Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, January 2015, chapter 103

Confirmation the prophecy isn't about Neville:

Neville Longbottom... who took this test in the Longbottom home... received a grade of Outstanding.

Harry raised the parchment with its EE+, still silent.

The Defense Professor smiled, and it went all the way to those tired eyes.

"It is the same grade... that I received in my own first year."

AND THE DARK LORD WILL MARK HIM AS HIS EQUAL

Not a spoiler, but rot13'd for explaining the joke:

"All of you in this room... have received grades of at least Acceptable. Neville Longbottom... who took this test in the Longbottom home... received a grade of Outstanding. But the other student who is not here... has had a Dreadful grade entered on her record... for failing the only important test... that was given her this year. I would have marked her even lower... but that would have been in poor taste."

Gur bayl tenqr ybjre guna Qernqshy vf "Gebyy".

I wonder what, in Harry's model of the world, has been going on with Bellatrix all this time, and why he never inquired about her.

If someone wishes to give their readers the choice of whether or not to access a piece of information, it is in very bad taste for a third party to then take that choice away for no good reason.

Draco's plan at the start of the chapter is entirely correct and Harry should have been doing it on his own. They will find out that Hermione was reading about the stone before she was killed.

In fact she was probably killed precisely because she was getting too close to the stone in her readings. She may even have said something out loud like "eureka" that gave away that she had gotten it. This, by the way, points to her being killed by someone other than QQ, since he would want her to succeed since she would tell Harry and harry would tell him.

I originally interpreted the following as subtly implying the students were using prediction markets

A sudden air of attentiveness, as of long-standing disputes about to be settled. "Well, finally," someone said, as Millicent tried to catch her breath. "He's only got, what, ten days left to go bad?"

"Eleven days," said the seventh-year who was running the betting pool.

But it seems more likely that eleven days is how long the year has left.

As a comment on the story as a whole, I used to think it was likely that the story would cumulate with Harry finding the source of magic. But with only one arc left, there simply isn't the time. It would be like the hobbits setting off to Mordor halfway through 'the return of the king'.

I also thought there might be a hunt for the horocruxes, but I doubt there will be time for that either. Without the horocruxes destroyed, Quirrelmort will at least partially survive. I'm guessing Harry will too. Dumbledore might be killed, either by Quirrel or by Harry, when Harry realises that Dumbledore has been sitting on mass immortality. Hermione might be resurrected somehow, perhaps by a combination or the resurrection stone and the philosophers stone, depending on how the philosophers stone works.

All in all, it seems likely that there will still be interesting plot threads left, and most of the characters will still be alive. So will there be a sequel? If EY is too busy working on FAI to write it, maybe it could be a community effort. After all, there's been some pretty good fiction written other LWers.

As for the rest of you... those who have received Exceeds Expectations or above... have received my letters of recommendation... to certain organizations beyond Britain's shores... where your training might be completed. They will contact you... when you are old enough... if you still appear worthy... and if you have not failed an important test.

Any guesses about these "certain organizations beyond Britain's shores" that Quirrell finds capable of completing his students' training?

'Throw away the cheese and buy a new pair of shoes.'

Any ideas on what this is alluding to? Shrieking Eels are from The Princess Bride.

How did the grading work? My first guess was that Quirrell was telling the truth, but this seems unlikely, and would mean that the EE+ he gave Harry couldn't mean anything. My second guess was that Quirrell came up with the grades before-hand, but all he knows is how well they could actually defend themselves, and real-world ability is not a good indicator of how well you'd do on a written test. My third guess is that a Time-Turner is involved, and he'll have Harry deliver the tests to him in the past.

Registering some predictions and observations before the next chapter comes out:

Predictions:

The snippet at the start of Chapter 1 is from somewhere in the final chapter. 40%

Lily wasn’t making up the "excuses" Petunia mentioned in Chapter 1; she was indeed warned through some form of Divination that the world would end if she made Petunia pretty, and a centaur did actually tell her not to do so. 95%

Magic’s full power allows the user to rewrite reality. 99% (Look at Harry’s reaction to McGonagall’s Animagus transformation: "Magic isn't enough to do that! You'd have to be a god!" (Chapter 2))

Harry is going to bite someone at Hogwarts who bites him first. 50%

There are indeed "three [items] needed to complete the cycle of infinite wish spells" (Chapter 3) or otherwise ascend to godhood / rewrite reality, and they are the three Deathly Hallows. 75%

McGonagall is unwittingly correct when she says that Harry "triumphed over the Dark Lord by being more awful than he was, and survived the Killing Curse by being more terrible than Death." 60%

Harry will learn how to "cast a Confundus Charm on the entire universe" (Chapter 5). 50%

The "Bafflesnaffle Counter" will be used at some point in the final arc. 50% (Notice that every other item specifically described within the healer’s kit (Chapter 6) has been used at some point so far.)

The surviving Death Eaters will "attack the whole school to get at [Harry]" (Chapter 6). 50%

The fact that Obliviation doesn’t erase all the effects of the experience (Chapter 6) will become plot-relevant in some way, possibly through events that have already occurred (such as the Obliviations performed on Hermione and the Weasley twins). 95%

Sirius Black is not actually imprisoned in Azkaban. 85%

At some point in Harry’s fight against the Dark Lord, "the winner shall lose and the loser shall win" (Chapter 6). 50% (If the Dark Lord is Quirrell, then this may have already happened with Harry learning to lose.)

There will be "Ninety-Five Theses of the Snitchless Reformation" (Chapter 7). 50%

Conditional on there being "Ninety-Five Theses of the Snitchless Reformation" (Chapter 7), those theses will be nailed to a church door. 50%

The customer whom Harry asked about Lucius during the Incident at the Potions Shop (Chapter 7) is Snape. 90%

Harry is "going to tear apart [Draco’s] pathetic little magical remnant of the Dark Ages into pieces smaller than its constituent atoms" (Chapter 7). 98%

Harry will become capable of traveling more than six hours back in time, then return to the train to Hogwarts, making it true that "there are three of [Harry] on this train" (Chapter 8). 20%

The unknown terrible thing that Harry fears during his Sorting (Chapter 10) is that if he fails, Death wins. 80%

Harry will eventually remember his to-do list (Chapter 12). 50%

Hermione’s and Draco’s Christmas wishes will be fulfilled by the House Cup being awarded to Harry, with some acknowledgement of both his Houses. 60%

The note accompanying Harry’s Cloak was written by Dumbledore. 80%

The Remembrall glowing for Harry (Chapter 17) indicates that he’d forgotten something other than not revealing the secret of Time-Turners. 80%

McGonagall will "sit in the Headmaster's office and hear some hilarious tale about Professor Quirrell in which [Harry] and [Harry] alone play[s] a starring role, after which there will be no choice but to fire him" (Chapter 17). 80%

Quirrell will be fired on the last day of the school year. 80%

Snape’s statement that he "can teach you how to ... stopper death" (Chapter 18) will become important. 75%

Harry will eventually investigate Quirrell’s starlight spell. 50%

He-who-is-coming in Trelawney’s aborted prophecy (Chapter 21) is the more resolved Harry after Hermione dies. 90%

Quirrell is an intended hearer (there may be more than one) of Trelawney’s aborted prophecy (Chapter 21). 80%

At some point Draco will show Harry that he’s wrong. 85% (This may refer to the debtor’s meeting.)

Quirrell intentionally gave Harry a paper cut (Chapter 26) in order to forcibly obtain his blood. 90%

Bacon’s diary will teach Harry something about how magic works. 50%

In the prophecy in Chapter 28, at least one instance of "the Dark Lord" refers to Death. 80%

Conditional on "the Dark Lord" referring to Death, Death marking Harry as his equal has something to do with his ability to block the Killing Curse using the True Patronus. 65%

Conditional on "the Dark Lord" referring to Death, the power Death knows not is intelligence and/or rationality. 90%

In the prophecy in Chapter 28, at least one instance of "the Dark Lord" refers to Voldemort. 15%

In the prophecy in Chapter 28, the phrase "the Dark Lord" has multiple referents. 2%

The sense of doom Harry feels around Quirrell is proportional to Quirrell’s strength / health if the distance between Harry and Quirrell is held constant. 75%

No one person can be capable of casting both the True Patronus and the Killing Curse at the same time. 99%

Quirrell wanted to prevent Harry from saving Hermione. 85%

Harry has Transfigured Hermione’s corpse into the ring he wears. 75%

Speculations:

The "moonlight" described in the flash-forward within Chapter 1 could be Patronus light rather than actual moonlight; Patronus light has been described as moonlight repeatedly.

When McGonagall says that she’ll "find a solution [to Harry’s sleeping condition] in time" (Chapter 2), she could have already thought of a Time-Turner as a possible solution.

The nature of Transfiguration might be meant to make readers think about caution and unrecoverable disasters.

Animal Patronuses are easier to cast in the presence of a Dementor because a Dementor’s presence makes most people flinch away from the thought of death and think about something else instead.

The True Patronus is a magically embodied preference for life over death, the opposite of the Killing Curse (which Moody describes as a magically embodied preference for death over life).

Observations:

The 'dark' power of rationality that inhabits Harry is in fact contagious. (Chapter 5)

The Verres family motto, "you can never have enough books" (Chapter 7), is about accumulating knowledge (and hopefully also skills and wisdom). The Potter family motto, "the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death" (Chapter 96), is about defeating death. Harry combines both of these.

Notice what Quirrell says to Hermione: "Knowing things isn't always enough, Miss Granger. If you cannot give and receive violence on the order of stubbing your toe, then you cannot defend yourself and you will not pass Defence. Please rejoin your classmates." (Chapter 16) Even when angry, Hermione doesn’t use any violent or painful spells, and she indeed doesn’t pass Defence. Even with a troll coming after her, she doesn’t try to kill it.

Two things are described as bright red and "blazing like miniature suns": the Remembrall when Harry holds it, and Voldemort’s eyes in Harry’s memory.

I realized why Quirrell gave Hermione a Dreadful grade, rather than just failing her. Recall from canon that there are three failing grades:

[passing grades]

Poor

Dreadful

[redacted for explaining a joke]

But a Poor grade indicates that the student can repeat the course. Death is final, there are no do-overs.

Harry sat there silently. He had seen the point immediately, and even if it was a wrong point, he knew Professor Quirrell would never, ever be talked out of making it.

Anybody wish to provide arguments for why this decision of Quirrell's was a wrong one?

ch14

If Dumbledore saw a chance to possess one of the Deathly Hallows, he would never let it escape his grasp until the day he died.

Wait, is the message Harry got with his cloak from Dumbledore? (edit: he admits that in ch79). I thought Dumbledore refused to lie? And yet he's letting the cloak escape his grasp while saying that.

(For a moment I thought he might be saying he wouldn't let the chance escape his grasp, rather than the cloak itself, but that's just silly, and there's no particular reason why that would even be true, if the other isn't.)

Not that it matters, but I don't really understand Quirrell's grading criteria. Is Neville's score 'outstanding' because he alone made the sensible move of escaping to safety of his home from life-threatening dangers of Hogwarts and Hermione's grade low because she failed the 'ultimate' test? If so, does Harry's surivival to-date 'exceed' Quirrell's expectations?

Alternatively, is Neville's score a reflection of his rate of improvement over the term, which admittedly was outstanding, relative to Harry's (or Hermione's)?

Perhaps, grades other than OWL's and NEWT's do not matter academically, so Quirrell's grading is purely subjective/random?

I rot13d it in my comment just because it's funnier if you figure it out yourself, and like many stealth jokes, it's easy to figure out once you know there's a joke to look for (if you've read canon). If it was an actual spoiler for the chapter that would facilitate discussion because it wasn't just a random throwaway joke, then I wouldn't rot13 it.

A spell to grade tests is probably not an old spell that's been around forever since no one else seems to use it, but QQ may have invented it for this purpose.

Either way, it's existence is a further hint to the nature of magic in the world of HPMOR. It involves some pretty sophiscated natural languge processing. The fact that magic can do natural language processing is hinted as significant in chapter 6 while Harry is studying the retrieval charm and trying diffent phrases that point to "bag of gold". If we knew how magic could read a test and predict what the ministry would give it, we would know a lot more about magic.

Note, we can reject the hypothesis the the spell just doing something simple like implements a big data style algorithm with 800 years of prior tests and grades as its training corpus because QQs students are going to be writing answers that are very different from the training set and so the model wouldn't have good predictive power

The Pythagorean theorem hasn't been mentioned in HPMOR. Given this, would anyone bet me at 100-to-1 odds that future chapters will reveal that Harry rederived the Pythagorean theorem, in secret, while a student at Hogwarts, before April, and had fun?

I just noticed this comic unintentionally references HPMOR. Some coincidence!