king of nowhere

temperature also depends on other factors, like sea and air currents. stockholm and the baffin island are at the same latitude, but the first has a temperate cold climate and supports farming to feed millions, while the second is a frozen tundra with a few thousand inhabitants. from that, i can guess that there could be a circular current around the continent, coming south from the steamwater ocean, warming aimia, then moving westward and getting colder, until it hits aimia as a cold current.

but are they still invested? i may be wrong, but i was under the impression that gemstones would not charge in shinovar. Possibly because of the girl who looked up, that her people lived in the dark

i checked to see if someone else proposed it first, but can't find a reference. the coppermind says that, according to an interview, the misted mountains are an homage to tolkien misty mountains. I do not think brandon would lie to us, but he's used a lesser truth to conceal a deeper truth so, the name tell us those mountains are full of mist. it may be regular weather, what with humid air getting colder as it rises. But it may also be invested. we know from mistborn that mist is one of the forms of investiture. and on the other side of the misted mountains, there are no spren - at least, not visible. highstorms stop there too, and while - again - this is connected to geography and the mountains barring the path to stormwinds, there is also the investiture part; highstorms are invested, and it stops on those mountains. so i'm thinking perhaps the mist on those mountains is a form of investiture, and it is part of what makes shin different from the rest of roshar.

actually, it was this other oneù

@HonorlessYou may appreciate to know that, after our unfortunate... heated argument earlier in this thread, I took an interest in the LGBT condition. I couldn't figure out why "being represented" was so important - after all, i don't care about being represented in any way, nor do I feel like I should discuss my sexuality in public - and I got curious enough to pay more attention to the issue. Thus I learned how, especially in small backwards communities, lgbt kids struggle with their identity. I am straight, as a child I was told growing up I would eventually like girls, and at some point I started liking girls, all ok; but those kids, they grow up thinking they'll like girls, instead they don't, but they don't realize it at first because their culture doesn't even tell them there are other possibilities; or at most represents those possibilities as a very negative stereotype, so that as they gradually come to develop their sexual orientation they are afraid there's something wrong with them, and/or they are afraid of being discriminated... speaking of which, I also paid more attention to homophobicity; I assumed it was, at least in the west, a thing of the past, as I come from a progressive social environment. People may occasionally talk politically incorrect, but I've never seen anyone actually discriminated, isolated, or treated differently. When push comes to shove, nobody in my social circles would deny everyone's right to equality, fairness, and freedom. Simply disliking a group of people is not a crime; i mean, if somebody told me he dislikes italians, i wouldn't be offended and i wouldn't call him a horrible person. Depending on his specific beef, I may even agree with him. but I'm going on a tangent here. Anyway, I also realized that some people, when they tell mean jokes, are not actually joking. And how this also makes for a fertile substrate where actual intolerance can take roots. And how people who are afraid of being discriminated may not be able to tell the difference when they hear an off hand comment. I did not see the problem, I did not even realize there was a problem; I was naive and ignorant. I also did look back at what the media were showing when i was a kid, and it was incredible at how backward some of that stuff was. I've been basically supporting the "don't ask don't tell" attitude not out of a mildly homophobic "you guys are disgusting, but as long as you hide away we'll tolerate you", but simply out of a privacy approach "unless i intend to date you, i prefer not to know about your sexuality. It's a private matter, and it should not be discussed publicly". But even in its positive acception, this phylosophy leaves those confused kids alone at a time when they'd really need to know there are others like them. So, I now understand why it's important for the lgbt community that they come out, that they are known, that they are widely represented across the media. I'm actually pessimistic about this stopping homophobia; after all, black people are visible everywhere, some even occupy important positions in the government, and yet there's still plenty of racism around, don't see why with lgbt it should be different. But it is fair, and it will definitely help those kids. I wanted you to know that with your effort you actually touched and moved someone. And that though we started with the wrong foot, you eventually won a supporter. P.S. I am still ambivalent on inclusion in the media. On one hand, I fully agree that it would be good to have more representation. On the other hand, forcing creators to be more inclusive - even indirectly, by shaming them on social media or by prejudicially rejecting work for not being inclusing enough - is the antechamber of censorship. Even worse, if you try to force people to like you, it never works. Just like I reacted poorly to a forceful attempt, while I reacted well to a slow trickle of information through the internet. So, the trick is to get more lgbt representation in the media, without giving the impression of being forceful. well, good luck with that P.P.S. On "normal" and "different", there's no reason normal should be good, in fact it is often the opposite. In italy, calling someone an "average italian" is a strong insult, as we built this stereotype of the "average italian" who encompasses all the worst attributes associated with italians, and none of the good ones. So, no need to be "normal" EDIT: Huh. I just read this, and I feel like I contributed to it. Also, I had no idea you actually came from some part of the world where you are actually discriminated by law. that sucks. All I can say in my defence is that I've actually had to deal with some people belonging with minorities actually trying to milk their status as specially protected to get away with stuff. The worst case involved my brother's ex wife beating my brother (a very nice men who's always ready to help anyone in need) and trying to frame him as the aggressor by playing the part of the woman victim of violence. it didn't work, but my brother had a hard time going to trial for divorce, even though he never lifted a finger against her and she sent him to the doctor several times. So, I'm probably overly sensitive when i see a minority asking for what looks like "special treatment", but my life experience gave me plenty of reasons to be. Unfortunately, that sensitivity can sometimes be triggered by people who actually had good causes for their requests

I remember seeing a video of Brandon talking about being good vs being successful, about how we like to think that we build our success, but luck also has a part in it, and sometimes people are very good but they still are not recognized. And he advise that people work for themselves, for their self-improvement; this way, even if society does not recognize them, they still got their goal. he talked about writing and publishing, but it could be adapted to pretty much any career. I have a friend who's a researcher in physics, lately his academic career has been going downhill for no fault of his own, and i would like to show him the video, it may cheer him up. But I can't find it. I tried for some keywords, but there are just too many videos with sanderson, about similar topics, and I can't find the one. Can someone please help me help my friend? thanks

quoted from that very article: vax is one of those few individuals. nowhere the article says that level of aiming skill is impossible. it is just impossible to expect your average policeman, even a highly trained one, to have it. especially considering that shooting is not a policeman's first specialization, and most of them never need to use their guns (at least in europe; one hears horror stories about violence in the usa, but not really sure how much is fact and how much it is inflated urban legend).

i don't think it was ever stated. when the singers capture human land, they enslave the humans. when the humans capture singer land, what do they do with the singers? i don't think any of the radiants would stand for enslaving them again. but they can hardly trust them free during a war, when any one of them could become a fuse. perhaps they could relocate them, but it's very impractical for large groups of people over long distances. and the quickly shifting war fronts make the endeavor even worse. so, how are they treated?

why not? we know detecting someone in a coppercloud is only a matter of power. and we can be pretty sure a massive spaceship will have much more power than a bird, no matter how magical

actually, it's more of a sexual innuendo variety. like saying underwear should be banned. how did the teacher react?

when you want to recover silver after an experiment with silver nitrate, out of a vague feeling that silver is important... but when you think of "uses for silver", the first thing that comes to mind is "wards against shades".

well, not exactly. sure, those two arguments were used to justify a lot of evil. but a lot more evil was justified on stuff like "god wants it", "they are a lesser race", "they are enemies", "they started it", "it's us or them". "for the country/clan/family/whatever affiliation" is a personal favourite because it's so often argued like it was right. A lot of arguments in the "lirin hate thread" devolve around "lirin should support his son, even if he disagrees with him". Do we want to talk about how many times prioritizing one's family or clan enabled crimes? heck, it's the whole foundation of the mafia. and yet a lot of people aare arguing it like it was perfectly right to ignore murder (as seen from lirin's perspective) just because it's your son committing it. more to the point, though, the opposite argument "the greater good does not justify evil" has also been used countless times to turn a blind eye on evil. I may point out how the nazis were allowed to grow strong because everybody thought attacking them would be bad? and furthermore, it's not even clear what are the ends and what are the means. you can have the same argument on both sides. Take the contemporary covid lockdowns: proponents of lockdown would say that "protecting personal freedoms (the greater good) does not justify letting more people die of epidemics (the evil means)". On the opposite side, opponents of the lockdown would say that "reducing the death toll (the greater good) does not justify restricting personal freedoms (the evil means)". so which one is the evil done for the greater good? If you analyze it closely enough, the whole motto about not justifying the means loses meaning. ultimately, it's about not compromising your ideals for what seems like an easier gain. Well, szeth was all about not compromising. nale was about not compromising look where it brought them. and if morality was as easy as quoting a few meaningful sentences, it wouldn't be a hot topic. actually, the best argument against taravangian, and the one that also works most for the real world, is the one of ignorance, brought out by dalinar at some point. you don't know that doing this will help. you don't know that we'll fail. you don't know that you'll win, or that you winning would help. and you are undermining everyone else's effort on the long shot that you may be correct. when in doubt, better be safe. it's not an argument of lofty ideals. it's an argument about unforseen consequences. and evil actions are much more likely to have evil unforeseen consequences than good actions. now, back on taravangian, i don't believe him to be right. but i'm still calling him morally grey, for the simple reason that, unlike many proponents of his morality, he actually wants to help, and he is actually self-sacrificing more than many other more heroic character. and this is a hallmark of good. "will sacrifice himself for others". "will put the well being of strangers in front of his own". taravangian fits those completely. having him just be evil would completely undermine the characterization.

To further expand on the point of "brandon would not write a bad book, it would get stopped in the revision process", I point out this is exactly what happened with apocalypse guard. brandon set out to write a book. the book wasn't good. brandon did not publish it. that's all. worst thing to happen would be something like calamity, the end was somewhat unsatisfying but it was still a good book. in any case, one bad book would not impact the quality of every other book brandon has written. they wouldn't magically become bad just because of a bad sequel. At worst we'll see something like the indiana jones trilogy, where the fans insist it's a trilogy despite evidence to the contrary. I can see the meme on the internet "brandon is dead and was substituted by a lookalike".

yep. it could be mediocre, but there's too many people involved in the revision process to pass a genuinely bad book.

he does not mention the wheel of time tv adaptation in any way. as he wrote the last 3 books, i was hoping he'd be sharing some info on them

I disagree. odium is bad for all of roshar, singers included. he will destroy them too in the long run. dalinar and kaladin are probably good for all of roshar, they would try to help the singers too. that said, indeed, we don't know much about cultivation and we have no reason to assume she's altruistic. she may well be aiming to simply divert odium away from her.

yes. on the other hand, cultivation had planned hard to get this outcome. unless cultivation is a dumbass (which, given how she manipulated the situation, we can safely assess she's not) then we can assume that she sees some gain on taravangian as odium. actually, the reason i like taravangian is that he's a different take on the whole "do evil for a good cause" concept. always in the past i've seen the concept thrown away to pass a cheap morale, or to make a villain more hateable. i'd hate for the same to happen here. brandon can do better than this

ah, but this is perhaps the main reason i can be mildly optimistic. the whole "does evil for a good cause" has been done to death. and in every instance i can remember, at some point the villain showed that he didn't really care and it was all just an excuse. and it feels wrong to me. it undermines the characterization to try to force an aesop. "see, this thing is not really right, because this guy was never good to start with". Yes, but what if he actually was? brandon does not reuse old archetypes like this. he twists them. he sees a thing done in a way, and wants to lead it somewhere different. so taravangian may well be his take on "what if the guy doing evil for a good cause does not turn out to be a hypocrite and is, indeed, genuinely trying to do good?". indeed, all the way taravangian was characterized would be completely undermined if he now just started plotting for power. furthermore, brandon also said that making strawman enemies to pass an aesop undermines the whole aesop. again, making taravangian suddenly selfish just to "prove" that doing evil for good reason is bad would be a cheap move, and it wouldn't actually prove anything - except perhaps that you can't make a compelling argument against an opponent who has not been weakened. brandon said that he tries to give the best representation to those with whom he disagrees, and he certainly would disagree strongly with taravangian. so, i assume his intent to portray mr T as positively as possible in the circumstance will continue. on the other hand, the main reason i can be pessimistic is that there are still 6 stormlight books, and if the main opponent was removed just like this, the remaining books would be too easy for the protagonists. unless brandon has some other more powerful villain hidden somewhere - he did that in most books, but it's hard to imagine a villain more powerful than the shard of odium - then i expect taravangian to succumb to his shard. as an outcome, i believe having taravangian setting up some plan to make himself fail, then being consumed by his shard intent, then being the major villain for the next part of the cosmere, until eventually being defeated for good, in the climax, party thanks to the plotting he himself started while he wass still in control, would be the best way to handle him. to keep his characterization as someone genuinely trying to do good, while letting him be a villain. he can also fully be a villain while trying to serve the greater good. perhaps he set up the attack on scadrial to make himself fail, to be destroied by harmony. and perhaps he miscalculated and will actually win. even if he loses like he wants, he'd still create incredible damage. having him show that his real heart was black all the time, carefully hidden even inside his own pows, would be infinitely less satisfying.

i still don't know how to feel about it. on one hand, taravangian as odium has the potential to be even more dangerous than his predecessor. but on the other, he's still in control of himself, and he will be for at least a few years; and he has genuinely good intentions, and he even states himself that he has to plot to protect the people from himself and his shard's intent. victory for the good guys should be easier in this light. random thought: what if odium attack on scadrial is because taravangian wants to ultimately merge shards so odium won't exhist anymore? it will certainly keep with his theme of doing bad stuff with good intentions

you mean, in the same way that kaladin could have escaped from the battle of the tower with his bridge crew, but choose to stay and help dalinar? and that led to three of his comrades dead at the battle, and many others dead later by szeth or other means. all because kaladin is putting the best interest of his crew second to him playing hero. or when kaladin led his squad against a shardbearer, getting them killed in the process. in fact, i'd argue that putting the well-being of foreigners before your loved ones is what defines a hero. putting yourself and your clan above others is the mark of a petty man. thieving, corruption, bullying is justified by "my family comes first". the most common excuse you hear out of corrupted politicians or mafia henchmen is "i have family"; as in, "if i was stealing for myself it would be bad, but since i'm stealing for my wife and sons, then it's all right. it's all right to steal from someone else's children, because they are not mine". Being a teacher, i've seen countless kids ruined because their parents protected them from the consequences of misbehavior, because they were their sons. Overprotectiveness is not good, and arguing that one should put his family before strangers like this is a berserker button for me. when the same sentiment is applied to national level, it leads to xenophobia, aggression, and strife. Nope. being a hero does not work this way. behaving this way does not make the world any better. Lirin is a hero exactly because he puts the well being of his town above his own. Proof required. Do we have indication that kaladin was favored - besides being given lessons in surgery, which of course are needed for his job, while tien was being trained in carpentry by someone else, because lirin can't teach carpentry? do we have any indication that tien was treated unfavorably? that tien got no attention? Do we have any real indication of lirin acting out of ego? Unless you count "doing your best to help others" as nothing but a big attempt at ego stroking. in which case, kaladin would still be much worse than his father. so, now lirin is a monster for missing an obscure passage of the law. i guess if he really cared about his family, he should have been a lawyer after all. let me ask, how would you - exactly - plan to apprentice your son who can't stand the sight of blood as a surgeon? are you planning to do it as a facade? your son is never going to actually work as a surgeon, but you'll put it in paper so he'll be protected by conscription. so your son will know no job and will live all his life sheltered like this? what happens when you die of old age and he has no job? and all this because of a remote possibility of conscription; when tien got apprenticed as carpenter, it was several years earlier. shame on lirin for not predicting the future too. And it's strange, but I was under the impression that tien being conscripted was roshone's fault. a revenge for failing to save roshone's son. You, as reader, know this is the literal war of armageddon, with enemy forces led by a hostile god bent on destruction. Lirin, on the other hand, knows nothing of this. what Lirin actually knows is that a people that has always been enslaved managed to rebel, and they are treating everyone more fairly than anyone would have expected given the premise - and better than most brightlords. under that premise, it makes full sense to not resist the invasion. your terrorists are out freedom fighters, after all. it's easy to sort out right and wrong in hindsight. so, first lirin directly caused tien's death, and now he even "directly killed" him? And he also caused kaladin's depression, no less! all this sounds like you have already condemned lirin from the start, and your are reading everything he did - or didn't - in the worst possible light to justify the outcome. but above that, this sounds so much like what kaladin thinks when depressed. if we boil it down, your accusation has the following arguments - lirin helped people out of pride, not altruism - lirin meddling made worse the lives of those he was trying to protect - lirin failed at protecting tien, for his fault, for not trying hard enough that's exactly what kaladin thinks when depressed. he thinks he tries to help just because he can't admit defeat, and that all those people whom he failed to protect are his personal responsibility for not being strong enough. that his attempts to protect caused the death of those he was trying to protect, and he should just give up. and we all know those arguments are faulty, we should not apply them to someone else.

I think it has to do with a certain part of our culture being related to war and combat, and equating bravery with guns. it reminds me of the battle of hacksaw ridge, where the protagonist is a military medic who wants to go in battle unarmed, and he is dubbed a coward by his mates. only after he runs out from cover amid the bullets and explosion to help wounded they realize he is the most brave of them all. in my opinion lirin is getting the same kind of flak. he won't fight, so he's coward. never mind that he's willingly putting himself in more danger by his actions.

i'm talking way back in way of kings, when jasnah brought her out by night with the street thugs, and shallan thinks she can summon a blade. i doubt her bond with pattern had progressed enough by then

the thing about lirin is, in any other circumstance he's right. for all his life he's seen useless wars between the highprinces, with empty excuses. the lighteyes were playing risk with the lives of men. not wanting to have anything to do with it is right. it's the only correct recourse. then the singers take over. and they actually administer more fairly than the lighteyes. why would you ever possibly want to fight to reinstate the corrupt leaders? it makes no sense. it does not make the world any better, even if you win. now, lirin is missing that those singers are controlled by an evil god whose long term plan involves killing everyone. in this specific case, he's wrong. but he's seen the same pattern all his life. and his take on it was spot on. can you blame him for not seeing him at first, the one time he was actually wrong? as for the "you're not my son", this is not some corrupt ceo disgruntled because his son decided to leave everything and become an artist instead of inheriting the family business. no, lirin son had just killed a person, and endangered others. and not even particularly for protection; teft was going to be taken prisoner, and no harm was being done to him. as far as kaladin and lirin knew, teft was in no danger. yes, in retrospect kaladin was right, but there was no way to know it in advance. from lirin's perspective, kaladin had shown, time and again, that when presented with problems, killing people is one of his first resorts. we are used to reading stories where there is a clearly good and clearly bad side. sure, there is some moral greyness, the people on the good side are not perfect and the people on the bad side are misguided, or have understandable motivations, but ultimately, there is a clear distinction between right and wrong. so we are used to the answer, fighting is the right option. the real world is rarely so clear-cut. it had been on occasions, like when the free world fought the nazis, but it's generally more grey. and perhaps more important, violence is not the only solution, and often it's not the best solution. think of batman; he built an expensive high tech suit and used his vast resources to fight crime, and it works; but if he'd spent the same money and resources to improve lives in the slums and solve social issues, he'd have prevented crimes even more effectively. only in fiction the first resort to anything must be violence. now go back to lirin. he's been ruled by tyrants all his life. now he's invaded by some new people, nothing new there, just those new people have marbled skin, and sometimes carapace. can you blame lirin for assuming that those people were no worse than the previous leaders? for thinking that peaceful cooperation was more likely to do good than fighting to the last? had the singers done any worse in conquering alethkar than the kholins did when they conquered it? no, in fact they did considerably better; then should we not get mad at kaladin for joining amaram's army instead of mounting a resistance against the kholins, warlords and conquerors? Finally, I am astonished that anyone would call lirin a coward. he could escape, get away from problems, but he remained every time to protect the people. deliberately choosing to not fight back, to put yourself at the mercy of others because you refuse to do violence, takes more bravery than fighting. kaladin is an amazing combatant and keeps winning; it doesn't take much bravery to bring out a weapon and fight when you know you're the best. it's easy. facing an armed opponent and trying to calm him down, giving up on defending yourself, that entails a much greater risk.

also the fact that she needed 10 heartbeats. because her blade was a dead one it's amazing that two different cryptics even tried to bond the same person

it is very interesting how the ones above are sharing their technology with a more primitive people, vastly improving their lives, saving thousands with modern medicine, and still they are oppressing them. the morality implications are uniquely interesting