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ArisKatsaris comments on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 11 - Less Wrong Discussion
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Harry in ch.79 claims that both notes were signed "Santa Claus" but in chapter 14 the note is explicitly unsigned (though it mentions Christmas).
This may have been a thematic demonstration of the faultiness of memory, a crucial topic of chapter 79, but currently it feels to me more like an authorial mistake. If the mistake was deliberate on the part of the author, I think a (3rd person-omnicient) narrative note could be edited in chapter 79 to note this failure of Harry's memory in passing.
Answered here.
Not quite. I don't disagree that they were from the start supposed to be from the same individual, nor that 'Santa Claus' was meant to show Harry they were the same individual. It's just that the first letter was not signed 'Santa Claus' and Harry says it was. This is a mistake on either Harry's or Eliezer's part, (with a lesser hypothesis being that the inaccuracy was a deliberate minor ploy on Harry's part - but that's a bit unlikely and silly)
Maybe he states them as both being signed 'Santa Claus' just because it's simpler to do so. After all, in Harry's mind the author of each note is very likely the same person, so the two notes may as well have both been signed 'Santa Claus'. It potentially saves the time of having to explain (what is to him) a foregone conclusion. Whether or not that's a detail Harry would normally skip is up to you I guess.
Of course it could just be an authorial mistake. But I'm willing to give Eliezer the benefit of the doubt on a minor point like this.
Ugh. That's possible too, I guess, but it'd be rather hypocritical on Harry's part given how insistent he is, in the very same conversation, about clearly distinguishing between observation and inference.
Reasonably sure Eliezer did that intentionally. It's very much his style.
Edit: This whole idea is a joke on the reader as well. So you're convinced Snape is S and Dumbledore is Santa Claus? But all you observed was Snape burning some letters that could help Hermione, and Dumbledore saying "you know me too well" (note: not a real admission).
(Of course, considering prior probabilities shows that these doubts would be unreasonable. But the same holds for the first letter-writer being the same person as Santa Claus. All told, it looks like Eliezer's poking fun at Harry's "Observations, not inferences!!" diktat.)