Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 23, chapter 94

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Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 23, chapter 94 — LessWrong

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Some theories of how the wards could (a) not detect Hermione was wounded and (b) claim that the Defense Professor killed Hermione.

Wounding wards:

Wards were tampered with
Hermione's battle was fake. Hermione was not wounded during battle. When Hermione appeared to die, the Defense Professor killed another witch.
Dumbledore says "If Voldemort wishes us to distrust a truth told by the wards, then Voldemort has not fully mastered the wards. And in that case the wards had to believe that some Professor's hand was at work, or they would have cried out at Miss Granger's injury, and not only upon her death.". Perhaps this means that any teacher can circumvent this ward

Defense Professor killer ward:

Wards were tampered with
See wounding ward theory 2.
The Mountain Troll was the killer. To identify the Defense Professor to the wards, Dumbledore drew a circle and said that that "he who stood within was the Defense Professor". Quirrell arranged for the Mountain Troll to be in the circle. This explanation might require polyjuice, transfiguration of live organisms, or Quirrell to be female.
A previous Defense Professor, thought to be dead, was the killer.
Mountain Trolls are considered weapons, as Dumbledore said. "it was no stray creature, but a weapon pure and aimed." The wards blamed the aimer of the Troll, not the Troll itself.
The Troll was a witch. The troll's death triggered the wards.

EDIT Added Defense Professor killer explanation 5 and 6.

Showing 3 of 6 replies (Click to show all)

ChrisHallquist13y90

Oh, another hypothesis, based on something I'd forgotten: Slytherin's Monster was supposed to be keyed into the wards at a higher level than the Headmaster himself. And in this version, it had knowledge it transmitted to Voldemort. What if that included knowledge of how to hack the wards? And then Quirrellmort decided to make the wards register himself as the killer, as a purloined-letter type deal?

1Viliam_Bur13y

Actually, it was all like this: Quirrell heard about Minerva's decision to support more heroism. He realized that Harry changed his original plan (to make all teachers obstacles to Harry, except Quirrell himself), but adapted quickly. He asked Minerva to do something heroic together, as teachers -- to travel to the past and try saving Hermione. In the past, he changed Minerva to Hermione, telling her that now the attack will come to Minerva and she can better defend against it, or do something very clever. Without Minerva's knowledge, he changed Hermione into a troll, and somehow made her believe that the enemy's plan is the following: while the real Hermione cannot be found, the false Hermione will try to kill Harry. Or something like that. Now the troll (Hermione) heroically followed and attacked the false Hermione (Minerva) and tried to kill her. The sun didn't hurt the troll, because it was not a real troll. Harry came and killed the troll (Hermione), which made the wards report that a student was killed. The dying false Hermione (Minerva) tried to do the right thing and explain Harry that it was not his fault. Quirrell is now waiting for the moment when Harry tries to revive Hermione and realizes that the body/brain that he saved actually belongs to Minerva from the future. Then Harry will realize that he killed Hermione, and specifically destroyed her brain by explosion. That should turn Harry to the dark side.

4buybuydandavis13y

Quirrellmort is "the quote undying unquote Baba Yaga, yes, I see some of you are still shuddering at the sound of her name even though she’s been dead for six hundred years."

See in context