Hoiditthroughthegrapevine

I think they could use pre-existing fabrial science to create flying airships right now! The fact that they have sails on the ship, seems to imply that they are going to be using the wind for X and Z axis propulsion/movement, and there is existing fabrial technology that was used at the end of WoR to accomplish vertical or y axis movement, the conjoined Amethyst fabrials used to raise the Archery platform. We know that the other type of conjoiner, ruby used in spanreeds, can function across the whole continent of Roshar, so if Amethyst (being the reversed conjoiner) can also function across Roshar the solution is simple. Here's the diagram of how this could work: The Knights Radiant live on the freaking tallest mountain in all of Roshar, giving them the unique ability to very precisely control the vertical position of a ship using fabrials that could be conjoined to weights in the ballast portion of the flying ship to a pair of counterbalanced weights on pulleys that are anchored at the top of the Tower of Urithiru. All fabrials have a mechanism for being turned on or off, so their effects can be utilized or not, so if a flying ship had two conjoined weights in its hull, A and B in the diagram, that were conjoined to two weights at Urithiru, A and B, that could be raised or lowered, you could effectively control vertical ascent and descent. Further a control mechanism on the ship that controls which weight drops or rises could be paired with a similar control at Urithiru using normal spanreed like conjoining, allowing the pilot of the flying ship to remotely control vertical height. I imagine that when the conjoined weights are engaged, there will be a translation of the angular momentum of the Ship's conjoined weight back to the tower's conjoined weight, but if the counterbalanced weights are hung off of the top floor of Urithiru and properly spaced, this shouldn't be an issue, but this conjoined fabrial would exert a counter force on the conjoined fabrial in the ships hull until the periodic effect of these forces balance out and the ship could come to rest at a specified height. If the vertical fabrial was disengaged while the ship was still in horizontal transit, the wind captured by the sail could be used to direct it's x and z axis movement while it falls. So effectively you could recreate the flying process of an Eagle capturing a thermal and then gliding. The airship designs, to effectively use this means of transport would most likely have to have wings, to increase the surface of the exosed air and harness the Bernouli effect to more effectively glide. And after one glide is done the pilot could use the synchornized weights to gain altitude and begin the process again. This should totally work if the increased load on the reversed conjoined Amethyst isn't too much for the conjoined fabrials to withstand. But given the fact that a heavy stone platform (I think it was stone) was raised on the shattered plains using this method makes me somewhat confident that this could indeed work.

I personally like the idea that the Sibling is a composite entity, kind of like Ursula's eels Flotsam and Jetsam from the little mermaid. This would also be convenient for the 3rd Bondsmith, they could potentially leave one portion of the Sibling at Urithiru to power system critical functions and take the other portion of the Sibling out of the tower city to have access to their surges. My personal hope is that the 3rd bondsmith will be Arclo or another one of the Sleepless, because they have the ability to be in more than one place simultaneously. So they would have the ability to fight on the front lines while simultaneously keeping Urithiru going, and they could make sure that enough of their Hordelings were left at Urithiru to maintain their consciousness so that they would be effectively unkillable. @harel55, you were really close, here's the exact words of the passage: I really like your formulation that the pronoun ambiguity and gender non-specificity is because the Sibling is a pair of spren of opposite genders. Maybe the thing that hurt the Sibling was Odium splintering off one of them to form the unmade Chemoarish, the Dustmother (total speculation here, but interesting to think about). I'm out of upvotes but I'll give you one when they trickle back in.

Dalinar the Barbarian says:

This theory is really a reaction to 3 things, @WeiryWriter's thread on The Expanse of Densities, a couple of WoBs, and the extended view of the Rosharan sub-astral we got in Oathbringer. I think the Cognitive Realm is a contiguous topology, like the model for gravitation's effect on space time. It's a large continuous surface that is elastic and is stretched by densities of thought. To put this in terms of the analogy of the warping of space time through gravitation, thought would be like mass; a dense accumulation of thought in one area would warp the topological plane, but unlike with space time, this warping wouldn't manifest as a dimpling of the surface of the cognitive realm, because it really is a two dimensional construct, instead the elasticity of the system would spread outwards, like a balloon being pulled on both ends stretches in reaction to the force. The exact shape and nature of the Cognitive Realm in relation to the Physical Realm I think is best left to the Scholars at Silverlight to determine, until we get the 3 Dimensional map of the Cosmere that Brandon has hinted that they are making, but there are a number of topologies that are surfaces that are fully contiguous, where it would be possible to circumnavigate the surface of the topology in a near infinite varieties of ways. One example of an interesting topology is the Klein Bottle (which can be non-intersecting with a time component, spoilered below because the animation can be distracting unless you want to look at it). The thing is that is compelling about this formulation is that it allows for the Cognitive Realm to change and adapt over time, depending on where cognitive densities occur, like this animation of a Coffee Cup transforming into Torus (spoilered too, because it's animated): So the Cognitive Realm, as I see it, is a modified plane, a plane that is in continuous transition to form a changing 3 dimensional surface. And the Spiritual Realm is a single point, the single Point of Pythagorean thought where all infinity is encompassed. Everything is connected to this point, but this point exists outside of time and space, it is a one-dimensional construct (the Great I-Am of the Cosmos). Certain points are more connected to this singular point, and because everything is connected to it as well, sentient beings can use these points of high thought density to access the point outside of time and space, and through cognitive will, reach another point in time and space (most likely this transition occurs from the Physical Realm with an intermediary stop in the CR before the being is transported to the Spiritual Realm, and process repeats in reverse (to CR then to PR). So here are the WoB's that I think support this general idea: First this WoB, which implies that the Cognive Realm is like a flattened version of the Physical Realm (emphasis added): And this WoB, which I think gives the best idea of what the Cognitive Realm actually is (emphasis added): Here are the rest of the supporting details (spoilered so you can read them if you want to): Here are some general thoughts about why the Cognitive Realms manifest in such different ways on different Shard worlds (spoilered again, read if you want): And Here is the most important part, I am going to be getting some signed copies of Brandon's books for my birthday (coming up in February) and I'll have 3 questions to ask, I already know what I want to ask for the first one, but I would love to hear your guys' thoughts on what I should ask for the second two. I do have to say I want the suggestions restricted to Realmatics (cognitive realm, spiritual realm, linkage between 3 realms, etc). Excited to see what some of the smartest sapient lifeforms on this planet come up with!

Really nice work! The Lay of Beren and Luthien Tunniveil is one of my favorite things ever written. I'm one of those odd ones that likes the Simarillion more than the Lord of the Rings though, so take that for what it's worth. These are my 3 favorite parts: And this: And the ending, again with the symmetry from the opening, is beautiful: Have you ever read Gerard Manly Hopkins, he's one of my favorite poets and your evocations of Nature remind me a lot of his poetry.

That would be awesome! Nice catch I missed that Ulim, the voidspren that lead Venli to Eshonai's corpse in Venli's first interlude was a red voidspren. I thought that all of Odium's voidspren were yellow and made a huge speculative mountain out a mole-hill that I didn't even get the details right on. But that's the beauty of the 17th shard, erroneous ideas are quickly corrected and good information reigns supreme. I also missed that the large army of dark spren milling around the Oathgate in Shadesmar were used to bond with Sadeas' troops to create the Thrill puppet human army at the battle of thaylen fields, first time through I thought it was just the super-powered effect of the Thrill that turned their eyes red.

@Pagerunner I think I have Szeth's neurological atyipicality, it's a lot like @Subvisual Haze analysis of the Cult Mind, but I think it's a better fit with his primary character trait of Believer, I think it's an intelligent,quetioning fanaticism. I know that sounds like an oxy moron, but it describes his inability to distinguish what is right. He has a deep seated desire to have some external framework that justifies his actions, but is also intelligent enough to see the flaws of the system that he has subsumed himself to. To a certain extent this is what has undone Nale as well, and I think might be what make's it preferable to pick the dunn sphere type of person for the Skybreaker order. Szeth's character reads like his mind is always at war, drawn between two poles. The definition of what is right by set by his external moral code vs. his reasoned understanding of the obvious wrong that he is being forced to do in order to live by that moral code. I personally like his character and this conflict a lot, and I also think that it's the reason that he has Nightblood. He is innocent in a lot of ways because he is cognitively undeveloped and can't really understand the morality of what he is doing. Szeth also is a tool of restrained violence, who having lived according to the moral precepts of the Stone Shamans has done things that have torn apart his soul, and he was intelligent enough to discern that the Evil he did had no moral foundation whatsoever because the Shamanate was wrong and he was never Truthless. He still has an innate desire to believe in something higher than himself, an inability to take responsibility for the morality of his own actions, but this is something that interacting with Nightblood will probably help him learn how to do.

@Wit Beyond Measure I think that there were historical cases of Dysian Aimians becoming Knights Radiant, the back of book quote from TWoK heavily implies this: I think it would be freaking awesome to see some Sleepless Radiants, but this raises some interesting questions: How would the Nahel bond Work? We know that the Nahel bond is a symbiotic relationship between a higher spren and a Knight Radiant. The spren gains sapience and the KR gets access to 2 surges. I think what the spren is really getting is access to experience in a changing dynamic system, filtered through the cognitve lens of the consciousness of the KR. This cognitive filter helps the spren interpret that experience, which allows the spren to change and grow. We know that Shadesmar is far more static than the Physical Realm, which makes sense. Ideas evolve over time, but they have a certain fixity or else they wouldn't be commonly held ideas. We also know that the Singers think that the spren abandoned them for the humans because: I think this is pretty direct evidence of the above analysis, the Singers are basically stuck in one Cognitive mode, so how they view and experience the world, i.e. their cognitive filter, limits their perception of the world. Each form comes with an innate mentatility that consciousness sits behind. So given that Dysian Aimians are a vast complex of sensory apparatus, capable of distributing their consciousness across time and space, this seems like they should have Spren beating down their doors to form Nahel bonds. Talk about a fast track to Sapience for the bonded spren, they can be in multiple places, experiencing multiple different facets of reality from multiple perspectives filtered through the Cognitive lens of what is essentially a Cognitive entity. Would a Dysian Aimian be able to bond more than one higher Spren? So the one Sleepless we have seen is Arclo in Edgedancer, and he is building a Grand philosophy by examining how the parts of a thing make up the whole. He asks Lift what part of the body she thinks she is most like, and then he goes onto to describe a city as a vast organism composed of individual people that are like small pieces of this larger organism. This obviously parallels how his Identity works, but the more interesting part is the idea that Identity can be broken down into constituent pieces. Could a Dysian Aimian create multiple assemblages of hordelings that act like two or more people? What is the limit to this splitting apart and incorporating? Could you have a small town, populated with Hordeling puppets that are all the same Dysian Aimian? Could their identity be split apart where they can project into one Hordeling puppet the constituent quality of their Identity of Leading or Protecting? And into another the quality of Pious or Guiding? Ok, this is the fun bit. We've seen Shallan fracture her identity into 3 parts, how much easier would this be for a Dysian Aimian to do? We know that it is theoretically possible for humans to bond more than one spren from this WoB: Seems like with their ability to store memories externally into different hordelings, that it might be possible to intentionally create the perfect vessels to attract specific spren. Also, their is a mention of flying cremlings seen in the hills outside of Yeddaw, how rad would it be to have a Dysian Aimian Elsecalling Radiant composed out of flying cremlings that is sharing consciousness with another Knight Radiant Windrunner? Picture if you will, the Windrunner persona of the Sleepless painting a wide swath of the ground with a glowing line of Adhesion as the Elsecaller Sleepless persona flies through the air and turns into a giant hand composed of cremlings that flies into the back of the thunderclast stuck on the adhesion line and transforms his rocky body into Crystal. Freaking rad! Could a Dysian Aimian bond the Sibling??? I think this would be the best! The Sleepless could split off a portion of themselves to man the Engine Room back at Urithiru (consequently enough to maintain their consciouness if anything happens to their other hordelings making them functional unkillable) and have another portion of themselves fighting on the front lines. This would be rad, and it would be a way around the curse of the 3rd bondsmith, that of basically being consigned to fiddling with the controls of Urithiru while the war marches on. This is all speculative to be sure, but HOLY CRAP this would be RAD!

Disillusionment/broken faith fits the best I think. @Kaleid I don't think Szeth is presenting enough symptoms to be truly Schizophrenic, the voices he hears are like the ones Dalinar hears, and I think it's a function of their frayed spirit webs and Spiritual connections to those they have killed. I haven't read all of this yet, I'll edit my post after I've looked at this in more detail, but this looks like an awesome framework @Pagerunner

Thanks @ccstat! The water is indeed shallow and warm (in the summer) and there's also a 30+ acre off leash dog park there, so if you do visit bring your dog. I just got a Taiyaki waffle maker for Christmas (Fish shaped waffles that you put red bean paste filling in) so I could even set you up with some magic fish when you're here.

@Mestiv I updated the OP, does this look like the attribution is right? If not, let me know and I'll change it so it's right. I love your signature by the way, creepily reassuring....

@Darkness_ I've looked through the General Discussion threads enough to know that there are Kind (mention it first because it seems to be the primary attribute), Intelligent (second because it's the secondary Surge that Sharders share), and Creative people here. This is a special place, this is a place where people help each other out, where people hear each other out, and where we can all bask in the radiant glow of Brandonalsium. This is totally for real. Before Oathbringer came out, my favorite author of all times was Plutarch. His comparative Lives of the Noble Grecian and Romans was the best thing I had ever read, and it was one of the ONLY books that I have ever read that made me actively try and figure out what it was to be a better person. After OB, Plutarch has been pushed down to #2, Brandon writes with the same moral imperative but his canvas is much larger. He's not restricted to details that have actually happened, and he seriously has outlines that span 4+ books for extended metaphors. Possibly the best thing about Brandon's writing is that, as a thinking, critical human being, after finishing one of Brandon's books, I think that I am better human being. The questions he raises, the thought he puts into the character arcs, they all add up a picture of everyone trying to do better. And really this is the ultimate aim in life, try and do better. I am seriously thinking about making a t-shirt based on OB that says (OB spoilers):

Everything matters, work that you do because you believe it in is worth more than work you get paid for. Arcanum is such an amazing resource, and I can see how much time and effort went into that. It boggles my mind that it exists, at the same time, it is proof that like Pangloss said in Candide "This is truly the best of all possible worlds". Anyone that refutes that, I would say, Exhibit A: The 17th shard.

I don't know any of you, and my wife would probably disagree (but if you PM with something compelling I could probably sway her) but my gut instinct says that if any of you needed a place to stay in Eugene Oregon you would be welcome at my house (note though the bolded portion above). I realize that this is a special place, kindness and intelligence don't often align (as witnessed by Mr. T), but here they do.

I totally agree. I feel bad for the Siah Aimians, but if you look at Axies he seems pretty happy with his lot in life. Resigned to the fact that he is a burdensome boil on the fresh pink cheek of the world. I actually think that this is remarkable, he has his own mission in life, and as evidenced by his interlude he doesn't want bad luck to affect people around him, because he leaves the beggar in the alley (probably a herald) before his bad luck can rub off. I guess this is the conundrum, obviously you can't hug the world with Nuclear arms, but if you hug Chernobyl and your arms fall off, whose fault is it that you have no arms. This is why Brandon is such an amazing author, writing characters that are deeply sympathetic with obvious flaws. I think Axies is a deeply likable character with an unchangeable external, inherited flaw. He would not curse people if he could help it,but he can't help it so he lives his life as well as he can, trying to mitigate the unfortuante effects of his mere existence.

I think I might have erred by saying that to get good fortune people would be likely to rub the heads of Siah Aimians. I understand that this is belittling, but I was just trying to convey that if they had a good luck effect based on how people treated them then there would be a different Rosharan view of them, and possibly this would create at least a state of wariness in regards to how people interacted with the Siah Aimians. But they seem to be, like in Stranger in a Strange Land, the lowest of the low, the group that you can kick without any Karmic repercussions because they are a living curse. I personally would be very happy to hear that after the urchin stole Axies blanket wrap in the Interlude, that he tripped and fell face first into a pile of chull dung, becuase that is what he deserves. But I think the whole point is that Siah Aimians have taken upon themselves "The Curse of Kind", the offsetting bad luck so that good luck (or limited prescient sight into the future) can be granted to another important tool in Cultivation's garage. I love Axies the collector, but he seems to be at peace with his place in the Cosmere, what's another week in jail when you live an immortal life? A chance to find captivity spren!

@Willshaping Crasher it probably won't be convincing (considering he's another Thaylen and most likely shares her fundamental beliefs, i.e. superstitions) but the escort she has, Krylm, seems equally worried about the Siah Aimian's bad luck rubbing off on them.

I know I am preaching to the choir here, but holy crap this is such an amazing website. I've only been posting to the Shard for 1.7419 months, but in that time I have been so impressed with every possible aspect of this website. I don't know who is responsible for the website design and notification system, but this website is one of the best implemented websites for computer and mobile that I've ever seen. The design is simple, yet intuitive (I am in the process of finishing up designing and laying out a book on Intuitive Design). The ribbon at the top of the post exposes every tool you need to control the format of your post, and the biggest Kudos of all go to the fact that all of these tools are accessible and usable in the mobile version of the site! Holy crap, it's amazing, and because it's so amazing I know that a lot of hard work into getting it to this point. @Chaos is primarily responsible for how amazing this website is). Prior to the release of OB, I was posting on the Tor.com forum. Adonalsium bless them for releasing the chapters 3 at a time before the release of the book, but when I was commenting on their forum I had to maintain a separate txt file that I would pre-write my posts in, because when you hit the submit button an hours worth of speculation and well worded thought could be lost in the nebulous vacuum of the interwebs. I am still continually impressed at how well implemented this forum is. The fact that if you start typing a comment, go to a different page and come back and the comment is automatically repopulated blew me away the first time I saw it. What an amazing feature! The coders that are responsible for this amazing bit of non-cosmere magic should reply to this and I will upvote you until my upvotes run out, and mention you here (so others can upvote you too). The other thing that is truly special about this site, is that it truly is like the Forum of Periclean Athens. Every voice can be heard and all citizens are respectful, intelligent, and interested in advancing the common good. I think actually, given the level of scholarship on this site, that the better analogy is the Library of Alexander under Ptolemy I. It is truly amazing to be able to theorize and speculate with some of the most intelligent people currently inhabiting the Physical Realm of our planet about the minute and subtle details of the Cosmere. I just want to thank the Moderators of this site, you do an amazing job of diffusing potential problems that are counter productive to the discussion (which is why we are all here, right?) and keeping everything running smoothly. From my short time on the shard I have to say that @Chaos, @Greywatch, and @Pagerunner (sorry if I missed anyone) you guys do an amazing job fostering an environment where the discussion is the primary thing people are focusing on. I also have to say that Arcanum is amazing! Having searchable WoBs, with the primary source sound clip included, is ridiculously amazing (and as far as I understand it @Mestiv, @Jofwu, and @Pagerunner are primarily responsible for how amazing Arcanum is). The amazing people that devote their time to make sure we have the Authoritative WoBs deserve praise as well (and incidentally these are some of the nicest, smartest people on the Shard that I have interacted with). Envisage if you will, Princess Leia is giving out very attractive medallions for you efforts in shedding light into the dark places of speculation, as she mentions your name, you come forward to receive your awesome necklace medallion (and Chewbacca does his Chewy vocalization as all of you are mentioned) @Calderis, @RShara, @Extesian @Oversleep, @Argent, and @WeiryWriter thanks for all your work (Arcanum is RAD!). If I had to pick a primary selector for whether I want to talk to a particular person or not, my primary selector would be "Do you like the works of Brandon Sanderson or not?". Everyone on the Shard passes this test, and I feel truly blessed that there is a place where truly intelligent discussions about the extremely important ramifications of small factoids about the cosmere exists. Thanks all, and if I missed anyone that should be acknowledged, let me know and I will edit this post. *EDIT* Please don't upvote this post, upvote one of the contributors that has made this such a special place. This is a total appreciation thread, give the love to the people who deserve it.

@Willshaping Crasher you are totally right, all this is in the realm of speculative surmise. I do like the idea of "The Curse Of Kind" being a sort of karmic resonance, but I don't think it fits the evidence of the primary source. At this point I could agree to disagree with you, but if you want to read further argument, I have some spoilered below: If you don't want my two cents, can I have them back I need to buy some more pop....

Ultimately this is the reality of the situation: Brandon controls the ship. *EDIT* Brandon has obviously been attacked by less lampreys.

@Vortaan your rendition of Odium's Your Welcome (which is beyond masterful) inspired me to do my first bit of 17th shard derivative fan art. Here is the opening scene of your song: If you look closely you will see that a crab-lizard thing is enjoying Odium's song too. Hmmm, wonder who else could be listening to this jaunty little number? My real objective for posting this is so that you can get over 100 upvotes for you song, because it totally deserves it. If anyone looking at this hasn't already upvoted Vortaan's song, you should really do so right now.

If it was simply Karma and you received back what you put in, then I think the Siah Aimians wouldn't be thought of as bringing bad luck (as they obviously are in the Rysn interlude). If you received good luck if you treated them kindly, this would be a property of their race that was widely known, their is no evidence of this, no mention of rubbing a Siah Aimian's head for good luck or any other such folk superstition. I don't have ironclad proof, but I think it's pretty close to proven that the Siah Aimian have a proximate affect on people around them that makes the people around them experience unfortunate things.

@Subvisual Haze there's this WoB that states that the Aimians have different colors of blood: So I was assuming that the Dysian Aimian's cremlings had violet blood because chasmfiends and great shells have violet blood (like this is the standard color of blood of the crustacean-like life on Roshar), but the blue skin color and the blue veined Barbartham would make more sense if these races had violet blood. @Calderis on his The Sleepless. A natural creation of Roshar's magic says this about the Siah Aimians: Based on my limited time on the Shard, I tend to read things Calderis says as canon.

@Confused this is beautifully put together, and is a great idea that that the mandates map to different stages of life. I think your analysis is amazing, well reasoned and an incredibly interesting lens to look at the different shards that we know about. The one question I have is, that if this is true, you would need 7 more stages of life for all of the mandates of all the shards to fit in this paradigm. I honestly don't know how you would subdivide a life into 16 stages, but there could be a stage that's a transitional point between stages. Like I think conception/newborn could be broken up into two separate stages. Just something to think about, and like I said, awesome post. I love you Cosmere Magic Theory post too, by the way. It's one of the posts that I read that made me want to start posting on the Shard.