Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality

[Cain]

Chapter 99-101 are up.

Chapter 99 is a corker.  So much so, I'm going to repost the whole thing.  Is your body ready?  Brace yourself...

Ten days later, the first dead unicorn was found in the Forbidden Forest.

[Junkenstein]

99's good but the reveals (if that's the best term) in 100-101 were excellent. I hope they give him a few more weeks next year to finish it off.

[Cain]

Two new chapters up.

Killer line (spoiler alert):

The silence stretched.

Slowly, Harry turned around.

Professor Quirrell was standing upright and smiling.

In the Defense Professor's hand was a shape of black metal pointed at Harry's wand arm, held with the sure grip of someone who knew exactly how to use a semiautomatic handgun.

Harry's mouth was dry, even his lips were trembling with adrenaline, but he managed to speak. "Hello, Lord Voldemort."

Professor Quirrell inclined his head in acknowledgement, and said, "Hello, Tom Riddle."

[Cain]

Shit just got real:

This is your final exam.

You have 60 hours.

Your solution must at least allow Harry to evade immediate death,
despite being naked, holding only his wand, facing 36 Death Eaters
plus the fully resurrected Lord Voldemort.

If a viable solution is posted before
*12:01AM Pacific Time* (8:01AM UTC) on Tuesday, March 3rd, 2015,
the story will continue to Ch. 121.

Otherwise you will get a shorter and sadder ending.

Keep in mind the following:

1. Harry must succeed via his own efforts. The cavalry is not coming.
Everyone who might want to help Harry thinks he is at a Quidditch game.

2. Harry may only use capabilities the story has already shown him to have;
he cannot develop wordless wandless Legilimency in the next 60 seconds.

3. Voldemort is evil and cannot be persuaded to be good;
the Dark Lord's utility function cannot be changed by talking to him.

4. If Harry raises his wand or speaks in anything except Parseltongue,
the Death Eaters will fire on him immediately.

5. If the simplest timeline is otherwise one where Harry dies -
if Harry cannot reach his Time-Turner without Time-Turned help -
then the Time-Turner will not come into play.

6. It is impossible to tell lies in Parseltongue.

Within these constraints,
Harry is allowed to attain his full potential as a rationalist,
now in this moment or never,
regardless of his previous flaws.

Of course 'the rational solution',
if you are using the word 'rational' correctly,
is just a needlessly fancy way of saying 'the best solution'
or 'the solution I like' or 'the solution I think we should use',
and you should usually say one of the latter instead.
(We only need the word 'rational' to talk about ways of thinking,
considered apart from any particular solutions.)

And by Vinge's Principle,
if you know exactly what a smart mind would do,
you must be at least that smart yourself.
Asking someone "What would an optimal player think is the best move?"
should produce answers no better than "What do you think is best?"

So what I mean in practice,
when I say Harry is allowed to attain his full potential as a rationalist,
is that Harry is allowed to solve this problem
the way YOU would solve it.
If you can tell me exactly how to do something,
Harry is allowed to think of it.

But it does not serve as a solution to say, for example,
"Harry should persuade Voldemort to let him out of the box"
if you can't yourself figure out how.

The rules on Fanfiction dot Net allow at most one review per chapter.
Please submit *ONLY ONE* review of Ch. 113,
to submit one suggested solution.

For the best experience, if you have not already been following
Internet conversations about recent chapters, I suggest not doing so,
trying to complete this exam on your own,
not looking at other reviews,
and waiting for Ch. 114 to see how you did.

I wish you all the best of luck, or rather the best of skill.

Ch. 114 will post at 10AM Pacific (6PM UTC) on Tuesday, March 3rd, 2015.

[The Wizard Joseph]

Just the premise stated in the OP sounds amazing.  Have not even bitten into it yet, but have the link from the OP bookmarked. Got a friend or two that might filp for this. Thanks for posting and bumping!

[LMNO]

I was NOT expecting that. Shit. I'm not sure I'm smart enough for this.

[Cain]

Well, you've still got what, two days?

I'm unfortunately working night shift, which turns brains to mush, otherwise I'd throw some ideas around.

[The Wizard Joseph]

The above question is simple. If Harry wishes to survive he must join the Deatheaters. His pointless death will do no good and all other options in the scenario result in fast, messy death at best. He can be treacherous right?

If you can't beat 'em join 'em. Then beat 'em with their own bar stool later.

[LMNO]

Interesting option, but he must speak truth. Parsletongue would not let him deceive, even in absence of information.

I'm thinking that it comes down to his two largest discoveries: partial transfiguration and patronus 2.0.

If you've read the sequences, there are two major things Elizer believes: Muliple Universe Theory, and Timeless Physics.

He's also shown Harry to be able to affect reality if he's holding his wand, even if it's not pointed at anything -- because everything is reality.

So, my guess at this point is that Harry will focus his magic to the very limits of existence, and change the very fabric of the universe. I'm not sure if this violates his vow, but if he changes the universe, that changes everything inside it, including the vow.

[Cain]

Technically, it shouldn't because it would allow for another Universe to exist alongside the former one. 

[The Wizard Joseph]

Not read the other things at all yet, just happened to read the above conundrum when I realized it wasn't going to be a spoiler.

The idea of parseltongue is symbolic and plays to how I see such a solution as I presented working out. Got to get ready for work but will write and post a bit more detail BEFORE I dig into the fan fiction. Also note that I haven't read the whole series either, but am very familiar as my brother is a fanatic and due to mild dyslexia got the unabridged audio books. I got a lot of little pieces from that.

[LMNO]

Um,  I don't want to get in the way of your fun, but to propose a solution without even knowing the backstory is a guarantee you're gonna miss.  This Potter Universe is waaaaay not canon.  I strongly suggest you read the whole thing first.

[The Wizard Joseph]

Um,  I don't want to get in the way of your fun, but to propose a solution without even knowing the backstory is a guarantee you're gonna miss.  This Potter Universe is waaaaay not canon.  I strongly suggest you read the whole thing first.

Fair enough. The essence of what I was getting at above was that lies per se and treachery are not quite the same. But I will read first and see if the rest of my thought can hold water.

[Reginald Ret]

Um,  I don't want to get in the way of your fun, but to propose a solution without even knowing the backstory is a guarantee you're gonna miss.  This Potter Universe is waaaaay not canon.  I strongly suggest you read the whole thing first.

Fair enough. The essence of what I was getting at above was that lies per se and treachery are not quite the same. But I will read first and see if the rest of my thought can hold water.

You are going to have so much fun!

[LMNO]

I've been poking through the comments section, and most people seem to have forgotten rule 3:

3. Voldemort is evil and cannot be persuaded to be good;
the Dark Lord's utility function cannot be changed by talking to him.

I still got nothing.  Guess we'll find out at 6PM GMT.