Are you sure about that? Hermione firmly denies being suspicious of Harry while talking to Mr. Hat-and-Cloak, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that this won’t make her more suspicious of him on at least a subconscious level. If Mr. Hat-and-Cloak is Professor Quirrell, as is strongly suggested in both of his appearances, then we should expect that this is fairly likely to be the case, as I would expect Quirrell to be fairly good at this sort of thing.
I’m not entirely convinced. If Quirrell has a weakness (note, I did say “if”), then it’s his lack of empathy with children, and especially Muggle-born children. Harry is able to consistently surprise him (f.ex. in Azkaban, or by cheering him up at the end of the bully saga, etc.), and I didn’t get the impression that this is because Harry is some sort of an uber-outlier. He’s an outlier, yes, but he’s still a human kid.
This weakness probably stems from Quirrell’s cynicism, which a few characters have already commented upon. Qurrell subconsciously assumes that everyone is acting like a perfectly rational agent that attempts to maximize its own expected utility by enhancing its power to manipulate external reality (which occasionally includes other actors). In Quirrell’s subset of the world, this assumption is quite often correct, but most real people—such as Hermione—do not, in fact, act that way all of (or even most of) the time.
Qurrell subconsciously assumes that everyone is acting like a perfectly rational agent that attempts to maximize its own expected utility by enhancing its power to manipulate external reality
He definitely doesn’t think so consciously; one of his more memorable quotes is something along the lines of “The main thing ordinary people do, Mr. Potter, is nothing”.
Ok, that’s true. Instead of saying “everyone”, I should’ve said “everyone who is not beneath his notice, except perhaps in aggregate”. I doubt that Quirrell counts Harry or Hermione as members of the “ordinary people” set.
Are you sure about that? Hermione firmly denies being suspicious of Harry while talking to Mr. Hat-and-Cloak, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that this won’t make her more suspicious of him on at least a subconscious level. If Mr. Hat-and-Cloak is Professor Quirrell, as is strongly suggested in both of his appearances, then we should expect that this is fairly likely to be the case, as I would expect Quirrell to be fairly good at this sort of thing.
Yes. If Mr. Hat-and-Cloak is Quirrell, then either:
a) He will sucessfully make Hermione more suspicious of Harry, or
b) He will make Hermione less suspicious of Harry and that will be what he wanted.
I would expect Quirrell to know better than to appear to Hermione as Hat-and-Cloak in the first place.
Yes, this particular episode has greatly increased my confidence that H&C, whoever it is, is not Quirrell.
I’m not entirely convinced. If Quirrell has a weakness (note, I did say “if”), then it’s his lack of empathy with children, and especially Muggle-born children. Harry is able to consistently surprise him (f.ex. in Azkaban, or by cheering him up at the end of the bully saga, etc.), and I didn’t get the impression that this is because Harry is some sort of an uber-outlier. He’s an outlier, yes, but he’s still a human kid.
This weakness probably stems from Quirrell’s cynicism, which a few characters have already commented upon. Qurrell subconsciously assumes that everyone is acting like a perfectly rational agent that attempts to maximize its own expected utility by enhancing its power to manipulate external reality (which occasionally includes other actors). In Quirrell’s subset of the world, this assumption is quite often correct, but most real people—such as Hermione—do not, in fact, act that way all of (or even most of) the time.
He definitely doesn’t think so consciously; one of his more memorable quotes is something along the lines of “The main thing ordinary people do, Mr. Potter, is nothing”.
Ok, that’s true. Instead of saying “everyone”, I should’ve said “everyone who is not beneath his notice, except perhaps in aggregate”. I doubt that Quirrell counts Harry or Hermione as members of the “ordinary people” set.