Gasper

I would either pick a detail knowledge of fabrial technology, Feruchemy, or Biochromatic breath. I would want Fabrial tech because it is very versatile, even more so than what we see currently. Breath because I could, with a few hacks, make basically living, self healing armor. As for Feruchemy, I could really use zinc, electrum, tin, and copper in my engineering classes.

What would be Darwin Award worthy deaths or feats of stupidity in the Cosmere? And what characters in the Cosmere deserve a Darwin Award so far? For those of you who are unfamiliar with the Darwin awards, a Darwin award is a posthumous award that goes to people who die extremely stupid deaths. The sick and twisted logic behind this award is that they remove themselves (or are removed by something else) from the gene pool and are playing a part in the evolution of the human species by proactively participating in Natural Selection and survival of the fittest. Please post your comments below.

I love the idea of the internet existing the Cognitive realm, but I really, really do not want to see that happen. Mainly because of places like 4chan, Reddit, and the Youtube comments section. Odium would be overloaded just by one of those websites. Not to mention that Honor spren would die on contact and Harmony would not be able to go anywhere near anything infested with the Internet spren. Also, I do not want to see any internet spren forming any bonds. If they did, I suspect that the bond would physically warp the physical creature into something resembling a cross between an Koloss, an Mistwreath, and a Dahkor monk. The creature would have a foul, monosyllabic vocabulary and the ability to channel the powers of Ruin, Odium, Dominion, and entropy into focused, yet extremely weak attacks. In addition, they would have a powers similar, but vastly inferior to lightweaving and Rioting. These powers would have effects inverse to each other. Individuals and small groups would be able to create indistinct yet colorful imagery but be unable to do much with their Rioting-esque ablities. Inversely, the more of them there are in a certain area, the less they can do with their psedo-lightweaving and the more they can riot a crowd. They will now be known as the void-sparkers.

It would remove most of the sanitary problems given that the bacteria are also soulcast into grain. The amount of energy needed to just keep the city afloat would be massive, even if you are using investure. Secondly, you would need life support systems to keep people who do not have stormlight from freezing or dying of oxygen deprivation. Then there is the logistical problems of consumables. On Roshar, water is not a problem, food on the other hand is. Soulcast grain and meat have next to no flavor and are rather unappetizing, that means that spices need to be grown. And then there are medicinal substances, fabric, fuel for non-fabrial systems, safety systems, fabrials to trim and stabilize the city while it is in flight. Then you would need massive augmenter fabrials to act as structural integrity fields to prevent the city from collapsing in on its self when ever it moves. Then you need the mechanical systems for take off, landing, repairs, expansion, and defense. Just one city is a massive undertaking that would require massive amounts of resources and power. A floating Rosharian city may not need the small stars worth of power that Atlantis needs, but it still need a huge amount of power just to function.

I think that a flying city would have to float one the edge of the highstorm or have a perpendiculary at their core to allow for continued flight. A city is orders of magnitude larger than a ship. Atlantis from Stargate Atlantis is an example of this.

I am going to take a wild guess and say that Khriss, Nazh, and probably Silverlight have a hand in this given that they want to study investure.

Weirdly enough, this theory makes sense. Taln's attributes as a herald are dependability and resourcefulness, so I could see a person like that sacrificing his own mortality and well being for some one else. Also it would explain why Ash is so attached to him in Oathbringer and would explain a large portion of her brokenness, she abandoned her lover to save the world.

True, but some of the "adaptations" seem a little too weird to not be the result of a focused attempt to create a certain trait. The evidence I have for this is that the Horneaters live around Cultivation's perpendicularly. Given what happens when other races live near perpendicularies (the Terris people and the residents of Elantris) and that Cultivation is one of those shards who ignores any sort of noninterference policy, it is likely that she is directly responsible for at least some of the modifications to the various Rosharian races.

Yeah, thats what I am saying. The Singers and Humans have very different biochemistry based on what we have seen on their internal biology and blood. They are only superficially similar. Two arms, two legs, a head, and maybe some other bits. The Singers can change form and shut down or start up different parts of their anatomy and physiology based on their form. They can also see spren. What I am saying is that Cultivation combined human and Singer DNA to create the mostly human Horneaters. She needed to test to see if a human could be modified to see spren without having to warp the spirit web too much. Given that she had good future sight, she might have begun experimenting so that she could roll out human 2.0 once Odium returned so that she could keep Cultivating. I think Lift may be one of the first test cases for Humanity 2.0.

In the Are Honorblades Spren thread, the diversity of Rosharians was brought up. Given that the Rosharians are not natives, and biologically distinct from the Rosharian ecosystem, I think Cultivation might be messing with the human genome. I think that Cultivation might have modified humans for some reason to make them either better adapted to the planet or for some bigger purpose. Examples: Alethi: Shallan remarks in Words of Radiance that the Alethi are freakishly tall. Herdazians: They have rock like fingernails Horneaters: Have throat teeth and can see spren. I think that the Herdazians are a prototype for the Horneaters and the Horneaters are a prototype for what ever Lift is. I think that Cultivation might be trying to fight back by modifying humans to do her dirty work. A human who can see spren and make their own stormlight would be a huge boon against Odium because they do not have to rely on the Highstorm to fuel their abilities. That is a backup in case Odium manages to destroy Dalinar, the Stormfather, and the Highstorm.

Since the Thaylens showed up and Oathbringer really starts to show the massive variety of humans on Roshar, I have wondered if Cultivation has decided to play scientist with the Rosharian genome.

I disagree. I say thing because all you need to do is trap a madras in a gem ( I suspect a sapphire) and then feed it a ton of stormlight. Have one large crystal and a bunch of smaller crystals to trim the ship and there you go, flying ship. I have been thinking about this for months and have mentioned it in a few of my posts before. All the Rosharians need would either be a massive gem heart or figure out a way to grow gems. The whole ship would be one massive fabrial. I think the life support systems of Urithiru will be crucial in the development of such ships to keep the passengers and crew alive and safe.

What part of themselves are the deadeyes missing? Would it be possible to heal this by tapping a metalmind or using Ba-Ado-Mishram?

What ways could you think of to help slow down or negate the wear and tear on an Elantrian? We know that being one is taxing on your soul, but do we know any magic that could help heal this issue?

I read Khriss's essays on Scadrial, Roshar, and Sel and something struck me, how would humans from Sel and Scadrial react physically to Roshar's lower gravity and higher Oxygen levels? We know that out of the three, the Selish will have the highest bone density and the strongest muscles because they live on a higher gravity world. The Scadrians will be in the middle because they are on what is basically Earth, which still has lower oxygen levels and higher gravity than Roshar. This would basically lead to a John Carter of Mars effect for the Scadrians and Selish. Both groups, without enhancements like Pewter, Dakhor, or Feruchemy, could run faster, jump higher, lift more, and have higher endurance than a similar Rosharian. It would be like a runner training in a weighted suit at 15000 ft for his entire life and then going to Miami and running a triathlon.

Given what we know of people leaving cognitive shadows, imprints on the spiritual realm, or coming back as shades, I think that this explanation is very likely. Evi was not any more invested (that we know of) than a normal Rosharian, but she might have left Dalinar a "recording" that he could access using Honor's connections in the Spiritual realm. I think this is also how Shards like Ruin and Harmony and creatures like Bleeder can speak through Hemalurgy.

It would make sense that each order has a different fortress that is there own outside of the Urithiru. I know the humorous Urithiru PSAs thread was just for fun, but it brings up some good points. Many orders would not get along with each other. We hear stories of the Skybreakers and Windrunners fighting over guilty people and I cannot imagine that other orders did not have at least some disagreements over life in general, that is why we need the Bondsmiths. But back to my point, the various orders do not all have the same purpose. The Windrunners, Stonewards, and Edgedancers seem to be combat based Radiants while the Elsecallers deal with the Spren societies and cognitive realm. Urithiru acts as a home base for when things get really bad and as a train terminal for the Oathgates. Lets say George the Windrunner needs to get from Shinovar to Thaylen city. Well, George could falll with style for several days and use a ton of stormlight and risk being intercepted by the Fused that have taken over Azir. Or he could catch the 6th hour Oathgate to Urithiru, have an 2 hour layover to check up on the latest directives about using Adhesion on criminals, gossip about that one WIllshaper, grab some cheap chouta, and then catch the 8th hour Oathgate to Thaylen city. It is cheaper, in both time and stormlight, to use the Oathgates. Also, the Windrunners are protectors, it would make sense for them and the Stonewards to have several bases across the globe staffed with a couple windrunners and their squires, one or two stonewards and maybe one other radiant order depending on the base's purpose. That way you do not run into any surprise attacks by Fused or Voidspren.

Most of my family, my best friends younger sister, and a significant portion of my brother(s)'s friends and teachers are all Sanderson fans. As are a large portion of the librarians in my area.

Given that Szeth is currently very close to being a cognitive shadow because of his death in WoR, I think it is likely that he will take Nale's place as a Herald and gain unfettered access to Nale's Honor blade and his connection to Honor's investure. Only then could he cause such a large amount of destruction.

Most cultures currently (STA era) in the cosmere are not advanced enough to discover atomic structure. The only ones that might have discovered it by now are darkside Taldain or Sel.

I highly doubt sulfur has any Cosmere significance. This is because metals interact more with investiture than nonmetals. Denizens of the Cosmere have the same Periodic table as we do, only with the god metals added, please see Alloy of Law and Wax's metallurgy hobby.

@CalderisYou make a good point, but at the speeds I am talking about, time dilation is not a problem yet. But the kinetic energy you build up is. Think of it this way, a 50 caliber sniper round packs enough force to basically make a human body pop like a balloon. A human fist, moving at a similar or even faster speed would devastate almost anything in front of it. The equation (1/2)*mass*velocity^2 determines the force applied to both the hand and the object the hand is striking. For the sake of simplicity, lets say a 80 kilogram Steeldancer taps his/her metalmind and starts moving at roughly 850 meters/second (the speed of a 50 caliber BMG round, courtesy of google). No other forces such as drag, friction, torque, or other effects are present in the system. The steeldancer now has 28.9 million joules behind their fist. Add in the equation that transfers Kinetic energy into force, K=F/d, d being the distance traveled after the two objects impact each other. Lets say the ferring punchs a misting in the head while running that fast in our one dimensional system. The skin on the head compresses exactly two millimeters. Do a little math and you get that the punch, assuming all kinetic energy in transfered, just transferred 1.445 billion Newtons of force to the mistings head.* The average accepted value of force needed to crush a human skull is a little less than 3000 Newtons. Result, even at moving at speeds that are close to 3 times the speed of sound, no where near the speed of light, the steeldancer is a deadly kinetic weapon. Add in any magics or magical items that make the Steeldancer more durable and you have someone who can literally punch their way out of anything.** *All of these calculations and numbers have been simplified because I did not want to do any additional work. **Assuming they had enough room to speed up their fist and enough stored steel.

You do not need to outrace an atomic bomb to cause relativistic damage. I am assuming that you mean the radiation in the blast and not the shock wave. If we go with the radiation, then you do not need to get even close to the radiation which is at the speed of light. You could still level a city by going a hundred times slower than the radiation. If we go with being slower than the shockwave, then leveling cities or planets is out, but you could still pulverize a thunderclast, windblade, or chasmfiend with a single punch. That is assuming you held enough F-Gold or stormlight to repair the damage done to your body by the resulting force on your fist. Basically you would become OnePunch Man for a fraction of a second before your bones turn to dust, the shockwave bursts every membrane in your body and you explode like a waterballoon with a core made of C4 and bone broth.

The speed at which Feruchemical power is used is only limited, in my understanding, by how fast you can tap it and how much power you have stored. We see this with Wax and F-iron, he is able to quickly tap years of storage and destroy buildings, or he can tap a little and just speed up his bullets. A Steeldancer would be able to theoretically hit lightspeed for a fraction of a second. Which would turn them into one of the most dangerous ferrings out there. Think of a suicide run hitting even a fraction of the speed of light, that could crack a planet. Or just mechanize it using the little South Scadrian box to externalize the effect on a tank shell.

I would say that Endowment is Seven based because of the Iridescent tones and the visual spectrum in general.