Theoryland of the Wheel of Time

1.Are there any other sentient spren like Syl, if not are there any Spren capable of becoming sentient or is she purposefully unique?

2.If so, what are the conditions that must be met for a spren to become sentient?

Ok Cool.

1. There are other sentient spren.

2. There are many more who could become sentient, there were choices that were made that we will get into that were made by some spren that, that involved-

There were certain choices that were made that influenced this, so yes, that was a very detailed and specific question, you did a good job and so I will give you your answer that there are others like Syl that could become and there are some that are sentient already

RICK

Would that also mean that certain spren had an alignment or would some spren be catered toward good or evil or not?

BRANDON SANDERSON

They're creatures of nature and so good and evil aren't as, as big a deal to them. There are some that may be put in that sort of alignments, certainly honorspren are going to be of a certain type, but there are many spren of many different temperaments and they are kind of aligned to their temperament, having to do with who they are and what they are.

Could Syl, or any other type of spren, be seen in a photograph?

Excellent question, and I like the way you phrase it. Let's give this one a little more time before I get into the specifics of whether spren are manifesting physically or not.

Regarding the topic, a quick question: Are Truthspren originally sentient, or do they gain/regain sentience from a bond, like Syl?

RAFO for Words of Radiance, where a lot of these questions will find answers.

A question related to that. There’s an idea going around that all the spren that can Nahel Bond, all Knight Radiant spren are called honorspren, and then Nohadon talks specifically about honorspren. Is that the case? You know, is it just the Windrunner spren, or is it all the spren?

I’m going to deal with this in the next book. So I’ll just go ahead and let it be a literal RAFO. It is coming.

(interruption, leading Brandon to lose his train of thought)

So what we are dealing with here is that all Spren are indeed all pieces of the one who has gone, so those spren are all- except the Windrunner spren, the spren like Syl, have certain umm.

ZAS

Nohadon mentioned that "All the spren aren’t as discerning as honorspren."

BRANDON SANDERSON

So there has been dissension among them about who gets to call themselves honorspren, if that makes sense, and there is some disagreement among scholars about which ones are really, you know "This is what defines an honorspren".

But the spren you are running into are all (something) of either Honor or Cultivation, or some mixture between them. And you can usually tell the ones that are more Honor, and the ones that are more Cultivation. That should be able to be (something).

Yes.

Question

Why does he do that?

Brandon Sanderson

Because when Kaladin was there and they were touching it, they actually heard the spren that was inside of it.

Question

So it wasn't Syl that he heard, it was —

Brandon Sanderson

It was the sword's spren. That Kaladin was touching it — when a Knight Radiant touches it — you'll see when other Knights Radiant pick up sword, they can hear the screaming.

She did not, it was actually Syl. But he was in the process of breaking the bond, and so she was able to get some stormlight to him, but that is what really — Like you can imagine, this bond was really a strain for her to use at that point, so it was her, but doing what she did just about destroyed her, which is why you don't hear from her after that.

Question

Is healing a universal stormlight power then?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, within reason. Some are better at it, but it is a universal power.

Question

With Dalinar, as a bondsmith, what does that mean his power-?

Brandon Sanderson

That is a good question! That is going to be an [RAFO card].