Will Rand kill the DO?

[Knivy]

Apparently there hasn't been infinite turnings...

 

"I am not the Dragon! My name is Rand Al'-!" Rand camped is teeth shut to stop himself.

"Oh, I know the name you use now, Lews Therin. I know every name you have used through Age after Age, long before you were even Kinslayer." Ba'alzamon's voice began to rise in intensity; sometimes the fires of his eyes rose so high that Rand could see them through the openings of the silk mask, see them like endless sea of flame. " I know you, know your blood and your line back to the first spark of life that ever was, back to the First Moment...."

[FarShainMael]

But was that the First Moment of this Turning? Ba'alzamon speaks of Age after Age, not Turning after Turning, which may be significant.

 

If successive Turnings are separated by a Big Crunch / Big Bang event, there would be a first spark of life in each Turning.

[Cybertrolloc]

Author fiat is that those don't happen in WoT, FarShainMael :)

 

The category error in the OP is that the Fal Dara message is prophecy, per author it likely isn't. I think that was a QotW answer, hence at least given some thought by RJ (though maybe not for what's currently under discussion). Anyway he gives several possibilities for what it might be in that passage. ETA: QotW didn't say what I thought, mea culpa. Even if that's adapted from Foretelling/whatever, life everlasting is what everybody already has after all. I'd also point out that there's other men that channel in the series to be cheeky.

 

Not sure where the Flicker passage or Rand's/others' death(s) in Prophecies are accounted for, as described they are somehow (pattern and all). Whether the Pattern grabs other surrogates (ta'varens people) or gives them some kind of unlikely do-over...prophecy tends to be pretty vague after all. If those are actual other realities, what's to say prophecies are the same there (and that's a stretch because there's many other things that could be going on besides actually seeing other lives or ways your life could have gone--the heroes laugh at chance all the time).

 

It's certainly tricky to make too much (sometimes any) sense out of the cosmology of WoT...it only goes so deep (remember the author's distaste for the most stunningly successful branch of science yet that makes things like this forum possible lol).

[avernite]

But was that the First Moment of this Turning? Ba'alzamon speaks of Age after Age, not Turning after Turning, which may be significant.

 

If successive Turnings are separated by a Big Crunch / Big Bang event, there would be a first spark of life in each Turning.

 

That kind of doesn't work with the WoT world having myths of our time AND us having myths of WoT time. How would the myths go past that big crunch?

[Dagon Thyne]

I do not think the DO is supposed to be killed. I think he is supposed to be resealed to await the next turning of the wheel.

 

The DO is not some evil demon, he is the spirit of destruction and chaos. And the Creator is the spirit of creation and order. They are two halves of the same coin. They are nature itself. The DO is supposed to break the world in order to prepare it for new creation. That is his job. Humans, who can not understand this, assume that he is some evil demonic figure that the Creator opposes, but this is not true. They are the same being, simply different halves of it.

[FarShainMael]

Author fiat is that those don't happen in WoT, FarShainMael :)

 

Could you supply a reference please?

 

RJ knew a bit of physics. I hope he knew about the signs of the Big Bang - observations of the expanding universe, common microwave background, etc:

 

http://en.wikipedia....of_the_Big_Bang

 

I can't believe he would destroy the credibility of the WoT by saying there was no BB.

 

 

 

But was that the First Moment of this Turning? Ba'alzamon speaks of Age after Age, not Turning after Turning, which may be significant.

 

If successive Turnings are separated by a Big Crunch / Big Bang event, there would be a first spark of life in each Turning.

 

That kind of doesn't work with the WoT world having myths of our time AND us having myths of WoT time. How would the myths go past that big crunch?

 

I've wondered about this myself. 'Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again.' If myth is long forgotten, how do the inhabitants of Randland know of the Wheel? The only thing I can think of is that it is preserved by the Heroes, safe in T'A'R for eternity; or by the reborn souls of those with special abilities to recall their previous existences.

[Cybertrolloc]

http://www.theorylan...vmain.php?i=204 question 8 is a clue. I think there's a specific big bang doesn't happen quote somewhere as well. Having a degree isn't an indicator that someone actually knows something about a subject, RJ's Schrödinger's Cat explanation was pretty bad after all and that's covered in 2nd year.

 

Maybe I'm being hard on RJ on that point, it's not clear what he doesn't like in modern science after all, but he did make the blanket statement and should know better if he's not talking like popular press level science reporting. And the basic math and physics concepts in WoT aren't that bad (depending on what he really means by parallel/mirror worlds).

[yoniy0]

Cybertrolloc, what's your point? RJ wasn't handing in his dissertation; he was writing a work of fiction in the fantasy genre.

[Byzantine279]

Anyone think that if they shoved Fain in the middle, then tried to seal the bore Fain would soak in the entirety of the taint that tried to get on the OP, since his power and the taint draw eachother, and it would allow the seal to be completed, this time fully rather than the weak version that showed up the first time?

[Cybertrolloc]

yoniy0: I didn't say RJ was stupid, I said his explanation in that instance and a few others reading interviews was, and mentioned that the in book stuff that jumps out as math/science related is fine. There's any number of explanations why this is so, but as someone familiar with the subject material...

 

I'd rather you'd address http://www.dragonmou...40#entry2646053 2nd paragraph especially, but hey, semi-imagined slight and all :)

[Apoc81]

I've always considered it like this. If the creator couldn't kill him, and had to lock him away in his prison at the moment of creation, how can Rand kill him?

 

I really do not believe that the DO can be killed, to be honest. He is a part of the wheel, therefore all Rand can do is seal him away to be found in another age.

[yoniy0]

yoniy0: I didn't say RJ was stupid, I said his explanation in that instance and a few others reading interviews was

And I didn't say you have. I said you were looking for scientific fidelity in the wrong place.

 

I'd rather you'd address http://www.dragonmou...40#entry2646053 2nd paragraph especially, but hey, semi-imagined slight and all :)

I'm not sure what's funny about it, but sure thing:

The category error in the OP is that the Fal Dara message is prophecy, per author it likely isn't. I think that was a QotW answer, hence at least given some thought by RJ (though maybe not for what's currently under discussion). Anyway he gives several possibilities for what it might be in that passage. Even if that's adapted from Foretelling/whatever, life everlasting is what everybody already has after all. I'd also point out that there's other men that channel in the series to be cheeky.

I'm not completely sure what you were saying here either, but I think you're mistaken. The writing was referred to as Dark prophecy in meta as well. On top of that, I disagree that a cycle of battle with the DO, with the always present risk of his winning, constitutes "life eternal". Or rather, I believe there's an argument to be made for it, and I wanted to see whether anyone else would agree. Of course, there are a few arguments that will nullify this interpretation, which I've mentioned in my first post; however, I've yet to see any additional argument that convinced me (your assertion that 'the channeling man' might not be Rand notwithstanding).

[Byzantine279]

I've always considered it like this. If the creator couldn't kill him, and had to lock him away in his prison at the moment of creation, how can Rand kill him?

 

I really do not believe that the DO can be killed, to be honest. He is a part of the wheel, therefore all Rand can do is seal him away to be found in another age.

 

But we don't really know the creator wasn't capable of killing him, or even wanted to. For all we know they are friends playing a game.

[Byzantine279]

yoniy0: I didn't say RJ was stupid, I said his explanation in that instance and a few others reading interviews was

And I didn't say you have. I said you were looking for scientific fidelity in the wrong place.

 

I'd rather you'd address http://www.dragonmou...40#entry2646053 2nd paragraph especially, but hey, semi-imagined slight and all :)

I'm not sure what's funny about it, but sure thing:

The category error in the OP is that the Fal Dara message is prophecy, per author it likely isn't. I think that was a QotW answer, hence at least given some thought by RJ (though maybe not for what's currently under discussion). Anyway he gives several possibilities for what it might be in that passage. Even if that's adapted from Foretelling/whatever, life everlasting is what everybody already has after all. I'd also point out that there's other men that channel in the series to be cheeky.

I'm not completely sure what you were saying here either, but I think you're mistaken. The writing was referred to as Dark prophecy in meta as well. On top of that, I disagree that a cycle of battle with the DO, with the always present risk of his winning, constitutes "life eternal". Or rather, I believe there's an argument to be made for it, and I wanted to see whether anyone else would agree. Of course, there are a few arguments that will nullify this interpretation, which I've mentioned in my first post; however, I've yet to see any additional argument that convinced me (your assertion that 'the channeling man' might not be Rand notwithstanding).

 

Perhaps the simple answer is the DO has a 0% chance of victory, and hence can never really win, so there is no chance of the world beign destroyed. But that leads into the other half of the prophecy about Death eternal, and implies it wouldn't be possible, which makes it even more complicated. I have no idea how RJ is going to get out of this one without killing the DO, which he all-but-said he wasn't going to do.

[yoniy0]

Perhaps the simple answer is the DO has a 0% chance of victory, and hence can never really win, so there is no chance of the world beign destroyed. But that leads into the other half of the prophecy about Death eternal, and implies it wouldn't be possible, which makes it even more complicated. I have no idea how RJ is going to get out of this one without killing the DO, which he all-but-said he wasn't going to do.

Yeah, I know. It wouldn't be the only early-bookism, and this one he could sorta excuse, but I won't be satisfied with a return to status quo (not thematically, I mean with regard to this prophecy; other than that I prefer the Wheel to some real-world tie-in).

By the way, RJ is on record saying the DO can win this time around, and in fact has already very nearly won. He said it would take a knockout for Rand to win now (which ties in nicely with what we're currently talking about, coming to think of it).

[Byzantine279]

Perhaps the simple answer is the DO has a 0% chance of victory, and hence can never really win, so there is no chance of the world beign destroyed. But that leads into the other half of the prophecy about Death eternal, and implies it wouldn't be possible, which makes it even more complicated. I have no idea how RJ is going to get out of this one without killing the DO, which he all-but-said he wasn't going to do.

Yeah, I know. It wouldn't be the only early-bookism, and this one he could sorta excuse, but I won't be satisfied with a return to status quo (not thematically, I mean with regard to this prophecy; other than that I prefer the Wheel to some real-world tie-in).

By the way, RJ is on record saying the DO can win this time around, and in fact has already very nearly won. He said it would take a knockout for Rand to win now (which ties in nicely with what we're currently talking about, coming to think of it).

 

I suspect he would just say we were interpreting it wrong, since I really don't think he is going to kill the DO, or if he does Rand isn't going to be responsible for it. (Note that I do agree with your position on it, it seems to require a true resolution or it doesn't really fit)

[SylvanFox]

Is it possible that Rand could somehow permanently seal away the DO? Like, maybe he could put some kind of layer between the DO and the pattern, so that the DO can't reach the Pattern at all?

 

Maybe if he stuffed Fain into the Bore, or used saidin and saidar (and maybe that's the end of channeling, which also means that Avi's vision could not come true, at least not completely), he could create a barrier to keep the DO away for good. It sounds easier than killing him, at least.

[Cybertrolloc]

It might be permanent until the next turning ;)

 

I edited my QotW stuff last page. Had thought about checking before posting, but you know how that goes.

 

Next person I see misquoting I'll rage at slightly less.

[BFG]

There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.

 

There is another theory which states that this has already happened.

 

Ten out of ten for style, but minus several million for good thinking :)