gwern comments on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 10 - Less Wrong

11 Post author: Oscar_Cunningham 07 March 2012 04:46PM

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Comment author: gwern 12 March 2012 03:36:45AM 4 points [-]

It's entirely possible that this is entirely natural.

Sure. It's just... I feel this would violate the idiot-ball rule - Hermione going berserk enough to put Draco in the hospital wing? Yes, she was angry before, but losing control is an idiot-ball thing to do.

I like this option, but it's also probably the least likely one.

Agree. Not sure how such a mutual trap would expose their manipulators either.

Comment author: linkhyrule5 12 March 2012 03:47:04AM 3 points [-]

It could be an accident - Hermione hits a chandelier with a cutting cures, etc. It's a fight, things like that happen.

Agree. Not sure how such a mutual trap would expose their manipulators either.

Whoever's manipulating them is probably not anticipating a team up. (And if they are, they're beyond the two's ability to deal with anyway, so no point in worrying about that option.) So, Hermione apparently gets taken out of the picture, while Draco is free to investigate what's going on with a manipulator who's moving ahead with his plan.

... Okay, so that was kind of nonsensical since I was deciding what my opinion was while I wrote it. Let's try this again:

Hermione and Draco meet, and actually talk it out. They decide to work together against their mysterious puppetmaster by playing along with the plot, as opposed to completely derailing it and then not knowing who was behind it.