So ahhhh.... Moridin was right?

[AnAnonymousWOTFan]

I was a big fan of how the sealing of the Dark One in the Bore played out. Evil is necessary for people to be humans, the power of choice is what makes men men, yada yada yada, taking it away would make people puppets, blah blah blah...

But Moridin is right. The Dark One CAN win. If he breaks humanity, he wins. This time around, we saw Rand get PRETTY FREAKING CLOSE to breaking and destroying the Pattern. In an infinite series of repetitions, AT SOME POINT Rand will break and the DO will win. At that point, the Pattern is destroyed and the good guys have permanently lost. The Dark One imposes his vision of humanity on the world and it won't be fixed.

The Dragon's role as a counterbalance to the Shadow not to kill it, but to preserve balance between Light and Dark and preserve men's ability to choose between the two is a fantastic concept. He's really the champion of the Pattern and not the Light. But ultimately, the good guys will lose. That's not a development I like. Thoughts?

 

[Martin Alvito]

Moridin's logic is flawed on quite a few levels. It has unstated (and unsupported) assumptions, and fails to appropriately define outcomes.

1) Moridin's logic implicitly assumes that the Dragon has free will. There's no basis for that assumption. Even if everyone else in the world has free will and the Dragon thinks he does, we can't infer from that data that the Creator actually gives the Dragon free will. Note that the Creator obviously keeps the Dragon on an awfully short leash as ta'veren. It may be shorter than we know, and if that's the case the Dragon can only fail if the Creator has some plan that will save the Pattern prior to disaster.

2) It is pointed out early in the series (not sure if it's by Ishamael or Lanfear) that the champion of the Light has previously fallen to the Shadow and become the Shadow's champion. This has some interesting implications that Moridin conveniently ignores. Ishamael/Moridin can (will?) be displaced as the Shadow's champion at some point in the future if the game is repeated infinitely. Moridin's payoff matrix is therefore flawed, as there are three possible outcomes of Moridin's choice rather than the two he posits. Ishamael/Moridin can win before he is displaced and get some reward before the end of time. He can fail to win, get displaced and spend an eternity in torment. Finally, he can stick with the Light and (if his logic is correct) eventually lose. That matrix seems like a good reason to choose the Light to me, unless you have enormous faith in your own abilities.

3) Moridin assumes that the DO isn't lying about his promised reward in the payoff matrix. Which, if you think about it, is a pretty heroic assumption when dealing with someone known as Father of Lies. As is pointed out in AMOL, the DO is lying to his servants on this point.

Long story short, Moridin's proof is worthless because of those problems, and there's no reason to believe that the Light MUST lose eventually.

 

[Sorcha Al'Verdan]

When TDO wins, it will not be forever. I think the creator would make something else happen.

 

[AnAnonymousWOTFan]

Moridin's logic is flawed on quite a few levels. It has unstated (and unsupported) assumptions, and fails to appropriately define outcomes.

1) Moridin's logic implicitly assumes that the Dragon has free will. There's no basis for that assumption. Even if everyone else in the world has free will and the Dragon thinks he does, we can't infer from that data that the Creator actually gives the Dragon free will. Note that the Creator obviously keeps the Dragon on an awfully short leash as ta'veren. It may be shorter than we know, and if that's the case the Dragon can only fail if the Creator has some plan that will save the Pattern prior to disaster.

2) It is pointed out early in the series (not sure if it's by Ishamael or Lanfear) that the champion of the Light has previously fallen to the Shadow and become the Shadow's champion. This has some interesting implications that Moridin conveniently ignores. Ishamael/Moridin can (will?) be displaced as the Shadow's champion at some point in the future if the game is repeated infinitely. Moridin's payoff matrix is therefore flawed, as there are three possible outcomes of Moridin's choice rather than the two he posits. Ishamael/Moridin can win before he is displaced and get some reward before the end of time. He can fail to win, get displaced and spend an eternity in torment. Finally, he can stick with the Light and (if his logic is correct) eventually lose. That matrix seems like a good reason to choose the Light to me, unless you have enormous faith in your own abilities.

3) Moridin assumes that the DO isn't lying about his promised reward in the payoff matrix. Which, if you think about it, is a pretty heroic assumption when dealing with someone known as Father of Lies. As is pointed out in AMOL, the DO is lying to his servants on this point.

Long story short, Moridin's proof is worthless because of those problems, and there's no reason to believe that the Light MUST lose eventually.

By your 2nd point, point 1 is invalid. The Dragon, evidently, does have free will and can destroy the Pattern. The Pattern keeps him on a short leash, true, but that is only because he has human impulses (self-protection, protection of others, etc.). If he did not have these and went to the Shadow or fell to Moridin's logic, the Pattern would have no hold over him.

My only point was the Shadow would eventually win, not that Moridin's decision to join is stupid (which it is). Obviously, if all the powerful channelers kept the the Light, the DO would be powerless. However, they don't, and since Rand almost certainly has free will, he could destroy the Pattern.

 

[AnAnonymousWOTFan]

When TDO wins, it will not be forever. I think the creator would make something else happen.

Still, all our characters die and their world is destroyed. That's a wee bit of a cop-out to me.

 

[Martin Alvito]

By your 2nd point, point 1 is invalid. The Dragon, evidently, does have free will and can destroy the Pattern.

What makes you think that it wasn't the Creator's plan all along to have his champion fall? There may very well be an Age where the champion of Light invariably falls and is raised up as the Shadow's champion. This neither precludes the champion of Light's redemption (the rules might be different for the Dragon than for everyone else), nor does it preclude the emergence of a new champion of the Light. For all we know, Ishamael was the Dragon on the last trip around the Wheel, and Rand is the next Ishamael.

We know that the fall of the champion of Light cannot be decisive alone, since it's happened and the world didn't end. For that result to actually threaten the Pattern, you must posit some other necessary condition that leads to victory. But we have no reason to believe that such a condition must exist. We lack an existence proof by the very nature of the problem; once the event happens, the proof is academic. The only way we can be certain such a condition exists is to derive it from things we already know. Characters certainly behave as though it must exist, but that doesn't make them right.

I happen to think you're right, but it's extremely important to recognize that the whole argument rests on unstated axioms. It falls apart if the champion of Light is the Creator's puppet. There are also other possible conditions of the world that would preclude the DO from ever winning. The net result is that it's impossible to say anything conclusive about the future of this fantasy world. If you believe Moridin's unstated axioms, you believe one thing about the future of this universe. If you don't, then what you believe is the derivation of the axioms you chose to accept a priori.

 

[AnAnonymousWOTFan]

What makes you think that it wasn't the Creator's plan all along to have his champion fall? There may very well be an Age where the champion of Light invariably falls and is raised up as the Shadow's champion. This neither precludes the champion of Light's redemption (the rules might be different for the Dragon than for everyone else), nor does it preclude the emergence of a new champion of the Light. For all we know, Ishamael was the Dragon on the last trip around the Wheel, and Rand is the next Ishamael.

I happen to think you're right, but it's extremely important to recognize that the whole argument rests on unstated axioms. It falls apart if the champion of Light is the Creator's puppet, or if his fall is not always decisive. There are also other possible conditions of the world that would preclude the DO from ever winning.

The net result is that it's impossible to say anything conclusive about the future of this fantasy world. If you believe Moridin's unstated axioms, you believe one thing about the future of this universe. If you don't, then what you believe is the derivation of the axioms you chose to accept a priori.

Well of course. The fact is we CAN'T know anything for certain until Team Jordan says "this is so", but since the whole reason Rand decided to move the Wheel to another LB was to preserve free will, I think it would be highly inconsistent with both the WoT universe and Jordan's ideology to have Rand NOT have free will. It simply seems more likely by far that he does, and I would have extreme problems with the story and its philosophical inconsistencies if it was not so.

Moridin's axioms make sense to me, but a question of whether or not Rand has free will should be directed towards Sanderson at some point, with a potential follow-up about the Pattern's future depending on his answer. All in all, it would really suck if it turns out the Champion of the Shadow was right all along and is guaranteed an eventual victory.

 

[Martin Alvito]

Sorry about the ninja edit. I realized that the original version of the response was a bit sloppy on logic, so I tightened it down a bit. (Initially, I treated something we know to be true as an unknown. That made the post unnecessarily confusing.)

We could potentially know something for certain if we can deduce it from what Team Jordan has already said. I don't think such information exists, but I'm not going to claim perfect recall of the series or immunity to logical error. And I certainly don't have encyclopedic knowledge of what RJ and Sanderson have said at book signings.

Sorcha al'Verdan has already identified another possible condition of the world under which the DO cannot win: the Creator possesses some deus ex machina that prevents the DO's victory even if the Dragon fails. Others almost certainly exist. In fact, since that deus ex machina can theoretically take any form in imaginative fiction, the number of possible conditions is infinite. I bet we can tighten that down a lot by properly categorizing the possibilities, given the extensive known rules of this fantasy universe. I'm a bit too tired at the moment to trust myself to pull that off without making some glaring error, though.

I think it would be highly inconsistent with both the WoT universe and Jordan's ideology to have Rand NOT have free will. It simply seems more likely by far that he does, and I would have extreme problems with the story and its philosophical inconsistencies if it was not so.

That doesn't bother me quite so much. Maybe Rand is the corrective mechanism for the Pattern that exists to guarantee free will for everyone else by defeating the Dark One. Sort of like Neo in the Matrix, except falling in love keeps him from screwing things up rather than causing the problem.

 

[AnAnonymousWOTFan]

Sorry about the ninja edit. I realized that the original version of the response was a bit sloppy on logic, so I tightened it down a bit. (Initially, I treated something we know to be true as an unknown. That made the post unnecessarily confusing.)

We could potentially know something for certain if we can deduce it from what Team Jordan has already said. I don't think such information exists, but I'm not going to claim perfect recall of the series or immunity to logical error. And I certainly don't have encyclopedic knowledge of what RJ and Sanderson have said at book signings.

Sorcha al'Verdan has already identified another possible condition of the world under which the DO cannot win: the Creator possesses some deus ex machina that prevents the DO's victory even if the Dragon fails. Others almost certainly exist. In fact, since that deus ex machina can theoretically take any form in imaginative fiction, the number of possible conditions is infinite. I bet we can tighten that down a lot by properly categorizing the possibilities, given the extensive known rules of this fantasy universe. I'm a bit too tired at the moment to trust myself to pull that off without making some glaring error, though.



That doesn't bother me quite so much. Maybe Rand is the corrective mechanism for the Pattern that exists to guarantee free will for everyone else by defeating the Dark One. Sort of like Neo in the Matrix, except falling in love keeps him from screwing things up rather than causing the problem.

I've always thought of Rand as more of a champion of the Pattern rather than that of the Creator. He fights for everyone, really, even the Shadow, as he preserves it and allows people to choose it. If viewed from that perspective, it becomes far more unlikely that he is a special vehicle that lacks the same qualities of humanity as everyone else. The possibility that he is a vehicle for the Creator does exist though, and in that case you would be right. However, his episode on Dragonmount makes me think that he is capable of deviation from what the Pattern or Creator wants. Additionally, the Creator (or whomever else other than the DO would have an all-caps voice) speaks to him twice, reassuring him, maybe three if the grey-haired Aiel lady was the Creator. This also makes me think he is capable of making mistakes, as if he was a pre-programmed fix-it-up robot that would not be necessary.

A deus ex machina-type thing from the Creator would, again, bug me. He is supposed to largely keep himself out of the events of the Pattern and let humanity do it out themselves, and it would take away from the substance of the novels if it turned out the Creator had an instant fix-'er-up button if Randlandians screwed up.