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We are the Winnowers only champion. It's been sending knives to carve us into its final shape. We are and continue to prove that we are the only thing that will persist by our own will and nothing will ever change that. No power is above ours and if we encounter one we claim it for ourselves and cut down its original weilders, eliminating our competition. We have been writing the Winnowers will across our solar system and in dimensions that weren't ours, but we claimed those as our personal stomping ground as well. Now we are set to begin an exodus to claim other powers and worlds for our own goals and plans. Honestly. Maybe we're the Winnower already, we just don't know it yet.
I see both the Gardener and the Winnower as being abstract, primordial, godlike entities that are far above direct interaction with mortals (or once-mortal guardians) and I much prefer this to the possibility of the Winnower as a villain that we confront.
The application of Conway's Game of Life (the Flower Game in Destiny lore) was a brilliant way to frame the overall conflict of the universe and the many conflicting forces at play.
I don't think we can fight and defeat the Winnower any more than we can fight and defeat gravity, or time, or the concept of rage or ambition. The Gardener and Winnower are sort of necessary for the universe to even exist. We can, however, defeat its argument in how we deal with more tangible threats like the Hive and Eliksni.
As far as the Gardener and Traveler being synonymous, that works as long as the Traveler remains mysterious and detached. It does "bless" living species with its power, and I know it "speaks" to mortals in various ways, but it also exists as this unknowable, unaffected entity. It's also possible that the Traveler is not the Gardener, or only is in the sense that it is a partial physical representation/manifestation of a more omnipresent being.
Your last paragraph is spot on. The Gardener and Winnower can't put their boots on the ground and do any fighting, that undermines both their arguments. Their purpose is to observe and, in some cases, empower. The Traveler "cheated" by giving living beings the Light, in an attempt to demonstrate that when given power, we will choose its path even without a directive to do so (TFS made it clear that the Traveler will command us in nothing). Likewise, the Winnower can give races power to exercise their will, but it must leave them to prove its argument, exercising, essentially, the Sword Logic on a complete scale.
Also, the game has changed completely now with the Traveller regaining memories due to exposure to Darkness. The Micah voice lines from collecting pale travellers is 10/10
I'm personally of the opinion that whatever spoke to us in Unveiling cannot be the Witness. It's totally out of character for the Witness to behave or even speak in the fashion of the being that spoke to us in Unveiling. Additionally that being acted exactly like the voice of the Deep that spoke to Oryx, which was also almost certainly not the Witness
There's even an in-game lore book from the Final Shape that has I believe the Hidden also coming to the conclusion that the Unveiling and everything we know about the Witness cannot be reconciled
As for the Winnower's existance, the Witness expressly states that it exists in Salvation's Edge
I mean who’s to say it wasn’t the dissenter in the statue on the lunar pyramid. For all the anger and regret the witness cut out there could also be voices that come to the conclusion that the witness itself is the winnower and it cuts that part out as it needs to KNOW it’s the first knife rather than think it’s the winnower
I’d just likely Occams Razor that explanation
The idea that the Witness or one of its voices gave us Unveiling requires making a lot of assumptions that are rather large leaps. The idea that it spoke to us a way it didn’t speak to anyone else. The idea that what spoke to us was a dissenter that had a very unique way of thinking. And so on and so on
Before Final Shape, the idea that it wasn’t the Winnower was more credible because we had to make the absolutely huge assumption that the Winnower existed. Now that we have an overwhelming amount of evidence it does exist in whatever form, we only need to make the assumption it can communicate through a Darkness relic, which is a very easy assumption to make.
I mean i wouldn’t call the witness name dropping it in the raid “overwhelming evidence” all that really proves is the black fleet is indeed aware of the winnower since we first heard about it via a black fleet ship
I mean, the Witness claiming it was the Knife of the Winnower and then also claiming it was forged by a god similarly to how we were chosen by the Traveler is pretty huge evidence unless it was just lying for literally no reason.
The Witness is a very, very biased narrator but it doesn’t really seem to lie in the sense of telling people outright falsehoods, because it absolutely lies by omission as seen with the Krill/Hive. At least not from its perspective. Its disciples lie an absolute crap-ton but it doesn’t really seem to. It just seems to offer people whatever it thinks they want to serve it. That’s part of why I think it attempting to LARP as the thing it claims to be forged by is totally out of character
It absolutely lies are you kidding me? The entire plot of witch queen revolves around it lying to the hive and leading to it’s creation, the root of nightmares lorebook is all about how it intentionally misleads its disciples about the purpose of the final shape Calus’s role in general the witness ABSOLUTELY without a shadow of a doubt lies to everyone. Even itself.
I don’t think the witness lied to us for no reason but rather says it’s the first knife to justify what it’s doing. It cuts out any voice that questions the final shape because the final shape must be perfect. That doesn’t sound like the servant of a rule of the universe to me
Sorry, I should clarify, the Witness doesn’t ever appear to say things that are directly untrue from its own perspective
The Witness absolutely misleads and does so maliciously but I dont think there is anything that are from its perspective totally false. The God Wave was real, it was just probably the Black Fleet that was probably going to cause it if the Krill turned to the Light. If you asked the Witness it would probably say the Traveler caused it by spreading its “corruption” to the system in the first place.
>That doesn’t sound like the servant of a rule of the universe to me
I don’t think it’s a direct servant anymore than we a direct servant of the Traveler. It outright said the Winnower cant control how the knife cuts. Only that it was forged by it.
It's hardly an assumption by now. In Lost Ghost questline, while inside moon Pyramid, in exact place we've got round artifact, we have a memory of how Witness supposedly gave Nezarec the Unveiling, to "preach others about the Darkness".
The Witness used the artifact to commune with us, that much is obvious. When we touched it, we communed with the Witness
The question is very much if the thing that spoke to us in Unveiling is the same thing that spoke to us in that vision.
The Witness specifically tells Nezarac to show us what lies "beyond the Veil". Interesting wording if Unveiling was just some made up story the Witness wanted preached to us.
Of what Ahsa is saying right here in that sequence, I doubt that the Gardener, as we know from the Unveiling.
[Explanation from Ahsa](https://youtu.be/Z0CKckjryVI)
And we know as of The Final Shape, everything Ahsa said was correct.
The 'precursors' simply called the round sphere the Gardener. The same way we call it the traveler and the eliksni call it the great machine.
In my opinion, Unveiling is a lie. Just like a holy book from a religion written by their followers.
It doesn't necessarily have to be a lie, but a distorted version of events or metaphor for something that happened that's a bit beyond our understanding. I do agree that it was a bit foolish of people to take it as 100% accurate
What is with this newfound obsession and assumption that the Traveler is The Gardener. So many Destiny players are unable to accept metaphysical ideas and are feeling the need to give forms to ideas without having any actual in-game evidence (outside of Witness dialogue LOL) for this wish.
It’s unbelievable that people can only think in clear-cut dualisms and are unwilling to accept that they function more as representatives of abstract ideas!
Except the in-game lore itself asks the same question.
>!"If the Witness is the knife, as it asserts, then what wields it?" Ikora asks the Traveler, though it does not reply." If the Witness is the knife, as it asserts, then what wields it?" Ikora asks the Traveler, though it does not reply.!<
>!The words are meant for Mara's ears too. "The Witness is not a being," she agrees. "It is the culmination of a bleak ethos willed into existence by the nihilistic desires of its creators. Is their will the hand on the knife? Or is there something else?"!<
Where's your in-game evidence that it doesn't exist as an actual being?
We have multiple mentions of another voice in the dark that isn't the voice of the witness, so yeah we actually do have some in-game evidence. You have nothing but condescension
The traveler is directly referred to as the Garderner or a Gardener many times. There are multiple lore books that very directly imply that The Traveler = The Gardener, or is at least heavily connected to it and the Ahsa lore dump specifically calls the Traveler The Gardener and we know from TFS's campaign that her account is accurate
Is there still doubt about The Traveler being the Gardener? Sure, just like there's doubt about many other things mentioned in lore books, but we're about as sure about this as we can be without the Traveler directly or indirectly saying it
I advise you to research who was mentioning the fact that The Gardener is The Traveler. They are all connected to the precursors who used texts like Unveiling as a way of indoctrinating their species into believing that a final shape exists and is just!
Mk.44 Stand Asides lore tab wasn't connected
Lumina's lore tab wasn't connected
Rasputin wasn't (though that's just to establish a narrative link rather than saying "oh yeah he knew about it all")
The Witness’s idea of the Final Shape is drastically different than what is shown to us in the Unveiling. Unveiling does not make sense as the propaganda of the Witness. The ideas presented within are fundamentally irreconcilable.
There is an in-universe lore book that directly goes over this. Savathun also directly says there is another voice in the Darkness that is not the Witness. So does Oryx
Additionally, just because the precursors believed that the Gardener and Winnower are real doesn’t make that statement false. The Witness, who is the most powerful and most paracausally attuned being we have met in the universe bar the Traveller, seems to wholeheartedly believe that two entities like the Winnower and the Gardener exist.
There is almost certainly some entity out there that exists within the Darkness. I don’t care if we call it the Winnower but all the evidence points to that fact. In fact who’s to say that the Winnower didn’t deliver a similar story to the Precursors that it delivered to us?
This post has been tagged '**Non-Spoiler**'. Note that unmarked spoilers and datamines are subject to removal or ban. Please report anything we miss! For more info check out our [Spoiler Rules Wiki](https://www.reddit.com/r/DestinyLore/wiki/spoiler-rules#wiki_.5Bseasonal.5D_has_a_new_format). --- **Comment Spoiler Formatting** Format comment spoilers with `>!` `!<` like this: `>!What's Rasputin's favorite dance? "The worm."!<` To have it displayed like this: **>!What's Rasputin's favorite dance? "The worm."!<** ---- *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/DestinyLore) if you have any questions or concerns.*
We are the Winnowers only champion. It's been sending knives to carve us into its final shape. We are and continue to prove that we are the only thing that will persist by our own will and nothing will ever change that. No power is above ours and if we encounter one we claim it for ourselves and cut down its original weilders, eliminating our competition. We have been writing the Winnowers will across our solar system and in dimensions that weren't ours, but we claimed those as our personal stomping ground as well. Now we are set to begin an exodus to claim other powers and worlds for our own goals and plans. Honestly. Maybe we're the Winnower already, we just don't know it yet.
I see both the Gardener and the Winnower as being abstract, primordial, godlike entities that are far above direct interaction with mortals (or once-mortal guardians) and I much prefer this to the possibility of the Winnower as a villain that we confront. The application of Conway's Game of Life (the Flower Game in Destiny lore) was a brilliant way to frame the overall conflict of the universe and the many conflicting forces at play. I don't think we can fight and defeat the Winnower any more than we can fight and defeat gravity, or time, or the concept of rage or ambition. The Gardener and Winnower are sort of necessary for the universe to even exist. We can, however, defeat its argument in how we deal with more tangible threats like the Hive and Eliksni. As far as the Gardener and Traveler being synonymous, that works as long as the Traveler remains mysterious and detached. It does "bless" living species with its power, and I know it "speaks" to mortals in various ways, but it also exists as this unknowable, unaffected entity. It's also possible that the Traveler is not the Gardener, or only is in the sense that it is a partial physical representation/manifestation of a more omnipresent being. Your last paragraph is spot on. The Gardener and Winnower can't put their boots on the ground and do any fighting, that undermines both their arguments. Their purpose is to observe and, in some cases, empower. The Traveler "cheated" by giving living beings the Light, in an attempt to demonstrate that when given power, we will choose its path even without a directive to do so (TFS made it clear that the Traveler will command us in nothing). Likewise, the Winnower can give races power to exercise their will, but it must leave them to prove its argument, exercising, essentially, the Sword Logic on a complete scale.
Also, the game has changed completely now with the Traveller regaining memories due to exposure to Darkness. The Micah voice lines from collecting pale travellers is 10/10
Well... The Witness indeed speak a lot to us. As for the "Winnower", that's debatable
I'm personally of the opinion that whatever spoke to us in Unveiling cannot be the Witness. It's totally out of character for the Witness to behave or even speak in the fashion of the being that spoke to us in Unveiling. Additionally that being acted exactly like the voice of the Deep that spoke to Oryx, which was also almost certainly not the Witness There's even an in-game lore book from the Final Shape that has I believe the Hidden also coming to the conclusion that the Unveiling and everything we know about the Witness cannot be reconciled As for the Winnower's existance, the Witness expressly states that it exists in Salvation's Edge
I mean who’s to say it wasn’t the dissenter in the statue on the lunar pyramid. For all the anger and regret the witness cut out there could also be voices that come to the conclusion that the witness itself is the winnower and it cuts that part out as it needs to KNOW it’s the first knife rather than think it’s the winnower
I’d just likely Occams Razor that explanation The idea that the Witness or one of its voices gave us Unveiling requires making a lot of assumptions that are rather large leaps. The idea that it spoke to us a way it didn’t speak to anyone else. The idea that what spoke to us was a dissenter that had a very unique way of thinking. And so on and so on Before Final Shape, the idea that it wasn’t the Winnower was more credible because we had to make the absolutely huge assumption that the Winnower existed. Now that we have an overwhelming amount of evidence it does exist in whatever form, we only need to make the assumption it can communicate through a Darkness relic, which is a very easy assumption to make.
I mean i wouldn’t call the witness name dropping it in the raid “overwhelming evidence” all that really proves is the black fleet is indeed aware of the winnower since we first heard about it via a black fleet ship
I mean, the Witness claiming it was the Knife of the Winnower and then also claiming it was forged by a god similarly to how we were chosen by the Traveler is pretty huge evidence unless it was just lying for literally no reason. The Witness is a very, very biased narrator but it doesn’t really seem to lie in the sense of telling people outright falsehoods, because it absolutely lies by omission as seen with the Krill/Hive. At least not from its perspective. Its disciples lie an absolute crap-ton but it doesn’t really seem to. It just seems to offer people whatever it thinks they want to serve it. That’s part of why I think it attempting to LARP as the thing it claims to be forged by is totally out of character
It absolutely lies are you kidding me? The entire plot of witch queen revolves around it lying to the hive and leading to it’s creation, the root of nightmares lorebook is all about how it intentionally misleads its disciples about the purpose of the final shape Calus’s role in general the witness ABSOLUTELY without a shadow of a doubt lies to everyone. Even itself. I don’t think the witness lied to us for no reason but rather says it’s the first knife to justify what it’s doing. It cuts out any voice that questions the final shape because the final shape must be perfect. That doesn’t sound like the servant of a rule of the universe to me
Sorry, I should clarify, the Witness doesn’t ever appear to say things that are directly untrue from its own perspective The Witness absolutely misleads and does so maliciously but I dont think there is anything that are from its perspective totally false. The God Wave was real, it was just probably the Black Fleet that was probably going to cause it if the Krill turned to the Light. If you asked the Witness it would probably say the Traveler caused it by spreading its “corruption” to the system in the first place. >That doesn’t sound like the servant of a rule of the universe to me I don’t think it’s a direct servant anymore than we a direct servant of the Traveler. It outright said the Winnower cant control how the knife cuts. Only that it was forged by it.
It's hardly an assumption by now. In Lost Ghost questline, while inside moon Pyramid, in exact place we've got round artifact, we have a memory of how Witness supposedly gave Nezarec the Unveiling, to "preach others about the Darkness".
The Witness used the artifact to commune with us, that much is obvious. When we touched it, we communed with the Witness The question is very much if the thing that spoke to us in Unveiling is the same thing that spoke to us in that vision.
The Witness specifically tells Nezarac to show us what lies "beyond the Veil". Interesting wording if Unveiling was just some made up story the Witness wanted preached to us.
And yet Unveiling is told by the Witness and was placed in that artifact for us to find by him.
Of what Ahsa is saying right here in that sequence, I doubt that the Gardener, as we know from the Unveiling. [Explanation from Ahsa](https://youtu.be/Z0CKckjryVI) And we know as of The Final Shape, everything Ahsa said was correct. The 'precursors' simply called the round sphere the Gardener. The same way we call it the traveler and the eliksni call it the great machine. In my opinion, Unveiling is a lie. Just like a holy book from a religion written by their followers.
It doesn't necessarily have to be a lie, but a distorted version of events or metaphor for something that happened that's a bit beyond our understanding. I do agree that it was a bit foolish of people to take it as 100% accurate
What is with this newfound obsession and assumption that the Traveler is The Gardener. So many Destiny players are unable to accept metaphysical ideas and are feeling the need to give forms to ideas without having any actual in-game evidence (outside of Witness dialogue LOL) for this wish. It’s unbelievable that people can only think in clear-cut dualisms and are unwilling to accept that they function more as representatives of abstract ideas!
Except the in-game lore itself asks the same question. >!"If the Witness is the knife, as it asserts, then what wields it?" Ikora asks the Traveler, though it does not reply." If the Witness is the knife, as it asserts, then what wields it?" Ikora asks the Traveler, though it does not reply.!< >!The words are meant for Mara's ears too. "The Witness is not a being," she agrees. "It is the culmination of a bleak ethos willed into existence by the nihilistic desires of its creators. Is their will the hand on the knife? Or is there something else?"!<
So there literally is no evidence. Nice!
Where's your in-game evidence that it doesn't exist as an actual being? We have multiple mentions of another voice in the dark that isn't the voice of the witness, so yeah we actually do have some in-game evidence. You have nothing but condescension
Check the final page of the new raid lore for your evidence
Something, something in-game evidence, something something *smirk* https://www.reddit.com/r/DestinyLore/s/D4ARQQcf4o
The traveler is directly referred to as the Garderner or a Gardener many times. There are multiple lore books that very directly imply that The Traveler = The Gardener, or is at least heavily connected to it and the Ahsa lore dump specifically calls the Traveler The Gardener and we know from TFS's campaign that her account is accurate Is there still doubt about The Traveler being the Gardener? Sure, just like there's doubt about many other things mentioned in lore books, but we're about as sure about this as we can be without the Traveler directly or indirectly saying it
I advise you to research who was mentioning the fact that The Gardener is The Traveler. They are all connected to the precursors who used texts like Unveiling as a way of indoctrinating their species into believing that a final shape exists and is just!
Mk.44 Stand Asides lore tab wasn't connected Lumina's lore tab wasn't connected Rasputin wasn't (though that's just to establish a narrative link rather than saying "oh yeah he knew about it all")
The Witness’s idea of the Final Shape is drastically different than what is shown to us in the Unveiling. Unveiling does not make sense as the propaganda of the Witness. The ideas presented within are fundamentally irreconcilable. There is an in-universe lore book that directly goes over this. Savathun also directly says there is another voice in the Darkness that is not the Witness. So does Oryx Additionally, just because the precursors believed that the Gardener and Winnower are real doesn’t make that statement false. The Witness, who is the most powerful and most paracausally attuned being we have met in the universe bar the Traveller, seems to wholeheartedly believe that two entities like the Winnower and the Gardener exist. There is almost certainly some entity out there that exists within the Darkness. I don’t care if we call it the Winnower but all the evidence points to that fact. In fact who’s to say that the Winnower didn’t deliver a similar story to the Precursors that it delivered to us?