You're looking at Less Wrong's discussion board. This includes all posts, including those that haven't been promoted to the front page yet. For more information, see About Less Wrong.

Locke comments on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 16, chapter 85 - Less Wrong Discussion

9 Post author: FAWS 18 April 2012 02:30AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (1106)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: 75th 18 July 2012 12:26:54AM *  7 points [-]

"The adult wizard" was changed quite a while before the most recent round of retcons. Most of the other changes I can understand, even the removal of Ghostbusters, but this one seems completely indefensible. He's listing species that are dangerous, so it makes more sense to use a biology-type word like "adult".

And as Quirrell is perfectly open later on in telling everyone that he believes Harry wishes to become a Dark Lord, and also that he still wishes to teach Harry how to defeat his foes, there's no reason for him to put on false airs and claim that all the students present will have Dark Wizards as their enemies. He even took "Defense Against Dark" out of the class's name for crying out loud!

Comment author: Locke 18 July 2012 06:19:36AM 3 points [-]

Yeah, I'd really like to know Eliezer's reasoning here. What are the possible advantages of this change?

I suppose it is technically more accurate, since not all adult wizards are more dangerous than Dementors or Trolls. Dark Wizards, on the other hand, specifically train to be so.