Pretty sure she made up the idea of Horcruxes halfway through the series.
The second book, nearly the start of the series, centers around a diary that is nearly indestructible, can possess others, and can reconstitute Voldemort after his death. Even though it wasn't called a Horcrux by name at the time, it hits all the key points of something you'd make to save yourself from death. It's also known in that same book that he's got more than one of the things.
She might not have had everything planned out, but it seems pretty clear to me she had an Immortal Dark Lord in mind when she made the first book and had already mapped out the mechanism by the second book.
The second book, nearly the start of the series, centers around a diary that is nearly indestructible, can possess others, and can reconstitute Voldemort after his death.
It was fireproof. No other conventional type of damage ever occurred to it. (ETA: oops.) Those other properties you mention are evidence that the idea of Horcruxes had not been settled on when the diary was created- none of the other Horcruxes were independent, sentient copies.
(Incidentally, did anyone else think Arthur's line about "never trust anything that can think for itself i...
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This is a new thread to discuss Eliezer Yudkowsky’s Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality and anything related to it. This thread is intended for discussing chapter 85. The previous thread has long passed 500 comments. Comment in the 15th thread until you read chapter 85.
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