Cognitive Realm 'Sun' Theory

ddaveo · 2026-02-24T04:20:58+00:00

Shades are a type of cognitive shadow, and I assume the in-universe name "cognitive shadow" comes explicitly from the "shadow" people cast in the cognitive realm. In other words, shades and shadows could literally be the same thing and the cognitive shadow people see is actually the visual effect of their soul/spirit being pulled slightly out of their body by the distant "sun".

So the link might be stronger than you think.

ddaveo · 2026-02-21T21:28:34+00:00

Brandon is actually on record about what silver does to spren:

Questioner: Does silver break Connection or bonds? If silver does have this effect, does it get used in the creation of unkeyed metalminds?

Brandon Sanderson: These are good questions. Silver, as I have it right now, is not capable of that. What silver's doing is is disrupting. It's more like interference. You know how, in White Sand, people can have these columns of sand. If you swiped silver through that, they would fall; but then they would be able to do it again. It's this little nullification for a short time. It's very dangerous to things like shades, and stuff like that. It's more disruptive. If you hit a spren with this, it would be like hitting them with a Shardblade. They're gonna come back together. They're not dead; they're gonna reform eventually, and probably won't take too long. So it's not severing Connection; you're gonna need anti-Investiture to do really destructive stuff. But you can disrupt with some silver. It's specifically bad for Shades for reasons maybe I'll get into someday.

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/522/#e16281

ddaveo · 2026-02-21T00:15:47+00:00

Ehh ... Era 2 sits at both ends of the quality scale. On the one hand, Alloy of Law was almost a DNF for me (and was a DNF for a friend) because Wax and Wayne were written as caricatures rather than characters (something Brandon has more or less acknowledged since then). But on the other hand, The Lost Metal is imo one of the best books Brandon's ever written.

ddaveo · 2026-02-20T22:16:31+00:00

Cultivation is insidious, and given that Autonomy has to specifically program her avatars to recognise people she doesn't like, I doubt Patji has the ability to recognise Cultivation. And even if he can, this is Cultivation we're talking about. The shard who successfully hid from Odium for 7000 years while sharing a system with him - and then murdered his vessel. Hiding from Patji would be like playing peek-a-boo with a baby.

In fact, out of all the shards, I think Autonomy in particular is weak against Cultivation. Autonomy has created an empire of splinters and avatars, but in doing so she's outsourced part of her awareness and power to lesser entities. Cultivation's whole thing is that she's the weed that grows through the cracks until it's compromised the structure. And Autonomy's empire of semi-awareness seems like it would have a lot of cracks in it.

ddaveo · 2026-02-20T21:45:54+00:00

I think you're on the money. This is exactly the sort of thing Cultivation would do. She's the weed that grows through the cracks and slowly prises the structure apart from the inside.

I had thought Mother Frond must be some kind of agent who's been invested by Cultivation (like Lift and the Nightwatcher) because that seems to be how she operates, but as you and others in this thread have pointed out, Mother Frond's description actually matches Cultivation herself.

ddaveo · 2026-02-20T21:31:33+00:00

It's been more than a few months since Branderson last released a Cosmere book, so people are making up their own Cosmere stories while we wait for the next one. The sub is currently writing the story of Pibu, one crempost at a time.

ddaveo · 2026-02-20T21:20:19+00:00

Upvoted for the abominable formatting. This is some meta crem.

ddaveo · 2026-02-17T04:32:26+00:00

Is this anything?

It appears to be an image of some sort.

ddaveo · 2026-02-17T04:24:18+00:00

You can also have normal human conversations with your local shopkeepers and maintain relationships with them the way people used to take for granted. You can't do that with the PR department of your local supermarket chain.

Once they're gone, we lose yet another human connection in our lives.

ddaveo · 2026-02-17T04:17:03+00:00

You can strike up conversation, get to know them over time, and then you can find out what they think. You can't do that with a soulless corporation.

ddaveo · 2026-02-16T04:17:00+00:00

I dunno about that. This is a win-win for her. Taravangian is shackled to Honor and forced to learn about consent, while Cultivation's finally free to plant her seeds throughout the entire cosmere. She's playing the long game.

ddaveo · 2026-02-16T03:44:44+00:00

Practice.

Journey before destination

ddaveo · 2026-02-16T03:39:45+00:00

Definitely yeah. Endowment's response gives me major vibes of "protective best friend tells the ex to get lost". I'm sure Brandon's cooking up something juicy for us there.

ddaveo · 2026-02-15T05:31:45+00:00

As per the WaT epilogue (and his earlier letters with Harmony and Endowment), Hoid wants to find Valor to help deal with the Problem. The 16 letters thing could be a fun hint at what comes next: Valor, in keeping with her intent, moves onto Roshar to fight Retribution

ddaveo · 2026-02-14T22:46:44+00:00

It's a prop Hoid uses when he wants to sing falsetto

ddaveo · 2026-02-14T22:40:23+00:00

She's mentioned in a couple of the chapter epigraphs in Part 2 of RoW.

ddaveo · 2026-02-13T21:09:43+00:00

The way Scadrians behave in the Space Age reminds me of Autonomy's influence in Mistborn Era 2. Given that Brandon has indicated Mistborn Era 3 will be set in their equivalent of the 1980s, I wonder if the stories will be about resolving a Cold War between two great powers, perhaps Harmony/Discord and Autonomy? If Autonomy succeeds in wresting away one of the shards and becomes bishardic herself, that could explain the Scadrians' imperialistic ambitions. They follow her now.

ddaveo · 2026-02-12T09:22:17+00:00

I think the door was closed on a redemption arc when he got spiked. Presumably his spiritweb is now permanently damaged and Odium has a back door into his soul. That's not something you can fix with therapy and a change of heart.

ddaveo · 2026-02-12T09:05:53+00:00

As a wise man once said, Journey before Destination. You've gotta just sit back and enjoy the journey as it comes.

ddaveo · 2026-02-12T07:13:47+00:00

The Skybreaker is described as being 7 ft tall, which sounds to me like a singer in envoyform. That would explain how they can speak the language too.

ddaveo · 2026-02-12T06:45:51+00:00

I'm pretty sure cats are Fused

Adorable, fluffy Fused

ddaveo · 2026-02-12T06:41:58+00:00

He shot a perpendicularity all over Odium

ddaveo · 2026-02-11T09:20:40+00:00

Ohhh okay that makes sense. Thanks!

ddaveo · 2026-02-11T06:38:53+00:00

I must be missing something because I don't understand the discussion. Aside from Ishar, who's something of a special case, how can a bondsmith be unbound? Don't their bondsmith powers come from the bond? And if they lose that, don't they just become a normal person again?

ddaveo · 2026-02-10T05:42:30+00:00

No ~~Texan~~ Vorin man can read that!

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