Dragon of the Shadow

[dreago]

Alright, NOT saying that the Dragon has/will turn evil but I seem to remember the Heroes from the Horn of Valere (Artur, I think) saying that they had fought with and Against the Dragon. So, and it can go either way, then either the Horn or the Dragon has been evil/used by evil before. By the Horn's description(only someone who is not seeking glory or something) I'd have to say that the Dragon is the one who turned evil.

 

Have fun flaming this post! Woot

[dreago]

Wtf, I was only trying to bold the word "Against"

[Andrew the Great]

If I Remember Correctly, the Horn can be used by whoever wants to blow it as long as no one else who is currently alive already has. Also, consider that not every age even knew about the DO, and it's very possible that in one of his past lives, Arthur fought a war against LTT. This doesn't mean that the Dragon has to be a Darkfriend. It doesn't even mean that The Heroes have to be darkfriends. It just means that someone fought someone else. You can fight someone without either party needing to be evil.

[Briwan Dragain]

If I remember correctly, weren't the Heroes of the Horn a little leery about charging into battle without the Dragon Banner at their head? Maybe I'm just remembering it wrong, or it was a small thing and they were just saying that to look cool. I just can't see the Heroes fighting for evil. Maybe that's because to get into the hero state, you have to have done something particularly noteworthy to acheive it.. in that hero..y sense.. which makes 'em all good guys. And since Birgitte, and some of the others I think but am not sure, keep tabs on the Forsaken and such in tel'aran'rhiod....

 

Just saying.

 

Anycase, definitely don't think the Dragon has gone to the Shadow. HOWEVER, since there are portal worlds... I think we can all say that in one of them, maybe things had been different? I mean, the Trollocs completely decimated one of 'em worlds.

 

As to people forgetting war and the Dark One... well, have peace long enough and that tends to become fiction real fast. Just take a look at our world today. I mean, picture it back before Sept. 11th... or just think about it now. I mean, there is war going on.. but we hardly ever think about it (or I don't, anyway.)

 

Also, I'd like to point out that we can already see some other possible Forsaken types climbing the ranks, even if they're not all Shadow-style. Taim could be a new Demandred or Sammael.. and there's that one Black sister that's a lot like Semirhage (the cat lady, I think.) I THINK that RJ said something about similiar spirit types being reborn in this age. It's hard to have a continous running soul cast when the only way to really kill the Dark One's major players is balefire.

 

But, I suppose I've always been one for the 'every action has an equal but opposite reaction' scene... so I like to think that, while perhaps not the same people, the Dark One pulls in very similiar types for his croonies. And while the Creator is all about respawning his champion, it's not necessarily the same spirit every time I don't think. Sure, there's a cycle.. but Lews Therin was just the last guy before Rand. And Ishy knew Lews Therin, as did the rest, so that's where they get the reference back.

 

I'm starting to ramble, though, and I think it's late and I haven't been able to make a post without making it a freakin' novel. So I'll just stop here and maybe pick up more later since most of my thoughts were kinda.. jumbled and unedited. Props to anyone that makes it out. Lol.

[The Lost One]

There is a massive, important difference between allowing people free will to make choices within a system that can disrupt the system, and deliberately creating the system with a built-in disruption in place.

 

 

Thanks RAW, this answered some other questions I had been thinking about.  Nicely put.

 

 

 

[Wayhey]

 

When Rand takes Verin and the others through a portal stone in The Great Hunt, at the end of each life he hears "I have won again Lews Therin". I thought that if the Dark One won even once the wheel would be broken and therefore the Dragon would not be reborn again. How could the Dark One have won before to be able to say "again"?

 

There are degrees of victory. The Dark One can achieve victory by breaking free, but can also achieve lesser victories. Such as by stopping the Dragon Reborn from doing other things he was born to do. It isn't as simple as him being born to fight The Dark One. It's never simple.

 

 

I suppose as an easy example, the Dragon achieved on partial victory in the War of Power.

 

The way I see it, the Dark One wins in all the other (infinite) alternate realities, but only the one (main) reality can (and needs to) be won by the Dragon to save the Wheel--i.e the reality in which the conditions are right and the actors make all the right choices to fulfill prophesies.  The alternate worlds are like dream worlds, created by choices and eventually destroyed by the DO.  Maybe the Pattern gets too "heavy" with these periodic Last Battles are needed to clean up the mess?  If you think of it all in terms of Order and Chaos being the primeval forces at work, then this makes some sense.

 

[Wayhey]

Why would the Pattern recirculate a champion for the being who wants to destroy it?  Neither Ishamael, nor any of the Forsaken are permanent "Champions of the Shadow".  He just takes what he can get each time ... there are always souls in the world who would be attracted to the Shadow.

 

I disagree!  I think the goodies and the baddies both play their parts to allow the Wheel to turn.  It's all about balance, really.  The Dark One needs to be close to victory at some points in order that the Pattern to renew itself.  If the Light could achieve perfect victory and somehow destroy the DO, would that also not break the Wheel?

[Wayhey]

 

Because the Creator apparently believes in free will, and made his Creation in a way that allows such actions.  Just as he made the One Power available, but did not constrain its use.

 

There is a massive, important difference between allowing people free will to make choices within a system that can disrupt the system, and deliberately creating the system with a built-in disruption in place.

 

 

In order for free will to exist, I do think the system must be deliberately be created the way it was, Dark One and all.  Life and Death must both exist, and people must themselves choose between Order and Chaos or there is no choice at all.  There must be balance--when the Wheel tilts too much one way or the other, things start to get really hairy and we get conflict that ends an Ages.

 

 

[Wayhey]

The Pattern represents Order. The Shadow is destuction and chaos, it is the antithesis of the Pattern and Wheel.  That being said, it is very unlikely that the Pattern would purposely spin out a champion for the shadow.

 

I don't think the Pattern is Order.  The Pattern is everything that exists, created out of both Order and Chaos -- i.e. it is the logical result of all that is and was and will be.  To just call it the "Pattern" is a little misleading.  It certainly is a pattern, and contains many patterns, but it also has randomness and uncertainty.

 

The Creator represents the source Order (and life, and trust), whereas the Dark One is the source of Chaos (and death, and fear) but everything in between contains elements of both.  Creator provides the Power that creates the universe, but him and the Dark One together really make the Wheel spin (if there were no chaos and no death, there would be no change).  Intervention by the Creator would be an act of Chaos, and mistrust of his own creation, which He can have no part of.  But the Dark One wants to do exactly that!  His mission to intervene as often and as much as possible.  Like RJ said, the DO is the ultimate control freak.

 

[Wayhey]

 

Anycase, definitely don't think the Dragon has gone to the Shadow. HOWEVER, since there are portal worlds... I think we can all say that in one of them, maybe things had been different? I mean, the Trollocs completely decimated one of 'em worlds.

 

That makes sense.  Different alternate realities would certainly have the possibility of Dragons turning to the DO.  If that ever happened in the last (i.e. main) reality branch, the DO wins forever and the whole of creation ends.  At that point maybe the whole thing can start over at universe T=0?  Maybe not.  I suppose it all depends really on what RJ had in mind, philosophically.

[BrainFireBob]

Maybe the "Anti-Dragon" isn't always the same embodiment.  Where the Dragon seems to be a constant lifeline (Reincanation of same soul) perhaps the other is simply that which is most against the current Dragon embodiment.  What would have happened if Ish and the Forsaken had died in the Breaking.  Could the current A-D then be someone in Rand's present.  Maybe someone who always felt like Rand got lucky beating him in competitions/ with girls etc.  Then when the whole DR thing comes out this person goes ballistic and joins DO.

 

Thats basically what I said, I think.  The Dark One just makes do with whoever is willing to side with him in that time and place, and there are always people who are willing.  But that is not because the Pattern "deliberately" spins some out; its because people have free will, and some choose to use it to help the Shadow.

 

Personally, I've always thought this is why he had his "only the strongest" mentality with the Forsaken- he's looking for the statistical fluke who could go toe-to-toe with the Pattern's deliberately created best. In D&D terms, the Dragon has straight 18's, and the DO keeps rolling dice to get a fair match- and tests them to death to find the one that's closest.

[Mr Ares]

The way I see it, the Dark One wins in all the other (infinite) alternate realities, but only the one (main) reality can (and needs to) be won by the Dragon to save the Wheel.

Aren't we told that if Shai'tan wins in one world, He wins in all of them? So if He won in one PSW, He would eventually destroy all of them? Possible, at least. So, the possibility of Him winning must be low - it has never happened. But it still could.

 

Why would the Pattern recirculate a champion for the being who wants to destroy it?  Neither Ishamael, nor any of the Forsaken are permanent "Champions of the Shadow".  He just takes what he can get each time ... there are always souls in the world who would be attracted to the Shadow.

I disagree!  I think the goodies and the baddies both play their parts to allow the Wheel to turn.  It's all about balance, really.  The Dark One needs to be close to victory at some points in order that the Pattern to renew itself.  If the Light could achieve perfect victory and somehow destroy the DO, would that also not break the Wheel?

I disagree with you!!! I don't think the Pattern needs Shai'tan in order for the Pattern to renew itself. I think if "perfect victory" could be achieved, the Wheel would spin on, happy as ever. I don't think it is even possible, though.

 

Because the Creator apparently believes in free will, and made his Creation in a way that allows such actions.  Just as he made the One Power available, but did not constrain its use.

 

There is a massive, important difference between allowing people free will to make choices within a system that can disrupt the system, and deliberately creating the system with a built-in disruption in place.

In order for free will to exist, I do think the system must be deliberately be created the way it was, Dark One and all. Life and Death must both exist, and people must themselves choose between Order and Chaos or there is no choice at all. There must be balance--when the Wheel tilts too much one way or the other, things start to get really hairy and we get conflict that ends an Ages.

In order for free will to exist, there must be choice. Between good and evil, light and dark, creation and destruction, order and chaos, intelligence and ignorance (hard to believe, but that was not a specific shot at anyone, just a point in general...you ignorant peasants). But that choice is internal to the Pattern, and Shai'tan is external. He is not necessary for its good functioning, He is detrimental. The balance need not be perfect. Shai'tan was not created part of the system, He is external to it. The choices people make are there, regardless of His Dread presence. They may choose without Him there.

 

The Pattern represents Order. The Shadow is destuction and chaos, it is the antithesis of the Pattern and Wheel.  That being said, it is very unlikely that the Pattern would purposely spin out a champion for the shadow.

I don't think the Pattern is Order. The Pattern is everything that exists, created out of both Order and Chaos - i.e. it is the logical result of all that is and was and will be.  To just call it the "Pattern" is a little misleading.  It certainly is a pattern, and contains many patterns, but it also has randomness and uncertainty.

The Pattern is existence. It contains both order and chaos.

 

The Creator represents the source Order (and life, and trust), whereas the Dark One is the source of Chaos (and death, and fear) but everything in between contains elements of both. Creator provides the Power that creates the universe, but him and the Dark One together really make the Wheel spin (if there were no chaos and no death, there would be no change). Intervention by the Creator would be an act of Chaos, and mistrust of his own creation, which He can have no part of. But the Dark One wants to do exactly that! His mission to intervene as often and as much as possible. Like RJ said, the DO is the ultimate control freak

The Creator is the source of Creation (no sh*t Sherlock), Shai'tan seeks to destroy the Creation. But He is not a part of it. Neither of them is necessary for the continued good functioning of the Wheel. His mission is to destroy the Wheel. Not interfere, destroy. And RJ said he was the ur-control freak. Ur- translates as original, not ultimate.

 

At that point maybe the whole thing can start over at universe T=0?  Maybe not.  I suppose it all depends really on what RJ had in mind, philosophically.

I think if the world ends, it ends. Wheel is gone, Creator doesn't care enough to repair it, universe is over.

 

Am I the only one who thinks all this talk of Balance, Order/Law and Chaos is a bit too Moorcockian? If I hear much more if this, I will expect to start seeing people to start referring to Rand as various aspects of the Eternal Champion.....Did I say Rand? I meant Erekose...

[Tyrell]

So, the possibility of Him winning must be low - it has never happened. But it still could.

 

I disagree, I think that the possibility of the Dark Oone winning to be non-existant, the whole spiel about there being no beginnings nor endings in the wheel and so on, even the existance of Portal Stone Worlds kinda confirms it.

 

Why?

 

Well, to me anyways, it comes down to the whole infinity thing going on, the wheel turning forever and so on. Now if the wheel has turned an infinate ammount of times then all possible outcomes must have already occured and the fact that the wheel still exists kinda points to the Dark One not having won.

 

Now idunno how many times the wheel has turned, lets say it's on its first turning and look at PSWs - if each different choice creates a PSW and if the DO wins in one PSW then he wins in all of them (your statement, not mine) then logically the DO hasn't won in any PSW and although I'm not smart enough to be able to claim that an infinate ammount of PSWs would/could/have come into being there's gotta be a very very very large number of them just for start of age 1 -> the war of power which gives the DO a very large number of chances to win said war and destroy the wheel, the fact that He didn't and hasn't shows that the chance of Him winning is rather small, if not non existant. And if the wheel isn't on its first turning, then there would be even more PSWs for him to have a chance to win in, and more points in history when he has a chance of winning (end of age 2, end of age 3, we don't know of any else, but they may exist) and since the wheel still exists he hasn't won at any of those times, further pushing the chances of his victory down towards 0.

 

You wouldda thought that someone as smart of Ishy would have come to a similar conclusion.

[CUBAREY]

Quote

 

 

Well, to me anyways, it comes down to the whole infinity thing going on, the wheel turning forever and so on. Now if the wheel has turned an infinate ammount of times then all possible outcomes must have already occured and the fact that the wheel still exists kinda points to the Dark One not having won

 

 

You miss the most important rule of probability theory. If in tossing a coin the odds are 50/50 that heads or tails will land, the fact that the first 49 tosses came up heads does not change the 50/50  odds of the 50th toss. In the WOT the DO has a chance (actual probability unknownn)  of winning in each age.  Since whether he wins depends not only on what he does but the choices other people make, there is always the possibility of his victory.

 

To put it another way christian theology asserts that even the most evil person could be saved by acceopting Jesus. That does not mean that Hitler or Stalium were saved only that they could have been.  At the heart the question of whether the DO could ever win is a theological concept having much to do with free will (thats why I used the christian example, its one that most people are aware of).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

0

[Samuraiflip05]

You have entered a world of sight and sound......The Siliphophical Zone

[Mr Ares]

Tyrell, the thing about Shai'tan (BBHN) winning in one world meaning he wins in all worlds isn't mine, it's from those papery things we are here to discuss. The thing is, how many opportunities to escape did Shai'tan have? In the 1st Age, maybe none. In the 2nd, maybe a couple, in the 3rd, none yet. If He has say 100 opportunities to escape per turning then He has 100xN opportunities, N being the number of turnings. If every single possibility was payed out in a PSW then maybe we would expect him to be released...but maybe only some are. Maybe if PSWs go below a certain probability of happening, a certain measure of divergence from the main timeline, it becomes impossible to release Shai'tan in those worlds. If every single probability is played out in PS phase space, then we would expect Shai'tan to be free in some worlds, and so begin devouring them all, but if there are only a certain number of actual worlds and the rest simply exist as unrealised potential (which Rand and co. may have tapped into, experiencing worlds that never came into being in actuality even along the "lines of if") then there could still exist the possibiblity of Shai'tan (BBHN) escaping, He just hasn't done it yet....Of course, all of this is rampant speculation.

 

If the universe in infinite, then all probabilities will happen, eventually. If it isn't then they won't, neccessarily, but still may. If it is, then the probability of any event happening (ever happening, as opposed to happening now) is either 1 (it will happen, in time) or 0 (it will never happen). Ishy believed that there was a possibility of it happening, so it would happen, so he followed Shai'tan (BBHN) because Shai'tan (BBHN) is the only possible winner in the end. Of course, we really don't want to get into discussions of infinity (it can get quite complex) or Ishy's motivation (people try to rationalise him as an anti-hero, which he isn't) or whether serving Shai'tan (BBHN) is morally OK (only if destroying the world is morally OK, which it isn't generally considered to be).

[Tyrell]

Point taken, butwhat does BBHN mean?

[Samuraiflip05]

Possibly Blessed Be His Name

 

Just a note on PSW, (Ihave been keeping tabs on the thread) I seem to recall discussion in the books that the PSW's were not reality, only a reflection of the real world under different circumstances.  So events realized in those would have no bearing on reality.  That was why they had varying levels of clarity based on the possibility/likelihood of their occurence (some apeared hazy, etc).  I am going off of memory here, but it seems more likely that tDO winning in a PSW wouldn't matter, because it's not reality.

[BrainFireBob]

Time began at some point, in the world of the Wheel.

 

The Dark One can insert new items into the weaving- he's not trapped into a limited possibility set, meaning he can always try something new. Moreover, he *remembers*, although possibly not within the constraints of linear time.

 

"If the Dark One is contained in one world, he is contained in all worlds. If he breaks free in one, he breaks free in all."

 

The parallel realities of the Wheel aren't "real," per se- there's only one "real" world, and that's the one that matters for the Dark One being contained and being set free.

 

The others are perhaps "computations" of the wheel, and perhaps parallels maintained in the event of things like balefire- which shift truth value and "reality" from the "real world" version, which is no longer possible, to the relevent "possible" reality of the Portal Stone worlds. The fact that the people of "reality" supersede their parallels in Portal Stone worlds is shown by the fact that memories are intact- the people experience a shift to an alternate reality now true, but there's only one true "continuous" life thread for each person at a time, not separate ones in each reality.

 

Of course, there may be a limited number of "parallel" worlds that have a probability high enough to approach one- this may explain the Ogier, and why there are able to exist in Randland. And the exotics, for that matter.

 

Of course, this could also explain the declining populations of both groups- the Wheel "rejecting" them as their probability of having existed in the real world approaches a value less than one.

[Mr Ares]

Tyrell, BBHN stands for Blessed Be His Name. Don't ask why.

[Briwan Dragain]

I like all the dungeons and dragons references, haha.

 

Anycase, I think a couple of you have sort of nailed a decent enough explanation for me. Brain Fire Bob, especially, you made some interesting points with the parallel bits not being real.

 

Also, of course, we can't really trust Ishamael in what he says.. he's just a bad fellow and likes to demoralize.

 

But, the idea that these realities are more just.. reflections.. and possibilities that sort of die out while this world we're in now is the main continuity bit makes some sense, especially since most are doomed to end up realligning with the pattern anyway somewhere down the line as things fall into place..

 

Although, that last bit might be a reference to another story. Not sure.