Moash a lighteyes son ? (Theory)

[Natans he/him]

This litle theory aren't mine I just readed in a post and liked enough to create a topic about it. (all credits to Darnam and MadRand)

 

I gonna keep simple =)

 

1- We know that Moash is one of the brigdeman that hates lighteyes more.

2- He is a bitter person

3- He wanted to join the army to gain a shardblade

4- He want change the way that the darkeyes are treated 

 

In the Kaladin chapter reading it was said that he

5- Walk like a official, almost like a lighteye
6- He didn't want a tattoo in visible place like all the other brigdeman

 

7- And he want kill a person.

 

So what is Moash secret? Well the aswer is simple, he is a bastard of lighteye or,even better, he is a son of two lighteyes that born with darkeyes =)

 

 

His bitter nature, hate, dream and way how he bear himself all indicated that he must have some close experience with lighteyes. He want change the world because he was discriminated and,above all, he want kill a person, and that person probably is his father, the one guilt for all his suffering.

 

What you guys think? To many holes in this one ?

Edited November 20, 2013 by Natans

[Argent he/him]

Eh... None of those facts point towards your conclusion. Moash being the bastard son of a lighteyes is something the fits the data, but not something that's derived from the data. 

[Natans he/him]

Eh... None of those facts point towards your conclusion. Moash being the bastard son of a lighteyes is something the fits the data, but not something that's derived from the data. 

 

Well I called a Theory, but I lack the means to try some empiric experience and prove it, so this is really more a educated guess

Edited November 21, 2013 by Natans

[KiManiak he/him]

I would agree that, from the get-go, Moash appears to have some dark secret in his past (...but then, don't all of the Bridgemen?  ).  I don't see your theory as impossible or even improbable; I just don't know if we have enough information at this point to really back it.

 

I will say that in my multiple readings of WoK, I am consistently finding myself not trusting Moash's dedication to Kaladin's goals as much as the other Bridgemen's dedication.  Moash seems to support Kaladin because of what Kaladin can teach and do for him (first he wants to learn the spear, then he is the first to ask to Kaladin to teach him how to Surgebind).  I still am not convinced that Moash is as loyal to Kaladin and his goals; moreso that Moash sees Kaladin as a means-to-an-end; and as long as Kaladin's efforts positively impact Moash, Moash will go along with them.  

 

The Chapter 2 reading shows us that Moash still holds himself separate from the group (the tattoo) and also shows him trying to maximize the benefits of Kaladin's actions and new-found position for all of the Bridgemen as much as he can (his request to learn the sword).

 

I just think we should pay more attention to what Moash wants and his actions in WoR...

Edited November 20, 2013 by KiManiak

[marianmi]

Totally agree with KiManiak. Each time I read about Moash I cringe a bit, and have this feeling that we will see him on the other side....

[bookspren]

Natans, I am on board with this theory for now. Though it isn't derived from the data, is certainly fits. It's reminiscent of Zane, the illegitimate child growing up to hate his father, only without any qualms about killing the one responsible for such a miserable life.

I agree with marianmi and KiManiak that something's not right with Moash. I don't trust him; there's just an unsettling feeling I get when I read about him. He has a pretty obvious dark side.

Where I disagree with you, KiManiak, is his loyalty to Kaladin. There is a self-serving aspect to it as you clearly pointed out but Moash said he would trust him with life. He is not the kind of man to give his respect easily and I believe his loyalty will be a tempering influence. He initially praised Dalinar, and though his enthusiasm seems to have waned, I doubt he will kill a Kholin ally without telling Kaladin what he's planning. An enemy house, however, could be an entirely different matter. He might strike without warning. 

I find myself getting really interested in how Moash and the other minor characters will play out and affect the protagonists.

[Shardlet he/him]

I'm going to toss out a baseless idea early on.  I propose that Moash wants to kill the Azish man, from the prologue, with the odd patch of pale skin on his cheek ( ) for killing his mommy (or daddy).

[Natans he/him]

I'm going to toss out a baseless idea early on.  I propose that Moash wants to kill the Azish man, from the prologue, with the odd patch of pale skin on his cheek ( ) for killing his mommy (or daddy).

 

Kill DARKNESS? I can only hope =)

 

Edit: dionysus,at least in real life is very possible http://genetics.thetech.org/how-blue-eyed-parents-can-have-brown-eyed-children

Edited December 11, 2013 by Natans

[dionysus]

Do we know yet how lighteyes are passed on? Can 2 lighteyes have a rare darkeye child? Does just 1 lighteyes parent ensure a lighteyes child?

 

I definitely subscribe to the theory that all lighteyes are descended from shardbearers after the Recreance.

[Gloom he/him]

"Ahh, there he is, the sixfingered scar faced man!" Moash says as he approaches the Azish man with a pale cresent-moon shaped scar on his cheek. Moahs glares at the man and lifts his spear. "Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya Moash, you killed my father, prepare to die"

[name_here]

We get some explanation in the Kaladin flashbacks. Apparently a mixed marriage can produce some of each. Genetically, that's pretty confusing, lending credence to the idea that it's mystical in origin. Yes, that sort of thing can happen, but if lighteye-darkeye marriages regularly produce mixed first generation families then one would expect it to happen with reasonable frequency among non-mixed marriages. We have no specific evidence on whether it ever happens for non-mixed, but if it does it's probably a rather rare event or we'd see significant social implications. I would guess that it's associated with sDNA that has only one "slot", and which parent fills the slot is semi-random.

 

If it is genetic, I'd guess it's a sex-linked trait on Roshar, mostly because that can obfuscate inheritance patterns. While the resultant impact of that is fairly distinctive, Roshar doesn't necessarily have the genetic knowledge to figure it out and the most obvious first guess about the pattern would have counterexamples.

[Natans he/him]

"Ahh, there he is, the sixfingered scar faced man!" Moash says as he approaches the Azish man with a pale cresent-moon shaped scar on his cheek. Moahs glares at the man and lifts his spear. "Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya Moash, you killed my father, prepare to die"

 

Lol, now make more sense, I almost can see he saying "I want my father back, you son of a bitch" and driving the spear in his long date enemy =)

 

Beware DARKNESS revenge comes in your direction =)

Edited December 11, 2013 by Natans

[The Count he/him]

@ Shardlet: I love love love the idea that Moash want to kill darkness. It is way better than my airy fairy bastard son idea... +1 for you!

 

@Gloom: +1 for making me spit tea all over my work laptop!

Edited November 22, 2013 by MadRand

[kraefzke]

Actually, I think they'd have figured it out pretty easily if it were sex-linked (however, I do genetics for a living, so "easy" for me might not be so easy for somebody else; I still think so).

Light eyes being the recessive phenotype makes much more sense. That way, lighteyes could only have lighteyed children and a mixed couple could sometimes have a lighteyed child as well (if the darkeyed partner were himself the darkeyed offspring from a mixed couple).

Only problem with that is: A darkeyed couple where both parents descend from mixed couples could have a lighteyed child. I don't know if this is reported though.

[name_here]

Well, the pattern of a sex-linked recessive is pretty distinctive, but the Alethi don't know genetics. It'd seem to randomly skip generations sometimes and follow no discernible pattern; even if they drew up one of those hereditary trait trees they wouldn't know what to make ou it.

If it were a simple recessive, then either most parings would have darkeyed children or almost all darkeyes are hybrids and would often have lighteyed children. I think that mismatches between parents and children are fairly rare, although I am willing to believe it occasionally happens and is blamed on adultery or divine will.

It might also be a non gender-linked trait with an inheritance pattern considerably more complex than a basic recessive, but it would need to frequently produce mixed sets of children in mixed pairings while almost never leading to lighteyed children of darkeyes. I'll bow to your expertise if you know of one that fits that profile. I guess social factors would mean it'd be less likely to be known if light is dominant, since lighteyes have more of a reason to cover it up while darkeyes would be quite happy to have a high-status son, question about his legitimacy or not.

[Gloom he/him]

Well, we know that Kaladins parents had hopes that he would become a successful surgeon in Kharbranth and marry a light-eyed woman of lesser means. We also know that just because your a light-eye doesn't mean your influential and powerful. Both Lamaril and Matal were pretty low ranking light-eyes. I would assume that there were others light-eyes who for whatever reason were financially impoverished and needed a good match for their daughters but lacked the prestige or financial security to capture the interest of other light-eyes.

 

I'm not sure what to make of this though. We know that prostitution is fairly common, and we know that prostitutes have children. So this would mean that the light-eyed children of prostitutes have a higher social ranking than that of a high ranking dark-eye. If it is possible for Kaladins children to be born with light eyes, then it should be equally possible for the some of the children of a prostitute to be born with light eyes. This leads to the potential of light-eyed street urchins, which just seems counter to the entire social structure of Alethkar.

[kraefzke]

Let's play this through:

Since we don't know any better, we have to assume earth-human genetics. In that case, sex-linked recessive has to mean X-linked recessive (Y-linked wouldn't make sense). If that were the case, a lighteyed woman and a darkeyed man would always have lighteyed sons and darkeyed daughters. I cannot imagine this going unnoticed, even though it gets more complicated if the couple consists of a lighteyed man and darkeyed woman. Also, the way I read Kaladin's flashback, it seems to be a rather rare occurance for a mixed couple to have lighteyed children, something that can sometimes happen, nothing on a regular basis.

On the other hand, if the inheritance pattern were autosomal ("normal") recessive, it doesn't matter anymore which partner is lighteyed, the only thing that matters for the possibility for lighteyed offspring is if the darkeyed partner descended from a mixed couple himself.

We also have to take into account the whole dahn-nahn business. Only a highranking darkeyes can marry a lighteyes and even the darkeyed children of such a couple would in turn be highranking enough to marry a (lowranking) lighteyes (and would certainly strive to do so, very Alethi that). So, even if there is a (25%) chance for a darkeyed couple to have a lighteyed child if both partners in turn stem from mixed couples, it might just be rare enough not to be common knowledge. Same goes for prostitution: I don't know if we have any knowledge about contraception on Roshar, but it probably exists. If so, there might just be few enough children of prostitutes by lighteyes for random lighteyed offspring of darkeyed couples not to occur in the lower ranks (or to be too rare for most people to be aware of even the possibility).

Of course, there is a good chance that the inheritance pattern is more complicated than that and/or that Roshar genetics works very different from earth genetics, maybe even entirely magical.

[Aether he/him]

I would agree that, from the get-go, Moash appears to have some dark secret in his past (...but then, don't all of the Bridgemen?  ).  I don't see your theory as impossible or even improbable; I just don't know if we have enough information at this point to really back it.

 

I will say that in my multiple readings of WoK, I am consistently finding myself not trusting Moash's dedication to Kaladin's goals as much as the other Bridgemen's dedication.  Moash seems to support Kaladin because of what Kaladin can teach and do for him (first he wants to learn the spear, then he is the first to ask to Kaladin to teach him how to Surgebind).  I still am not convinced that Moash is as loyal to Kaladin and his goals; moreso that Moash sees Kaladin as a means-to-an-end; and as long as Kaladin's efforts positively impact Moash, Moash will go along with them.  

 

The Chapter 2 reading shows us that Moash still holds himself separate from the group (the tattoo) and also shows him trying to maximize the benefits of Kaladin's actions and new-found position for all of the Bridgemen as much as he can (his request to learn the sword).

 

I just think we should pay more attention to what Moash wants and his actions in WoR...

I sincerely hope not. I liked the character development of Moash; he has become one of my favourites.

 

And while I am already not inclined to believe this, I also find it rather unlikely. Moash repeatedly volunteers to life-threatening missions (such as playing the Parshendi-bones decoy, following Kaladin at the battle of the Tower etc.), which would be highly uncharacteristic if he was primarily self-serving. I do believe he has double motives for what he is doing, but his (apparent) fierce loyalty to Kaladin seems sincere.

 

Also, I wouldn't put to much into what you've read from the WoR chapter. First of all, he never had a slave-brand (which most - if not all - of the others had), so it isn't too strange that he didn't want it to have the "Freedom" glyph on his face, which would suggest he was once a slave. Secondly, if Moash think the Lighteyes position in society to be highly unfair and/or unjustified, then him wanting to learn how to use a sword isn't too much of a stretch either. He wants to elevate his position, no doubt about that (he's pretty much said so already), but not necessarily through nefarious means (at least not to Kaladin)

[ADIMORTIS he/him]

I doubt that Moash would be a bastard son of a lighteye. In the chapter "Fear" he says this..

“I’d surrendered my plans, but you’ve returned them to me. I’ll guard you with my life, Kaladin. I swear it to you, by the blood of my fathers"

If he wanted his father dead,I doubt that he would swear by it.....

[The Count he/him]

Not necessarily...

 

'...by the blood of my Fathers' could just be a generic oath in Roshar and may have no actual connection to his real father.

 

Also the plural (Fathers) to me indicates general ancestors rather than specific antecedents so doesn't seem mutually exclusive to hatred of his Father.

 

I hold my judgement of this (even though I sort of suggested it!) until I get more information. I do like the 'Moash wants to kill a certain Azish man with a moon scar on his face' theory very much though.

[Aether he/him]

Also the plural (Fathers) to me indicates general ancestors rather than specific antecedents so doesn't seem mutually exclusive to hatred of his Father.

Could also be indicating that he in fact has two fathers, which would mean that his parents either divorced and then remarried, or that he was raised by a homosexual male couple.

 

EDIT: Lol. I seem to remember having two up-votes on this post. Somehow this one became both my first double up-vote post and my first double down-vote post.

Edited December 13, 2013 by Aether

[Argent he/him]

For a Veristitalian, shouldn't this hypothesis be beneath your notice, on account of how little (i.e. nonexistent) evidence there is for it? =\

[Aether he/him]

For a Veristitalian, shouldn't this hypothesis be beneath your notice, on account of how little (i.e. nonexistent) evidence there is for it? =\

Oh, but it is all about the intent guiding my reasoning. When theorycrafting in earnest, this would indeed be the case, but when it is so much more amusing to blatantly ignore my own precepts, then fun takes over and permits me to say whatever the heck I want.

 

Besides, if I permit myself to be utterly pedantic, then my suggestion can be claimed to have been aimed at showing how little that oath of Moash actually tells us. I do not actually claim that it is so, only indicate how feeble any claim derived from that particular quote would be.

 

EDIT: grammar

Edited December 3, 2013 by Aether

[Swimmingly he/him]

Aether, no offense, but that's a pretty petty tactic. Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit.

[Aether he/him]

Aether, no offense, but that's a pretty petty tactic. Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit.

I do not agree with your premise, but that's beside the point. I wasn't trying to mock MadRand in any way, just illustrating that we should read too much into Moash's oath, as it is rather generic in its form. And in the very next post I am quite clearly mocking myself for my rather blatant lack of commitment to my own precepts.

 

EDIT: Going to take a page out of  Jit's book here and quote Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians:

 

 

“You see, that is the sad, sorry, terrible thing about sarcasm. It's really funny.”

 But yeah, that might not have been my best attempt at it.

Edited December 6, 2013 by Aether