the person above me should convert to spontaneous happiness.

sho 'nuff there's the person above again.

the person above me loves this game.

the person above me plays castle crashers

The person above me didn't read the rules :P

sig reminds me of a disney character.

OM NOM NOM NOM NOM

person above is incorrect, i have taken my medicine, all six of them,

 

A red skittle

a green skittle

a purple skittle

a orange skittle

and two yellow skittles

 

 

/\ tastes the rainbow.

ugly

Yetti

intergalactic

surrender

anaphylactic

I had the same thought and completely agree with you. It is validating to hear somebody else voice the same opinion.

I would like to offer some evidence to the jury out there. FIRST OF ALL, I agree with you about how we become familiar with the way that RJ writes about channeling by way of the oneness through Rands PoV, and that the scene reflected this implication (and I think this is reasonable evidence to speculate on).

Secondly, I feel like it's significant that this was written into the prologue of the book. I don't think that RJ was just plopping this into the beginning of the book, to precede the story to come, just to verify to all of us that some white cloaks are douche bags (as we know) and that Galad is amazing with a sword (which we knew). I think it's about a little bit more than the alliance with the Seanchan (and if I'm wrong about this, then the Seanchan would be the only other significant reason to drop this into the prelude). I believe that we are meant to be in the head of a man whom is on the cusp of channeling for the first time, and furthermore, that Galad may very well be one of the first men whom have embraced, or at least become aware of clean Saidin, without ever knowing the presence of the taint, since the DO was sealed away in the age of legends (well except Rand in TEotW... but only because of that pool of pure Saidin, which the book was named for, was stashed away for him).

Third, I also believe that his role as a White Cloak is supposed to offer some kind of irony here, and as such, may help spin together a cohesive story line that will tie the White Cloaks to Rand in the future. We know that Galad and Rand do share the blood line, and this is important as well when establishing cause, but has been discussed to death.

My final argument for why this may be a valid point is as follows... When trying to find the spark in a man, the technique employed is for a man who can already channel, to channel a significant amount of the power in the presence of the man being tested, and hold it there until there is an... "echo" of the power in the man being tested. One of the things RJ wrote about when Rand was cleaning Saidin was of a man who was delivering a wagon full of brandy coming across the giant Sa'angreal and seeing for the first time with the sphere in the statue's hand glowing fiercely. The impression I gather from that particular scene was that this was the first time that man had been mad aware of his ability to learn to channel (he was a man in his later years, and he went home to drink every drop of that brandy himself as a result).

The implications of this scene seem to be that many men in the world were essentially exposed to a large amount of Saidin, within a reasonable proximity (anywhere on earth, hell maybe even the moon haha), and echo's all over the world could probably have been felt during that time, if they hadn't been drowned out by the great beacon in the sky. Men all over the world the ability to learn to channel had felt that spark light something up inside them. That being said, I believe this would explain how the the spark would have been lit in Galad, and why he is now experiencing such a high level of intricate detail when he delves deep into the oneness.  

thanks for the great post!