Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 22, chapter 93

daenerys

This is a new thread to discuss Eliezer Yudkowsky’s Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality and anything related to it. This thread is intended for discussing chapter 93. The previous thread has passed 300 comments.

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: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17,18,19,20.

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Eliezer Yudkowsky which is not supposed to be publicly available (which includes public statements by Eliezer that have been retracted).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.

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Eliezer Yudkowsky which is not supposed to be publicly available (which includes public statements by Eliezer that have been retracted).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.

Ch 94 - I notice I'm confused. In many ways. Which each confuses me even more.

Why don't anyone take seriously the hypothesis that Quirrel did it ? That he could trick the wards, but only to a point, and he had to use the fact he was a teacher to do it, which somehow make the wards point at him. And assuming everyone will think it can't be that straight-forward, they'll think Quirrel was framed.
It really seems like Harry didn't do anything special with Hermione's body, that he didn't do anything in the many hours since Hermione's death until the night, which sounds very unlike Harry.
The ease at which "the enemy" suspiciously overpowered all the wards and precautions taken is surprising. Hogwarts is supposed to be the safest place, built by the most powerful wizards of the last centuries, protected by the most powerful spell, and with the acting Headmaster being the most powerful alive wizard. Outsmarting Dumbledore/Hogwarts is definitely possible, but overpowering them that way ? Why doesn't anyone suspects he didn't actually control the wards, but just cleverly cheated them (like the slow-killing spell on Draco cheated them without altering them, but with a more complicated scheme) ?
Anti-Phoenix wards ? A phoenix can go everywhere, including to/from Azkhaban, Hogwarts, the Wizengamot, the Department of Mysteries, and yet any Death Eater can cast anti-Phoenix wards ?
How is Neville safer outside Hogwarts ? Sure, Hogwarts has shown to be vulnerable, but the rest of the world is too. McGonagall and Dumbledore especially should be aware of that, since they believe it was Voldemort who broke into Azkhaban. How do they plan to protect him, Fidelius charm ? Having Neville stay in Hogwarts, but always with one teacher (and neither Quirrel nor Snape) with him at all time would sound safer for Neville to me. It makes sense for Harry's parents to not "draw attention to them", but it's not like attention wasn't already drawn on Neville. And what about the Weasley twins ? They are also known friends of Harry, and just 3rd years, so why aren't supposed in danger too ?

I have even more questions storming in my head, but I'll stop here now... point is, I notice I'm confused, the actions of Harry (and of McGonagall/Dumbledore) don't match my expectations. So either there is a lot we aren't being told about, or I had a wrong model of them, or something even more fishy is going on...

Regarding 1), Dumbledore says he sent instruments back in time to examine the fight. Presumably he verified the troll was not Quirrel. (Even though the instruments may have been tricked, he might not believe it likely.)

2mare-of-night13y

I hadn't caught 4, but it's a very good point. 5 - If Harry's enemy aims to isolate him, then Neville is no longer a target if he isn't Harry's companion anymore. It does seem odd that Neville is the only student whose safety people are worrying about, though.

3fractalman13y

1. in-cannon? some do suspect him. however, there MIGHT be something in the curse on the profession. Either way, whoever IS behind the attack has got to be laughing at their brilliance. 2. :shrugs: 3. dumbledore walks through other people's wards like they're water. Quirrel pretends that simply sneezing is enough for him to dispell an incomming hex at one point. hacking into the hogwarts wards might be possible if one of these were to take their time and nobody was upgrading the wards. 4. MoR Azkaban prohibits pheonix-travel OUT, just not in. I think that anti-phoenix wards are probably one of the more difficult ones to cast, and not all wizards think that way even in MoR. but any dark wizard that thinks to have them cast can probably get them cast. 5. If the culprit is trying to cut harry off of his support structure, then [neville leaves hogwarts] looks much the same as [neville gets killed] from the culprit's perspective.