Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 11

Oscar_Cunningham

EDIT: New discussion thread here.

This is a new thread to discuss Eliezer Yudkowsky's Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality and anything related to it. With two chapters recently the previous thread has very quickly reached 500 comments. The latest chapter as of 17th March 2012 is Ch. 79.

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.)

The first 5 discussion threads are on the main page under the harry_potter tag. Threads 6 and on (including this one) are in the discussion section using its separate tag system. Also: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.

As a reminder, it's often useful to start your comment by indicating which chapter you are commenting on.

Spoiler Warning: this thread is full of spoilers. With few exceptions, spoilers for MOR and canon are fair game to post, without warning or rot13. More specifically:

You do not need to rot13 anything about HP:MoR or the original Harry Potter series unless you are posting insider information from Eliezer Yudkowsky which is not supposed to be publicly available (which includes public statements by Eliezer that have been retracted).

If there is evidence for X in MOR and/or canon then it's fine to post about X without rot13, even if you also have heard privately from Eliezer that X is true. But you should not post that "Eliezer said X is true" unless you use rot13.

EDIT: New discussion thread here.

You do not need to rot13 anything about HP:MoR or the original Harry Potter series unless you are posting insider information from Eliezer Yudkowsky which is not supposed to be publicly available (which includes public statements by Eliezer that have been retracted).

If there is evidence for X in MOR and/or canon then it's fine to post about X without rot13, even if you also have heard privately from Eliezer that X is true. But you should not post that "Eliezer said X is true" unless you use rot13.

Snape's plotting here is interesting, but I'm not sure what he is actually trying to accomplish.

Quick rundown of what we know:

Snape was the one who sent Hermione the notes on where to find bullies.
Snape destroyed those notes when asked to look for them.
He went through great efforts to obliviate everyone at SPHEW's final battle.
Snape had a conversation with Quirrel where he had his ass handed to him. (either he was stupid when dealing with Quirrel, or wanted Quirrel to think he was stupid)
He is probably working outside of Dumbledore's ordersl, and is definitely hiding things from Dumbledore.
After the SPHEW girls kept on winning he stopped the Slytherin bullies from advancing any farther.

So I suspect a few things:

Snape was the one who was forcing the repeated escalation of the SPHEW situation
Snape is actually working to help Harry somehow. (Because of his love for Lily)
Snape is not nearly so biased against muggleborns as he pretends to be. (Remember Lily was a muggleborn)
Snape is trying to restore the reputation of Slytherin house in much the same way as Harry. (He's cutting down on bullying and is, in a way consistant with his character, making the hatred of muggleborns look stupid)

Now, if we ascribe his love for Lily as his primary motivation (Which "Sunk Costs" seems to support) , his support of Hermione, and his plotting to restore the reputation of Slytherin makes sense. What I don't understand is why he needs to hide this from Dumbledore. Even if his motivations are counter to those of Dumbledore (I.E. He's actually evil), all of these actions would cement Dumbledore's trust in him. I can think of a few possible reasons:

Dumbledore thinks Hogwarts needs an evil racist Slytherin.
Dumbledore is a control freak and any plots that are not his are to be distrusted. (Seriously, this is Hogwarts, ancestral home of the gambit pileup)
Dumbledore doesn't have the best interests of Hogwarts in mind.
Dumbledore would think that Snape's methods (Making Slytherin look stupid in its current form, and hurting little girls in the process) are wrong.
Dumbledore is insane. (Like a pie)

None of these are particularly satisfying or convincing, hence why i'm throwing the question out there.

Edit: People have repeatedly pointed out that Snape's attachment to Lily was either broken or reduced by Harry's analysis of the situation, and that Snape's kiss in Sunk Costs was a reflection of that, and I can't help but agree.

I don't believe Snape values his love for Lily, past or present. I believe Snape is scheming to his own ends and by his own mercilessly practical means. He's not the best at it, but he's left the chump train.

Snape forced the escalation in order to get justification to do exactly what he did at the end of the first scene of chapter 75, where the following describes him admonishing the top Slytherin bullies:

"You will do nothing," hissed their Head of House. Severus Snape's face was enraged, when he spoke small spots of spittle flew from his mou

... (read more)

-1TomM14y

I can't see clearly why Snape is being presented as a likely hidden ally of SPHEW. Without doubt, he involved himself in the group by providing information on where and when to find bullying, but this led to an escalation of hostilities rather than reducing bullying. This culminated in a massive confrontation during which he acted mysteriously, and by no means clearly in SPHEW's interests (I suspect the myriad memory charms were to hide/obfuscate his prior manipulation of almost all of those present!). The only way in which he openly acted on the matter was to punish and publicly humiliate Hermione. Snape is not just a tragic lover of a murdered muggleborn - he is a very bitter and emotionally stunted person, and a major bully in his own right up until his actions were curbed through Harry's influence. The idea that he would be on a personal crusade against bullying seems (to my reading) to go against almost every aspect of his character as presented so far in the fic. If asked to speculate, I would suggest that: * Snape intentionally escalated the SPHEW/bully situation, and used the final brouhaha as an opportunity to trample Hermione when the bullies failed to do it for him. * He has observed the warming in relations between Hermione and Draco, and decided it had to be stopped - preferably by making each of them betray (or seem to) the trust of the other. * He decided that his own handling of the SPHEW situation had been too clumsy and ineffective - he needed to make Hermione herself a villain if he wanted her more permanently dealt with. My main uncertainty is why Snape would pick Hermione in particular to target (I haven't done a complete re-read for a few months, so I may be remembering events a bit 'selectively' - if I am being to mistrustful of Snape, I would love to see some references to points in the text where any of my interpretation is plausibly contradicted. Edited: for grammar and clarity

7buybuydandavis14y

And Snape is the Half-Blood Prince.