Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, March 2015, chapter 114 + chapter 115

Gondolinian

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 114, and also, as a special case due to the exceptionally close posting times, chapter 115.

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Yudkowsky which is not supposed to be publicly available (which includes public statements by Eliezer that have been retracted).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

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Yudkowsky which is not supposed to be publicly available (which includes public statements by Eliezer that have been retracted).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

Fame is harmful, not helpful, to Harry's goals.

Is that true? Harry wishes to reform or replace the government of Magical Britain, and being the hero who defeated Voldemort twice would make that a lot easier (as Voldemort himself acknowledged). Turning Hermione into the Girl-Who-Lived dilutes that effect, and also brings all his fame-related problems down upon her.

Is it really that much better than being the hero who defeated Voldemort once, though? Putting on Hermione does seem pretty mean, but I think it's a very in-character sort of mistake, especially after the kind of day he's had.

5Oshi11y

Harry at this point trusts Hermione's judgement far more than his own. Putting Hermione in the position of power as the girl-who-lives-again pushes her into the forefront, letting her be the head that Magical Brittain needs, leaving him to go about his business determined to not destroy the world, as his unbreakable vow requires.