Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 7

Unnamed

Update: Discussion has moved on to a new thread.

The load more comments links are getting annoying (at least if you're not logged in), so it's time for a new Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread. We're also approaching the traditional 500-comment mark, but I think that hidden comments provide more appropriate joints to carve these threads at. So as of chapter 67, this is the place to share your thoughts about Eliezer Yudkowsky's Harry Potter fanfic.

The first 5 discussion threads are on the main page under the harry_potter tag. Threads 6 and on (including this one) are in the discussion section using its separate tag system. Also: one, two, three, four, five, six. The fanfiction.net author page is the central author-controlled HPMOR clearinghouse with links to the RSS feed, pdf version, TV Tropes pages, fan art, and more, and AdeleneDawner has kept an archive of Author's Notes.

As a reminder, it's often useful to start your comment by indicating which chapter you are commenting on.

Spoiler Warning: this thread is full of spoilers. With few exceptions, spoilers for MOR and canon are fair game to post, without warning or rot13. More specifically:

You do not need to rot13 anything about HP:MoR or the original Harry Potter series unless you are posting insider information from Eliezer Yudkowsky which is not supposed to be publicly available (which includes public statements by Eliezer that have been retracted).

If there is evidence for X in MOR and/or canon then it's fine to post about X without rot13, even if you also have heard privately from Eliezer that X is true. But you should not post that "Eliezer said X is true" unless you use rot13.

Update: Discussion has moved on to a new thread.

You do not need to rot13 anything about HP:MoR or the original Harry Potter series unless you are posting insider information from Eliezer Yudkowsky which is not supposed to be publicly available (which includes public statements by Eliezer that have been retracted).

If there is evidence for X in MOR and/or canon then it's fine to post about X without rot13, even if you also have heard privately from Eliezer that X is true. But you should not post that "Eliezer said X is true" unless you use rot13.

The alarming thing about being tested isn't that they tested Harry specifically; it is that they were aware that tests needed to be performed at all. Had the plan gone successfully, nobody would have ever have known that Bellatrix was removed. Remember that the entire advantage of Patronus 2.0 (to Quirrell) was the undetectable nature of it. It allowed a person to commit a perfect crime without the guards or dementors being aware that a crime ever occurred.

From the point of view of Harry, sitting with his invisibility cloak in the empty room at 3:00 PM, only a small number of possible futures could exist:

No note - Either the plan will go successfully, Harry shall be captured/killed in the attempt, or they abort for some other reason.

Do not mess with time note - This also should result in aborting the mission since some terrible paradox occurred and you DO NOT mess with time.

Passcode note - Harry will not be apprehended, but the plan will fail in some way and Harry is a suspect. Or Harry will chose to abort the mission and send back a false passcode preserve a stable time-loop. This is the result that actually occurred and is the only one that confirms a definite partial failure.

I admit it is possible that, once the message was sent back in time, Harry and Quirrell were committed via fate to perform the prison break. The problem is that both Harry and Quirrell act as if No Note was received. In the TPSE chapters, we do not see characters who are aware that their plan will be detected. They do not seem to act as if their plan is definitely going to partially fail. Neither does Harry take heart in nor mention the fact that he has already survived escaping Azkaban. Contrast with the same situation in cannon!PrisonerofAzkaban where it is a major plot point.

Edit: There is the possibility it is related to "Azkaban's future cannot interact with it's past", but then you run into the problem of Harry being able to send the note at all. If they abort or are just more paranoid on their mission, Azkaban's future is still effecting its the past either way.

Do not mess with time note - This also should result in aborting the mission since some terrible paradox occurred and you DO NOT mess with time.

Such loops are stable even without any paradox. The extent to which one can deduce whether bad things happen depends on the psychology of the individual and existing priors.

I admit it is possible that, once the message was sent back in time, Harry and Quirrell were committed via fate to perform the prison break.

But so is this. A message 'Abort! X, Y and Z bad things will happen if you try!' can be reproduced and sent back in time perfectly well - and this kind of thing has been observed already in MoR.

-2Danylo15y

Let's speculate. Say, Harry Potter tried, failed, and sent a note to the past. What happens to the Harry in the future? He presumably continues to exist, in an alternate universe where he didn't get a note and went on with the plan. Thus, we have a scenario where, if the test was planned for, Harry must have both Gone on the mission and Not Gone on the mission, and we're merely following the one that did in the narrative.

0cata15y

One obvious option is that Harry might have chosen to commit to sending a note back with opaque instructions to himself either way, even if no test were being performed. In that case, getting the note would mean only that he returned in one piece. Is there an advantage to that?