Proletariat

Duralumin contracts the conversion process from however long it would take to burn all the metal into one go. Given the lerasium seems to go all at once as is it probably wouldn't do anything.

I'm not 'mad', but I do think this conversation can't go anywhere further so long as you keep insisting on this circular line of reasoning. And it's not the dictionary I'm disagreeing with, but your very limited interpretation of the definitions in front of you.

There's a bit of circular reasoning going on here. There are a lot of reasons why people on Scadrial might consider Sazed to be a god, but an argument that starts with the unprovable assertion that Sazed must be a god and hence the existence of investiture is proof of gods is not conclusive. This dispute as to the unprovable question of divinity is the crux of the higher order debate between religion and atheism of which everything else is a sub-point since atheism isn't simply a rebuttal of a specific origin myth. It isn't enough to declare that Sazed is powerful or has abilities that not everyone understand nor is it enough to say we know the origin of Scadrial. Those are common debates between atheists and Christians here due to the specific content of the Bible, but very obviously Scadrial is not the world we live in and Sazed is not Jesus. Similarly, it's not enough to declare atheism as denialism and refuse to explore or defend that outside of copy pasting a dictionary. It makes it impossible to have a conversation with a resolution, because the circular reasoning justifies itself and jams us from moving forward. Furthermore, any sufficiently developed technology is indistinguishable from magic. This is a world where they don't just have gas, electricity, nuclear etc. but also investiture and it's reasonably explicable. It seems pointlessly insistent to declare that it must be magic when no one walks away from an X-men movie thinking mutants are magic simply because there are extraordinary traits not present in the real world. And so what if investiture is the same material that created the world? It's not like I'm gonna worship atoms and atomic bombs just because of the Big Bang, right?

I feel like this is still conflating a few things. The functional disagreement between atheism and religious doctrines comes down to two things: 1) how you interpret the things that you can see/touch/etc.; and, 2) whether you have faith in the things that you can't prove to yourself. This means an atheist in the Cosmere would understand investiture as a form of energy much like electricity or gas that can do significant things but can be understood. It is not magic, and its users are not gods. This means for atheism on Scadrial that: a) the Lord Ruler is not god but is instead a tyrant with full access to feruchemy and allomancy due to tapping liquid investiture; b ) that Vin is not a goddess but instead an allomancer who managed to connect to gaseous investiture; c) that Kelsier is not a god but instead a cognitive shadow; d) that Marsh is not 'death' but instead someone who's been stabbed with a lot of hemalurgic spikes and stayed alive through compounding atium; and, e) that Sazed is a feruchemist who is trying to balance two huge chunks of investiture. The difference here is not in whether you acknowledge the existence of investiture or the people who've used it for significant things, but instead the spiritual meaning that you attribute to these events and people. It's a difference in interpretation. These interactions from the Lost Metal might be helpful for understanding this: “Wayne wiped his brow, leaving an unconscious gangster on the floor. “You got the magic boxes?” “They’re not magic, Wayne,” Marasi said. “Malwish technology is just different but—” ... “Wow,” Marasi whispered. “That’s … magic?” “Is Allomancy magic?” Moonlight asked. “Of course not,” Marasi said. “Neither is this,” Moonlight said. “To repair something, I merely rewrite the past, making the object think it was well-maintained or never broke. Like I said, universal stamps are a new technology. I don’t have them working perfectly yet, but they’ll do for now.” It felt magical to Marasi regardless. Allomancy was one thing—it made perfect sense to be able to use metal to Push on other pieces of metal. But rewriting the past of an object? How was that not magical? Marasi is not insisting that allomancy isn't real when she says that it's just technology, but rather that it's not magical. It is entirely plausible that people would extend that framework to include Sazed, Kelsier etc. while accepting that they exist and are powerful.

I think this misses what atheism is. The key feature of atheism is rejection of the existence of god/s rather than a refusal to admit the existence of things that are worshipped as god/s. It's a subtle but important distinction. There are spiritual doctrines around a lot of the wildlife amongst First Nations peoples here, for example, and I don't share those spiritual beliefs but I obviously do think those animals exist. Similarly I think people called Jesus and Muhammad probably existed in some form (not that their existence itself is relevant), but don't think they were divine. Given how flawed the various 'gods' are (the shards, kelsier, the returned, the heralds the sleepless, the spren, the aethers, the kandra) I would suggest that becoming more cosmere aware would entail being more skeptical of these being divine. I mean most of them are just really invested people who were born human, and it doesn't require much brain gymnastics to not see them as gods. I'm pretty confident that Hoid is an atheist, since he certainly sees most of the gods more as peers or obstacles. And worshippers of the God Beyond probably have the same conclusion - that they believe in an actual god whereas these are just invested people, or bits of investiture that's been broken off and gotten a little bit of sentience.

The shards, their splinters, and the aethers are all real and worshipped, but them being real doesn't mean someone in the Cosmere has to regard them as a god. I mean, the Horneaters see Hoid, the Sleepless, and all the spren as gods whereas Jasnah interacts with the same beings without worship as she believes they exist she just doesn't see them as god. As 'god' is a term with different definitions neither set of ideas is truly falsifiable. On topic I think Pathism will probably experience upheaval as Harmony further enters into Discord however, because so much of it is based on having a direct line of connection through the spike and the kandra. As Sazed changes, then his worshippers will also start changing and potentially in ways they don't like. I wouldn't be surprised if there's mass resignations from the faith if people start acting a bit like the koloss.

The original Aether book had that you got converted to being an inanimate construct of your aether element after a lot of use, which would be pretty heinous. Otherwise the risk of killing yourself through dehydration if you use your powers too much seems like a big catch in its own right.

I mean, it makes sense that Sazed would want MeLaan to dabble in the Roshar situation since Odium is another serious threat and the only other shard (Cultivation) with a history of opposing Odium is also on Roshar. It also makes sense that Horneaters and Iriali are the first Rosharan people we'd see in Scadrian books given they're cosmere aware, have a history of travelling in that space, and have a shardpool and oathgate in their respective territories that'd make it easy. The main thing that confuses me is how Skybreakers got off world, and used their surges without glowing bc of the Stormlight (or even a bottle of Dor). It also seems a bit bizarre that a pro-Odium organisation that's a stickler for the rules would also have defections to Kelsier.

Also random thought ... Marsh has been using the atium alloy from era 1 to extend his lifespan, but Sazed mentions in TLM that atium was found in the explosion produced by splitting the ettmetal which will save Marsh. Does this mean the ettmetal explosion produced an alloy? Or that the era 1 atium actually was pure atium? Did I miss something while reading?

Yeah, Brandon mentioned that the Ghostbloods outside of Kelsier's control are a bit rogue. And there's also the suggestion that he's lying to the Ghostbloods - at least on Roshar - about his situation going by this WoB: My guess is that Kelsier's control of the Ghostbloods is a bit fragile, and partly enforced by deception. The crew in TLM are going to be more cohered around his ideas, because he picked them, probably trained them, they're under his direct oversight, and the first tenet of the organisation matters to them but even here there's some conflict. If you look at the team in Roshar they're picked and trained by someone who is potentially even Kelsier's factional rival in the organisation, have no direct contact with Kelsier, and have no loyalty to anything on Roshar outside of their own group. And tbh if Kelsier is hiding his inability to leave the planet (and TLM moment with Marasi hints strongly he's a liar so it's likely), then whatever shred of control he has over the Rosharans will go out the window if it gets out that he's neither a threat nor in keeping with the organisation's own rules.

Thinking about it also seems like Wax is going to be the most powerful Allomancer since the Lord Ruler. I forgot that lerasium also enhances pre-existing allomancy, so between the lerasium mistorn + hemalurgy duralumin, the double steel pushes, and being able to compound weight he's going to really test the limits on what steel pushing can do. We'll probably get lots of cool broadsheets in the next book about his experiments on manipulating the axi that Kelsier referenced from the metal vision. Also wondering if Brandon is setting up another Shai novella? Because this seems like an odd dangling plotline with a character whose had her own novella, and been a significant character in another to then pop up again and be like 'got better! no worries my dudes.' Won't she eventually go Shaod if she doesn't give up the soulstamp? Or will she last as an Elantrian until era 3 and be one of the immortals just chilling out in the background cast of Scadrial like Marsh? And are these self aware safes that the Ghostbloods have based on Awakening or a fabrial? Because there must be some really screwed up stuff happening in Nalthis if Yesteel is producing Artificial Intelligence to order and making thousands of drabs. Like is he just creating a region of drabs out of Huth and Kuth? And are these golden armies that Autonomy has appropriated a mass of his new and improved Lifeless that she's influencing like she does the hemalurgists?

Yep! He also clarified here with this WoB:

Yeah, I mean the impression I got from this and the WoB is that Forgers are basically the most realmatically aware in the art of transformation but have the most minimal access to investiture of all end-positive arts. Removing her limits to access makes her an absolute beast in changing people's SDNA to do almost anything. Even if it took a while to do a few people she could introduce powerful traits into a population by soul forging someone who then had children passing on the new traits into the rest of the population. I also wouldn't be surprised if she could just create full unkeyed goldminds using those Dor bottles tbh. If people can figure out how to unkey the mists of Scadrial or the storms on Roshar to use as fuel like the pools or the Dor, then some of these typically low investiture arts like Shai's are going to become almost unrecognisable.

Finally had the lightbulb moment and realised that Shai's invested ink must be the purple dye from Nalthis! It explains why she can still get some things going when she otherwise needs direct access to a shard's investiture.

My understanding is that when it mentions all abilities is that it's talking about all inherent abilities (like intellect, strength, resilience, senses etc.), as opposed to powers like feruchemy and allomancy which atium can take. God metals are also able to take more than ordinary metals when forming spikes, and given lerasium's origin it may well not lead to any decay in investiture.

If Shai is able to create self-renewing soulstamp of such power that she can forge Elantrians, couldn't she also create full Feruchemists or Mistborn using more Dor bottles or just by standing in a perpendicularity? Contributing the genes of a few people to the population with those abilities would probably be easier than waiting on Harmony giving peeps lerasium.

I'm super glad that I read the early chapters each week, because it meant that I had a really quick and fun read of the book. The main criticism that I would have is that for a concluding book in a series it seemed to invest an awful lot into set up, and if I hadn't gotten around to reading other cosmere books then I might not have been as into it. The foreshadowing around Harmony becoming Discord was pretty heavy what with Sazed's shadow self, the production of lerasium and atium, the name dropping of Discord, and Kelsier's worrying conversation with him at the end as well as the tidbit in the Hemalurgy section of the arcanum at the end about Ruin being suppressed. It also seems like being of both Ruin and Preservation has severely restricted Sazed's future sight in contrast to Leras. I would guess that Sazed is going to be the ultimate villain of the next Mistborn era, which will be triggered by Autonomy somehow, and then space age will be the Roshar v Scadrial conflict. The changes to Hemalurgy are interesting in that there's a limit to how many spikes someone can have now, and spikes can't gift someone with the ability to compound, but they can withdraw charges without killing the victim (producing someone similar to a drab, presumably) and can accumulate charges from across several victims. The highest number in use in TLM seems to be 4/5 spikes, so maybe that's the new limit. We also got some small additions with feruchemy and allomancy through those cool identity locks, and the way the seeker can track feruchemy now. There was also interesting stuff about perpendicularities in that it seems to further hint that they can be produced by a chunk of god metals, but also that moving into Shadesmar is just one invested command you can use amongst many and it can turbo charge any invested arts user maybe even to the degree that Rashek used it to move and terraform the planet. What is weird for me is how it seems to suggest that godmetals and perpendicularities are unkeyed while you need a specific kind of connection to draw on Stormlight, Voidlight, or Mist. Of other Cosmere references, it was interesting to see there are Iriali immigrants in Bilding, that MeLaan has headed to the Horneater Peaks, the addition of ShoDel who have a direct line of connection to their god (who?), two new planetary systems, and the suggestion that the Rosharan Ghostbloods have gone a bit rogue

I mean, another thing that counters Trell as Odium is that Brandon didn't know if Stormfather could be dead eyed or not. If there's some bond breaking moment for Dalinar where he becomes Odium's champion, and Odium is free to terrorise Scadrial in an already completed book, then you'd think he'd have finalised that.

Nah, like there are people more aligned to Ruin but it requires cracks which have also damaged your ability to reason. The koloss are still a perfect example of this, because the ones who embrace the spikes can't use their allomancy even if they have the talent otherwise and even their children are moderately impacted by it. The southerners still have as much ability to reason as anyone else, though they are marginally less connected to Preservation's investiture due to no lerasium in the blood line.

Yeah, I mean this has always been an unresolved point for me. I'm starting to wonder if they got their powers from the pool and the concentration of investiture of the atium alloy, kind of like the horn eaters got abilities from being around their pool, and then got the prophecies from interacting with Preservation in the cognitive. There obviously was some communication between the early Terris and Roshar due to the World Singer/World Bringer thing so people used Ruin's pool, Preservation's ghost can't send messages to people in the physical, and there were no Mistborn to burn atium alloys with duralumin to see enough into the future for these kinds of prophecies.

The kandra's statement about ettmetal being impossible to divide while Harmony remains Harmony while the team uses trellium to blow ettmetal into its separate pieces seems to be pretty heavy foreshadowing. I suspect creating two separate metals isn't the only thing that'll happen in the next Wax chapter. The other thing is that we've only ever seen Nightblood physically impact a pure godmetal before (which even shocked a herald), but we've seen pure godmetals interact before like the Fused's raysium edged spears clashing with shardblades. Does this mean the end-negative element of investiture in hemalurgy is a key part of the reaction here, or further confirmation that the intent behind this godmetal has a specific pairing with Harmony's? Also I reckon this is hinting at creating a perpendicularity:

I mean, since Mraize's Aviar is a bird of prey it's reasonably likely that it has the ability to sense prey, much like Nightmaws and Deepwalkers. As far as non-predatory Aviar go their abilities presumably would be themed around camouflage, detecting danger, rapid escape, or being unpleasant to eat or some combination of the above. A kind of shocking illusion in line with how peacocks use their tail or octopi use their ink as a distraction makes sense, or projecting pain or sleep or something more in line with the purpose of the toxins of a frog or spines of a hedgehog. The ability to sense intent, or to have a telepathic flock mind so they could easily set up a warning system like meerkats have. Temporal abilities to slow predators down, or even being able to shift into the shadesmar for brief periods would be the equivalent of say a pigeon making a quick get away or a mole hiding away in the ground.

Perhaps this is a bit left field, but what about Infection, Plague, or even Mutation? A violent and destructive process that can create change, and given that both Cultivation and Odium had at some point been affiliated with Ashyn the form of investiture there could be a hint.

I'm not sure that's correct based on what Brandon has said in a few places. After TLM it sounds like the Secret Projects, the Rock novella, maybe that boat load of mummies book, maybe some Elantris sequels and then next Mistborn era and then once that's over Stormlight 6 - 10.

I don't think it's possible to do what you're thinking of in order to make one person all powerful since there's limits on how much a human body can hold and what they can do with it, but I think something similar will need to become a plot point. There needs to be renewable Investiture access if there's going to be consistent space stuff in the future, otherwise where are the never ending sources of metal going to come from to fly between different solar systems? Or the loads of perfect gems to store all the light necessary to send a ship between planets and back again? And how will Selish magic users fuel their abilities once they figure out the connection issue? These expanding empires will need to be powered somehow, and it will require producing the amount of investiture you're thinking of but distributed amongst a huge number of people.