Tripitaka comments on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 21, chapters 91 & 92 - Less Wrong
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Some thoughts on "Hermiones brain will be transfigured and kept frozen by Harry":
We know from Harrys first transfiguration lesson that transfigured living things undergo changes with time, which will kill said things. Harry knows this, and is thus likely to thing of deep-freezing the Hermione-diamond. Only he also plans to retransfigurate his fathers rock, and we know that one sustained transfiguration is a serious drain on his magic. Add to that the magical drain from having to cool the H-diamond and its thermal buffer, I think it unlikely that he did something of that sorts.
One way to circumvent the drain of the transfigured H-diamond would be to make it microscopically small, but he still would have to touch it regularly; given that its temperature should be in the cryogenic range, only touches with his wand would be feasible.
The only way I can think of to circumvent these problems would be to have others partake in the task, but that brings with it other problems.
Any thoughts which theories Harry tested with
He tested whether Dumbledore anticipated his use of the rock when he told him to carry it around. He's looking for explanations of all the early behavior where Dumbledore pretended to be mad, since he now believes that while Dumbledore may have wrong and even "mad" beliefs, he only does things like burning chickens to mess with people.
Alternately, he might want people to believe he has transfigured his father's rock again, but not be actually planning to keep it transfigured, because he wants to carry the Hermione diamond and let people think it is the rock.
Any thoughts on the changing/cooling issue? That seems to really get brushed off. Is a perfect diamond supposed to be absolutely stable at room temperature?
It isn't
What is the most stable thing at room temperature, with magical assistance?
Arguably a troll - it's constantly transfiguring itself back into the same form.
So transfigure Hermione's brain into a troll until you figure out how to save her.
Twitch.
I don't think that a troll's transfiguration is supposed be stable at that level of detail.
I rather suspect he would be willing to sacrifice that goal (whim) if it seemed like it would help Hermione.