On one very special day, Taravangian was the smartest person in the world. In a single effort, he scrawled a codex that laid forth a plan to save the world that would make him king of all things. Unfortunately, he’s not always intelligent enough to understand his own plan.
Every morning Taravangian has his servants test his intelligence to see if he is fit to make progress on his plans. Most days he is of average intelligence and can do things. Some days he is dumb and must be stoped from making any decisions for fear of destroying his plans. On fewer days he is of above-average intelligence but he never repeated the single day of genius ever again.
From The Stormlight Archive series by Brandon Sanderson.
See also:
- I love this character because of how narrowly he rides controlled self-deception
- He blames himself for lack of success and is the scariest kind of villian—one who is self-aware and entirely sure they are saving the world
Links to this note
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Thinking in Systems - Literature Notes
Systems react to external events but behavior is entirely dependent on the internal workings of the system. That’s important because changing behavior can only come from changing the system.