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Chimael comments on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 14, chapter 82 - Less Wrong Discussion
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This has probably been mentioned before, but:
a) what if primary goal of this plot was never hurting Draco or Hermione, but to weaken Harry by making him relinquish his money/his claim to the debt from Lucius? Either the money or the claim to the debt that House Of Malfoy has towards him could be something that is dangerous to a hitherto unknown plan of H+C, which is why H+C devised a plot which would strip Harry of both. A genius (like Quirrelmort) could have predicted that Harry might offer either, in exchange for freeing Hermione. In fact, it might have been a win-win-situation for H+C: either Harry loses his Light soldier Hermione, or Harry loses his money.
Does anyone else find it strange that Hermione just happened to know the formula for swearing allegiance by heart? I mean, sure, she could have read it once and that would have been enough, but the fact that she knew it seems awfully convenient in the case that the plot was meant to end like this.
b) Dumbledore mentions that the House of Malfoy has "certain rights over Harry" now. This means that Harry is, to some extent, now alleged to both Slytherin and Ravenclaw.
Now, remember which two houses are supposed to win the House Cup, simultanously, according to Quirrel's "cunning plan"? (Ch. 54)
Not really, she is indicated to be interested in history, and shown reading history books all the time. In another situation I would have be surprised by her willingness (given her wish to be “her own person”), but after being threatened with Dementors...
There's a passage for that in Chapter 9.
I'm actually annoyed by this. Since the next digit is 6, he should be rounding to 3.141593, not truncating at 3.141592.
The difference between the two is 0.000001, and the difference in quality of approximation is roughly 0.0000003. So I don't think it matters as a practical preference. Aesthetically, the string of digits of Pi has a cultural significance of its own, quite apart from its numerical value, so I think it's preferable to memorize a number that's actually a prefix of that string.
Also, only if you truncate can you truly say that you've memorized "the first six digits of Pi after the decimal" as opposed to "An approximation of Pi to plus or minus 0.0000005 tolerance".
The sixth decimal digit of pi after the decimal point is 2.
The value of the millionths place in the decimal expression of pi when rounded to the millionths place is 3.
The reason I know pi out to the sixth decimal digit past the decimal point is because the digits to the fifth fit into an easy rhyme, but the fifth decimal digit after the decimal point is a 9. If it were to round up there would be a little cascade, so it's good to know the next digit.
If Harry knew to round up the millionths place in the decimal expression of pi when rounded to the millionths place, he would know pi out to the ten millionths place, or the seventh decimal digit following the decimal point.
Rounding errors at the millionths place are errors of less than one part in a million.
The original text remains correct.
One doesn't need to remember what the digit past the rounded one is in order to memorize the rounded figure.
Did I say that the text was incorrect? I'm 99.999% sure I didn't, but looking back . . . no, still looks like I didn't. All I said was that I was annoyed, and what I think Harry should have memorized instead.
If this annoys you and so you always stop your approximations at a point where the next digit is 0..4, I think this biases your estimates of numbers (in a way that doesn't really matter for most purposes).
Why would I do that rather than simply round correctly for the number of sig figs I'm dealing with?
I don't particularly care how many digits Harry want to go to, just think he should pick 3, or 3.1, or 3.14, or 3.142, or 3.1416, or 3.14159, or 3.141593, or 3.1415927, or 3.14159265 . . . etc.
Obviously Harry should go up to the Feynman point.
It's a risk for a hypothetical person who is bothered by having to round, which isn't precisely the thing you're bothered by. A person who doesn't decide in advance how many digits to use/remember.
I agree with bogdanb. "Hermione knows X by heart" is usually equivalent to "Hermione saw X in a book", and Hermione seeks out books.
a) Unlikely, but I think it's a payoff that Voldemort will still consider to be worth the (rather trivial) costs of setting his plan into motion. It's not as ideal as denying Hermione to Harry, but it still imposed significant costs, which is all to the good.
b) Oh lord.
Gut reaction is the same, but the part of me that remembers the rule of rationalist fiction is thinking there's no way Quirrellmort could have predicted both Harry's and Lucius' actions that exactly.
Which is why I say my a). He had no believable way of predicting this outcome, and the one he almost certainly expected didn't happen(well, it partially did, p>0.5 Draco is lost to Harry now, but Hermione is not), but it's still a result that was worth the effort he put in, so I doubt he's shedding too many tears.
Feeling exactly the same.