ILuvHats

Hear hear. Just to add background, we know it’s likely Odium has a method of extracting knowledge from the dying, considering the Sleepless’ statement to Kaza that she cannot even sate a dying wish because there are those who can take info from the dead. Unfortunately, I don’t have my copy of OB right now so I can’t find the exact quote. But that’s one of the main points of evidence for this theory.

I don't want to derail the thread, but in case you guys weren't aware, Overlord Jebus wrote a really good fan fiction describing this exact scenario. I'd highly recommend reading it if you haven't already.

Bela dies?! Noooooo! I literally just started reading the wheel of time during Christmas break.

You never know, you could be right. But a lot of people think the Old Magic seems more like direct shardic intervention rather than a complete magic system. There aren’t really any rules guiding the old magic except that you always get one boon and one bane. And that could just be the result of Cultivation’s nature, and her desire to make people grow.

I’m surprised nobody’s mentioned that Roshar’s atmosphere has a high oxygen content. So gunpowder? Bad idea. It would be much more explosive than on earth like planets, and dangerous to control. Guns powered by gravitational surges, I could see though.

I wish I was attending this university instead of my current one. Imagine getting to read Sanderson's books as homework for history class.

My main question is, is an Entity the same as the spark that can make intelligent beings planeswalkers? According to the MTG wiki description of a spark: "A planeswalker's spark is a latent power inborn into a very small number of sentient creatures across the Multiverse, which if activated permanently turns the bearer into a planeswalker. A planeswalker is granted the ability to travel between the planes of the Multiverse. The exact mechanics of the planeswalker's spark are unknown, and many of the descriptions are prerevisionist." Based on this definition alone, the two don't seem to be the same, since the spark is something inborn while the Entity doesn't appear to be. However, its clear that Tacinda only gained the ability to planeswalk immediately after she obtained the Bog Entity. So its kinda confusing. Maybe Tacenda and Wilia both had the spark, and thats why the Entity chose to inhabit them in the first place? But the spark could only be activated once the full power of the entity was claimed by one of them? I really don't know, so please help, those of you who are more knowledgeable about MTG lore.

Keep composing, @Spock. I always try to keep an eye out for quality composers of Sanderson inspired music on YouTube, and I’ve found a few I really like. But they either made one post, or they only have a new video one every year and a half. So please keep making music because I’d love to see more. To be honest, I’ve always wanted to make some orchestral arrangements for some cosmere books, but I never really got around to it. I mean, I made a pretty repetitive diddle on Guitar Center, but it wasn’t that good. Plus, I mean, it was Guitar Center . If I have time next summer, I might finally get around to it, rent Sibelius for a few months, and compose something I’d actually be proud enough of to share. But until then, I’ll keep having to listen to amazing artists like you.

Just took a math final. It did not go well . I even ended up pulling an all-nighter studying for it, for all the good it did me. And now I'm procrastinating studying for my chem final tomorrow by going on the shard because I am brain dead and I JUST NEED TO BE DONE WITH SCHOOL ALREADY.

Don't do that! That's what the Shard is for; sharing opinions even if they end up being wrong. We all make mistakes. But don't keep your opinions to yourself because you're afraid others will shoot down your ideas.

Hear hear. Exactly my thoughts.

First of all, a disclaimer: I loved Harry Potter for a long time. I think I read the series 11 times before I was so familiar with the story that it got a bit boring. And even though I’m no longer a fanatic about the books, I definitely agree that they were fantastically written and the series as a whole is a masterpiece. However, the fact that Rowling might have intentionally made the first few books simple and portrayed characters in a black and white way doesn’t excuse its simplicity. It would be more understandable if the series was targeting younger audiences, which I can see in the first 3 books. But based on the length and narrative complexity of the latter four books, she transitioned to targeting an older audience, yet the same mistakes remained. Especially in the last 2 novels, I think Rowling succeeded in making readers feel like the universe and the characters were more nuanced. But she was never able to fully cover up the stereotyping she established in the first few books. So there ends up being this dissonance between the maturity of the readers and the maturity of the universe. And that’s what bothers me.

Yeah, Hogwarts is a messed up school system. Who in their right minds would pit grade school age children against each other in a year long competition that just serves to create rivalries and form school disunity? And the bias is astonishing. Gryffindor wins 5, 6 years in a row? Give me a break.

Sorry, but I need to go on a rant about Rowling. Prepare thyselves! This was one of my main problems with Harry Potter. The way Rowling portrayed the houses, some of them seem to readers to be inherently better than others (cough cough Gryffindor). For example, it’s hard for people to think of Hufflepuff as a house of exceptional people. Sure, there are exceptions like Cedric Diggory, but the way the characters in the books thought about the house led to the perception that people were put in Hufflepuff because they weren’t good enough to be in the other houses. After all, where did the idea that Neville should have been sorted into Hufflepuff come from? And this perception is despite the fact that there is a list of exceptional attributes for Hufflepuff, like Agent34 mentioned. And don’t get me started on Slytherins. My god, Rowling, could you have portrayed them in a more one dimensional light? Sure, we have a few “good” Slytherins (spoilers ahead). We Have Slughorn, Regulus Black, Draco Malfoy, and Snape. But even though the last 3 got redemption arcs, they still did some messed up stuff, especially Black and Snape considering how long they were Death Eaters for. So they’re still pretty bad people. Literally almost every Death Eater was a Slytherin, and (spoilers again) when Voldemort offered the ultimatum to hand Harry over in the final battle of book 7, almost all of house Slytherin was ready to do it, but every other house was against it. The valued attributes of Slytherin are ambition, cunning, leadership, and resourcefulness, which to me don’t scream “Evil!” Sure, you could say people who value these attributes tend to lean towards “the ends justify the means” and that they are willing value their own well-being over that of others. But these do not equate to pure evil, which is pretty much what Rowling portrayed them as! These are the attributes of good businessmen! (Ok, lets not get into the argument that businessmen are evil ). Besides, just because somebody values these attributes, doesn’t mean they dont also value kindness, or loyalty, or bravery. It’s not mutually exclusive! It just annoys me that Rowling presented such one-sided views of the houses in her books, and a lot of people are still stuck with biased views of the houses as a result. She could have shown us more nuanced houses. There could have been a bunch of Slytherins who spoke against Voldemort, there could have been Death Eaters from Gryfindor or Hufflepuff. But no. Instead we get a story that, in spite of attempts to show otherwise, still generally emphasizes the philosophy that people can be described and placed into little boxes.

@Quantus So you’re theory is that Adonalsium was the state of investiture at which the net energy of the system was minimized? (I probably phrased that wrong). Did you ever post thread about it? I am intrigued.

BLASPHEMY! For real, though, it's just semantics. It could be interpreted either way. Maybe Brandon messed up the instant noodles timeline, or maybe he didn't and he meant it the way you thought he did. This is why English is such a dumb language. Though other languages have the same problem, so... math all the way?

WHAT IS THIS CONTRADICTION!? HOW CAN THIS BE?? You need to get your instant noodles timeline straightened out, Brandon.

I have a theory about this so called fourth law of thermodynamics. Its always bothered me that all Shards are incapable of breaking promises or agreements, and not just Honor. By extension, spren are also incapable of breaking their word. So, I think this law is at the root of this limitation on Shards and spren. I’d phrase it as follows. - Investiture is inherently only able to form Spiritual bonds. It cannot destroy bonds without some form of intervention from non-investiture, sapient beings. Maybe it could be better re-phrased, but hopefully I got the gist across. Basically, investiture by itself cannot break spiritual bonds. I think investiture wielded by humans or other sentient beings could, but not investiture alone. So when investiture-based beings like shards or spren make agreements, they form spiritual bonds, and because they can’t break these bonds, they are bound to their word. I’m not good with following the mechanics of the spiritual realm, so there might be problems with this theory. For example, Shards can obviously kill people. When you kill somebody, are you physically breaking their spiritual bonds? I don’t know, but maybe somebody better informed does. If this is the case (and there might be other equivalent problems with this theory) maybe a qualifier could be added to the types of spiritual bonds investiture cannot break. For example, maybe investiture can’t break bonds keyed to it by Intent. So when Shards make promises, they are forming a bond molded by their own Intent, so they can’t break it? Or something like that. Hopefully, if people think I’m onto something, they could modify or rephrase this theory. If I’m right and the Fourth Law of Thermodynamics is along the lines I think it is, then I have another proposition. Honor is not the embodiment of one of Adonalsium‘s personality attributes, but rather is the embodiment of this fundamental law of the cosmere. So, Honor is more comparable to Ruin and Preservation as fundamental forces than Shards like Odium or Devotion. Anywho, what do you think? Sorry if this has been discussed before, by the way.

I feel like I should have phrased things a bit differently for the poll. A lot of people are saying they think both sides contributed to starting the war, which I totally agree with. When I gave the poll options that humanity started the war vs the aliens, or vice versa, I didn’t mean to imply that one side was solely responsible for beginning the conflict, but rather that one side contributed significantly more to starting the war. I didn’t make that clear though in the poll, though, unfortunately.

Nobody else has mentioned Future Diary, so I’m gonna do it. It’s probably my favorite anime series. It’s a short, 20ish episode series that has some similiarities to hunger games style stories. Really dark, but a lot of intrigue and mystery, and the mechanics of the universe are really interesting. And the opening music is hella catchy. I’d recommend it for anyone interested in a shorter anime spree.

Uh, considering Asimov’s 3 laws of robotics, I don’t think Nightblood would make a very good sword if he followed them. The First Law of Robotics: A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.

Does anybody think Tony will actually die in space before being rescued? You’d think there would be no way they’d let him die like that, especially after everything Dr Strange went through to save him. But we have seen pictures of Gwyneth Paltrow (the actress who plays Pepper) in an Ironman suit. The question is whether she’s just going to accompany tony as Ironman or will actually replace him as Ironman after being inspired by his death. I’m actually not sure what to think, because the obvious expectation would be that Tony is rescued, even if he dies later in the film. But are they really going to give us what we expect?

Relevant WoB: What is this unpleasant area of Alethkar, hmmm? Could it be...Kholinar?

I'm curious what everybody thinks. We don't have much evidence so its all based on gut feelings, but I think the humans were the ones who first declared war. What about you guys?