All of Jello_Raptor's Comments + Replies

Nah, where's the fun in that? ;)

Off Topic

 What is the next number in the sequence 14, 15, 16, 17, 21, 23, 30, 33?

damn that 30, i can't think of any valid hypothesis that includes that.

0timtyler
Did you Google it? Google seems to have the sequence. It suggests that one possible answer is 120!

Well, the question is how to spin it as medical care.

As I see it the political biases are very deep and pernicious, firstly there 's there right, with its view of a god given natural order, and how breaking free of that is an affront to any such entity. Then there's the woo laden portions of the left, which take a distinctly non-reductionist view of the world, accepting things like homeopathy and whatnot. Speaking from experience, a lot of people with that worldview have two major roadblocks to accepting cryonics, firstly a steadfast belief that 'natural... (read more)

To boot, I would be very surprised if people elected politicians who hadn't submitted to the lie detector after it had the cultural time to sink in.

People with foresight would work very hard to discredit it before that happened though.

1loserthree
We might not know if they already had.

I think this is doubly emphasized by the bit where Draco struggles to rephrase his thoughts without using "Harry words", but given that the fic is meant as an evangelizing platform for rationality it makes me wonder whether there's a good way to lessen the turnoff of such speech.

Ideally we'd have Hermione and Draco speaking the same ideas in a more colloquial fashion, but that would seem forced in all of the ways I can imagine it being done.

On the other hand, if it is there (a highly unlikely situation) it would be immense evidence that it wasn't Dumbledore, or at the very least that it was an accident of some sort.

But this is mostly useless speculation given what we know.

4hairyfigment
I was thinking the exact opposite. If he enshrines "my closest friends, and those who died of my worst decisions," then someone he burned to death seems more likely to fit in the latter category than someone who died for other reasons. If, say, Voldemort killed Narcissa to manipulate Lucius and/or to amuse himself, then I'd expect Dumbledore to regret this death but not to rank it among those he regrets "most of all". I did neglect the possibility that she was working for Dumbledore somehow. I probably shouldn't, since that would increase the probability of Mor!Voldemort killing her in this way.

Snape is suitably evil, smart, and with reason to hurt ... Harry (after their talk about James Potter), ...

See, I have trouble with that, mainly because it's been established that he's still in love with Lily Potter (which is why Harry's advice was so cutting), and hurting her only son would fall counter to that.

I dunno, I always read that conversation (and the subsequent scenes from Snape's POV) as indicating that Harry actually succeeded in convincing Snape that Lily wasn't all that great and that his carrying that particular torch for so long was pathetic.

In the process cutting the only tie holding Snape to the Light.

Oops.

0DanArmak
I agree that it's unlikely. OTOH he isn't hurting him personally and directly by taking out Hermione. He may just not appreciate how important she is to him emotionally.

Well, given that we're discussing alternatives to Quirrelmort, that doesn't quite apply.

I'd be willing to wager that in MORverse Quirrelmort could imperius even Mc Gonnagal.

0DanArmak
I don't get the sense that McGonnagal is unusually powerful or hard to Imperius, anyway. She's just as much of a candidate as Flitwick. However, since Hermione was terrified to see the (presumed) real face of H&C... The obvious solution seems ever more obvious. (And Eliezer's last two Author's Notes seemed to suggest it as well, but that is just my interpretation. I was wrong when I stated that he "practically confirmed it" earlier.)

Point, though wanting to curb bullying, and end the racism amounts to nearly the same thing as wanting to redeem Slytherin.

DanArmak100

Not really. Bullying is House-neutral; Slytherin and Gryffindor both bully each other as well as random other students. Note the heavy non-Slytherin presence at the last bully battle, and note that James Potter was in Gryffindor. And Quirrelmort, who was (for the sake of argument) in Slytherin, spoke of how much he once hated bullies.

... Can we get the weasly brothers to do it?

Also if Harry is taken off campus for the trail wouldn't that be at odds with Dumbledore's intention to keep him safe?

7DanArmak
In Dumbledore's personal presence he's safe enough. Especially since Dumbledore now thinks that Voldermort is in Hogwarts.

He's more than capable of defending himself, and given that he's probably keyed into the wards at a level just below McGonnagal , it would be a huge security hole if he was easily imperiused.

2DanArmak
Flitwick would be beaten in a fight by Quirrelmort, who is both more powerful in raw magic and laughs scornfully at formal dueling rules. He could be taken by surprise as well, or fall into a magical trap, given that Quirrelmort has free access to premises. Being Imperiused by Quirrelmort isn't the same as being easily Imperiused at all.

Good catch, that is definitely making my trope sense tingle.

Snape's plotting here is interesting, but I'm not sure what he is actually trying to accomplish.

Quick rundown of what we know:

  1. Snape was the one who sent Hermione the notes on where to find bullies.
  2. Snape destroyed those notes when asked to look for them.
  3. He went through great efforts to obliviate everyone at SPHEW's final battle.
  4. Snape had a conversation with Quirrel where he had his ass handed to him. (either he was stupid when dealing with Quirrel, or wanted Quirrel to think he was stupid)
  5. He is probably working outside of Dumbledore's ordersl, and
... (read more)

I don't believe Snape values his love for Lily, past or present. I believe Snape is scheming to his own ends and by his own mercilessly practical means. He's not the best at it, but he's left the chump train.

Snape forced the escalation in order to get justification to do exactly what he did at the end of the first scene of chapter 75, where the following describes him admonishing the top Slytherin bullies:

"You will do nothing," hissed their Head of House. Severus Snape's face was enraged, when he spoke small spots of spittle flew from his mou

... (read more)
-1TomM
I can't see clearly why Snape is being presented as a likely hidden ally of SPHEW. Without doubt, he involved himself in the group by providing information on where and when to find bullying, but this led to an escalation of hostilities rather than reducing bullying. This culminated in a massive confrontation during which he acted mysteriously, and by no means clearly in SPHEW's interests (I suspect the myriad memory charms were to hide/obfuscate his prior manipulation of almost all of those present!). The only way in which he openly acted on the matter was to punish and publicly humiliate Hermione. Snape is not just a tragic lover of a murdered muggleborn - he is a very bitter and emotionally stunted person, and a major bully in his own right up until his actions were curbed through Harry's influence. The idea that he would be on a personal crusade against bullying seems (to my reading) to go against almost every aspect of his character as presented so far in the fic. If asked to speculate, I would suggest that: * Snape intentionally escalated the SPHEW/bully situation, and used the final brouhaha as an opportunity to trample Hermione when the bullies failed to do it for him. * He has observed the warming in relations between Hermione and Draco, and decided it had to be stopped - preferably by making each of them betray (or seem to) the trust of the other. * He decided that his own handling of the SPHEW situation had been too clumsy and ineffective - he needed to make Hermione herself a villain if he wanted her more permanently dealt with. My main uncertainty is why Snape would pick Hermione in particular to target (I haven't done a complete re-read for a few months, so I may be remembering events a bit 'selectively' - if I am being to mistrustful of Snape, I would love to see some references to points in the text where any of my interpretation is plausibly contradicted. Edited: for grammar and clarity
7buybuydandavis
And Snape is the Half-Blood Prince.
75th140

Snape is over Lily. He's been coming to grips with losing his love for Lily ever since Harry gave Snape his (incorrect) explanation for Lily's treatment of him. The moment he kissed Rianne is the moment he finally decided to stop living and grieving for Lily and start living for himself.

The question is what it means for him to live for himself. Dumbledore's trust in Snape is based on his knowledge of Snape's undying love for Lily. If Dumbledore were to find out that that love no longer exists, he would (gently, perhaps) kick Snape out of the Fellowship. He... (read more)

DanArmak170

I believe Snape's motivations are more personal than trying to help Slytherin House. He's remembering how he was bullied by James, and his conversation about the topic with Harry prompted him to devise this scheme to fight bullying today. He's basically looking for redemption, having perhaps abandoned his love for Lily after talking with Harry and also after the Interlude with the Confessor.

This explains why he's starting this scheme now, rather than as soon as he became Head of Slytherin.

He's hiding this from Dumbledore because Dumbledore explicitly acted... (read more)

Aye, not that the general idea "hijack the various stupidities of the human mind to spread raltionality/science" is itself bad, but i think this particular implementation is dubious.

Mostly because science is something anyone can do without the support of a central authority. Having a central authority and secrecy just invites people to betray it for the quick cash that one gets from a tell all memoir. Maybe we could hijack scarcity effects by actively changing the culture. Change the message to something like "Science is really hard, and yo... (read more)

1wedrifid
Exactly. It is an inept attempt to harness a bias - it just wouldn't work in this instance.

Wait, I can't find this discussion and I am very interested, mind linking it?

0btrettel
A door to the basement was open. We should have stood by it to make this more obvious. Either way, I think we should reserve a public room (not the basement of a dorm) for another meetup at UMD. I know how to do this and I'll see what I can do.