Pretty much. It’s not mass producible, is the problem here.
It’s a start, and a pretty good start at that, but it’s not done.
linkhyrule5
Karma: 1,704
Nnnnot quite. Remember, for Harry, part of defeating death is mass true resurrection. And the only method of resurrection Harry knows of requires a finite amount of his own life-force. (I suppose that may not apply to Muggles, though.)
Also, he needs the body, which doesn’t usually exist for anyone dead too long ago...
Presumably, the body was repaired to true health—which also means that the brain was restored to its original state, that is, functional.
At that point, a Muggle can be revived by simply restarting her heart. A witch, apparently, requires a bit of magic.
While I’m not at all sure this is all real (we did end the last chapter with Harry staring into the Mirror, after all), Quirrell’s continued NOPE-ing over Trelawney’s star prophecy remains utterly hilarious.
It’s like he thinks that his own life depends on Hermione Granger being alive, somehow.
For I would never want you to be deprived of Hermione Granger’s counsel and restraint, not ever while the stars yet live.
snickers
Further speculation along this line: Even if this is a dream, what has Harry gained from this vision?
A reasonably non-Dark way of resurrecting Hermione. (!)
Insight into the Dark Lord’s motives, assuming that this is all things he “might have” said.
A hint into how he might be killed.
Meta-level evidence for this: Eliezer doesn’t usually post two chapters, short or not, in one day.
Not wasting his readers time speculating about a “dream” would be a good motive for that.
Random note of confusion—Why is the mirror blank? Harry should be seeing his CEV right now, since he’s unCloaked in front of the mirror.
Also, the Cloak is Harry’s, yes? If Harry claims the Cloak right now, while Quirrell’s wearing it, will that trigger resonance?
Meh. The big Dath Bey Yewoonen prophecy may not apply to this one, but Harry will certainly consider this to be “death” for his purposes—and Harry does not intend to leave anyone dead.
And what magic can do, an immortal rational wizard can undo...
… Huh.
… Is it just me, or is Harry Potter now in the same room as the Elder Wand and the Philosopher’s Stone?
… Well, there’s a great big Dark Lord in the way, but.
Right, but the Mirror (in theory) has no power over anything not reflected in it, and Harry’s still invisible.
So You Want to Be a Wizard is the name of a Duane book, the first in the Young Wizardry series.
I immediately thought of Eliezer’s metaphor of the brain as “the lens that perceives its own flaws”, and reflective consistency.
… Have you had this sitting in a bookmark for four years so you could give him credit?
I’m not sure whether to be impressed or squee at the adorables. Probably both.
It’s not an FAI, it hasn’t taken over and promptly saved the world yet.
Well, I suppose this could all be a very slow plan on its part, but that would be boring, so it’s probably magically charged to not do that, in some better-than-English conceptual way.
And well, insofar as they’re trying to save the world and no major government cares to throw large quantities of public funds at them.
Not quite. It won’t show you what you think you want, or even what you really truly want this second—it shows you what you would want, if you were were better, smarter, and more the person you wished to be. It’s coherent—you should never look into the Mirror and go “on second thought, that’s a terrible universe.”
For example, Ron would not see himself becoming Prefect or being Head Boy, because in a decade or less he’ll have outgrown such ambitions.
Also, under the assumption that Eliezer reads these threads—usually, the critique is anchored on Harry, but moves on to poking at Draco’s little-professor-ness. Though I’m sure there are plenty of idiots who go on about Harry not being eleven, most of the intelligent detractors I’ve taught to quickly move on.
I’m sure that they’re anchored by Harry’s not-normal-ness, but at least they don’t keep pushing that once it’s pointed out that Harry is intended to be Voldemort.
I see. “Heart’s desire” indeed.
So… Atlantis managed a neutral AI? But see convergence of methods—I’d expect a hypothetical NAI to be considerably harder to build than an FAI.
(Also, nice Duane shout-out.) In what sense is Altantean Magic more like Wizardry than post-Antlantean magic, though? Just the bits about making the Holy Grail as opposed to merely operating it?
(Heh. True Magic.)
Even Riddle would wish to be happy, I think. Or rather, if he knew more, was more capable, and was more the sort of person he wants to be… he would wish to be happy and immortal. Why not, after all?
I wonder how Dumbledore turned that into a trap, though?
For that matter, if Harry is right and Aberforth has the stone… there is another way of getting it, if this one is copy. There’s more than one way to see someone who’s dead, after all.
Tangential, but I believe you mean the anthropic principle, which anyway really only applies to things that happened before you were born.
Hm.
On the one hand, this is a plausible enough theory, with few enough moving parts that I can legitimately assign it a non-negligible probability.
On the other… from a narrative perspective, this doesn’t feel satisfying. It’s a violation of Knox’s First—we’re bringing barely-mentioned and undeveloped characters in at the last minute and giving them primary roles in the plot.
Well, I suppose if the point is that Quirrell gets taken down by adults and Harry can solve Death in peace, that’s valid...
He doesn’t actually know that ritual, though. Quirrell does stuff with his wand and Harry knows better than to just blindly copy whatever off his memory.
The resurrection ritual, as near as I can tell, requires only going to that obelisk, placing flesh on the slab, and saying “X, X, X so wisely hidden”, where “X” is whatever you you have—blood, flesh, bone, vitreous humors of the eye, whatever.