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Couple thoughts: 1) Spook's bloodline would be unique because he was Elevated to Mistborn directly and recently, not born as one with the accompanying dilution of those generations between Era1 and the original elevation of the noble bloodlines. EDIT: Nevermind, WOB confirms he was reduced power 2) Per WOB, Scadrial had "a population of about 100 million during The Final Empire (with 1-2 million in Luthadel), and around 15 million during Alloy of Law (with about 5 million in Elendel)". Not sure how well that lines up with your RL analogy 3) One of the main things Harmony did was futz with the population, changing how Koloss Breeding and Snapping work, and fixing the changes that TLR made. 4) None of this actually has anything to do with normal DNA, so the normal real world transmission & inheritance rates Etc. likely dont apply. Metallic Arts are passed via Spritual DNA (sDNA) rather than the amino-acid sequences in the Physical Realm (ie there is no "blood test" for allomancy, etc).

In the case of Medallions in particular (because that was the context of the WOB) we know that storing in Nicrosil is like Copper in that it is stored whole as a discrete things like a memory, not a uniform quantity like weight or health. "Taken, Used, then Returned" makes me think the ability is lost or suppressed when it is transferred into the Medallion.

Here are the two relevant WOB's that I know of, one that confirm it was an issue even back in era1, and another that burning the metals off is effective to prevent metal poisoning. The latter is from 2016 and still talks about it as a current issue, so I assume it hasnt changed been affected by Harmony.

Im not arguing against the fact that Unattended Investiture can and will gain Intelligence, that's fairly settled; Seons themselves are a good example being accidents. What Im not as on board with is the assertion that any investiture of Autonomy (or Honor or Preservation, etc) would qualify as "Unattended" while there exists a Vessel of that corresponding shard and thus that the formation of Avatars is a purely natural process. If the Vessels that Rasye killed only had command of the "local" piece of their Shards as you describe, then Rayse was only able to affect a finite amount of the D&D shards and there should be some Infinite "Rest of it" out there in the spiritual realm and/or other planets. Which is not how it's been described at all. And on the other part of it where we really cant assume the relationship between Bavadin and the rest of the Avatar's, this WOB implies that they are not equal.

While I agree with all the individual things you said here, I dont think we can say that the formation of an Avatar is a natural/inevitable process, or to what degree the Avatar's control over the Power of Autonomy are separate (given the prevailing use of the Plural in Autonomiy's self-descriptions). Personally (unless it's unique to the nature of Autonomy) I strongly doubt it's a natural process or else it would logically happen a whole lot more (especially when the Shard has no vessel, or an inexperienced one). I mean, if the main Vessel doesnt actually have all the Investiture by default, then Rayse only shoved a portion of D&D in the Cognitive Realm and there would be Avatars developing on all the other worlds, right? The implication of the Letters (to me, at least) was that Autonomy at the very least has the ability to influence the emergence of a new Avatar, possibly control over the emergence entirely. It also both seemed to confirm the Collective/hive self-description, it also that they are independent enough to disagree about Hoid himself. All that to say the internal dynamics between the Avatars of Autonomy are a mystery and likely more complex than we know, especially since we dont even know what the true definition of an "Avatar" is. It could mean that control of Autonomy's shard is distributed equally among all the Avatars as you say. Or it could be that Bavadin is in Command of a growing army of Godlings that she has empowered to the point of a permanent Ascension but less than the actual 1/16th of Infinity that she maintains. Or something else entirely.

The Rhythms exist in the Spiritual Realm, so theoretically anyone with the appropriately heightened/tuned perceptions and/or realmic access could do it. Singers can do it because they have a Gemheart, which is naturally formed through direct Leakage from the Spiritual Realm. Rock's personally weirdness seems to come close, he mentions being able to Almost here rhythms or songs occasionally. If Im not mistaken some other Radiants have made similarly vague statements, and [Redacted, unnecessary RoW example]. For Hoid, he could definitely do it with Allomancy, given their apparent flexibility he could probably pull it off with Breaths/Heightenings (especially given their innate sensory interactions), and with what could arguably be two of the most powerful Surges I would not be shocked to learn he could pull it off with some weird realmic Lightweaving (which is all about rhythms and waves and frequencies and whatnot). Bronze is easily the most likely just because it's a confirmed ability of his and function of the system.

Late to the game, sorry, came looking to see if anyone else thought this line was significant. He does have access to major physical modifications, just not the more open-ended Stormlight Spiritual Healing. But the Forms already change a singer's Gender. "Male" and "Female" exist almost Exclusively, in Mateform, for the vast majority of the other forms, they get the neutered Malen and Femalen genders, and WOB confirms that Singer culture recognizes at least one more, a 5th non-binary gender. All that to say that given the cultural views and the fact that Gender change is already part of the Form Change, I could easily see Rlain being Gender-fluid more than anything, spending most of his time (and viewing his self-identity) as the Malen we've mostly seen, but making a change to Femalen if he goes into Mateform. Given the "or anyone really" part of the quote, I suspect whatever happened was clearly visible/obvious to the others of his community.

Hmm. Dragons, or at least the one we've actually met in canon (two if you count The Traveller short), still maintain a sense of personal gender, and we know that pre-ascension at least, Bavadin herself is always referenced as female (even if avatars span the gambit). Id have to go back to the ones we've met to see if Sleepless seem to consider themselves gendered entities, but from I recall I dont think they do.

d'oh! sorry Nah, "medallion" is what they were being called in Bands of Mourning. Though I suppose the argument could be made that the term only applies to the common commodity shape that the Southerners use, as a subset of UnSealed metalminds. "UnSealed Metalminds" hasnt appeared on page yet, but that term was at the direct request in a WOB, though he said era 3 characters might use a slang term. I too had no idea what it meant, and had missed the WOB. My immediate question is: Why are these "halfborn" possible now when they were not before? Is this a Harmony-Era change? We know he changed both Snapping and Koloss reproduction, perhaps those changes allowed more "blending" options of the powers?

First off, Welcome to the Shard! I dont think so, personally, because the need for physical contact is baked into Feruchemy just like burning the internal metals is baked into Allomancy. In all the Cosmere it might be possible, but I suspect you'd need to hack some other planet's system into the equation to bypass that fundamental Physical Realm requirement of Feruchemy. But I could be wrong, and if Dor can theoretically be tapped off-world with effort perhaps Metalminds can be too. Kinda sorta yes no maybe. In theory anyone that can forge a strong enough Connection to a Shard and/or channel enough of their Investiture will at least partly Ascend, which can include access to Shard-like Powers. Burning enough Atium, tapping the Mists directly, taking up the Well, and the weird Orb in Secret History are all examples of this (at varying degrees of power). So with enough Compounding, flaring, duralumin, etc you might be able to get some degree of Ascension going, but I think you also might risk burning yourself out in the attempt. And all of that kind of assumes that the current Shard vessel lets it happen (or is too distracted to stop it). Hard to say, and it kind of depends on your definition. In general, Intent Matters a lot with the more "targeted" Feruchemy metals, like we know you can store all kinds of "senses" if you visualize it right. On the other hand, the philosophic argument could be made that Feruchemy already stores "Spark of Life" Investiture by definition, with each metal just storing different aspects of it (kind of a white light vs colors analogy). So maybe you can visualize a more generic Life Investiture that encompasses more, then store it in a normalNicrosil-mind. Or maybe that's the mysterious and unrevealed feruchemical power of Lerasium, storing this broader Feruchemical Spirit-power.  Per WOB you cannot store a shard in a spike, there are real limits to how much investiture you can store in the physical metal by those means. So long as both Archivists are picturing the wire/sheet as one single object, then sure, as far as I know this should work. There might be some practical length limit that keeps trans-continental telegraphs from being practical, but I dont know of any specific evidence of that since metalminds of that size have never appeared. We have asked many times and he refuses to answer this, and most questions about Compounding, saying he's saving those reveals for future books. Theories abound but Im not sure any of them have taken the lead. Also Medallions open some options.

True, but the point (or at least my point) is not whether the process is effective or can be trained up, rather it's a) whether it's the same as the stereotypical "photographic memory" and b.) whether it would be considered Fair to use in a Memory Competition with non-Ferrings. I vote 'No' in both cases. For what it's worth, it has also been recently confirmed that there is an an practical limit to how much memory a person can hold before they need supernatural assistance. Trying to keep it as spoiler free as possible, but it was confirmed that after a long enough time a person will need to store memories in magic means to preserve them. Whether that's an issue of total capacity or long-term storage stability (ie memories just getting normal fuzzy) is probably debatable.

Heh, not the way I learn... Ok, I think I get you now, and I think we're on the same page. At the end of the day, in the context of a Jeapordy-style contest, I dont really see any difference (other than practical effectiveness) between using a Coppermind and having a bunch of Answers written on your arm. I could see the argument on something that is literally just rote memorization: the Letter and paragraph of Rulebooks, the "Places and Dates" part of History. But even those examples tend to have other areas that require a deeper Understanding than just a regurgitation of facts, at least when taken to the point of a profession/trade. This does raise a question that I dont know we have an answer to: you can Store Memories in Copper, can you store Skills, things that are less memorization and more applied understanding and procedures and things? Could somebody store their Musical skills with an instrument that they refined and practiced way in the past but then left alone for decades? Could I have stored all that nice Calculus that I was great with in College but havent touched in too many years? Can you store "Muscle-Memory"?

Sorry about that, accidentally deleted a few bits right as I was posting. Reload to get the full post Did you do the same thing?

Even though it does have similar realmic underpinnings, Shallan's is functionally different in a whole lot of ways. But enough that it is not equivalent to the steroetypical "Photographic Memory" where everything is right there in your mind if and when you need it. Also, when you are talking about absorbing a whole lot of book information without going through the full process of absorbing and internalizing the information, it's just going to be a lot of image memories of book pages. Learning and Memorizing are VERY rarely the same thing, and anyone telling you otherwise is selling you something. One is having a Spanish/English Dictionary at your fingertips, the other is being Fluent.

Not really, you just have to get the relevant information into your short term memory. You wouldnt need to even let it get moved to Long-term memory, let alone actually internalize the content. I see it as akin to the action of copying the information from the Textbook to your Notes; truly Memorizing it would require the next tier methods like flash cards and/or Pneumonic devices, etc. and depending on the nature of the topic actually Learning it might be a whole other exercise that borders on the F-Zinc realm. This is really just my own interpretation, but to me Copperminds are just a far more direct and convenient interface than Eyes & Pen, Ears & Tape Recorder, or any of the other media recording technologies we have figured out (We're getting surprisingly close to being able to extract actual images from brain scans, for example). Circling back to the OP, I think there could be a very interesting moral/ethical debates in Scadrian society, especially depending on the Era in question. If the Test in question is just testing your practical capabilities then I would see no reason not to allow them (any of the metallic arts), my Professional Engineer exam was open book for this reason. If it's more of a sport style Competition then it gets trickier. The justification for our sports banning significant performance enhancing drugs is (as far as I understand) that they are known to be harmful and also extremely effective, to the point it is unfair to allow them and thus indirectly require them to be competitive. Hemalurgy would probably get a blanket ban on those grounds, not to mention the fundamental "Stealing from Others" aspect of it. [Era 2 Spoilers] And in a Jeapordy scenario, where is the Line with the other metals? Is F-Zinc allowed? How about F-Steel to hit the Buzzer faster? If Feruchemical means that are your own stored Investiture allowed, are Allomantic powers which are externally sourced? The catch is that when a memory is stored in the metalmind it is removed from the Ferring's mind, and is not available. And it takes some amount of time and fatiguing effort to move them in and out of the metalminds (with degradation each time), and Copper will not aid your ability sort or utilize the information.

Two reasons:

Oh, I think they are amazing, and are in most ways better than any of hte the RL paper or electronic equivalents. But if we're talking about a Jeapordy-style test of your actual ability to Memorize and Recall facts, a coppermind is still external storage like any other media recording. And Id argue that you can loose a chunk of Copper just as easily as a notebook; you can mitigate that by making it a ring or necklace, but those still be lost, damaged, and/or stolen.

I disagree, to me a Coppermind is a lot more like the 1/2 page "equation cheat sheet" that some but not all of my engineering classes allowed us to prepare and carry into the exams. Because, like a coppermind, it only proves you knew the material the day before when you were doing your studying, not that you learned it enough to actually make it stick long term. The logic of the professors that allowed it was that you would never actually be asked to do professional work absent any reference materials.

Assuming we lived in a world were such magics were both possible and commonly known, I think Copperminds (and mental augmentation Spikes) would be the equivalent of Performance Enhancing Drugs. Or those Ferrings would compete in their own separate division in such sports/games.

No worries, I figured that was it. I just pointed it out because I think the OP just did the same things with the Metals. They were making connection with Edgedancers to the name "Slider" rather than the specific metal, and Wayne is a Slider.

Bendalloy = Slider, Cadmium = Pulser

My theory on Wayne is that his Spiritual Restoration and Time Manipulation are working together to maintain his Age that is closer to his Objective Age rather than the Subjective time he's experienced through all the Time Bubbles. A normal Slider that burns as much metal as regularly as Wayne does could potentially die of old age in the 40's. Making matters worse, Bendalloy is toxic and WOB confirms the standard way to deal with that is to burn any excess off before you sleep, so even being prepared to Slide forces the average user burn metal and thus Lifespan each day. Wayne has the option to instead use his Gold Reserves to heal the damage of the Heavy Metal Poisoning, assuming he rations his limited Gold Stores for that purpose (which I dont see evidence of). TL;DR Wayne is using a combination of the thematic abilities to Restore/"Preserve" his Spiritweb via F-Gold and his ability to manipulate Time to "reset" his age back to the objective Timeframe.

As the good folks of this forum reminded me today, about a year ago (ie way back in the Before Time) I discovered that Piezoelectric Crystal Transformers are an actual factual Thing that exists, which was close enough to proper Fabrial Crystal Power for my inner child, so I went a little nuts designing a electric Arc Glove. I really need to get back to that project...

For him there would be more practical limitations in terms of how many people he could reasonably Breed and Disappear in a given timeframe. At least compared to the sort of experimental churn you could do if there was a hemalurgy experiment performed on every single cow and pig slaughtered in an industrialized meat industry, where it's on the order of hundreds or more per day.

Starting easy: