TalenelStonesiniew

Unless Taravargian is a puppet dangling on Cultivation's strings. SHE decides when he has good days and when he has bad days.

The problem with with Taravangian is his boon was egocentric. "How can I save the world." instead of "How can the world be saved." The difference might seem slim, but they are oceans apart. Taravangian is acting is his OWN interests. The double-cross is Nightwatcher/Cultivation is USING taravangian's self interest to achieve victory over Odium. Taravangian is not an instrument in Roshar's salvation, he is merely a tool.

GRRM is a glass half empty guy. BS is a glass half full guy. Both are valid viewpoints. I personally align with BS's viewpoint. It's hard to feel that way in today's world and I feel myself drifting to GRRM's viewpoint, so I appreciate reading books written by a talented author who writes amazing fantasy that is realistic, yet full of hope

Jenet, I think that is what makes the 4th oath so difficult for Kaladin. It's opposing emotions. Kaladin wants to protect everyone. That is who he is. Yet, the 4th oath is diametric to his very being. I cannot protect everyone. He's not ready to admit that.

Great post Jenet. I just wanted to say I totally agree with you about point #1. Kaladin's 4th oath is going to involve self forgiveness in some way. He's very similar to Rand al'Thor in his carrying the burden of guilt for those who have died under the aegis of his protection. He'll have to learn that he can't save everyone, and he can't hold himself as a failure for that.

I have an theory. Kaladin is going to become a Herald. We know that this series is going to be split in two subseries of 5, with a number of years between them. We also have a better understanding of how the oathpact works, and the consequences for the Heralds. With Jezrain, Herald of the Windrunners dead, someone will need to take his place to fulfill the Oathpact. My general inclination is that the end of the 5th book will result in a draw between the Honor/Cultivation and Odium, and the Oathpact will be enacted. Kaladin, who will be a 5th heightening Windrunner by the end of the 5th book, will take Jezrain's place in locking Odium up, back on Braize, with all the consequences that entitles. If other Heralds die to Moash's blade, then their highest ranking Radiant will take their place in Braize. We could see Shallan, Jasnah, etc; all being the replacements for the the Heralds of their respective order fulfilling the Oathpact at the end of the desolation. The second half of Stormlight archive starts when one of the heralds breaks, and starts another desolation. My guess will be Taln breaks. He's held out for 4500 years, and his mind is already broken. It wouldn't take much to break it again. So we get a second desolation for the second half of the series, 10-15 years after the end of book 5.

Soulcast the bags of sugar at the grocery store into salt.

I actually think there is some merit to this. First of all, lets look at Allomancy. We know that the catalyst is the "burning" of the metals themselves. Vaporizing a bead of metal (ie turning the mass of the metal into energy, via E=MC^2) is a MUCH larger expenditure of energy than than with Stormlight investure, which lowers the temperature of the ground/air (at least for Windrunners) surrounding the surgebinder. This actually ties in really well to Scandrial being a low investure world and Roshar being a high investure world. Let me explain. I'm a biologist by education, and we learn the importance of concentration gradients early as freshman year in college. It requires a LOT more energy to move something across the gradient than with the gradient. The amount of investure on Scandrial is low enough that the resistance to the investure would require a much larger expenditure of energy in the catalytic reaction (consumption of the metals) to move the investure across the gradient. With Stormlight, the investure is high on Roshar, thus the amount of energy required to move the investure across the gradient is much, much lower due to the "ionic" difference being much closer to neutral than on Scandrial. Hence, the expenditure of energy in the form of heat (if that is in the fact catalyst) is much lower. As for Fedelpen's last two sentences, I don't think the author of this thread is implying that investure is caustic towards the shard itself, but rather the medium used as a catalyst.

Understandable, I didn't intend to use this forum as a pulpit for beliefs that I don't necessarily believe in. However, I did think it was pertinent to the topic on hand as far as shaping our understanding of Realmatic theory. Afterall, many writers draw on personal beliefs to create the world in which their writings exist. Terry Goodwind is a good example of this. Edit: Windrunner, if you feel you need to remove my post or you would like me to do it, feel free to do so.

I'm also a mormon, though I have to admit I haven't practiced the religion in a while. The theory that the opening poster presented makes a lot of sense, however it does seem to place too much emphasis on physicality. In other words a larger person with the access to the same amount of spiritual power would have a larger cognitive component. It seems this is refuted in the case of Vin being stronger than Ham and Kelsier, or at least stronger than they though she should be. If Sanderson used his religion to develop his realmatic theory, then it is beneficial to understand mormon doctrine in regards to this. Turos Stoneward is right in regards to the general doctrine that mormons follow, however I would like to add my thoughts to this. First, the founder of the mormon religion stated that there are two eternal things in the universe. The first is matter and the second is intelligence. In other words, both of those things were not created in the sense that is typically understood in the idea of God creating things. They exist outside the realm of creation because they have always been there. A way to explain it is that the intelligence that all humans have has always existed. Thus if you reduce a sentient being down to its most fundamental component, it would be the intelligence, ie the cognitive component. God then give these intelligences (us) spirits. After a period of time those who were most worthy and agreed to follow God's plan were given a physical body. While matter has always existed according to mormon doctrine, it is the last thing "added" to us as humans. The soul is the combination of all three things, intelligence, spirit, and body. So, IF realmatic theory follows mormon doctrine, then the order of importance or at least seniority would be intelligence (cognitive)> spirit (spiritual)> body (physical). Maybe importance is the incorrect term to use here, because all three components are required for us to enter into heaven but as far as the most ancient characteristic of humans to the most recent, that is the correct order. How this information validates or invalidates your theory is hard to say, but IF we're going to assume that Sanderson's personal beliefs are the basis for the realmatic theory, then the idea that cognition is merely a result of the spiritual and the physical overlapping - it doesn't jive with the doctrine of the mormon religion. If anything, the spiritual aspect provides a bridge between the cognitive aspect and the physical aspect in the LDS church. Another tidbit that might be helpful as pertaining to this discussion is that the founder of the mormon faith (Joseph Smith) said that spirit is matter, only a more refined and pure form of matter. A way to state this in modern terms, particularly as pertaining to General Relativity is that spirit is energy, as expressed by Einstein's E=mc^2.

So I was partially right! Spren did exist before Honor was shattered but some new ones came about after the shattering and some pre-existing spren changed..... Hmm. Very interesting. I think its possible the nature of surgebinding changed after honor died. Perhaps honorspren didn't exist until after the shattering. Somehow, I think this all ties into stormlight and the highstorms too. I don't think highstorms infused gems with stormlight until after Honor was shattered.

I would have to say the importance the "Spiritsong (?)" played in the ascendance of the bridgeburners. Also, the weird behavior of Quick Ben rubbing his face as he accesses the other souls he has.

Erickson's magic system is undervalued here. It is more subtle than just warrens. Later on you learn about the Holds. In addition, there are Elder Warrens which are immune to the affects of Otataral. In addition, you have the warlock based magic as first laid out in Chain of Dogs, which is really a more elemental/shamanistic/spiritbinding form of magic. The solution to keeping Chaos at bay by Anamander Purrake/Draconus is pretty elegant. Last but not least, you have the Soultaken and the D'ivers as well as the unique properties of both Icarium and Karsa Orlong.

I'm not offended. To be honest, my thoughts on this are primitive and the way I expressed it wasn't very clear. As far as the spren goes, that was more of a musing on my part, unrelated to the theory I espoused later in the paragraph. Personally, I think spren have been around as long as Roshar has been around, though the fact there is evidence as yet of spren in Shin lands (where the Highstorm is very weak) is interesting. As far as the highstorms being a result of honor, I thought I had read that here, but I either must have imagined it or read it on a different forum. It somewhat makes sense to me, because looking at it from the viewpoint of honor - He knew or at least suspected that Odium would kill him. He needed a way to impart his power after his death. In the case of the heralds, what if they were each directly invested with a splinter of the shard of Honor (before his death) and had a direct link to stormlight that didn't require the use of gems infused during highstorms? The Honorblades themselves could be actually shards of the Shard of Honor that not only could be used as weapons but as the fuel required for the lashings and surgebinding of the Heralds. Anyway, so honor is dying, he needs a way to give his power after his death. He makes it so either he causes the Highstorms or he dies and shatters in the Sea of Origination and the highstorms serve as a delivery mechanism for stormlight (aka Honor's power), in this way he still can combat Odium's intent after his death. Now, about the Nahel bond - First, you said that the Heralds are divinities of sorts. Do we have evidence of that? From what we do know, as far as I understand, the only difference between the Heralds and the Radiants is that the Heralds have to follow the Oathpact and return to a place of torment between desolations. Additionally, their shardblades are probably different than the Radiant's blades. Aside from that, they could be just as human as the Radiant's, only directly invested with Honor's power. Now, about power levels. We see evidence that Kaladin's surgebinding ability grows stronger after he recites the second ideal - "I will protect those who cannot protect themselves." In correlation to that, Syl is the one that urged him to say the words, suggesting to me that Syl is able to provide Kaladin with stronger surgebinding power as a result of him doing so. This, along with the research of the old ardents, indicates to me that the symbiotic relationship between spren and surgebinder is strengthened or weakened depending on how you define not only the spren, but the surgebinder as well. There is a cognitive agreement between the two. We know the ideals comes from the Way of Kings. I merely postulate that the ideals from the Way of Kings is a reaffirmation of the ideals of the Oathpact. The Way of Kings provides a way for the formation of the Knights Radiant that follow the same ideals and provides the same strength of symbiosis between spren and surgerbinder as the Heralds had access to, with the benefit of restricting the Knights Radiant to following the ideals of the oathpact and preventing a misuse of surgebinding power. Therefore, the difference between Heralds and Knights Radiant could be as simple as the types of shardblades they had and where they got their stormlight power/fuel. (Heralds directly from honor, possibly from the Honorblades and the Radiants from highstorm infused gems) Please feel free to criticize my admittedly very fledgling theory and and flaws and strengths it may have.

I don't recall any specific mentions of highstorms in Dalinar's visions. I do remember him asking if there was a place they could go for protection during a highstorm and the woman he talked to was confused. The implication from that passage was that humanity didn't have access to soulstones to create such a place, but what if the real confusion is because there wasn't a need for such a place at that time? Or perhaps, maybe the highstorms did exist then but they didn't have the characteristic of providing stormlight. I don't know, I may be rambling, but some how I think honor is responsible for the highstorms being able to provide stormlight. I also feel just as strongly that the increased ferocity of the highstorms are not a symptom of the Final desolation, but rather a reaction to it. I don't have concrete evidence, but it seems to be right.

Do we have any evidence that Highstorms have been around longer than the last Desolation? My personal theory is that Highstorms are a result of the shattering of Honor. In other words, compared to the cycle of desolations on Roshar, it is a fairly new phenomenon. Evidence against that would be that Jezrien is called the Stormfather as well as the peculiar geology and ecology on Roshar, but in the instance of Jezrien, that can be explained by the corruption of truth into legend. Highstorms could merely be Honor's last defense/gift to man to help combat the Final Desolation in the form of providing stormlight, since Honor can't directly empower the Surgebinders any more now that he is dead. The closer to the final desolation we get, the more powerful and common the Highstorms become, because humanity will need more stormlight to combat Odium.

I don't think Szeth can be a surgebinder because Sanderson has stated that Szeth doesn't have a spren like Kaladin does. What if what Szeth can do is a inferior mimicry of real surgebinding? I'm wondering if the Nightwatcher is tied in to this.... Is the Nightwatcher near Shin lands?

It's an interesting theory, it would depend on if the spren have always existed. I've wondered if spren is more of a recent development as a result of honor dying. Theory that is commonly accepted is that the Highstorms is a result of Honor's death, and as a result, the Highstorms allow spent gems to be replenished with Stormlight. I think I lean towards spren being a natural phenomenon that has always existed on Roshar as a visual manifestation of the forces of nature which are at work on Roshar. However, Honor's death very well could have more of an affect on the world other than manifestations of Highstorms. Another concern I have with the Way of Kings text defining the Nahal bond is that wouldn't that mean that the Radiants would be stronger than the Heralds? I'm more inclined to believe that the Way of Kings is a thesis that extrapolates on the Oathpact. Until that happened, people outside the Heralds themselves had no access to the Nahal bond. In other words, when Kaladin says the words, and felt a surge of power, he is repeating the words that the original Heralds said long ago when they chose to follow the Oathpact that Honor created. The Way of Kings is a text that makes the words of the Oathpact available to everyone and allowing the formation of the Radiants. The parables that are in the Way of Kings is a teaching instrument to a deeper understanding of what following the Oathpact truly means. TL:DR version - Oathpact is the event that originally manipulated the spren. Surgebinding was/is possible without saying the words (as evidenced by Kaladin, he clearly had surgebinding powers before he said the words) but by saying the words, the bond between spren and the surgebinder grows in strength, but also mandates the surgebinder acts in an honorable way. The Way of Kings made the words available to everyone, which lead to the Radiants, which meant acts of unethical surgebinding would eventually die out due to being less powerful and being prosecuted by the Radiants.