Okay.

His first comment capitalized "NOT", which was kind of rude. He also chided me in a paternalistic manner "keep the facts straight please". On the negative karma: Since I can't prove it and we're disagreeing he has an incentive to lie which means I discard his response and stick to the other information I have (to rephrase, he would have said he didn't do it regardless of whether or not he did do it, unless I have some reason to trust him I would ignore his comments either way, I obviously don't have a reason to trust him since he has no possible positive incentives to tell the truth but has possible negative incentives to lie, and also I don't know him, and also see my next paragraph for more support). I know that he commented within five minutes of my receiving a negative karma vote. So I feel like he lied there. (People lie all the time, especially on the internet, so please ignore that gut level reaction that you need extremely strong evidence to believe that someone lied to you and actually rationally evaluate what I'm saying here, he is probably lying.) Apparently the above is wrong, but don't ignore the first two points please.

He nitpicked one of my comments below, which shows that he argues for the sake of arguing. (http://lesswrong.com/r/discussion/lw/bmx/harry_potter_and_the_methods_of_rationality/6dnr) Coincidentally, this one also has a negative reputation. And there's nothing within it that should be considered bad. Even if you think his flaw was worth mentioning (I don't, and in fact his objection is wrong, see my new comment below his comment), it's kind of odd that he would go around following all my comments and pointing out their flaws. That doesn't seem justified, it seems kind of like something a jerk would do.

Finally, I feel like if he was critically evaluating the issue he would be coming to a different conclusion. If you honestly feel that it's most probable that Quirrell wasn't reading Hermione's mind despite his ability and obvious incentive to do so and the fact that Yudkowsky said they were making eye contact, then I'm going to conclude that you are arguing for the sake of arguing. There is literally zero evidence to reject the mind reading hypothesis, his entire line of argument [/sarcasm] is pointing out that other possibilities exist, which does nothing to effect the probability of my interpretation. They do exist, but they're barely probable, especially in light of the very obvious mind reading hypothesis. All he's doing is making minor points to slightly undermine my point, he's not producing any points which are more credible than even my slightly weakened theory, so his arguments don't really matter.

If there are three people out there who actually feel that it's most probable that Quirrell wasn't mind reading, and who are willing to let me mock them when their theories don't produce evidence making them better than mine, then I'll bother to address his points in his last comment. If they're not willing to let that happen then they shouldn't have -negkarma'd my comment(s). But I honestly doubt that there are really three people out there who really think that, and I'm pretty sure that if three people actually do respond it will be because of biases or social pressures and not critical thinking.

But it was justified to ask for reasons, that makes sense and honestly probably makes my viewpoint much more credible, so have a cookie, and also a karma point.