Questioner (paraphrased)
What is the relationship between Nightwatcher and Cultivation?
Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)
I expected a hard RAFO, but he said Nightwatcher compared to Cultivation is similar to Stormfather compared to Honor.
Found 626 entries in 0.102 seconds.
What is the relationship between Nightwatcher and Cultivation?
I expected a hard RAFO, but he said Nightwatcher compared to Cultivation is similar to Stormfather compared to Honor.
So the Cognitive realm. Is Shadesmar a Roshar specific term?
Shadesmar is Roshar specific term, but when I translate from what other people are saying in these books I just translate it to Shadesmar. So for instance when Wit is talking about it he's going to call it Shadesmar. He's just going to use the Roshar term. But no, Shadesmar is what it's called there.
The Heralds seem to be insane in the ways of their Divine Attributes, at least somewhat. Is this because they're Heralds? As Cognitive Shadows, they're subject to people's perception, like how spren are?
That's a very astute question, and yes, that is influencing them quite a bit. I'm doing something here with the Heralds. Like, I want the Heralds "madnesses," as we call them, to be magical diseases. And the contrast of something like Kaladin's depression, which I'm trying to treat very real-world. I'm trying to treat them as these things that couldn't exist in our world. They're fantastical mental diseases, like we have fantastic physical diseases in Elantris. So I did make them thematic, and I would say part of the reason for that is people's perception of them and their mental state reacting against that. And that should be a theme among all of the Heralds.
We’ve seen the Cognitive Realm now on Roshar with the spheres and Scadrial with the mists. So what does it look like on Nalthis and Sel?
Uh that is a big fat RAFO.
If the Stormfather were to turn into a blade for Dalinar, would it be bigger than other Shardblades?
Um… That's a RAFO. *people get excited* That doesn't mean that I'm going to answer it, that means that answering it would either canonize something I don't want to canonize or it would mean that it is something irrelevant and I don't want to send fans spiraling into-- and so... It doesn't necessarily mean that something that will be included in the books.
Are the Unmade and the Stormfather the same "class" of being?
Technically no, but they are on a similar level. It is a good analogy.
Does magic happen on Sel because areas have a stronger cognitive presence, like, more sentient life in that area.
Uhhh, no, good question, good question. That is not the answer. I am going to give it in the Cosmere collection if people don't guess it by then. So I'm going to leave off, I could tell you right now but, I can't remember if anyone has guessed it or not.
Is it related to tectonics?
No, it's all kinda going in the wrong direction. I haven't really given you the clues to figure it out, I don't think. Once I say it, it will make a lot of sense.
Is it normal for people to become Connected to an area after being there for a bit, like with Kel and wherever he was when he found the Ire, or is something special going on?
It is normal for a Cognitive Shadow to get stuck to places, because they exist through investiture it is normal for them to get tied to an area. Kelsier was still in Scadrial when he found the Ire. This happened with Odium and the two shards on Roshar, Preservation to Ruin, and the Heralds.
Why does the Stormfather consider himself dead, or will that be covered?
That will be covered, eventually.
Would Cognitive Shadows that travel to Threnody automatically turn into Shades?
Uhh… No. Good question.
Are there special effects if someone's born in the Cognitive Realm, or conceived or lives?
I will say yes, there are. They may not be large or overt, but there is a difference. Excellent question!
To what extent do the Shades of Threnody remember their lives? Silence’s grandmother appears to recognize her but on the whole Shades don’t really act like people. Kelsier however, the other main example of a Cognitive shadow, seems little altered from his living state.
Shades of Threnody are not as self-aware as other shadows.
You've mentioned several philosophical concepts used in the writing of your books, like Jung's collective unconsciousness, Plato's cave. Could you expand a bit on your use of those in your books, and whether you think it is necessary to use philosophy to make a good fantasy world?
I don't think it's necessary at all. The writer's own fascinations--whatever they are--can add to the writing experience. But yes, some philosophical ideas worked into my fiction. Plato's theory of the forms has always fascinated, and so the idea of a physical/cognitive/spiritual realm is certainly a product of this. Human perception of ideals has a lot to do with the cognitive realm, and a true ideal has a lot to do with the spiritual realm.
As for more examples, they're spread through my fiction. Spinoza is in there a lot, and Jung has a lot to do with the idea of spiritual connectivity (and how the Parshendi can all sing the same songs.)
Not completely sure where Spinoaza comes in. I guess the shards are part of the natural world and have no personality without a human wielder.
Yes on Spinoza there, and also the idea of God being in everything, and everything of one substance. Unifying laws. Those sorts of things. (Less his determinism, though.)
Are the strange refractive properties of Invested Light related to the backwards shadows in the Cognitive Realm and Axies the Collector?
Yes!
Are spren able to visit other planets than Roshar?
So, spren are, because of the nature of their Investiture, connected too strongly to the planet to normally get off. That doesn't mean it couldn't happen, but I will just say, normally no.
So the Cognitive Realm, or whatever that sort of like-- is that different on other planets?
Yes. It looks different on each planet, partially based on perception.
Does Dalinar bond with the Stormfather differ from any other spren bond?
This bond is a little different.
Is Thaidakar a Cognitive Shadow?
Yes he is. Have you finished Rhythm of War?
I have, yeah.
So you know who Thaidakar is, right?
No. Does it say in the book?
No, but it calls him... It's Kelsier. They call him the Lord of Scars, someone else confirmed it, it's Kelsier.
The "Lord of Scars" thing is what had us thinking, but we weren't sure if it was true.
It is Kelsier. He's been doing some stuff.
Can a Shard hold on to the Cognitive Shadow of a person for later use?
Yes, that can indeed happen.
Without it being fully Invested?
You don’t have to fully Invest it, no. They would have to do some Investing shenanigans, but what you’re asking is quite possible, very possible.
So, for instance, let me give you a corner case. You might be asking: could Endowment send somebody back later than immediately after they have passed away? The answer would be “yes.”
I’m gonna tell you, I have no immediate plans to do that, but it is possible within the framework of the cosmere.
Why are [Cognitive] Shadows so much more prevalent on Threnody?
That's a good question. Which is a RAFO. Sorry.
What does the Stormfather think of Cultivation?
He thinks the same as Honor thinks.
Mr.T has his emotional intelligence inversely attached to his logical intelligence. in the physical realm, this means that on his emotional days, he is functionally a blithering idiot. The physical realm is more logic oriented, so that makes sense.
However, would this inverted intelligence express itself DIFFERENTLY perhaps in the cognitive or spiritual realm? In the world of forms, emotion, and identity, could weepy/drooly Mr.T express some unique insight inside of Shadesmaar?
This is a theory with merit.
Reading Mistborn: Secret History, Kelsier sees fauna and flora in the Cognitive Realm. How does that work, are there people thinking about...
You'll see, there's actual... there's an actual ecosystem in Shadesmar.
Even if people aren't really--
Yeah. Well, think about it this way. The places people are thinking about will create landscape that this stuff can grow on. Where they're not thinking about it, there's just not going to be anything there, so nothing is going to grow.
I want to know how Hoid travels between worlds. Or, if you're not going to tell me right now, will we ever find out?
Hoid has travelled between the worlds by getting in one Shardpool in Shadesmar and coming out a different one. *pause* Okay? So that is one method he has used to travel between the worlds. The worlds are connected through Shadesmar. Um, things that people don't think about as much reflect very minorly in Shadesmar, so when you-- all the-- most of the space between planets is cut out, and there's some weird, twisted geography going on there. So that's basically how he does it, Cognitive Realm.
Odium locked the Selish Shards in the Cognitive Realm to keep them from achieving sentience or someone Ascending.
Is there a Shadesmar for each planet?
Yes. Anything that people think about, right? And, you really have to be inhabited to get a good Shadesmar… But, y'know, you can find the gas giants in Shadesmar, but they don't manifest as an entire plane. Um, that's gonna change! But we're years away from that. Shadesmar is cool and weird but--
Ohh, there's only one Shadesmar with different areas--
Yeah, really what we call it-- Shadesmar is a term that has started to stick in the cosmere for the Cognitive Realm. But there are manifestations of most planets. Or all planets.
But they do all exist-- All of those Shadesmars are part of the same cloth, so to speak.
Yes, you could walk from one to the other, barring some weird distortions that you might have to-- We're not going to dig-- I'm not gonna tell you about.
But spren can't because they're bound.
They're bound Physically to the Realm, the Invesiture.
Unless you help them off.
Unless-- There are certain ways you could do it, and things like that. But spren are bound, you aren't going to--
How would the city of Boston change over time in the Cognitive Realm, because its harbors have been constantly filled in with dirt?
Right, right, right. It will change to match, but there will be a time lapse, right? They'll be lagging behind.
So, you could dump it full of dirt, and then it might take like five or ten years before it actually appears as land.
Yeah, that's exactly about how it would go.
Is there a magic system that best allows people to worldhop between worlds?
Yes, but it isn't needed. Some do help more with understanding how to traverse the Cognitive Realm.
In the cosmere, if everyone on a planet believes unicorns exist, would some kind of unicorn shadow appear in the Cognitive Realm as a result?
If yes, could you create an actual, physical unicorn out of it?
No, it's not going to quite work this way. What's going to happen if everyone believes unicorns exist, but they don't, there's various things that could happen. You might end up with some Investiture taking on this persona and becoming this, but it's not like you can create it, but over time you might end up with the equivalent of a spren. Then it's not going to be just a physical unicorn running around. It's gonna have more spren aspects, and my guess would be that over time these things feed each other. Right? Like people see one, and then they describe, "This is what it looked like," and that changes the public perception to better match. And then over thousands of years what you end up with is, "Hey there's things in the forest over there that are a type of mysterious creature that are transparent and look a little like a horse with a horn, but maybe fly," or things like this. You would end up with something in the middle, between the two of them.
Things wouldn't naturally pop up on Shadesmar unless there's free Investiture in that same sort of way.
Say something is brought into the Cognitive Realm, and then the actual object is brought in through a portal…
That’s a RAFO, good question.
Given what happens at the end of the book, is Yumi immortal now? If not, does she age?
Her perception is going to influence this. She's going to need a small bit of power to persist, but she is so highly invested that it would take a very long time for that to be noticeable. Particularly because she's not even using that power. There's no out let for it. She's a Cognitive Shadow, much like the Heralds or Vasher, that is more self sustaining because of how highly she is invested. Imagine someone like Vasher with thousands of Breaths. You're just never going to notice. But her perception of herself will cause her to age. Probably not to age to the point that she dies though. Basically the answer is yes. You've got an immortal being running a noodle shop in a backwater corner of the Cosmere.
You've mentioned several times that traveling to Shadesmar [the Cognitive Realm] on Sel is incredibly dangerous. Would reassembling Devotion and Dominion solve this problem?
Yes, I suppose that could work, yes.
Is the difficulty of moving Investiture offworld specific to Cognitive Realm travel, or does it affect travel in the Physical Realm (for example space travel)? For example, if Kaladin summons Syl as a Shardblade, could he take her on a spaceship and travel to another system?
They would have the same difficulty.
Will we ever get to see or experience the Cognitive Realm on any other planets to the extent that we have on Roshar?
Yes.
Are there inhabitants there like there are in Shadesmar?
Yes.
Is there a separate "Shadesmar" for each planet or is it one big place that are all connected with different regions for each planet?
It's one big place with different sections.
So since its one big place, could spren travel to a different section that correlates with a different planet, such as the cognitive segment for Scadrial?
They could go there, but they wouldn't usually...
Is that because Honor's influence is only on Roshar?
*Brandon gave sort of a noncommittal half nod, but looked doubtful himself. Maybe best to interpret this last answer as a RAFO rather than reading into it too much.*
Has the Stormfather ever become a Blade in the past for previous Bondsmiths?
RAFO.
Can you use Allomancy in the Cognitive Realm?
Yes... you can.
In Words of Radiance, there's a fragment that says that the Bondsmiths have a power that none of the other Orders have.
That will be answered in a future book... *discussion on RAFOs* Basically, each of the Orders actually had their own quirks and individual things. Some of them were more dramatic than others. But if you watch through, you'll be seeing that they kind of have some different effects that aren't related necessarily to the Surges.
So, then follow-up question, the reason that the Bondsmiths don't get Shards is because they have that extra power?
The reason is because the Stormfather is particularly-- how he is. And he's more cantankerous than he was, even in the past...
Each of the Orders, I wanted to have a lot of individuality. I didn't want them to all just be different copy-clones. You'll also find that they also have very different philosophies on even things like honor and what is good and things like that.
Imagine a hypothetical Shard of Tenacity. What happens when the Vessel of that Shard dies?
The magic will change drastically. Among other things, it would be very easy for practitioners of that magic to become Cognitive Shadows.
Does a person have to die before they can become a Cognitive Shadow?
Yes. Depending on your definition of dying?
The physical body dies.
Yes.
Has the Cognitive Realm of Scadrial changed at all since Sazed redid everything?
I'll RAFO that, I'll RAFO that.
What does the Cognitive Realm of Sel look like?
RAFO!
While rereading HoA I decided to do a bit of research on an informant. But I also found another interesting tidbit on Theoryland.
http://www.theoryland.com/intvmain.php?i=727#35
This WoB. It implies TenSoon is eventually going to be able to reconnect with Vin, or at least, someone with Hemalurgic spikes is going to be able to communicate with someone that's departed to "The Beyond" (or the Spiritual Realm)...
Yeah, this looks like one where I was tired from answering a lot of questions, and was thinking about Kelsier--I was really excited to write Secret History back then. I realize that it wouldn't make sense for Kelsier to want to talk to TenSoon, but you'd be surprised the things that you say sometimes when you're trying to write in someone's book, keep yourself from giving too many spoilers, but also answer questions. You can go on auto-pilot sometimes for a minute or two, answering questions that my brain THINKS someone asks, when it's not one they actually asked. Or mashing together two questions, and having a kind of crossed-wires brain moment. You can see me do this on Reddit sometimes too, if you look back through my history. I often catch it and edit to explain myself, but not always This was during the era when I was heavily laying foreshadowing to fans for Kelsier's return, so it wouldn't feel like a cheat when I eventually got to Secret History. So I was looking for opportunities to talk about people with spikes communicating with the Cognitive Realm. I can't remember. There's also a possibility that I was still contemplating Vin staying, which she could have done, as someone who'd carried one of the powers. Either way, I made the call that even bringing Kelsier back was dangerous for undermining consequences, and having Vin hang around would be counter to her character arc and the arc of the stories. So Vin and TenSoon won't be talking any time soon. Sorry to shut down conversation on this one, and sorry to lead you on.
If you went to Shadesmar on Scadrial would there be spren there?
"Spren" is a term for things on Roshar. So yes, there are a few, but they're from Roshar originally.
What happened to Rand? He's not dead?
So Robert Jordan wrote everything from Rand stumbling out of Shayol Ghul until the ending, with the exception of the Perrin scenes, which I added to that epilogue. Harriet says--his wife--says he sat laughing to himself as he wrote the scene with the pipe, but he did not tell her what it means.
Pipe?
The pipe where he-- he lit the pipe just by thinking about it.
That's also something-- he's using the Tel'aran'rhiod power to light it in the real world?
I do not know. Now, I have my theories. I think that because Rand touched the Pattern directly, when he was doing what he was doing, that he now has influence over the Pattern.
So he can change and manipulate things? But he's-
That's what I think, but Robert Jordan didn't say, and he did write those scenes himself before he passed away. So, I wrote the actual Last Battle-
All of it? That was so epic.
Yes. So he took over-- where he left was right when Rand stumbles out. The Last Battle chunk before that was me. He wrote Mat in the Tower of Ghenjei... He wrote most of Egwene in The Gathering Storm, and then little snippets of Egwene all the way through. Perrin was almost one hundred percent me; he didn't leave much on Perrin. With Rand, he wrote little chunks here and there...
So I do not know. Now, I can tell you that there in the notes that when the balefire streams, when they crossed, intertwined [Rand's] soul with Moridin's soul. And one thing that his assistant said is that the [soul] that wanted to live found the body that was going to live, and the [soul] that wanted to die found the body that was dying. And that's what happened.
They swapped bodies because he had this thing-- Why didn't he go in and say "hey everybody?" ...He didn't want to be with his family and friends anymore?
I think he probably came back-- He just needed a break. I'm pretty sure that he eventually let them know, but he just needed a little time. So, but I don't know for sure.
I thought it was super cool, going in, the chase between Slayer and Perrin.
I had a lot of fun with that scene.
...Also, you told me last time I saw you, that Tel'aran'rhiod is basically-- Is that kind of where you got the idea of the parallel universe in the other books?
Yeah, Shadesmar. Shadesmar you can tie directly back to my love of Tel'aran'rhiod. It's kind of mixed with that in my love of some ancient Greek philosophy things that are not that important, but yeah.
Can you describe what Shadesmar looks like on either Nalthis or Sel.
Yeah. On Sel? Looks like a big old storm that will destroy you. More than a storm, it's like a big pressurized-- it's like plasma, almost. It is really dangerous. Really dangerous. That 'cause the Dor is hanging out there.
How big are the beads from Shadesmar?
...Bean-size, not as big as spheres.
Spheres are the size of your thumbnail, right?
Spheres are a little bigger than that. They're like a big marble. Not quite as big as a shooter.
Could you write a clue about Shadesmar on my shirt?
Shadesmar has much investiture in some places.
Does the Expanse of the Broken Sky refer to Taldain?
RAFO.
Do the Heralds need to consume Investiture in order to stay in their body?
No. Good question. Excellent question. They're asking if they're like Returned and they need to consume a Breath each week.
Would it be harder for Jasnah to Soulcast a Knight Radiant?
Yes.
Would it be harder for her to Soulcast a Mistborn?
Yes, Investiture resists Investiture. It's harder for her to even Soulcast a person than a rock, right?
Is a Mistborn Invested?
The Mistborn, while they're burning the metal. They are not specifically Invested when they are not burning. When the Investiture becomes active, then yes. Before, no.
So Kelsier, he stayed around longer, not because he was Invested, but because he had the potential to use Investiture?
Over time using the magic will Invest you, on Scadrial. Most of the power is not coming from, on Roshar the power isn't coming from the person either [he cut himself off, so I assume this is how it works on Scadrial even though he didn't finish his thought] so I'm going to have to back up on that one and say, yes, the Mistborn are as Invested as a Knight Radiant, because in both cases the majority, bulk, of the power is coming from somewhere else, but there is the Spiritweb. Investing the wrong term, but you have all these connections in the Spiritual Realm, so yanking you away from them, or rewriting them is harder.
Would they be harder with more Stormlight or metals burning?
Yes, yes. That would increase the difficulty ratio. For instance, wearing Shardplate is gonna be a great barrier, right, and things like that so yeah. The problem is like, Invested is the wrong term for that, their Spiritweb is connected in different ways.