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DanArmak comments on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, March 2015, chapter 120 - Less Wrong
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Comments (115)
If he let Draco choose the red pill without obliviation, then Draco might tell Narcissa or other people, and the secret of Harry Potter would leak. He's asking for obliviation for security, and it's important enough that he needs to obliviate Draco even if he honestly chooses to stay Harry's friend and keep his secret.
"You're my friend, but I can't let you know that I killed your father, because you might tell that to someone else and that would be unpleasant for me."
Tell you what, I've made peace with this chapter. It shows Harry as a flawed protagonist, and in a more interesting way than Eliezer's usual "I was flawed because I was not smart enough".
Perhaps that's Harry's real motivation (or: Eliezer intends us to understand that it is; or: an actual person who behaved as Eliezer describes Harry behaving would likely have such motivation) but it actually seems more likely to me that it's "... and that would risk destabilizing the government, messing up my plans for doing away with serious illness and death, and preventing me from stopping the end of the world wiping out human life as it seems to be prophesied I might be able to do and no one else can". Which would be a damn good reason, all things considered.
(Of course Draco, and Harry, and we, should consider the possibility that that's all just rationalization. But given what else we've been told in HPMOR it seems like something of the kind is in fact correct.)
Harry may be shown as flawed in this chapter, but choosing to keep extremely important secrets secure is not one of the reasons.
"If there's even a small chance that letting you know will reduce my ability, down the line, to save the world, then I am physically incapable of letting you know."
If the Vow prevented him from letting Draco know on a permanent basis for this reason, it would prevent him from telling him with the intention of obliviating him afterwards, since there would be a chance he would get away without being obliviated.
Good point. He's counting on Minerva to obliviate Draco, which makes it a bit safer.