1stBondsmith

I would like to address the use of the word "lie" and "lies" as the have been used in the Cosmere. Careful reading has lead me to notice that the word is used in many instances to mean "that which is not now". Patterns spren type do not like being called Liespren because they use the word differently. In his discussions with Shallan, he encourages her to make a lie, and what follows is a representation of something or someone different from what they are now, but definitely what they COULD become. The same is true in the Liar of Partinel discussions with the old Hoid. "People love a lie, if it is strong enough." "Tell them the lies they need to hear". It is used almost as an inspiration or a base for faith. We see a lie as a misrepresentation of the past. So if I say, "I am a clown", you would say, "you are a liar because you have never acted as a clown". But you may not know that I have taken a job as a clown and start later today; I use it as a title or description. But more specifically, I may have decided to be a clown from now on but you would still call me a liar. Pattern would see this as a lie too, but would relish it because it is descriptive of a future truth. They know time too, but call all future truth which is different from the past a "lie". It shows a change, a pattern, a progression that they recognize. They just have a different word for it. It seems both a cognitive interpretation and allows for time progression, much like a Cryptic's changing shape.

I have been meaning to write this for a while, but recent threads made me decide to make time for this. I will try to be brief on a deep topic. Many readers misunderstand what is meant by the Intents of the Shards. Specifically, they misunderstand what an Intent is without the context of having other Intents with it. An isolated Intent can be very unpredictable and even seem to work against itself. I will give some examples, but will leave you to extrapolate and contemplate what the means for all the other Intents. Ruin's Intent has also been described by himself as progression, change, aging, entropy, and nesessary for anything to evolve. But without Cultivation, entropy is stronger than progression. Without Preservation, passing forms that are desirable do not remain, so even good changes are passing and only statistically useful. Without Honor, the changes will never be tied to an agreement or morals, so they cannot be counted on. Without Autonomy, Ruin becomes dependent on controlling others to achieve its ends. Etc. Cultivation may indeed be controlled growth, but no Ruin means seasons and withering of your project does not happen. Do you care about the feelings of your creations without the intent of Love? How do you keep your creations without Preservation? Honor without Love, Autonomy, Forgiveness, and Preservation is hard to imagine. The list goes on. A single intent ( like Odium, or divine hatred), without its opposite or other binding Intents is a radical to even itself. I think more pondering on an untempered Intent would give us a better idea of what to expect, and might keep us from simplifying our judgments to a Good Shard and an Evil Shard.

@DarkJester, I like it. Have an upvote. It is original, plausible, and involves bonding to a dragon-looking thing magically. All good in this context. Also a good involvement if a long time character recovering from physical damage ( a good use of shardplate).

My Friends, @jofwus calculations are correct, but they miss the point. Kenton is not noticing the displacement of the sun based on a static point reference, he is noticing the difference from the angle he is standing relative to the sun. I will give you a concrete example, based on the Earth. When I was in Brazil, the sun was directly overhead. When I was in Mexico the next week, it was noticeably south, about 15 degrees. In Utah, about 10 more degrees. Then flown to Barrow, Alaska, it was at 80-85 degrees south. The sun position had not changed, my vertical position changed, so the observed angle changed. If Taldain is smaller than Earth (and I believe it is), this angle change would be even more noticeable. This subtle change would be highlighted if the sun never moved with seasons. I have been accurate in time within 5-6 minutes by solar position when I have lived in the same place for several years. Someone in the same place their whole life, with a fixed sun and a smaller planet could quite possibly tell position by a day's travel. Submitted for your contemplation.

Eshoni, who somehow survived her fall, (because a future book will be feature her) has a rematch with Dalinar, but he no longer holds a shardblade. He uses the power of Bondsmith's to break the hold the spren has on her. releasing the Stormform and allowing the Song of Peace to again flow from her. She turns to her people, striving to convince them to release the Voidspren, but they fight her. She is protected by Radiants, and is left without a people...for a while. The other Listeners that left before the Everstorm find her, and a long apology and convincing takes place. A new plan for fighting the effects of their New Gods is concocted, and sprung on the Stormform. It fails, but allied with the newly power-upped Dalinar, reduces their numbers greatly, and an allied Listener army is created, seeking to fight Odium.

I understood your position, but I think her mother had no idea she already attracted a spren, or if she did, that Shallan had come to be able to use some powers. We have no writing anywhere to indicate she used powers in front of her mother prior to her taking her mother's life. I think there was a great disconnect there that her mother would have celebrated, had she known. I great bit of irony in my opinion.

I believe that Shallan's mother belonged to the same organization as Teft's parents (Envisagers?). they believed that a mortal crisis would bring out the powers. Her death scene sounded more like this to me.

Correct. A description of moving across the storms that form a ring between Dayside and Darkside, and the wild storms that they are are described there.

One side of Taldain gets the light from the blue star, with its radiation giving investiture to the lichen on the sand. The planet is surrounded by a ring of storm clouds, that looks to be paralleling the lunar orbit. Then the other side is NOT exposed to the blue star, but to the dark star with lots of UV light. One side, bright lights, broken in the middle with the storm ring, and the other side with the different wavelength light and features. Seems a ringer for the Broken Sky to me.

This appears to me to verify my opinion that Shadesmar cannot see the planets without sentient life. Additionally, that Rosharians could not see all the planets from there. That leaves only two other source. Someone goes there physically, through space; or a totally new way of having an object think about its own identity is enough to place it in Shadesmar. From the in-book quotes, items only have an identity (or a strong one) when enough people think of it as an entity for a long period of time. I agree with Wirey Writer @Ookla the Indefinite that the statement is that you can't see all of them from Roshar. It is VERY hard to see uninhabited planets in the CR (just like I stated above). Also, the "So..." at the end of Peter's note leads you to the only other alternative...Someone "saw" them physically, the way we do or similar.

Points to you @thejopen27 for creative thought. I hadn't heard that anywhere. I will ponder this a while before I reply, but the first upvote is mine.

I do believe that Ishi sent him on this mission. I would lay most of the blame for the betrayal at his feet.

Correct. They had them prior to becoming Returned themselves. Characteristic given to them genetically. Not all returned have royal-locked children (as was the point of getting the marriage in the book). It sounds like only one line from one source.

Friends, I think you missed the quote @luckat just posted. They had the locks before and independent of being returned. No "son of Returned" involved. Just royal before the ascension.

Hear! Hear! @PallonianFire. I can't see why this was not acknowledged better on the other thread. It is almost so obvious that people seem to e trying to make it harder. I'm not sure why... To the theory, I think we have to stick with what we were given. No black hole. Why would the dust cloud be gone? No explanation there. If the cloud can be seen in the physical, people are aware and thinking it exists, so it should exist in the CR. Further, people in the CR do not see the all light as souls. Just souls, metal and investiture. Since we do not know where that is on Taldain, (I know the theories about sun, atmosphere, etc.) and they have very little metal, (see the text), and Kelsier does not mention any celestial bodies. I don't know what they would see in the sky. Do you?

In the scientific/engineering world, Tension is the power of something to be held together when being pulled apart. Something with low tensile strength, or low tension, is easily pulled apart. Something with high Tension (can sustain high tension), has a high tensile value. Giving something a low tension will allow it to break. So a person that can control Tension would be able to keep together or separate things by changing the tensile strength. This is not done in our world because tension is an innate property of materials, but if it becomes a Surge, I assume you can change that. It becomes a very powerful surge when applied to physical materials, or the spiritual bonds between people.

Well thought @VirtuousTraveller. Some details persist that we have no answers to, but the general premise is very good. This kind of stuff keeps me up late at night...pondering. Could Brandon have thought this all through prior to the novels, or is it popping up as he goes, and he wordsmiths it into past conversations? Either way it is amazingly fun to read and work through. My wife and I recognized the same quote ties when we read AU. Only difference we have is that the titles, Bavadin, Trell, and Autonomy seem almost all interchangeable, and now we find that they are legion. So until we get some confirmation, deciding which is which does not matter now while I read. We will enjoy the roller coaster without moping that we can't see the next loop. Can you think of another fantasy writer anywhere who gets the scientific, moral realism, or experiential parallel scrutiny Brandon does? Everyone else gets a big pass, "'cuz it's magic! Duh!". For plot detail and fun, NOBODY tops Sanderson.

Just a side note on the commonality of the game- there is some version or another of what English and American culture call "marbles" (different colored stones thrown at targets, holes, rings, each other, etc. in over 54 indigenous or isolated cultures. It is kind of the most basic of game types with the least amount of creativity needed. (It is really difficult and requires a lot of skill, and I love them). A stone throwing game would be everywhere there are stones. I don't think there is enough evidence in this to link worlds based on it. Sanderson might have intended this as a clue, but it is a very weak one if it is.

I have very little time to write...A carrier has been spotted near my home, and we are going to meet the Thunderclast before it gets here. The amount of damage caused bringing one down is well beyond my insurance to cover. I have summoned the Windrunner and the Dustbringer, as the Edgedancers will be of little use in the rain. Some words of warning for Oathbringer... Beware written words; some foreshadow, some distort, and some intentionally mislead. Letters in particular. As Dalinar consolidates the Radiants, his control over House Kholin dwindles. He prematurely abdicates to Adolin, even though his house is under great suspicion at Sadaes's death. Highprince Adolin ends up at odds of purpose with his Bondsmith father, and the good of the whole world, vs. the good of the House are brought to a stark arguing point. This is interrupted by the destruction of Kholinar as the Everstorm sweeps it and it is left a tattered country. Adonlin wants to bring the surviving people to Urithiru, but Dalinar insists that this must be politically neutral territory to make the Orders and Kingdoms trust each other. Adolin angrily stays in Kholinar to help his people and the King returns there as well, guided by a Lopen, now promoted to Captain.

A few more: Determination spren, Mirth spren, Riot spren, Charity spren, Compassion spren, Mourning spren. Boy, Embarrassment spren would be everywhere in schools, and what hormones could bring on in teens!. Imagine a spren that would give away your deepest desire to hide something! I have really wondered what it would be like to live in a world where every emotion was visible to everyone else. There would be a great market for schools to train emotion from your response. Oh wait, they have that. It's called Calculus!

I have seen no evidence of this in th writings or WoB. This would be very new information.

If a person dies, an idea given life through them would be cut from them. But the idea may persist in the general belief or experience of other sentient beings. If a person no longer believes something, but lives, the idea is still there but bereft of all power or influence. Still tied to the person who believed it, but now existing as an impotent historical relic. We do this in our work with Asset Management. If a pump wears out and we replace it, we still have to keep a record of the dead pump as; it was this type, it had these specifications, it lived this long, it cost this much to replace, etc. This way, it exists in the mental world, but not the physical. The guy assigned to maintain the pump no longer has a schedule to do anything to it, but neither does anyone else. We only have a record of who that guy was. The bond is all cognitive instead of also physical. This could be the description of a spren that exists, but cannot do anything or have sentience and thus, in the Cognitive, be "dead". The spren pump lived, and had a link to the physical realm once, and interacted in the building, but it no longer can. I can summon information about it any time I want, so It still exists, but I cannot interact with it. Add a stormlight Fabrial to call it back to existence, and I can use the pump to look at and maybe sit on, but it would not be able to use electricity (stormlight) to ever pump again. This is the best parable I can give to my understanding.

Remember that Adonalsium had 16 Intents. A God Is Autonomous of all other powers. God Cultivates his creations. God punishes and Hates those who do not obey laws. God Always keeps his word Honorably, etc. God establishes change (Ruin) and progression. He is mighty to save (Preservation). Just like Ruin balances Preservation and many other things, an all-powerful God would have all those intents in a perfect balance and used appropriately. I do not think they were kept from humanity, but were used for them.

I agree with you @Eki. A knight dying doesn't kill a spren. Also, some part of the bond must be left at the braking of oaths. But that is what would keep the spren from bonding to another. Part of the broken bond is left, and cannot be revived by someone else. If that person dies without the bond being broken, I think the spren can rebond according to the WoB you referenced. But I do not think that when some knight who breaks their oaths dies leaves the spren available to rebond. So maybe I should have worded the line above, "When a radiant breaks their oaths, the bonds are nearly severed and the spren "dies" but may be revived by only them". If the Radiant dies first, a zombie spren cannot be revived fully. From what I have read, this appears to be the case.

I think the line of thinking above misses the mark. Brandon's quote about needing to reestablish the original bond with the spren to its Knight appears to be to also touch on the nature of the Nahel bond. A spren cannot bond except to one person, it "dies" otherwise. It can be revived ONLY by that person (like Syl and Kaladin). So I agree that we should not expect this to happen unless we revive an original Knight radiant. That would exclude Adonlin bonding to his sword. The bond for a spren is forever, and when broken, breaks them. That is why the swords are abominations to other live Spren. It is like waving around a dead person and using it to fight. Not cool to spren, or to Parshendi. Should be not cool to people if they totally understood. But we are a practical race most of the time. Honor forbid we honor others' dead!