Heir Of Doom

Absolutely this. An aspect’s opposite/adjacent aspects are all related to it on a deep level.

Mind’s rationality + Breath’s heroism = Hope’s focus on justice in the test description, because justice is based on principles.

But at the same time, Blood = Organized religion (The Sufferer as a Jesus figure) and Heart’s romance are also related to Hope.

Space’s creation + Hope’s imagination = Mind’s emphasis on creativity in the test description.

And on the other hand, branching timelines are driven by Mind, and Mind’s rationality is linked to Rage’s hatred of false beliefs to produce a hatred of lies.

Hmmmst (Aspect Synthesis Theory)

Sorry, I had to get one in.  I’m considering that maybe the aspects are literally built out of each other. And so they are reducible/irreducible at the same time (which in hindsight sounds very homestuck).

Some examples would be: Light would be split into the aspects of space and doom as they are the two complimentary aspects on the aspect wheel. Which would make logical sense, since Light players are defined as “rule-breakers” and “resourceful” (being able to draw from their environment.) Light’s closeness to time on the aspect wheel positions it as an aspect of disparity, and thus allows them to navigate both space and the limits contained in those spaces, finding gaps in the rules. In contrast, Void would be a synthesis of Life and Time. It would make sense to be these two since time is connotated with the father and thus paternalism (which Equius is in alignment with, but also to an extent Roxy in her adoption of gendered norms as Mom Lalonde). Life would be the imposition of will onto others/force. Void is more aligned to the aspect of space, which is in opposition to time (disparity). And so, Void must be seen as having a perspective of homogeneity. The implication would be that void players don’t see disparities of time (how things change) which fits with their general rigid attitudes towards things, such as Roxy’s insistence on Dirk being gay despite gayness no longer being a relevant concept, or Equius’ insistence on the hemospectrum still being relevant. It’s my suspicion that all aspects are synthesized out of other aspects in this way, though the complimentary pairs of an aspect are the most prominent characteristics in a character. Whether or not an aspect is aligned with time or space (is it on the left or right side of the wheel) determines how an individual perceives reality (is reality fresh or new, or is it the same as it’s always been).   Lunar sway seemingly aligns with this view as Prospit dreamers (spatially oriented) are associated with the present and conformity to current norms, whereas Derse dreamers (musically/time oriented) are associated with the future and past. Difference/perception of reality as fluid may fuel their rebellion, even if their will is fixed. it’s ideas all the way down.

a chart of all the fused aspects

(we’ll be opening up classpecting description requests soon!)

- mod of Chance

Can you pls elaborate on those tags about the Derse kids feeling more like siblings than the Prospit kids?

I mean

hang on. /flips down mic. TED Talk Time.

Active and Passive Aspects

So now that the whole notional and material idea has been established, that leaves the question, is there another axis to the whole thing? In other words, what separates, say, Mind from Light, or Void from Heart?

I pondered this question for quite a while before coming up with an answer I found satisfactory, and I’m still far from sure I’ve got it right. But I believe the answer might lie in a slightly different perspective on the dichotomy of Active and Passive.

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Breath and Blood

Breath and blood are equidistant from Time and Space because their power is as related to creation, and posibilities as to destruction, action and completion.

This is a curious thing to take into account: All aspects have a passive or active nature except for these two.

Breath represents liberation, renovation, inspiration, individuation and especially change. The relationship between the wind and the soul is incredibly strong. In fact, two greek words for wind are amenos and pneuma, which both are refered to soul. From this two words we get pneumatic, animated and other words that imply movement.

Breath is the aspect between Hope and Life

-Hope means change through creation of ideas. Hope comes with the posibility to change. Here we can se how hope is both linked to space and breath.

-Life means change through action. Acting according to one's ideas, bringing them to completion. It is the union of breath and time.

So we can agree that breath doesn't only mean change, it also has to do with ideas. These ideas are pure and simple, as Tavros's and John's minds, but they are also independent, as these two kids end up being. The problem of being too independent is that you can get isolated from the rest of the world.

(When I talk about ideas, I'm referring to the usual term, but also to the "Ideas" in Plato's Theory of Forms. We'll get to that later.)

Blood is what we all have in common, it appears when we are wounded, when we make mistakes and suffer. Blood is present at birth, all along our lives and until we ultimately die. We cannot avoid blood, although we'd love to. Blood is common to all human beings, and so it represents restriction and society, pain and absence of change. Another curious thing to say about blood is how it means heritage. We do not choose our bodies, our families or our crushes.

If breath represents autonomy, blood represents dependence. We need many things to survive, but specially others. The bonds we make with the people around us, the ability to connect with them and to see that we are all the same, that's what makes us human beings.

Blood is between Doom and Rage

-Doom represents the general restrictions that rule the world, the inmutable laws that are necessary for a thing to exist. This aspect is very tricky and will require further explanation. It has to do with the restriction (blood) of posibilities (space).

-Rage is the power to act (time) in response to our restrictions (blood)

At this point we have to understand the so disputed duality of nature and spirit, body and soul. Are we authors of our life or are we determined by our genetic and society? Is society even something natural? Could we live by our own? Are we different to the rest of animals because of our conscience?

Lots of questions can be derived from our dual nature, but let's leave it here for now.

Vriska Serket, whose lusus constantly demands she feed it, received Cetus as a denizen, a monster known for eating every single fish on the Land of Light and Rain.

More obviously the number 8 is homophonic with the word ‘ate’ (and also takes the shape of the infinity, related to the ouroborous symbol depicting a snake eating itself), and in Homestuck’s symbology the sun - the symbol of the light aspect - is something that is meant to be ‘eaten’ by black holes.

Clownhood is masculine -> rage aspect is respresented by clowns -> rage aspect is masculine -> rage aspect is contrasted to hope aspect -> hope is feminine as rage is masculine -> hope is represented by cherub/angel wings -> cherubhood is feminine -> Caliborn overcoming cherub nature and transitioning to clownhood can be taken as a transition from feminine/female to masculine/male

it feels counterproductive to label cherubs as one particular gender, and counterintuitive to say that transitioning is overcoming cherub nature when it is in fact the very core of their nature... I'm also hesitant to say any aspect has a sexual sway outside of the fundamentally feminine space and masculine time, though I can concede that clowns being men in Caliborn's paradigm would lend itself toward Caliborn associating rage with masculinity (the same way Calliope genders certain classes based on her preconceptions?), and therefore making attempts to feminise the hope bloodline?

you are not alone but im curious to hear your view of how they're intertwined

a Seer of Light who can read the future and a Thief of Light who can steal "luck" are fundamentally interacting with the same force, "fortune"; one just happens to be a fortune teller while the other is a fortune stealer. and that's not just wordplay, the two meanings of fortune are literally the same! being "lucky" is just the name someone like Vriska gives to the idea of having a "good fortune"; literally just having a positive destiny or fate, which a Seer of Light would be able to read.

the synonymity of fate and luck are evident in the language we use to describe them; moira (as in moirallegience) and kismet (as kismesissitude) both mean "fate" but also "allotment" or "portion", to be lucky, or to be someone who steals fortunes, literally just means to take the good allotment for yourself and leave the people around you with the bad ones. this should be particular obvious in Homestuck, where possibilities are represented by branching timelines; if you're lucky, that just means the alpha timeline is the one where you got the best fortune, and if you're a fortune teller that means you can read these "fortuitous outcomes" into the future. this is only driven home by Aranea's plan, which does not involve "luck" or "knowledge" as we tend to think of them but rather the very literal twisting of fortune to make one timeline more fortuitous than the others.

looking over Calliope's dialogue exploring her bias about passive and active classes essentially being "selfless" and "selfish", respectively, the fact that she calls herself selfish on multiple occasions jumped out at me; seemingly betraying some kind of hypocrisy that Calliope is aware of herself, deep down?

UU: i really thoUght i was going to be someone special. UU: that i coUld Use my abilities do something no one had ever done.

and when Calliope does prove herself to be special with an ultimate expression of the Muse's power, it's by actively inserting herself into Caliborn's time loop, forcing her way into the infrastructure of reality; meanwhile, despite all his own selfishness, Caliborn's greatest strength is that he passively bends reality around him merely by existing.

Classpect powers and skill

So I was thinking about god-tier abilities in Homestuck, and it struck me that rather a lot of the so-called “classpect powers” showcased in hs are either A: a more “supernatural” expression of something the person in question had already been doing prior, or, rarely, B: a direct response to a previously established problem. And in aggregate, these feel like they point toward a fairly particular conception of classpect abilities, that of skills that are learned (or levelups gained in a special ability, if we want to get video gamey with it).

Let’s use John as an example. As the predominant early viewpoint character, his growth is fairly well detailed. As he enters his Land and starts properly growing, he goes from using the Breeze to send objects across his Land using the Parcel Pyxis network, to subconsciously summoning the Breeze to save himself from a fire, to subconsciously having the Breeze emanate in massive quantities from his very body to put out the planet-spanning Green Tragedy, to finally as a god-tier (and with some valuable advice from Vriska) taking full control of the Breeze and using it as a tool and weapon. All of these fall into the A category, but John also has two solid B category abilities, the ability to resist detection via scent, and the ability to turn into wind to protect himself against attacks. And both those abilities are perfect for protection against Bec Noir, who tracked John down via his scent and stabbed him in the chest shortly before John god-tiered, at which point he immediately gained the first of these abilities (he showcased the second when fighting Noir in the Furthest Ring later).

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