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JoshuaZ comments on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 8 - Less Wrong
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Ok. The Tonks thing was really clever. And the bit about double-witches was brilliant. It definitely drives home the whole issue of taking joy in the merely real. It is a clever, original, and highly plausible interpretation of what people would likely do if they grew up taking some sort of secret magic for granted.
I aspire to be a doubly aspiring double rationalist.
Yep, double magic is fantastic. Gonna use that when I hear someone wishing they had magical powers.
Double magic may be a reference to Grossman's The Magicians. Warning: While there are many good things in the book, the viewpoint character is depressed and (in my experience) depressing.
I don't know whether Grossman has read HP:MOR, but he heads it off at the beginning of the book. Everyone at the magic school is a good bit smarter than average, but there's no one who's qualitatively smarter than that, and it's stated that enough unproductive research has been done into the roots of magic that it's generally considered to be a dead end.
Grossman's novel was written in 2009. So barring time travel, he wrote his novel before encountering HPMR if he has encountered it.
Thanks. I should have checked that.
Extra props to Grossman for thinking ahead in a general way.
Discworld has "Sourcerers..." - the eighth son of an eighth son is a wizard, and the eighth son of a wizard is a Sourceror, who acts as a source of magic and is capable of doing things ordinary wizards can't. Unfortunately, too much magic in any one area breaks holes in reality and lets in Things from the Dungeon Dimensions, so any Sourceror ends up being a walking apocalypse waiting to happen. Which is also why Discworld wizards are celibate. ;)
And here's the version one level down from regular people wishing they were magic. Note: this information can only be unlocked with the gift of psychometric tracery.