Decades before the "power to vanquish" prophecy, which is only made after Harry's birth, and the "HE IS COMING" prophecy, which is only made after Harry does certain things at Hogwarts, the centaurs already know that he is going to destroy the world.
You make a mistake in that you add additional details into your story for which there's no reason.
A "beauty potion" -> "end of the world" prediction wouldn't need to mention Harry at all.
Centaur divination isn't an exact science. Centaur are quite capable of making mistakes when it comes to interpreting the stars.
It's quite possible that a centaur came up with the idea that "beauty potion" -> "end of the world" is one possible explanation for the movement of stars that he saw.
There no certainity in the way they practice their craft. It's quite possible that the prediction was at a strength that enough to produce a reluctance in handing out the potion but not strong enough to tell everybody about it.
A teenage girl who is bad at forgiving people comes up with excuses not to go out of her way to help the sister who used to bully her.
A smart person doesn't come up with excuses that are ridiculous, but makes excuses that are credible.
A "beauty potion" -> "end of the world" prediction wouldn't need to mention Harry at all.
It is, however, a prophecy about Harry, whether anyone knows it or not, and all other prophecies about Harry were pronounced not long before or after the key events that caused fate to head in that direction (Voldemort's confrontation with baby Harry, Harry's grim resolution...). Your suggestion that there was a twenty or so-year gap with this one does not match this pattern.
...A smart person doesn't come up with excuses that are ridiculous, bu
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 chapters 91 & 92 . The previous thread has passed 500 comments.
There is now a site dedicated to the story at hpmor.com, which is now the place to go to find the authors notes and all sorts of other goodies. AdeleneDawner has kept an archive of Author’s Notes. (This goes up to the notes for chapter 76, and is now not updating. The authors notes from chapter 77 onwards are on hpmor.com.)
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