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Dentin comments on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 28, chapter 99-101 - Less Wrong Discussion
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Imagine that I'm a pal who explained the modern analogous position to you. I tell you that I think our prisons are inhumane, and the death penalty is problematic. I know a guy who beat up 3 cops, a teacher and some kids and drugged them so they forgot what happened when they interrupted him slaughtering some horses, but I don't report him, and in fact helped him cover up his crimes because of my belief. We still buds?
Setting that aside I'm not clear at all on why Harry would still have a problem with the Azkaban/death penalty. Earlier, sure, it made sense, but now that he's declared himself the Vanquisher of Death he just seems confused.
Suffering is certainly bad, but Harry's cool with False Memory charms, and those can negate suffering. The time lost becomes the issue, and Harry intends that folks shall live forever.
I mean, he's going to conquer death, right? Not only that, he's going to resurrect Hermione, who is dead and whose body is gone presumably by now decayed. So he's confident that he will be able to resurrect someone based on, effectively, name and description. Surely he doesn't think his abilities as a researcher are terribly singular, never to be duplicated.
I mean, if he might in theory do it then its ultimately doable, then someday it'll be done, and all will rise.
So.what matter then, when precisely any given individual dies, so long as it does not alter this future? Worst case scenario. Quirrel goes to Azkaban for a few months before his disease overcomes him, and dies a howling deranged lunatic. Later on he's resurrected, false memory charms fix his trauma and bob's your uncle.
Let's try an analogy that's a bit closer to the mark:
"I know a guy who needs to eat freshly killed bald eagle meat every now and again to stay alive, and while doing so he was discovered by some forest rangers and kids out hiking on public land. He quickly used a gas grenade to knock them out without harming them, then gave them a drug that caused them to lose their short term memory of the event. He then dialed 911 on one of their cell phones and watched from a distance to make sure they didn't get eaten before help arrived."
Note that there are several things here which don't have good conversions into Real Life due to magic. In cases like that, you can't just pick the 'closest equivalent' and expect it to make sense. Sometimes, you'll have to drag something magical into the real world as well.
Analogies are hard, at least if you're trying to be accurate. Doing a double analogy to see if you can get back the original helps. For example, let's take your analogy, and try to convert it back into the original scenario:
"I know a guy who was killing some horses in the forest when he was discovered by a group of aurors, a school teacher, and some kids. This guy beat up everyone using curses that take weeks to heal and must heal painfully and naturally, then he stunned them and memory charmed them to get away with it"
This is a good way to tell where your analogy breaks down. In particular:
1) [minor] horses in the muggle world are typically owned by someone, with the very rare exception being free range horses on public land. Be default, the reader of your analogy will assume that the horses are unspecial and owned by someone. This is very different from killing something unowned but special, like a bald eagle.
2) [major] "killing a unicorn because my life depends on it" is turned into "killing some horses with no justification."
3) [critical] beating up a person to the point that they can't function is a much, much bigger deal in the real world than using stunning magic, where the stuns are reversible and extremely temporary, and healing magic makes major wounds no more threatening than a hangnail.
4) [minor] Quirrel did not leave until he knew that the aurors, teacher, and students would be safe (because of the presence of Harry's future copy), but this is lost in your analogy.
5) [minor] Dumbledore himself uses memory charms to wipe Harry's patronus 2.0 from the minds of three aurors, so memory charms are clearly less 'against the rules' in wizarding society than mind altering drugs are in muggle society.