Kyn

Would Nightblood consider Taravangian evil (assuming “evil” means not taking responsibility for one’s actions)? Personally, I’d say Taravangian doesn’t actually take responsibility for his actions, in the sense that he doesn’t stop committing atrocities or try to make up for them. He just uses his acceptance of consequences as an excuse to engage in worse actions, since he’s already paying for them. That’s not so much taking responsibility for past misdeeds as it is pretending to, to justify continuing them. Is (Nightblood’s) evil as subjective as (Honorsprens’) honor? Moreso, but with less room to adapt, I would guess. Syl described herself as “…one of the raw powers of creation transformed by collective human imagination into a personification of one of their ideals.” in ch. 31 of Oathbringer, Brandon Sanderson. In her case, Honor. This means that what spren like her are is, in some respect, crowdsourced. Moreso with Honor dead. However, each Honorspren is also an individual, with their own interpretations of what honor is. One might suppose (and could be wrong to do so, but we’ve got to begin somewhere) that the degree to which evil and honor are similarly subjective – in this specific case, rather than as concepts – would be the degree to which Nightblood resembles the Honorspren. I get the impression Nightblood is like a more extreme, less flexible but also less stable version of them. Personally, I don’t think Nightblood is as…complete, developed, or personified as the spren. So evil, for Nightblood, is both more subjective (whatever it feels evil is) and more definite (it must be destroyed) than honor is for the Honorspren. Nightblood has to pretend that it knows what evil is, incontrovertibly, so it might not be able to change its mind so easily as the spren at Lasting Integrity…which is kind of horrifying. I’d guess Nightblood will treat its cobbled-together definition of evil as sacrosanct, precisely because lacking the crowdsourcing or deific origins makes that definition even more questionable. And I’m also guessing Nightblood relies a lot on gut feelings for determining evil, and sees no contradiction between these two things.

I mean, it does, but also doesn’t Dawnshard tell us the most powerful Surgebindings require Intent plus a Command? Fuzzy sounds perfect for the difference between a Deadeye who maintains its original bond, and continues to confer abilities/power, and ones who didn’t. …Of course, even assuming that’s the reason for the difference in oathbreaking, we still wouldn’t be sure if what matters is Shallan’s (possibly insufficient) Intent or the fact that it wasn’t both her and Testament sharing the Intent to break the bond. So, time to puzzle out what’s most likely to have resulted in vestigial Lightweaver/Surgebinder abilities in this case? I’m questioning the Command portion, the handful of seemingly-unrelated-to-breaking-bonds words Shallan used. - RoW ch. 93, Brandon Sanderson However, it seems unlikely she got weirdness because she inadvertently tried to Unmake her Spren rather than just unbonding it.

Let me be clear: that is exactly what you are doing. You literally dismiss Kaladin freezing in an apparent PTSD-caused dissociative reaction to trauma as “feeling bad.” One of the many ways PTSD can present, this sort of overwhelming flashback is, in fact, much more common among battle-hardened veterans than among civilians. It is crippling and intrusive, and a perfectly normal and natural response to horrific experiences. Repeated exposure to trauma makes the human mind less able to cope with it, and more likely to be overwhelmed like this. Likely because of this, someone with depression like Kaladin’s is also more likely to develop PTSD from combat experience or losing a patient, which makes this completely in-character as well as naturally developed from his surgical and combat background. You are even more explicitly judging and criticizing both real-world plural experiences, and the fictional depiction of Shallan’s plurality. And, while it’s not my area of expertise, Shallan’s very different dissociative response meshes with her background of childhood trauma, so this is again in character. The way each of her identities turns out to encapsulate a part of her rather than being truly distinct may make her less relatable to some plurals. But it also makes her little different from other characters in the story (such as Dalinar as the Blackthorn) in the way she attributes her behaviors to different parts/versions of herself. She obviously still blames herself for things her other identities do, because she has to lock away memories behind Veil to avoid the guilt. In other words, the other personas may be Shallan’s attempts to hide from the things she knows she has done, but she does not seek to escape responsibility using those personas. - RoW Ch. 93, Brandon Sanderson

You’re fine. I assumed it was narrowly directed, but a) doubt myself, and b) would prefer to make things clear, especially when potentially hurtful…I keep running into trouble when I inevitably fail to. Sorry to derail. Honestly, though, I really just want to vent about Lirin more. I made the mistake of doing a reread, and am trying to parse Lirin’s reaction to Kaladin volunteering so his brother wouldn’t be going to war alone: - TWoK, Brandon Sanderson The reread made me realize this is why I can’t stand Lirin as a father. I mean, on top of him using exposure therapy to try to inure a sensitive kid to other people’s pain. This comment indelibly colored my perceptions of his ensuing behavior. I get that this is another illustration of Lirin’s capacity to triage even everyday suffering, sometimes callously focusing on who and what he can save. That doesn’t make it any more palatable. And this is a strikingly narcissistic way of framing a tragedy afflicting other people. As if their suffering is something being inflicted on him. As if Kaladin’s the one doing the inflicting, rather than one of the victims. Yeah, Lirin undermines adult Kaladin pretty viciously. But to do this to his kids when they were still children? Lirin’s reacting as if Kaladin’s personally attacking him by trying to protect Tien, just because Kal’s going against his plans. And worse, Lirin’s not only dismissing the value of supporting a brother, he’s dismissing Tien and is lashing out at Kal for not doing the same. Nope, can’t see why you’d want to go off on Lirin. /sarcasm

…Really, follow @Not an Ookla’s advice. You haven’t seen that part because nowhere does the book suggest Shallan is less responsible for her actions due to the different people she presents as. We don’t see anybody saying things aren’t her fault because Veil or Radiant did it, we just see Shallan fall back on them to avoid confronting realities about herself. Did you have the same problem with a distinct part of Adolin’s personality (his desire to do the right thing, perhaps) being the only thing that kept him from killing Sadeas, up until he failed to control that trait (because he could momentarily convince himself that the cost of not killing Sadeas was too high)? From my understanding, the identities don’t remove responsibility, they enable actions – and living with said actions – that otherwise might not be psychologically possible to manage without them. Most of the time, they’re presented as a defense mechanism, for coping with or surviving trauma. They are an internal function, not one that removes external culpability, either in real life or in the book.

No. Just no. You’re going to get better replies from people with more experience with DiD, and I apologize where the language I use isn’t what the people in any specific community would. But framing any mental health condition that isn’t violent as “dangerous” isn’t a good call. Most people who would fit under a mental health diagnosis are in greater danger because of it, rather than being dangerous. And presenting a real-world mental health condition as something normal for the people who deal with it is not “encouraging” any kind of behavior. It is presenting a condition as another facet of humanity so those of us who might not be exposed in real life have the opportunity to encounter it and possibly learn to be sensitive human beings, while those who are familiar with it get to see it represented.

I didn’t mean that, sorry. I just figure if somebody’s in a bad enough mood to go into multiple threads just to smack talk the people or subject in the thread, they’re not likely to be in the mood to give good reasons for it.

…You’re not likely to get a satisfactory answer from someone who has recently been replying to people/threads just to say they don’t care or to demean a topic. I kind of figured the biggest purpose for including minor characters who have a big impact on major characters was to elicit an emotional reaction from the audience. Otherwise, wouldn’t they be merely referenced and never shown to us? I’m sure other people have better ideas.

It really comes down to how the sword defines/judges evil. But I don’t think that’s based so much on whether those people want the sword as it is on whether those people are drawn to use the sword. We have seen Nightblood say it never really liked Nin, which seems to be separate from what it considers evil. And it liked Lift, about whom it basically only knew that she tried to save Szeth. However, it doesn’t consider Szeth evil, despite his history and actions. Could this be because of his self-doubt, self-loathing, and possible desperate need to make up for his past actions? Most of the people Nightblood considered evil in Warbreaker were those who tried to draw it. Who wanted to destroy as much as it did, or who succumbed to the lure of power. Since Vasher was very much a killer, one assumes he wasn’t considered evil by the sword for a reason other than actions/harm done alone. Ergo, Nightblood considers people evil who succumb to its siren song, and originally, I thought this was a matter of liking/respecting the strong-willed. Now, I’m guessing The OP’s point about taking responsibility for one’s own actions might actually be the difference. People who are willing to face up to, take on responsibility for, and potentially even make up for what they’ve done don’t qualify as evil to Nightblood. In that case, Moash very much would, just as he would if evil was judged as someone who wanted power at practically any cost.

Hmm, maybe we’re missing something. Doesn’t Talenalat’Elin speak what sounds like a northern dialect of Alethi when he first arrives army the warcamp back in I-7 at the beginning of Part 3 of Words of Radiance? If a Herald who had been trapped in Braize for 4 millennia is actually speaking a recognizable dialect, it might not just be a Herald translational thing born of their Connection. However, there is also an easier potential explanation for the Pursuer knowing Alethi. Since he was not the newly-awakened Fused in Chapter 14 of Rhythm of War, we have no idea how long he has been on Roshar again when we first meet him. I assume not too long, or his abilities would have been noticed because he seems the type to use them flagrantly, but he could simply have been around long enough to learn the language. Small details like that not being explained, however, can really throw off suspension of disbelief, especially in a work that generally does so well with logically connecting things. I’m looking at potential justifications of these apparent inconsistencies, but until they’re set straight in-story, all of this is just trusting the author and thus trying to make excuses for what looks like dropped balls.

Isn’t this basically the ability of an Augur, an Allomancer who burns gold, only enhanced to apply to somebody else? If Renarin’s regular abilities grant a future-sight more like – but far more extensive than – an Oracle’s, that would be like an extension of the abilities granted by electrum. Renarin’s psychic abilities seem to do more than the similar Allomantic ability anyway. Since electrum is gold and silver, this amplified version of Oracular powers could reasonably also encompass gold-burning Augur-like abilities that interfere with whatever Odium has that’s like an atium-burning future-sight. It’s not implausible to assume Renarin has multiple seer-like abilities these similar Allomancers would possess. Or that he might have distinct, but related, abilities related to Odium the way viewing atium shadows is related to Ruin. At least, since he’s already been shown to have combinations of stronger/farther-reaching versions of other abilities those other Allomancers would possess disparately.

I imagine the year time-skip gave a few people time to pick up on language. Leshwi seemed far too interested in her Windrunner counterparts, so it’s plausible she would have wanted to become more familiar with Alethi. She could be motivated enough to have gotten good at it in that time. And Kaladin, at least, seems to assume most of the other Fused and some regular Singers do not know much Alethi; he uses gestures and simple imperatives when speaking to them after fights. I like the idea of the tower having a universal translator after the Sibling gets fully online, because the one language moment I did question was Rlain stepping in between the humans and Singers at the end. He appears to be talking in Alethi the whole time, even when he tells the Fused and Regals they’re traitors. At least, I assumed this because the humans don’t ask what he just said to the Singers. It’s possible that only the leaders, like Leshwi, understood him, but better if everybody did.

Well, Navani agrees with the mist interpretation in RoW: -Brandon Sanderson, Rhythm of War ch. 69 it’s possible she’s a little off, but she’s the most knowledgeable in-world source we’ve gotten that much detail from. I’d say that’s good evidence. I do wonder if she’s just trying to triangulate a way to talk about it, or maybe getting at some deeper property of Light like mundane light’s wave/particle duality. …Sorry to derail. I just thought, if Light behaved more like light, we might be able to make better guesses about how likely it is for something like an anti-Adonalsium Light to exist. Or to predict how it might behave. Without that parallel relationship, our best bet for figuring out anything about Adonalsium’s tones would be extrapolation from Shards, not real-world physics. Like, knowing whether the Pure Tones of dead Shards stop working, or of combined Shards change, would be necessary first steps to deciding whether the OP was on the right track. At least regarding the possibility of an anti-Adonalsium tone, if not exactly what that would do to other pure tones, let alone normal matter.

I obviously don’t know, but I assumed it had to do with the strange sphere that wasn’t Voidlight. The one that, in RoW

Is there an in-text or WoB reason this thread refers to Lights as a "gaseous" Investiture? They definitely get described like steam a lot, but I thought that was a consequence of Investiture semi-solidifying, not a characteristic of the Light itself. Are they more like the Mists and less like actual light than I was thinking?

I’ve been wondering when someone would point out that Kaladin keeps getting described as passionate. There’s also his history of hating Lighteyes to draw on in shooting down arguments he’s Odium’s opposite. Yeah, Kaladin’s a terrible fit for an avatar of hatred seeking to destroy instead of protect, but he’s definitely not opposite Odium. The question, then, is whether a passionate nature makes him someone who could be touched by Odium’s power naturally in the tower, or someone who is likely to be overwhelmed by Odium like T in the future. Current evidence leans toward the former, imo. It definitely makes more sense for Kaladin to e stuck with a combined Honor + Odium, though I don’t see that as where we’re going. I doubt he’s getting to sleep well and live a normal life either, but Dalinar or Leshwi both seem like better fits for an Odium/Honor combo. However, combining dual Shards again seems so much like what’s expected that I question the likelihood. What I wonder is whether we’re going to get something even more intense. If Dalinar really went overboard on being Unity, such as forging a Unity version of the Honor Shard focused more narrowly on connections and Adhesions, we could get a number of interesting possibilities. Like merging numerous Shards, better connecting worlds and Investiture systems, or binding Kaladin and Syl together more tightly than the current Nahel bond. As long as Dalinar doesn’t take that to the next extreme and try to unify all the Shards – whether in some new gestalt or Adonalsium again – there will be plenty of space for exploring whatever role each of these people is meant to fill.

So, right, I’m sorry my argumentative style doesn’t mesh with yours. I like going over points of an argument in exhaustive detail, and being nitpicky about wording. I like having people disagree with my points using their own arguments and nitpickiness. I like arguing using logos and ethos, but I tend toward this sort of exaggeration, myself, since pathos is kind of a default mode. I totally agree with your point, but I find it incomparably stronger the way you put it here than when it was exaggerated despite being perfectly well-supported without the exaggeration. Tons of other people were surely happy with the original way you said it, and even agreed vehemently with your point above about exaggeration. I assume there’s room for both takes. Still, it’s not surprising at least one person specifically took issue with the exaggeration. That’s why hyperbole is better at evoking feelings, and not, well, arguing. When the argument’s style is extreme, people tend to latch onto the style rather than the argument itself. Just like my walls of text mean most people will be happier to disagree (or ignore) without actually reading my argument, your auxesis means some people will be focus on discounting the style rather than the substance. But... …Wow, cool, nice to know this isn’t a personal attack against other people in the thread. Oh, wait. Welp, I’d be sure I’ve earned it, I’m pretty obnoxious. But that wasn’t (just) directed at me, and it’s kind of impolite to sound like you might be lambasting the whole thread instead of narrowly calling out a specific person who bothers you. Not that the other way’s very polite either. I kind of thought Lirin was the one we were meant to be attacking, here. I mean, I think with good reason, but it’s not a [Support] thread, so I came in expecting to get arguments.

Huh, didn’t realize how much that category would limit my responses. Outside Cosmere, my faves shift with mood. Usually based more on characters or worldbuilding than writing. I’m rereading a lot of things for some reason. Right now, American Gods and The Hate U Give. Sandman (graphic novel series) gets a reread every once in awhile if only for the early “battle” between the Sandman and Choronzon.

Yeah, Kaladin killing in Lirin’s shrine was painful for Lirin. The problem is that he took it too personally. It seemed as if he reacted so harshly because he was looking at his son and his legacy rather than at an independent human being, a patient, he knew was in bad shape. And he did know. Lirin chose to ignore his own medical knowledge that Kaladin fighting back was exactly how somebody overcome by battle fatigue would react to what he protected being threatened. Hesina’s scene suggests it is precisely because Kaladin is his son that Lirin instead elected to consider Kaladin a monster, a murderer, and someone itching to kill. And told him so to his face. Of course I don’t expect Lirin to know what clinical depression is. Lirin watched his son attempt to rescue a friend and defuse the situation with no violence, then when this failed, pointedly called Kaladin a monster who just wanted an excuse to kill. Avoiding inflicting that level of emotional damage on his son in that moment required nothing so implausible as modern mental health expertise. Again, I understand Lirin’s point of view, and why a person in his position and of his personality would react the way he did. That’s why I think he was excellently-written. But understanding exactly why Lirin behaved as he did, seeing from his perspective, just explains his actions – it doesn’t justify them, or make them more palatable.

Sadly, I mostly specialize in out-there Grand Unification theories. I’m pretty much always wrong, but thinking about how it all ties together and how the Cosmeric “magic” and physics work is probably more fun that way. I mean, how realistic would the Cosmere be if someone who can’t grasp quantum chromodynamics just “got” the underpinnings of all forms of Investment? Hence mostly being here to look, listen, and wonder.

Kaladin. I always gravitate toward the ones who are broken in particular ways, the rare times an author writes them believably. This time is eerily true to life.

Mostly here to see everybody's thoughts on, well, everything Cosmere-related. If I share mine, tell me why I'm wrong (or right, it could happen) and I'll add you to my next soulstamp.

Haha, yes, I feel very strongly about this.Though it's more fun if you point out what speculation you're talking about, especially if you have contradictory facts. I thought I was pretty clear in my waffling, saying things like "seems" when it's just supposition, but that doesn't mean I wasn't making illogic leaps anyway.

Sorry, this is anything but a concise thought. Obviously people will have vastly different opinions, and Lirin goes out of his way to tear Kaladin down. But it's pretty harsh to say Lirin has no redeeming qualities. Yes, he fails to understand his son at all, too caught up in who he wants Kaladin to be. He put Kal, as a child, into a line of work that was inevitably going to mentally/emotionally cripple somebody who cannot separate out his emotions and sense of responsibility from the prices of doing what is necessary or being unable to prevent horrors. Lirin was emotionally manipulative and abusive even in Kal's childhood, withholding approval unless his son did exactly as he wanted. Adding responsibility, withholding approval, and sneering at the protection Kaladin attempted even back when Kal chose to go into battle with Tien was pretty much a recipe for exacerbating mental health issues in someone with Kal's personality and clinical depression. Doing more of the same now, only with added derision for Kaladin's choices to kill to protect, is despicable. Lirin can't pretend inflicting this kind of emotional pain is better than inflicting physical violence. So yeah, I can't stand Lirin because of the way he treats his son, but how does Lirin doing more damage to Kaladin than any enemy (except possibly Moash) make him have no redeeming qualities? Unless you explain otherwise, I'm assuming your next comment's a big part of the reason you'd think this. But first, Lirin was a surgeon long before those orders reappeared. He saved lives, even if he destroyed his own family with his insistence on remaining in Hearthstone. Lirin taught Kaladin to do the right thing, to help people. Admittedly, he managed to inflict some pretty heavy sense of inferiority on Kaladin in the process, and no amount of positives in raising Kal counteract the negatives inflicted by devaluing both sons when they weren't doing exactly what Lirin wanted. But saying the redeeming qualities don't balance out the good lessons and deeds is very different from saying there are none. And second, how do 50-some magical healers make other types of doctors pointless? Even assuming several thousand healers some day, they can't be everywhere. Should they become widespread, there will be a necessary limitation of their services based on a Radiant-decided system that will probably initially center around getting to those fighting against Odium or those in allied strongholds. Surgeons will still be broadly needed for a long time. Maybe always, in more farflung areas. The Tower might be one of those places where they're rendered redundant sooner rather than later, but there are plenty of other places to help out. On the other end of the spectrum, though, I don't get how to not understand the vitriol against Lirin if you can understand disagreeing. A person who tells slaves to know their place, do their jobs well, and not try to escape is pretty reprehensible in the real world. And this is what Lirin did to Kal. Additionally, emotionally abusing a child, and continuing the trend when he's grown, isn't something people are able to avoid getting upset about. As for Lirin, wishing not to do harm is great, but repeatedly demeaning Kaladin for choosing to fight (when he had little choice most of the time), and calling his suicidally depressed son a monster, makes Lirin a hypocrite at best. Hurting someone with a spear does a lot less damage than that did to Kaladin. But mostly, how is Kaladin killing an enemy soldier who swung an axe at his head an unprovoked attack? No context is needed. Defending himself or others makes it not murder. Letting the other enemy go, especially by putting himself and his family more at risk, makes Kaladin not a monster. This should have been obvious to somebody as capable of segregating emotions and reason as Lirin, making the choice to call Kaladin a monster a calculated attack, an intentional act of harm targeting Kaladin's known weak points of self-perception. Yeah, Lirin thought Kaladin could – should – have backed down and let the enemy take his friend, since he didn't know they would hurt Teft...immediately, at least. Assuming Kaladin had been able to think clearly, rather than sleep-deprived and in the chronic hypervigilant state of PTSD under any stressor, maybe he would have reasoned some response other than fighting as more appropriate. I doubt Kaladin could have just let Teft be taken, though, because Kaladin's emotions and logic are too intertwined. Which Lirin knew. Or had no excuse not to know, at least, given all his comments about Kal needing to grow callouses for surgery. Lirin is far more sociopathic than Kaladin. Not to say that this is a bad thing for somebody who has to cut people open to save their lives. Functions like this are surely why sociopathy exists, and it's a useful tool if not taken too far. But for Lirin to expect his son to be able to separate out emotion and thought now, in an emotionally fraught moment, when Kal never has before is irrational. This is where Lirin's own emotions overwhelm him. To lash out at Kaladin for being who he always has been is probably a fear reaction, but because it builds on previous comments, it's not just that. It's also willfully cruel, targeting his son's insecurities and fears about himself that Lirin has repeatedly stoked. Additionally, Kaladin seems to believe in negative responsibility in a way Lirin simply doesn't. Lirin was fine with letting Roshone's son die because he couldn't save him, but Kaladin always reacted viscerally to those who couldn't be saved in that kind of necessary triage. Lirin might consider it worse to kill even to protect, but Kaladin couldn't live with himself if somebody died because he failed to protect them. Killing in order to prevent somebody else from dying is a sacrifice Kaladin has to make, for his conscience, or feel as if he killed the ones he wanted to save. So, to Kaladin, letting Teft die would be as bad as murdering him, whereas Lirin didn't seem to care about that potential consequence as long as his son's hands weren't dirty...and the clinic wasn't bloodied. Lirin considered Kaladin guilty for the things he had done; Kaladin considered himself guilty both for the things he had done and those he had failed to do or prevent. Lirin was fine with pacifism because he didn't buy into negative responsibility as heavily, whereas standing by and doing nothing tore Kaladin apart. Those of us who bothered to get to know Kaladin at all, unlike his father, have every right to be furious at Lirin for tearing his son down repeatedly as if he thought that would let him rebuild Kaladin the way he wanted. This is something done to soldiers or others who are needed to be deindividualized cogs in a machine. It's not something you do to your child if you care about them as a person rather than some sort of extension of your own dreams. We don't just understand Lirin, we also understand the consequences of his actions for someone suffering from sometimes-debilitating depression and self-castigation. Knowing that, we don't just disagree with Lirin; we're upset with him, too. Because he seems to understand those consequences, if not as well as we do – yet he chooses to treat Kaladin like this anyway. Just...yeah. Some fathers don't realize what they're doing to their kids, and it's possible to be more frustrated than furious. Possible. But Lirin spent years essentially telling his son he was too sensitive, trying to subject him to enough horror to get over the inability to shut off emotional responses in moments of crisis. Then he claims Kaladin committed murder by fighting back instead of rolling over, and calls him a monster for killing just the one person who threatened Kaladin when he was in a hypervigilant state. Lirin knows enough about his son that he doesn't need to understand the PTSD and the depression to know he's hurting Kaladin; and yet he keeps doing it. tl;dr Lirin's bad at being a father to someone with that kind of clinical depression, but he's useful as a surgeon. He is not overall a terrible person, but more narrowly is, and deserves the vitriol, for calling Kal a monster and a murderer for self-defense. And @Bigmikey357 pretty much said everything that needed said.