adonalsium. So whilst the act of using the Dawnshards may have helped to define different aspects of his Intent, making it easier for A to be Shattered, the Intent has to come into being prior to or alongside the Dawnshards for them to be useful. 

Well it depends, I guess. We know the Dawnshards were used in the Shattering, so I've viewed their as leading to what the 16 groupings were. But that's not a given, just my view on how they relate to these things.

24 minutes ago, Sanguine Cavalier said:

Is the matter and energy coming into being from nothing? No. Is the spark of life, and the individual consciousness coming into being from nothing? Yes.

The thing is that like, it's clearly not fully out of nothing. Investiture can neither be created nor destroyed, and we know that giving humans the Investiture in their soul cost Preservation, weakening him against Ruin. You could argue philosophically the person's "self" or "being" is being made new, but the actual direct aspects to me definitely sound like they are from something, in my opinion.

25 minutes ago, Sanguine Cavalier said:

I like your last point in and of itself, but with only 4 Commands it seems... inefficient to need to use 2 of them for useful change.

Well, I think that's why there are four. None on their own are enough. Change on its own just results in an ever-changing thing that doesn't last, while some other Commands might lead to a still universe that nothing exists in a formed state in (this may not be a direct Command itself, but rather an effect of one that by necessity requires some stillness pushing back on Change to allow itself to work, but I'm not terribly certain). So you need all four to interact with each other and build a greater whole.

28 minutes ago, Sanguine Cavalier said:

This is a valid point, but I think it comes down to word choice in English. I chose Be for simplicity, because "Become" is too ambiguous (could very easily mean change), and "Be Made" is rather clunky and odd in English- but it's much closer to what I'm thinking of. I'd use Latin "Factus Es" (which translates as either Become, Be Made or Be Done depending on the context) but a dead language isn't the best choice for trying to explain myself to others.

Fair enough lol