Oudeis

Hrm... in theory, it should be able to. You might have to die on Nalthis. Also, in order to do something that specific, especially without the ability to "feel" your own sDNA to see if it worked, you'd have to be an absolute expert at lerasium, like someone who's been burning it and practicing with it for months, minimum. Or, find some sort of cheat. I wonder... Soulcasting cannot make a Godmetal. Is it that different Arcanii cannot replicate each other, as Moogle suggests, or is it that normal investiture is not powerful enough to replicate God-Investiture? The thing is, the bead of lerasium would have to have enough raw power to craft a Divine Breath, but it would also have to have enough additional power to fuel the transformation from the lerasium to this new type of Investiture. Additionally, you'd prolly need to have a much better understanding than we (or Nalthians) currently do about how Returned work. In fact, having seen the process of Returning from the eyes of a Returned, we likely have a significantly better understanding that anyone, Vasher included (unless he did remember his own Returning). In addition to the Divine Breath, do Returned need a Divine Command? So, in other words, would you give yourself a Divine Breath, and manifest some powers of the Returned, yet remain a living human being? It strikes me as unlikely that the two can exist so neatly together; it seems to me you'd be more likely to simply be a typical Awakener, albeit one with a single Breath that brings you to the Fifth Heightening (and can be used to heal). Would you still need to consume Breath, would your Divine Breath go away after a week and leave you human again? Would you have to technically kill your own body, in order to animate it with your new Breath, in order to get the benefits of being Returned? Can that be done without a Divine Command? Can a human brain burning Lerasium envision a Divine Command? What if you choose a poor command, like what happened with Nightblood? Fallen Rope: You have given me much, much to think about, and it fascinates me. Also, I see your sig is a quote of mine (feel free to attribute me). I give you ALL the upvotes! EDIT: Final thought. Imagine burning lerasium in an attempt to make it inevitable that when you die, however you die, you will Return... and then killing yourself to test the theory. You had BETTER be right...

My theory is actually that it would simply make Vin not a hemalurgist anymore. The spike would simply stop being a thing that affects her, the way Elend can't access Tindwyl's metalminds. It simply overwrites the part of her spiritweb that was changed at the moment she first became a hemalurgic host, cutting off her access to the earring entirely. Of course, there's the idea that if she ever put the earring back in her bindpoint, she would instantly become a hemalurgist again... a conundrum. Kay, but the author came up with Ars Arcanum. Technically for that to be translated as "The art of the arcane" it would have to mean Arcanum was in the genitive form, meaning that an individual system is called an Arcanis. You can call it what you wish, but I like Mr. Sanderson's term better. "System" sounds too generic for me, and in fact I've most often heard people call it "magic" which I dislike, as to me "magic" is the fairies and pixie dust, think-of-a-thing-and-it-happens, power with no cost, "wingardium leviosa" thing. Or, they use "system of investiture" which I find bulky to type. Arcanis is specific, unique (just like Mr. Sanderson's work), and quick.

Thanks, Moogle! Do we have WoB one way or the other? I feel like if it's anywhere, it'll be in the Hero of Ages epigraphs.

Investiture is the energy itself. An Arcanum, per Mr. Sanderson's use of calling the individual studies "Ars Arcanum", are the formalized practice powered by Investiture. Allomancy or Awakening, for example, as opposed to Vin's direct use of Preservation's power to spin the planet around. Preservation's mind had died thousands of years ago. His plan was to hope his creations could succeed. I disagree with you assertion that literally every step along the path was directed by Preservation's will. I think Preservation's plan was, basically, that someone like Vin would take in the power of Preservation by being in the mists and not being a hemalurgist sometime after using the Well. I could be wrong, and you could be right... but you can't prove that you're right. However someone else already proved me wrong, by pointing out that Rashek gave himself allomancy via lerasium and it didn't erase his feruchemy, so clearly that's not how lerasium works.

.... WHHEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeooooooooo.....boom. That's the sound of my theory failing to launch. Thank you for the insight. Upvote! Until next theory!

Syl says that the Blades don't come back to life, they come back to a semblance of life. I figure they're not smart enough to think or comprehend, they're just like a scrap, a shadow of their former selves, and the last thing they remember is being betrayed and killed.

The entire third book might have been totally useless because of Hoid. At the very least, the story would likely have ended differently. I've asked before, what would have happened if Vin had found two beads of lerasium at the Well? Who would have burned the second bead, after they saw what it did to Elend? A thought has recently occurred to me. This is HUGELY speculative, but just imagine. If lerasium truly overwrites your sDNA, this could have the effect of eliminating your access to other arcana. Like, for example, hemalurgy. If they had made the decision to give Vin the second bead, to combine her skill with Elend's raw power and get a single super-Mistborn... could that have healed the part of her that made her a hemalurgist? Overwritten that part of the sDNA that allowed the earring to work for her? If she had... the very next time she went out in the mist, barely days after Ruin was first freed, she would likely have Ascended. Before Ruin consolidated his power, before he gathered the koloss, before the empire was fractured. She would have had time to learn how to use her powers, to communicate with Elend. She could have been a balance to Ruin. With her ability to speak to minds, she could have gathered much more information, and fed it to Elend, all while he continued gathering the information hidden on those plates. It might have led to a far, far different version of the ending of the books. Again, this is a speculative assumption that lerasium doesn't just add to, but actually overwrites your sDNA. I have little to no basis for this assumption. I just think it's cool to ponder. I know it all worked out, but Hoid really was okay with Scadrial burning if he got what he wanted.

A bizarre brainstorm I had. Imagine this as a way to use Lerasium... Lerasium re-writes your sDNA, yes? Giving you a connection to Preservation, and the powers of allomancy. It's suggested in the MAG (I'm not sure if this is backed up in the text or via WoB) that Lerasium, in any of its uses, overwrites your current sDNA. That is, you gain a power, but lose your current powers to do so. A la Vasher's sacrifice trick, I wonder if this is a way to fight really powerful people? Let's say you're opposing Raoden. He's powerful and skilled at AonDor. What if you somehow tricked him into swallowing and burning a bead of lerasium? He'd gain incredible powers of allomancy... which will do him precious little good without any training, or even the faintest notion of how these powers can be accessed. Meantime, depending on how lerasium actually does work, he might unShaod, and lose his powers of AonDor. Just random speculation. Thoughts? If it does overwrite your sDNA, could it sever a nahel bond? Erase Breaths?

Except that there's not one "black and blond" hair type. Renarin has black hair with many blond streaks. Adolin has blond hair with a few black streaks. Laral, I believe, had black hair with a few blonde streaks. Others have had a variety of proportions of hair. Also, since we know that the Listeners, like the Aimians, are a distinct non-human race (unlike the Natanatan or Azir, who are simply human with different physical markers), there's no reason to try to come up with a solution for why Adolin's genetic makeup could explain Listener genders. ...Hrm, except that we know the Horneaters and Herdazians have listener blood, meaning that listeners can interbreed with humans to produce viable offspring... which is both preposterously unlikely, yet would semantically mean they are the same race as humans. Given this, and the WoB that they are, in fact, a different race, I'm going to propose the theory that sometime in the past an Investiture is responsible for the successful cross-breeding; perhaps the Old Magic.

While they admittedly have not mapped the Rosharan genome, they speak of alethi black hair breeding true, with percentage indicating purity of blood, in a way that makes such recessive genes unlikely. With a recessive gene as you described, half-Alethi children would most likely have full black hair, with successive generations having a chance to match up recessives into blond hair. Such a structure would never allow for hair of mixed color. A non-alethi man, with an alethi wife, having children with full black hair who nevertheless might have children who are blond (or part-blond) is not only contrary to the sense we get of hair breeding true, let alone the Word of Peter we have on the topic, it also defies what we've empirically seen with children of mixed blood. EDIT: I should take this moment to clarify; as I briefly touched upon in this post, the actual Rosharan people, let alone us, know so little about Rosharan genetics that almost anything is technically possible. The fact that it's so demonstrably different from Earth genetics means that, for the scenario you've described to happen, it would have to mean that Rosharan DNA mimics the same effects as Earth DNA with an entirely different underlying principle, which would surprise me greatly, personally. I also think it's contraindicated by what the Rosharans seem to think about hair. All science in this post is per my friend, who is a genetics counselor.

That makes Earth-genetics sense, but I don't think Rosharan-genetics sense. The simplest explanation is that the variance is simply extreme, and Adolin takes a LOT after his mother. That seems to fly in the face of how often we're told it's a very proportional thing, however. Or Adolin is simply a mutant.

Eh... I disagree with your assessment, and theirs, of what sort of "truth" Pattern likes. Light makes shadows as truth makes lies. He likes the lies coming from "the Yalb", the boasting and exaggeration. I admit that I'm projecting, as it's one of my personal philosophies, but this is the sort of truth I think he's the spren of. Things that are real, that have a demonstrable effect on the world, but which don't actually exist outside of human minds. Society. Community. Government. The things which are real only because we all collectively agree to let them be.

They also don't look or act anything like Pattern.

You made some good points here, I'm going to address this one... Syl makes a slightly dismissive comment about Highspren once, and expressly stating that her views on things are different from them, despite closeness of orders. I almost wonder if spren near each other would be LESS likely to get along? Like, Syl cares about protecting things. Glys seems to care about observing. Those are almost too unrelated for it to be a sticking point. Like if I'm a basketball fan, and you're a hockey fan. Well, why don't you tell me about your team, because while we both like sports, I have no strong feelings about any of the teams you care about? Versus, we both like football, and you're a Jets fan, and I'm a Giants fan. Same sport, same state even, except now I will not talk to you. Just a thought. Maybe this is for another thread, but I sorta wanna speculate on the raison d'etre of each order... what do they think is important, and how do they go about it? Sorta inspired by the fact that, from what little we know, Elsecallers, Lightweavers, Truthwatchers and Edgedancers all seem to be about collecting knowledge, but they all seem to go about it in very different ways (and I personally believe the Willshapers also fall into this category, but I admit this is based on very, very little evidence). If we knew the answer, rather than just guessed, it might shed some light on how the different spren view issues. Personally, since Jasnah seems to be the consummate scholar, and Ivory is her spren, I assume his focus is that he just doesn't care about things like morality. Like how Syl cares deeply about morality, but couldn't give two hoots about things written in books. Ivory might care deeply about thoughts, and consideration, and the gathering of data, and might not have strong opinions one way or another on how the conclusions end up being applied. Or, alternately, I'm completely wrong. That's always an option. ^^;;; EDIT: Additional thought. Was she in danger of being killed? Her cognitive aspect was sinking in the thoughts of other things... can the thought of you suffocate in the thought of other things? That wasn't her physical body, yes? Did it need air, or did she just "think" she needed air? What would actually happen to a person who "drowned" in Shadesmar? We know she believed she was in danger, and we know she and Shallan believed Shallan was in danger. Were they right? ONE LAST THING: Did Ivory choose that? Was it part of his transition? Remember, Syl flopped into our world and rode the winds for how long before finding Kaladin. Pattern... well we don't know what it was like the first time, but the second time he had to be drawn into existence. Do we know Ivory wanted to 'test' Jasnah like that, or was it simple necessity? Or, remember, he might be alien, which doesn't mean "he has human emotions but feels them weird," he might 'feel' things very differently from how humans do, so perhaps he never saw Jasnah as being in any real danger, even if we would. Maybe in his culture, being killed during a test to see if you're a Surgebinder is a great honor.

The actual WoB to which you refer is that specifically historical information on Scadrial is canon until he contradicts it. Even then, the idea that it's true until it's not is a flimsy level of canon. It's like saying that you can totally go through this door, there's not a hungry, angry lion on the other side... but there might be as soon as you open it. And, again, that's only the historical, societal data. The Treatise Metallic doesn't even have that fig leaf of canonicity. Apart from the things they print which are flagrantly non-canon (typically for the purpose of game balance, which is something I approve of) they admit that they more-or-less guessed on the rest of it.

My friend and I were discussing Jasnah, Ivory, and the scene with the Muggers. We had a few thoughts, and I was wondering what anyone else thought, too. How does Ivory feel about Jasnah's actions that night? What type of spren is he, which attributes is he attracted to? Was it like Syl at the Tower, where she felt pain at the deaths Kaladin caused, but understood it was necessary? Was it like Kaladin's decision to give the assassins a chance, where her Nahel bond was in serious jeopardy and she ended up having to make amends with him (maybe even say another Ideal)? Was it like a highspren whose Skybreaker executed a murderer following his trial, where he was simply perfectly okay with it? I actually have an additional thing to insert. Remember, consider what we've learned since from sentient spren, Syl is shockingly human. Pattern thinks that eating is "terrible destruction". Even Wyndle, who acts pretty human, asks Lift in genuine confusion, "Why do you care about some random guy?" Spren aren't human. They're pretty alien. There's not a lot of reason to assume their views will be human viewpoints. With that in mind, I wonder if Ivory really even thinks of what Jasnah did as murder. He grants the Surge of Transformation. We've seen Pattern speak of Lightweavings as shaping lies and making truths; these things mean a lot to him, he sees them as more integral to himself and less tacked-on superpowers than we humans see them. Would Ivory see what Jasnah did as ending a life? Or simply transforming a person? Would he look at the quartz statue and think, "this is a man who was killed in a terrifyingly mystical way," or would he simply think, "What's the big deal? He was flesh, now he's quartz. It happens." "Sure, this man turned into fire and then the fire went out. That's what fire DOES."

Sorry, I hope I didn't come across as sounding like I was trying to contradict you. I know it's mentioned in-text, and I get that. I was trying to express confusion over the whole scenario. It's like Syl told us, "I've been a seamstress for seventeen years!" and I'd be like... da-whu? Sorry if it sounded like I was trying to contradict you. I just have no idea what Syl meant when she said that.

Dalinar's hair is described somewhere as pure black, yes? I feel like this is a thing that's true, though i cannot find a quote. ...Since Alethi hair is proportional, how can Adolin have hair that's mostly blond, with a few streaks of black? Wouldn't that require his mother to be like, 600% non-Alethi?

What does "cousin" mean for Spren? How can "the idea of the wind" be a cousin for "the idea of honor"? This isn't just a family resemblance; she behaves, most of the time, like a typical windspren. Takes their forms, their behavior. Also, cryptics and honorspren don't get along. Weird, right? So, on this planet, the idea of honor and the idea of perceptual truth don't get along? I suppose that makes sense. Honor is all about acting like human societal constructs have inherent meaning, and perceptual truth means constantly manipulating human societal constructs. It's like two toddlers fighting over a toy. Does Pattern have a cousin? Are there bloodspren that act similar to Pattern?

Reember that in a lot of ways, syl is pretty much a windspren. Whats with that?

You just made all those up, yes, Moogle? So, the fact that they don't fit into a category might be an artifact of the fact that they do not exist? Or was there a "goodtastespren" (deliciousspren?) in the book that I missed?

Yes, it's struck me for a while that the "Truth" cryptics are attracted to is the concept of perceptual truth; like Jasnah says, if a beggar girl convinces a crew that she is the sister of the most powerful King in the world, they will render her the aid they feel she is due. There's scientific truth, which is true regardless of what people believe, but most of human society is "truth" that is simply commonly accepted, or even sometimes individually and specifically accepted.

No, Gloryspren are very specifically explained as showing up whenever you feel that you've accomplished something.

Jasnah and Shallan comment that they believe, per Namar's theory, that all spren are either of natural forces (fire, rain, gravity) or emotions (glory, fear, passion). Is a lie a natural force, or an emotion?