Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, February 2015, chapter 108

b_sen

New long chapter! Since I expect its discussion to generate more than 160 comments (which would push the previous thread over the 500 comment limit) before the next chapter is posted, here is a new thread.

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 108 ~~(and chapter 109, once it comes out on Monday)~~.

EDIT: There have now been two separate calls for having one thread per chapter, along with a poll in this thread. If the poll in this thread indicates a majority preference for one thread per chapter by Monday, I will edit this post to make it for chapter 108 only. In that case a new thread for chapter 109 should be posted by whoever gets a chance and wants to after the chapter is released.

EDIT 2: The poll indicates a large majority (currently 78%) in favor of one thread per chapter. This post has been edited accordingly.

There is 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.)

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Yudkowsky which is not supposed to be publicly available (which includes public statements by Eliezer that have been retracted).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

EDIT 2: The poll indicates a large majority (currently 78%) in favor of one thread per chapter. This post has been edited accordingly.

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.

... Hm.

This isn't the chain of logic I followed - for the sake of authenticity I'll put that at the end, but -

Isn't a little... strange, that artifacts designed and destined to defeat death transfer primarily by death?

I mean, even aside from the "kill the previous owner and take their stuff" method, the other option - inheriting it - is also heavily tied to death, as powerful artifacts like these are unlikely to be permanently given away until the original owner has no further use of it.

Backing away from plot for a minute - if you don't expect to manage to destroy death yourself, you should really program your powerful artifacts to seek out the most effective owners, anyway. Inheritance is very unreliable, and murder is entirely counterproductive - both would be backup selectors to anyone designing such a thing. So what's the primary determinant?

I think we've seen it. The prophecy stone, that responded to Harry's oath to end death, engraved with the symbol of the Deathly Hallows, and completely unmentioned since - if I were going to design such a thing, gifting the Hallows to someone who had sworn an honest oath against death would be a good start, particularly if I could somehow tie it into True Patronus capability (as the silvery light suggests.)

If that's the case, then Harry has a stronger claim on the Hallows than their current physical possessors. Most importantly, this includes the Resurrection Stone. Further, magic seems to register HJPEV as "Tom Riddle" - at any rate, the ancient Hogwarts wards do. So unless magic has multiple names for Harry Potter, then HJPEV may really count as the same person as Voldemort - in which case he would have access to his Horcrux network. Voldemort may even have anticipated this - but since literally nobody knows both the existence and the significance of that glowing stone, he can't anticipate losing control over the Stone.

So, predictions:

Harry is the Master of Death, in the sense of being the primary magical owner of all three Hallows - 75%.

HJPEV counts as Tom Riddle, to the point that on death, the Horcrux network will attempt to update based on him. - 60%.

Links go to PredictionBook pages.

(My actual chain of logic started from noticing that I was confused about the Death prophecy - since I didn't really see how the Hallows would play much of a part in the climax of the story - which lead to the realization that the prophecy might reassign ownership of the Hallows.)

I think you're right; on reflection, that's exactly the sort of thing I would expect rational!Peverells to do, plus the stone appears about the right age to be set up by the Peverells. Based on the same reflection, I agree with your predictions and the probabilities you've given them. Quoting for posterity:

Harry is the Master of Death, in the sense of being the primary magical owner of all three Hallows - 75%.
HJPEV counts as Tom Riddle, to the point that on death, the Horcrux network will attempt to update based on him. - 60%.

And I'll just make this my... (read more)