Manfred comments on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 17, chapter 86 - Less Wrong

9 Post author: Alsadius 17 December 2012 07:19AM

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Comment author: Alsadius 17 December 2012 08:37:04AM *  16 points [-]

I think I preferred the old version of 85 more than the new one. "The phoenix only comes once" seems a lot more made-up than Harry's original determination to abandon comic-book morality as soon as someone died, which felt very much in character.

86 is certainly interesting, even if it largely felt like a wrapping-up restatement of what we knew. That said, I loved the Moody duel, and after six months a bit of restatement is quite useful. Also, I'm torn between how to interpret Snape's last question - my first thought was that he was verifying the truth of a story he had been told("Your master tortured her, now join the light side already!" being the most likely), but upon rereading, I wonder if he was worried that she had been used as Horcrux fuel.

Comment author: Manfred 17 December 2012 09:53:06AM *  3 points [-]

I'm not sure if I liked the new version of 85 more than the old one.

Yeah - it's not so much the downer, that's fine, it's that I miss Harry's resolution. Hopefully that pops up later.

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 18 December 2012 07:34:44AM 1 point [-]

Probably not - there's just no room for anywhere to put it!

Comment author: loup-vaillant 20 December 2012 05:34:03PM 2 points [-]

I think you did, though it's not exactly the same decision.

In this version, Harry didn't even wait for a bystander to die. He deliberately sacrificed Azkaban prisoners, some of which are innocent, in the name of higher probability of success. The decision is not very explicit, but he had decided to stop playing nice right away.