Harry Potter And The Methods Of Rationality

Besides the curse, Mc Gonagall implies that the vast majority of the previous teachers have been incompetent (at least in recent years):

"Albus," Minerva said, "we cannot lose Professor Quirrell now, we cannot! If he but stays through January our fifth-years will pass their OW Ls, if he stays through March our seventh-years will pass their NEW Ts, he is remedying years of neglect in months, a whole generation will grow up able to defend themselves in spite of the Dark Lord's curse" (Beginning of Chapter 33)

Sure, he's scary (and Severus isn't?), endangers children (which is basically school policy anyway), and is outright insubordinate to the Headmaster's wishes, but he's the first competent teacher they've had in years. And not just competent, good enough to teach at least 3 years worth of material in a year.

edited 2nd Mar '12 11:59:48 AM by AlexRose

Guess so. And if Dumbledore had an thinkling or even mistrust about Quirrell, he'd want him in arm's reach. That breaks down if he's able to trust the Boy Who Lived with him on an extended basis, outside the school even. Dumbledore does have eyes everywhere though... possibly Santa Claus and Cloak and Hat answer to him, if one or both are not him already.

As for immortality, I personally have an aversion with modifying my natural body and brain beyond the point of no return and the like, so about anything other than Cryo is out. I'm okay with seeing where this current bag of bones takes me, and if they want to create a simulacrum of my brain from what's left over, my Facebook statuses and search history, not my problem. I'm dead, what do I care? Point still stands though about death being the motivator for change, and lets a new group of people start figuring out problems, but I guess space is big enough for everyone ever if it came down to it.

edited 2nd Mar '12 1:24:02 PM by moocow1452

I hate to say "well Duh!", but, well Duh! The implication of the curse is that a lot of the previous defense professors came to bad end. So they're likely to be incompetent, stupidly brave, or both. Apply now and you can look forward to dismemberment, insanity, death, or worse... what kind of person would take such a job?

I wonder what the mechanics of the curse are. Suppose it worked by stoking up "misfortune" until the "pressure" caused it to blow. It's like Murphy's law - if anything can happen which will remove the defense professor from their position, it will. And as the school becomes more and more tolerant, the necessary disaster becomes worse and worse.

Could they restructure the curriculum to avoid having a Defense Against the Dark Arts class, and sneak it in elsewhere, or is the curse laser guided?

Now that you mention it, if it's a curse that's supposed to last no matter who the the teacher is that could be why quirrel changed the name. It would very much be in wizard style to never try finding a way around the curse. .

Not really. Wizarding Creedo is to fudge prophecies and curses to your own ends, or otherwise void them as best you can. Voldemort probably didn't curse the office or the class, but put down a blacklist of spells that a wizard cannot teach at Hogwarts without Fate giving them a slap on the wrist, and then exempted himself when Quirrell took the chair, or left another way in. Assuming Rowling's series had the curse too, that might have been why Dumbledore's Army tanked to if it applies to anyone who teaches Defense against the Dark Arts.

edited 2nd Mar '12 4:46:43 PM by moocow1452

Word of God is that the jinx on the position was lifted by Voldemort's death. Not proof positive, but very suggestive that the Cannon!jinx is on the position and not the teaching of the subject. Of course, MoR!Voldemort is a lot more sensible than Cannon!Voldemort so who knows?

edited 2nd Mar '12 5:25:56 PM by anotherblackhat

Though you don't need to be Mo R!Harry to realize the implications of Quirrell teaching another year.

edited 2nd Mar '12 6:09:46 PM by AlexRose

He did wish for that...

Ah, fudge. So that's what his first wish was?

He said as much. Q was not amused.

Wait, what the fuck? There was a status update on the 28th, but only on FF.net? Why the hell wasn't it on HPMOR.com? But still, a possible deadline. Interesting.

How can that be? Less Wrong's author page on FF.net is basically just a redirect to hpmor.com now. There are no author notes at all.

edited 5th Mar '12 6:27:20 PM by glumph

Yes, but he does not write hpmor. It's a fan's site. Unlike, say, the site for Luminosity

I dunno what the problem with having Quirrel teach Battle Magic ( I prefer his and Yudkowsky's new term for what he is teaching) for another year is. Someone please explain? He is still the best fricking teacher of that subject in Hogwarts School that they have had for decades if not centuries. So what if he is evil? So is Snape, for pity's sake - yet old mister sallow skin and long black hair gets a free pass because he ends up a Big Damn Hero in canon!Hogwarts!

Quirrel is an extremely competent, capable, intelligent and adaptable teacher, able to get the very best out of his students. To say more would be indulging in far more fan-boy squeeing than is proper for someone nearly forty two years of age.

If I recall, the DAtDA/Battle Magic teachering position actually does have a Curse on it in the MoR-verse.

The Curse of Incompetent Teachers, perhaps? If so, Quirrel kicked that curse in the nuts. As he is hardly incompetent.

Well he is trying to turn the country into a dictatorship to wage war against the entire world. So there's that.

Are you saying that that is a bad thing, or that he (Quirrel) wants to be its ruler? Because from my reading of the book so far, neither are true. Maybe this incarnation of Magical Britain needs smashed to smithereens and rebuilt in a better image. Even if the ruler is a twelve-year old Dark Lord Harry, at least he will nuke Azkaban, hopefully killing all the Dementors and finding more human and humane ways to treat the criminals inside it. He will make no exceptions like what the rest of the Wizarding World did when they refused to incarcerate Grindlewald in Azkaban.

Remember, everyone in this version of the Potterverse is as smart as Harry is. His mind just works a different way than theirs do.

... Look, you seem to have completely missed the point of the latest chapters. Read this, urgently.

Also, he did not destroy LOTR by pointing out how "foolish" Gandalf was: in that Omake, Sauron's special power (and the ring's) was smarts to the point of borderline clairvoyance. You can't do worse in terms of superpowers than that. Canon!Sauron was a dullard by that point, and it was entirely unreasonable to expect a comback from him the way he did, in less than a hundred years, which in LOTR terms is very freaking fast, especially given how Minas Tirith had been keeping tight surveillance on Mordor for millennia. So, no, Gandalf's looking for archives wasn't stupid. Also, from a Doylist POV, not unsing a Dungeon Bypass at the very start wasn't possible because the Dungeon hadn't been imagined yet!.

See, this sort of behavior is what gives us lesswrongers a bad name. It's one thing to point out legitimate mistakes, and another entirely to make other people look stupid and act all arrogant and entitled, demanding their obedience because we, the smart and clear-thinking, obviously know better.

edit. Wall of text too much. Hmm.

edited 8th Mar '12 12:18:59 PM by TamH70

Please read it, it is good content, and very well-written.

^^Too long? I'll give you an excerpt:

Not the stuff you linked to. The stuff I wrote in response. I did read some of it and I liked it and tried to understand it. I don't know if my reply was worth reading so I deleted it from my post and saved it to my hard disk. I did not make that clear. Sorry.

If you are interested in my reply then you could pm me if you like. Or not. I just extend the offer.

edited 9th Mar '12 12:02:56 AM by TamH70

Update March 12: He's reading HP Mo R! We did it! He's still taking recs if you want to help me out or submit your own.

First off, some good news. From an exchange on a Less Wrong thread, it appears EY was considering posting the next chapter last night, but decided not to because he didn't want people staying up late the night before the SA Ts. That doesn't necessarily mean it'll go up tonight, but soon, my brothers and sisters. Soon the hour will be at hand. Soon we shall rise!

Now, while everything I write is bathed in that positive halo, may I ask you a favor? Damien Walter reviews sci-fi and fantasy for The Guardian. He's looking for weird, self-published online fiction to read over the next month, and he'll review the best ones he finds. He's just asked people to recommend stories in the comments to his latest article. If you want to see Methods of Rationality, Luminosity, or my Hamlet and the Philosopher's Stone reviewed in a respected newspaper, please consider heading over there and posting a short review (one link per comment, you can comment more than once). Each of the three is a hard sell even by online fantasy standards, and I imagine it would help if a disinterested party vouched for them. We've got two recs for HPMOR there already, but we could always use more, and my book definitely Needs More Love (if you haven't read it and can't buy it, PM me your email address and I'll send it to you).

Thanks!

edited 12th Mar '12 8:06:58 AM by HonoreDB