*Spoilers* AMoL Ending Theory Discussion

[Eluial Aldaran]

I'm not sure seperating them is the right word... I'm absolutly sure that there are Aes Sedai, I imagine from the brown Ajah, that have vast knowledge on the subject. That is, after all, their job. I just can't recall any of them actually teaching it to Rand.
I also agree that the theorists didn't work in a vaccume. In fact, RJ told us that they had vast knowledge from this age and the previous one. This just proves my point that it's reasonable to assume that they had information Rand did not (as I've explained that Rand had no such knowledge, and LTT lived most of his life WITHOUT the DO, and then at war with him, not exactly researching his nature).

Like I've said, that's just not true. LTT had no experience that would give him insight at the nature of the DO. Most of his life he was absent, then they were at war with him. We've seen nowhere in the books any indication that he has such insight.
Rand, too, had but one experience, at the last battle, and as I've explained and will also show in this messege, that experience is... Problematic... At best.

But LTT was the one who came up with sealing the bore in the first place... I mean, the 3rd age scholars got the idea because LTT did it. So, yes, he lived most his life without knowledge of the DO, but during the war he was very obviously giving active thought on how to seal the bore, which I can only assume involved quite a bit of research.

Actually, that's not described like that ANYWHERE. Lanfear discovered the power not because it "leaked" into the pattern. She discovered a place where the pattern was "thinner." How she sensed the power behind it was never revealed.
Also, it's not a big assumption to make. It's being told to us half the series, plain as day. The DO couldn't touch the world before the bore was created. It was repeated again and again.

Actually it is. Mierin drilled the bore because she sensed a power that she believed could be channeled by both men and women together (the TP). Leaked or not, she was able to sense it from inside the pattern while the DO was sealed away. Unless you want to argue that they had the ability to leave the pattern during the AoL?

And again, I don't know why would assume that not being able to touch the pattern is the same exact thing as not existing. If you have a water-tight bag filled with water, you can still sense the water, even if you can't touch it. It's very different from a bag not filled with water. And Mierin (and other AoL Aes Sedai) were clearly able to SENSE the DO in some capacity or another before the bore was drilled.

We also have reason to believe that it will keep existing without him. That's the whole point. Rand BELIEVES evil will not exist. That's a belief, not a fact.

That's an interesting thought. Did Rand tell the pattern to create a world without evil, or did he tell it to create a world without the Dark One? But either way, if you recall, the DO has a hard time making an appearance in that world when he's trying to communicate with Rand.

I agree. But the assumption that the DO is what gives the concept of evil in the world is, IMHO, just wrong. He's not the concept. A concept is not a living, physical thing. It's an understanding. But you just said that we shouldn't reduce the DO to "giving" people the choice of good vs. evil. If he's a concept, an understanding, then that's EXACTLY what it's reduced to.

:P That's just a lack of imagination on your part! Or, perhaps, pulling in too much from the real world. I mean, in a world that has magic and the like, is it really too much to imagine that an abstract concept could be personified and yet still be the embodiment of that abstract concept?

What you're saying is, basically, that a starving man about to die will not consider stealing food in order to survive, because the DO doesn't exist. And that makes sense to you? And I don't want to hear "without the DO no one will starv" explanations. It's a theoretical question. You're saying people will die, simply because they can't consider taking food that doesn't belong to them? I find that hard to understand, and I doubt that's what RJ had intended. It's extreme. Not impossible, it just sounds unlikely to me.

That's exactly what I'm saying, and that's why I also said it's incredibly hard for us as humans to understand that. Without the concept of evil, you would never think of saving yourself at the expense of another. It's not just that you'd think it's wrong to do so, like some lawful good martyr or something. It wouldn't occur to you. Do you get that? I mean, argument about whether the DO is the embodiment of evil aside, does that particular if/then statement make sense? Because if it does, we can move beyond this point and back to the main one (the "if" part of the statement).

Not only am I not saying that's remotly the same, I'm also saying that many people that live in the light still have emotions that could be considered evil. Do you think all killers are dark friends? Did no one kill out of ambition? Love? Think about Abu Dar and all the duals if you want to understand my point.

Not at all, and I don't think I ever alluded to or implied that I did. Just because you do something "evil" (the quotes are meant to show that I'm using evil there in a REALLY broad sense) doesn't mean you ARE evil, or that you're a dark friend. But the fact that that evil knowledge exists in the first place is thanks to the DO.

Not only do we have no reason to assume that the pattern just "showed the truth," we know for a fact that's not the case. First of all, not all those possible realities can be the future, which means for sure some of them are "lies," in the sense that they are possibilities imagined by Rand and the DO, not an accurate description of what will come to pass should certain things happen.

I wouldn't go so far as to say we have "no reason" to know it showed the truth, but I understand your overall point. However, you're conflating ideas again. In this context, truth does not mean something that actually happened. They are making predictions. They're using the machinery of the pattern to test their theories and assumptions about what will pass given certain events. Truth is therefore judged only by how accurate you think this manipulation of the pattern is.

 

[Aulrick Vendour]

But LTT was the one who came up with sealing the bore in the first place... I mean, the 3rd age scholars got the idea because LTT did it. So, yes, he lived most his life without knowledge of the DO, but during the war he was very obviously giving active thought on how to seal the bore, which I can only assume involved quite a bit of research.

Yes... And he was wrong. He wanted to seal the bore. The bore needed to be made anew. That's what Fel said, that one would need to remove the broken parts of the failed attempt to do it successfuly. We also know that LTT was SO wrong, that the women were in fact correct in not supporting him. Would they have come, Saidar could be tainted as well. He needed the True Power to shield the one power from the DO's taint, as is seen in this book.

Actually it is. Mierin drilled the bore because she sensed a power that she believed could be channeled by both men and women together (the TP). Leaked or not, she was able to sense it from inside the pattern while the DO was sealed away.

Agreed, though I really don't see why "sensing" is the same as influencing in the way you describe it. If I tap on a glass with water, I can hear the void and the sound would be different depending on the amount of water. Does that mean the water influence anything outside the glass?

Unless you want to argue that they had the ability to leave the pattern during the AoL?

Isn't that what skimming does? But I understand your point.

And again, I don't know why would assume that not being able to touch the pattern is the same exact thing as not existing.

Being dead is also not the same as not existing in the first place. Like I asked before - would killing the DO remove the concept of evil from people's mind's? Would they forget that people made bad choices in the past? Evil choices? If they would not forget, then the concept is not lost to them. If they would not forget, then things like ambition still have meaning, and thus the choice to do evil things is maintained.

That's an interesting thought. Did Rand tell the pattern to create a world without evil, or did he tell it to create a world without the Dark One? But either way, if you recall, the DO has a hard time making an appearance in that world when he's trying to communicate with Rand.

I don't recall that at all actually. I'm not sure it's relevant, but can you bring a quote please?

I mean, in a world that has magic and the like, is it really too much to imagine that an abstract concept could be personified and yet still be the embodiment of that abstract concept?

It does, yes, for the reasons I wrote above.
Also, I think this is the first time in my life anyone has accussed me of not being imaginative :P

Without the concept of evil, you would never think of saving yourself at the expense of another. It's not just that you'd think it's wrong to do so, like some lawful good martyr or something. It wouldn't occur to you.

But you do realize that's a matter of perspective, do you not? If someone takes the other's food, then he will live at the expense of the other. If he doesn't, then the other will live on his expense. So does that make the choice "evil"? If so, wouldn't the other man want to GIVE the food, because he can't think of keeping it and letting the other one die? And so, everyone would die, because no one would choose to live at the espense of the other.

But the fact that that evil knowledge exists in the first place is thanks to the DO.

This statement, right here, is the core of our disagreement. I don't think that knowledge exists because of the DO. I think the DO is simply making that knowledge into something more, making people more agreeable to using that knowledge. Without him people might still choose it, but they won't have that extra push.

In this context, truth does not mean something that actually happened. They are making predictions. They're using the machinery of the pattern to test their theories and assumptions about what will pass given certain events. Truth is therefore judged only by how accurate you think this manipulation of the pattern is.

We're not sure of that. In fact, it's not how it's described in the book. They don't say that they're creating a world based on choices they assume people make. They are showing each other the world as they envision it would be.
I'll give you an example - if Rand believes that a world without the DO will take away people's choice, then he's basically creating a world where people have no choice, and that's what he sees. We have no idea what he would have seen had he imagined a world without the DO, but where people still have a choice, because he simply doesn't think that's possible. But it's still what he thinks, and not the truth. Just because that's what he thinks doesn't make it true.

 

[Eluial Aldaran]

Being dead is also not the same as not existing in the first place. Like I asked before - would killing the DO remove the concept of evil from people's mind's? Would they forget that people made bad choices in the past? Evil choices? If they would not forget, then the concept is not lost to them. If they would not forget, then things like ambition still have meaning, and thus the choice to do evil things is maintained.

They would forget if the DO is indeed the embodiment of evil. Killing a person is not the same as killing an idea.

(Which of course, takes us back to square one.)

I don't recall that at all actually. I'm not sure it's relevant, but can you bring a quote please?

Sure, but you'll have to wait a couple hours for me to get home.

But you do realize that's a matter of perspective, do you not? If someone takes the other's food, then he will live at the expense of the other. If he doesn't, then the other will live on his expense. So does that make the choice "evil"? If so, wouldn't the other man want to GIVE the food, because he can't think of keeping it and letting the other one die? And so, everyone would die, because no one would choose to live at the espense of the other.

It would be an interesting philosophical discussion to have, but not entirely sure it's relevant to the matter at hand. We can just say "would people still do bad things that aren't motivated by evil reasons?"

I think that yes, eventually, humanity would die out. Just like they would if everyone was turned to the shadow.

This statement, right here, is the core of our disagreement.

Agreed.

We're not sure of that. In fact, it's not how it's described in the book. They don't say that they're creating a world based on choices they assume people make. They are showing each other the world as they envision it would be.
I'll give you an example - if Rand believes that a world without the DO will take away people's choice, then he's basically creating a world where people have no choice, and that's what he sees. We have no idea what he would have seen had he imagined a world without the DO, but where people still have a choice, because he simply doesn't think that's possible. But it's still what he thinks, and not the truth. Just because that's what he thinks doesn't make it true.

I think I need to reread the whole sequence again. I mean, you're right that we don't know entirely how it works. But Rand is shocked about the lack of choice in his world. He doesn't realize no DO means no choice until it's pointed out to him. I mean, if he was planning on killing the DO, it makes no sense for him to simultaneously believe that by doing so he'd remove important choices from peoples' lives. It's after he sees that world/vision/whatever that he comes to realize he should not kill the DO.

So really, the question should be, did the DO deceive Rand in that vision by fiddling with it, or is that vision an accurate representation, via the Pattern Manipulation Device (PMD for short?), of what a DO-less world would be like? But duh, that's how this discussion all started. So let me take it one more level out towards abstraction.

Can we trust the PMD visions to be impartial, as in, are they like mathematical functions (input -> [BOX] -> output)?

 

[Aulrick Vendour]

So really, the question should be, did the DO deceive Rand in that vision by fiddling with it, or is that vision an accurate representation, via the Pattern Manipulation Device (MPD for short?), of what a DO-less world would be like?

No, I believe it's different. When Rand holds the DO in his hand, there is a passage about how he KNOWS which of the things the DO told him were true and which were lies. The DO told him that he did not temper with that world Rand created. But that world was based on how Rand view the DO. If he believes that the DO is the source of evil, it makes sense that that's how his world would be created.

I dunno. I reread the later passages, and there are some things that don't sit too well with my theory, and it's all a question of how much Rand really does understand the DO vs. how much power does the DO still have to fool him.

But I still refuse to believe we should accept the ending at face value, because... Well, because it stinks if it does. Truely, a very bad ending for a very good series. So as long as I can interpret things differently, I shall.

 

[Eluial Aldaran]

OK. I have some quotes for you.

Start of Rand's DO-less vision.

The threads of possibility resisted Rand as he wove them together into the world he imagined. He did not know what that meant. Perhaps what he demanded was highly unlikely. This thing he did, using the threads to show what could be, was more than simple illusion. It involved looking to worlds that had been before, worlds that could be again. Mirrors of the reality he lived in. He didn't create these worlds. He merely...manifested them. He forced the threads to open the reality he demanded, and finally they obeyed. One last time, the darkness became light, and the nothing became something.

He stepped into a world that did not know the Dark One.

Later on

IS THIS PERFECTION FOR YOU? The Dark One's voice felt distant. He could pierce this reality to speak to Rand, but he could not appear here as he had in the other visions. This place was his antithesis.

For this was the world that would exist if Rand killed him in the Last Battle.

"Come and see," Rand said to him, smiling.

No reply. If the Dark One allowed himself to be drawn too fully into this reality, he would cease to exist. In this place, he had died.

These are interesting because they both speak to the nature of the PMD (excuse my dyslexia from before regarding the acronym).

Also, couple things to note: the pattern had trouble forming a world without the DO. The world Rand created was one without the Dark One -- no where in the passage is evil referred to at all. Rand makes no assumptions; he simply forces the pattern to show him a world without the DO and it does so, if not entirely willingly.

But I still refuse to believe we should accept the ending at face value, because... Well, because it stinks if it does. Truely, a very bad ending for a very good series. So as long as I can interpret things differently, I shall.

Well, you're certainly entitled to that opinion, but I thought it was an excellent ending.

I also haven't tried to create alternate explanations for parts of the book that I didn't like to make them more enjoyable. I mean, I suppose I could come up with all sorts of cool and important things Moiraine was actually doing in SG, instead of just having her clinging to a rock the whole damn time. But meh, what happened, happened.

 

[Aulrick Vendour]

OK. I have some quotes for you.

Start of Rand's DO-less vision.

The threads of possibility resisted Rand as he wove them together into the world he imagined. He did not know what that meant. Perhaps what he demanded was highly unlikely. This thing he did, using the threads to show what could be, was more than simple illusion. It involved looking to worlds that had been before, worlds that could be again. Mirrors of the reality he lived in. He didn't create these worlds. He merely...manifested them. He forced the threads to open the reality he demanded, and finally they obeyed. One last time, the darkness became light, and the nothing became something.

He stepped into a world that did not know the Dark One.

Later on

IS THIS PERFECTION FOR YOU? The Dark One's voice felt distant. He could pierce this reality to speak to Rand, but he could not appear here as he had in the other visions. This place was his antithesis.

For this was the world that would exist if Rand killed him in the Last Battle.

"Come and see," Rand said to him, smiling.

No reply. If the Dark One allowed himself to be drawn too fully into this reality, he would cease to exist. In this place, he had died.

These are interesting because they both speak to the nature of the PMD (excuse my dyslexia from before regarding the acronym).

Also, couple things to note: the pattern had trouble forming a world without the DO. The world Rand created was one without the Dark One -- no where in the passage is evil referred to at all. Rand makes no assumptions; he simply forces the pattern to show him a world without the DO and it does so, if not entirely willingly.

That's an interpretation again. It is more then possible that the reason Rand had so much trouble creating this world is just because of what I said - he forced the pattern into something which is far from reality. Even if the DO is destroyed, people will retain their choice. That's why he had trouble making the pattern show something else. Should Rand had created a world without the DO, but where people still had choice, it might have been easier for him to creat. We have no way of knowing.
Evil is not needed to be mentioned by name, that's the whole point. Rand equivilents the DO with evil in his mind, because he believes as you do, that the DO is the SOURCE of evil. Hence, by creating a world without the DO he's creating a world without evil, which is something the pattern has trouble accepting. Not because the DO is missing, but because evil is. If you assume, as I do, that the DO is NOT the source of evil, then you'd creat a different world. But Rand believes he is, and so the reflection he "forced the threads to open the reality he demanded" is just that, the reality HE demanded, one that COULD be, but is so far fetched that the pattern had a problem showing it to him. A world not only without the DO, but without evil at all. Those are, in my mind, two seperate things.

Also - not important for this debate, but we talked about it, so - it doesn't mention that it's "hard" for the DO to talk to Rand in that world. It's only said that he has to do it from afar, since he can't go in there or he'll die.

 

[Eluial Aldaran]

:desk

I give up.

If a passage doesn't support your theory, you say it's interpretation. Then you throw in your own assumptions, which you've only been able to support by claiming relevant passages are incorrect interpretations by the characters who experienced them, and then come out with the grand theory (which, by the way, you said you have only because otherwise you think the ending would suck).

Hopefully we'll all find out in a year or two or whenever they finally get around to publishing the encyclopedia.

You make some interesting points, but overall I can't find any support for the bulk of your theory in the books.

Thanks, it was fun, but now it's just becoming frustrating, so unless you have anything new to add, it's probably time for me to walk away.

 

[Aulrick Vendour]

The basic is simple - the only thing needs answering is if the DO is the source of evil or just enhances it and turns people to it.
If the DO is NOT the source of evil, as we've been told in the BWB, then Rand was mistaken. Maybe my theory is still wrong, but Rand's decision was based on the assumption that the DO is the source of evil and without him people will have no choice about evil things. If the DO isn't the source of evil then Rand was mistaken, and it was safe to kill the DO.
Everything else is background noise, interpretations that might be true or not, forced or not, but the bottom line is what is the source of evil. If it's the DO, Rand made the right choice. If it's not the DO, then he made a bad one. It's that simple in my book. The rest matters less.

 

[Syera Faelron]

MOD NOTE:

We welcome all and every opinions. Though please remember we are all different and you both seem to have passionate viewpoints. I hope you can reign in any loose cannons of disagreement

 

[Aulrick Vendour]

Has anyone said something wrong? :scratch
Seems to me the debate was going fine and everyone was civil.

 

[Eluial Aldaran]

MOD NOTE:

We welcome all and every opinions. Though please remember we are all different and you both seem to have passionate viewpoints. I hope you can reign in any loose cannons of disagreement

Yes'm Syera Sedai.

I know I was grumpy, but I was hoping the hug at the end on my post would take the edge off. I've had fun banging heads with Aulrick.


Aulrick -- It's been years since I've looked at the BWB. Perhaps I'll take a gander at it tonight. I'm notorious for being unable to drop discussions, even when I have tried to bow out :P

 

[Aulrick Vendour]

Like I said - it's not important. My theory has holes, and some things sound like a strech, because they are (most good theories have such things, though :P ), but as I said - the basic is simply was Rand right or not? The answer to that question depends on is the DO the SOURCE of evil (and thus is required for the choice) or is there evil without him (and thus he is not required and has fooled Rand). I fear the only answer to that question that I will accept will, hopefuly, be in the encyclopedia. I have heard many problems with my theory, and I agree with some of them, but I have yet heard a reason to believe the DO is indeed the source of evil, and without that I have no reason to believe the DO didn't simply lie to Rand somehow.

 

[MuKen]

Oh wow, I got caught up in my other theory thread and completely forgot about this discussion.

Well, not sure if you guys are already wrapping up, but let me just weigh in on why I think Rand's what-if reality without the DO must be accurate. Aulrick, your basic claim is that what happened is that Rand made the world that way not because he specified "no DO", but because he removed evil choice from everyone himself. The problem I see with this, is that the complexity of doing that seems far beyond mortal comprehension. That's manipulating the end-result directly, which means you have to understand every interaction throughout eternity and format your building blocks so that every one of those interactions will go that way to make that happen. I do not read Rand as someone whose intellect is so godly expansive that he can do such a thing. On the other hand, putting the threads into the "system", and blocking out the DO and letting it do its thing so you can step in at the end to see what pops out seems like something that is much more possible to do.

Speaking as a computer programmer, I see it like that. It is very possible for a human being to input a bunch of functions that run a reality simulation, leave and come back and see what its doing at the end. People do that all the time. But to try to manufacture a certain end-result from those same building blocks is unimaginably harder to do.

 

[Aulrick Vendour]

Muken - that's possible, but that's not exactly how I see it.
My view is far simpler then that - Rand believes the DO is the source of evil. Thus, he removes not only it, but evil itself, from the pattern, then lets it do what it does always, and show him the end result. It was not a thing he thought of. It happened because he believed the DO is the source of evil, and he thus he removed the source.
My claim, and the claim in the BWB, is that that's not the case, and therefor removing the DO would not remove evil from the world, and thus there is no harm in killing him, because people will still have a choice.

 

[MuKen]

Muken - that's possible, but that's not exactly how I see it.
My view is far simpler then that - Rand believes the DO is the source of evil. Thus, he removes not only it, but evil itself, from the pattern, then lets it do what it does always, and show him the end result. It was not a thing he thought of. It happened because he believed the DO is the source of evil, and he thus he removed the source.
My claim, and the claim in the BWB, is that that's not the case, and therefor removing the DO would not remove evil from the world, and thus there is no harm in killing him, because people will still have a choice.

So, just to clarify, you do then agree that in WoT-verse, the abstraction of "evil" is a single entity that can be removed from the system in one step? You simply don't agree that that entity is linked to the DO?

My impression before was that you are saying that evil is not a single entity at all, and hence can't be affected by the removal of the DO. That you were saying there is an independent evil part of every person's choice. But if you are instead saying that it is a single component of the system, just not that it is the DO, may I ask why you believe that? After all, there are plenty of quotes and indications throughout the series that would suggest they are the same, I can't think of any that do otherwise.

 

[Aulrick Vendour]

No no no... Your first impresion was correct. When I say I don't believe the DO is the source of evil, I mean I don't believe evil has a "source." I believe people can choose between doing bad and good, and that the existence of said choice is independent of any outside force. The DO is a force that affects the result of the choice by making it more likely for people to choose to do evil things, but he's not GIVING them the choice, he's just nudging them towards a certain direction with it. It's like I need to get to point C, and I can choose to go with path A or path B. Then someone comes and sais "You should choose path B." The fact that he is trying to influence me has nothing to do with the fact that I have a choice in the first place.

Now the basic question, the one that will answer all questions, is is the DO the SOURCE of evil, which means without him there is no choice at all, or is he not, which means the choice exists anyway, and he's just trying to influence the outcome.

 

[Hammar O'Justice]

Rand believes the DO is the source of evil.

Citation needed.

Rand believes (in fact, discovers) that the DO is the *intellect* manifested by the Primordial Force that is Evil. He's not the source of evil, he is Evil. There is no source of Evil except the Creator who created it as a choice.

 

[Aulrick Vendour]

In that case, there would be no reason not to kill him. If evil exists without him, then people's choice will exist without him.
If there is no evil for people to choose without the DO, then Rand's assumption is that the DO is the source of evil. That logic is unescapable. Otherwise why would killing him result in the lack of choice to do evil?

 

[MuKen]

No no no... Your first impresion was correct. When I say I don't believe the DO is the source of evil, I mean I don't believe evil has a "source." I believe people can choose between doing bad and good, and that the existence of said choice is independent of any outside force.

So this comes back to what I was saying about Rand creating that pattern. If evil is independent in each individual choice, then for him to do as you said, Rand would have had to arrange the threads of that reality taking into account every decision ever made throughout time. That is not something that I think Rand's intellect is characterized as being able to comprehend. It is far more reasonable to say he removed a base element (the DO), then allowed the pattern he created to evolve as it naturally does.

 

[Aulrick Vendour]

But that's just it - Rand arranges the pattern as HE THINKS the pattern works, and that is as the DO being the source of evil. That's why it's also so difficult for him to arrange the pattern in that way, as is described in the books, because he's trying to do something which is against the nature of the pattern - he's taking people's choice.
By believing the DO is the source of evil, he's not just forcing the pattern to create a world without the DO, he's forcing it to create a world without evil at all, which is something the pattern has a hard time accepting. He doesn't have to consider each individual choice. He just thinks about the DO as the source, and then removes it. The Pattern then does the rest, with some difficulty, and removes the choice people have. But that's only because that's what he believes.