Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, February 2015, chapter 111

b_sen

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 111.

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Yudkowsky which is not supposed to be publicly available (which includes public statements by Eliezer that have been retracted).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

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 111.

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Yudkowsky which is not supposed to be publicly available (which includes public statements by Eliezer that have been retracted).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

Thanks for pointing out the false dilemma. I'm wondering whether he ever intended to kill Harry, specifically as to whether that gun is loaded.

Does anyone remember anything in Parseltongue which stated explicit intent to kill? I note that this line is not in Parseltonge:

I suppose you have doubts? Mark well, I could kill you this instant, for there is no longer a Headmaster of Hogwarts to be informed of it. Doubt me all you wish, but remember that.

The previous dialogue is in Parseltongue, and the dialogue ends after this. I'll go have a more critical look at earlier chapters but I'm predicting the gun in Harry's hand will go 'click'.

EDIT: my mistake, Harry brought his own gun. I have a strong sense of literary disbelief that Harry managed to shoot Voldemort while his horcruxes were so conveniently down. If the gun is not suspect, then back up hypotheses are: Voldemort can deflect bullets OR Voldemort's horcruxes were in fact still working.

I don't think that's the same gun.

And yeah, that line tripped my wires as well, but I think there are two more likely candidates for concealment than lack of intent to kill:

-Lack of ability to kill

-Whether there is a Headmaster of Hogwarts now (one can imagine a magically designated Interim Headmaster being immediately instated for the purpose of the wards)

2[anonymous]11y

That's Harry's gun, not Voldemort's