[theories] Where does dissonance come from?

[Jason]

Is dissonance imposed internally, based on the celestial's understanding of self, or externally, based on the Truth of the Symphony? Or, to put it another way: Do celestials get dissonance even when they're unaware that they've done something dissonant?

I realized that this question has been coming up for me repeatedly lately, and I foresee likely situations in my current campaign that would put the question to the test. I'll explain a bit more about what I mean:

To consider an example: In another thread, I was reflecting on whether Kyriotates of Destiny (who can read their hosts' memories) actually have it tougher than other Kyrios in terms of making sure their hosts are left in good shape. If a Kyrio of Destiny possesses someone who knows that taking that person over for a even just 20 minutes will make her miss an important meeting, ruining her career, he had better make sure he gets her off to that meeting in time.

Any other Kyrio might be forgiven — and might forgive itself — for thinking that 20 minutes couldn't possibly be a big deal. If an ignorant Kyrio possessed the host briefly and then freed her again with an extra fifty bucks in her pocket, it'd either gain no dissonance (believing itself to have left her in even better condition than before) or it'd gain dissonance after the meeting is over and the career is ruined — but the Kyrio would have no idea where the dissonance came from. As a GM in this situation, my inclination would be to feel like the second scenario is kind of arbitrary and unfair, and that the Kyrio should only get the dissonance for acting against its own nature of taking care of hosts. In this example, I'd assume that dissonance comes from within, not just from being imposed externally based on some objective evaluation of the Kyriotate's performance.

To consider another example, however, we have the question of whether Mercurians generate dissonance for ordering others to do their killing for them. I think the canon answer is no, technically: In A Bright Dream, Nicole, a Mercurian of Fire, calmly and musically instructs a mundane human to kill her backstabbing servant. She doesn't seem too broken up about it, and Gabriel doesn't seem to object, even knowing that Nicole had the human drain the guy's blood.

I took this to mean that it's technically not dissonant for a Mercurian to actively order someone else to do violence (which is probably good news for Marc, who needs to give orders to his Malakim). That would imply to me, at least, that dissonance rules are imposed by the true nature of the Symphony, not from within the celestial him or herself. Playing strictly by "the rules," if the Mercurian isn't committing violence directly, she's golden! Personally, though, I feel like it would start wearing down the souls of the "Friends of Man" to continually order others to commit violence for them. I just can't picture a Mercurian leading a crazed gunman around, pointing to passers-by, commanding, "Kill that one next," and not incurring dissonance for it.

Clearly I have thought about the fictional metaphysics of this world more than is healthy for one person. Please relieve me of this great burden (or feel free to justify it for me by pretending to be just as interested).