Missing from your list:
Make Draco testify to his crime; use the newly won blood debt to save Hermione (or stall—see my reply to Daniel_Starr: http://lesswrong.com/r/discussion/lw/axe/harry_potter_and_the_methods_of_rationality/63rw)
SkyDK
Karma: 256
I’m now considering your hypothesis about Quirrellmort instigating this to be the most plausible. I still do not believe it to have been his best move unless there’s a good reason for him to turn Harry Dark. Besides I consider the option posted as a reply to Daniel_Starr to be more likely. Regardless, you get the up-vote for the better deduction.
I disagree. This is a possible, but weak solution whereto the probability calculation of good Bayesian says that it doesn’t stand a good chance of succeeding compared to the cost. Right now Harry is not in an impressive social situation. Besides being the Boy-Who-Lived he’s done nothing, and in this particular context he has not scored an awful lot of points.
First of all: Dumbledore has visibly just traded Hermione for his own position (so that’s one trade-off).
But besides that I find one hypothesis that answer your questions within the given parameters (more might dot my mind later, hence I’ll number it from the get go):
Harry asks Draco if Draco had submitted him to torture with no intention of helping him. Draco is already under the effects of Veritaserum, so he’ll testify.
The dark part: betraying a promise.
Now the social part: Now he has let everyone in the Wizengamot see that Draco is willing to torture another kid until this kid dies/goes crazy. And this is not ANY other kid; it is The-Boy-Who-Lived.
Next Harry could ask them if they then thought it beyond Draco to have Hermione and himself false-memory charmed/obliviated so as to both get revenge over Hermione who publicly humiliated him (which Harry hadn’t) AND regain his lost honour by appearing victorious in the false memory.
For kicks he could throw in the mudblood/true born-equality discovery (and that would also qualify for the taboo-part).
… Lucius would severely regret having earned that enmity. Dark side should like this.
Oh, and about the laws: this should have Draco, and thereby the House of Malfoy, owe a blood debt. This blood debt could be used to either: a. let Draco suffer the same punishment as Hermione (a good way to make sure none of them get hurt too badly) b. let him take her place (a way darker way of dealing with Lucius) (unlikely due to the sheer amount of harm done; too dark) c. have Lucius revoke his vote (uncertain about the legality)
Another option when it comes to Magical Britain’s laws might be invoking some duel right. I do not know if this is possible, but it would be in line with the medieval feel of Magical Britain.
We would object that laws cannot be changed retroactively. Magical Britain doesn’t follow a constitution so I cannot see why not.
Besides that I suppose a duel might actually invoked to defend Hermione’s honour. I’m really uncertain about that though.
Well, I’d say there’s a clear difference between ambushing (deception in tactical combat situations) and lying/manipulating (social deception in micro-situations).
The first requires way less self-deception: the requirement here is not control of vocal tone, facial expression and knowledge innuendo and social graces; no, here an understanding of which parts of the enemy forces the enemy appreciates, and which targets he would like to hit in your own army. The second calculations; terrain and so on are also logical advantages. So in effect it can easily be a silence-based deception yet Harry is still surprisingly mediocre in this aspect. Given that they are already in military outfits, a well-constructed ambush should be able to drop more than third of an enemy force before they even knew what hit them (this just by the most simple solution: half hidden, half baiting). A little instigated chaos by the non-hiding part might very well be necessary so as to negate the counter-ambush advantage of the maps.
About the “drilling people” together; that has already been mostly done by his reputation and being in a situation very much like The Robber’s Cave scenario. All he had to do was exploit the chaos he loves to create and have his running troops run so as to V around two sides of the enemy’s O positions (V and O are here used as visual representations of the formations in question).
I concur with you on the second part and I applaud the sharp observation on the aspect of self-deception/mucking one’s own cognition when it comes to social interactions.
First of all. Thank you for pointing this quote out!
Well, I’d say the first thing you do is hide better :) It hardly needed much more than a cloack over the object about to be transfigured. Perhaps another weakness of Harry’s, overcomplicating? I appreciate the sacrifice made and the development by the character of Draco. Still, for any good mastermind in the making keeping your top-secret plan top-secret is usually an extremely good idea.
Given Harry’s knowledge about basic game theory and decision making theory how come he’s so bad at producing fake information? I refer both to his dealings in conversations (where he arguably has increased his game level), but even more so in the mock battles. Not hiding the creation of green sunglasses did seem unnaturally stupid taking into consideration:
He knew scouts might be sent to track his dealings (it is after all a basic of military tactics as well as the logical thing to do against an enemy you know is outnumbered when you have to figure out what he does to deal with his disadvantage).
The cost/benefit was vastly in favour of benefit.
He himself had trained Draco to acquire better information before acting.
Furthermore I’m rather stunned by how bad at constructing ambushes and firing lines Harry is.
The rational choice is to be a socio-path (by which I mean acquiring great skill at manipulating people through both logic and emotion).
After becoming a socio-path the rational choice is to use the new-found skills to manipulate key-players in the local environment to become rationalist so as to increase predictable courses of action. {EDITED} 3. Anyone holding political offices ought to renege on their right to privacy so as to make knowing their utility preferences easier.
Massive indoctrination at any kind of public education is highly desirable as long as this indoctrination is done thoughtfully and instilling the right drives and values for society optimization.
Women wanting insemination should only get seamen from men who’ve shown skill. Couples needing eggs; the same for the women donating.
About some of the other comments: Bestiality is legal in Denmark (hence I s’pose very far from being taboo). Prostitution is legal in Holland (and partially in Denmark) (also not taboo)
{ADDED} [I think all 5 of these qualify to being taboo in our current day and age and are silenced in our society for the very same reason; logical counter-arguments can, but are not, made]
I’ve retracted this comment due to me not actually thinking it will aid anyone in the long run; nor does it further the promotion of my own values and as Percent_Carbon points out it (and many like it) might end up harming LessWrong way before LessWrong achives a lot of the good I believe it capable of.
Yes that would most probably work. Even though the costs do seem rather huge (which is why I went for frame Snape).
I’d actually take it half a step further and said that we’ve spent most of the years since WW2 on how to distance ourselves from ethical questions so as to allow ourselves to commit greater atrocities than ever before and still happily go home to watch Paradise Hotel afterwards.
I s’pose examples would be in order:
Undermining food production while at the same time burning food.
Specifically undermining the life quality of vast amounts of people so as to keep up a standard of living and increased consumption in quite a small part of the world. This includes, but is not limited to, instigating wars for the sake of resources, letting children deal with poisons, dumping nuclear waste where fellow human beings live and so on and so forth.
Thank you. {EDIT} I reserve most of my nonsensical actions for comic relief in tense real life situations.
Well for me two obvious questions arise: Why are we supposed to believe so? Given that Quirrelmort is dark, wouldn’t the Dementor just be the experimental method applied so as to test whether or not his brain-wave patterns interfered with Harry’s ability to act as a champion of light? {added} Also any of the given actions that day might as well have been a test of Harry’s current limits and willingness to follow a plan.
Even if not, shouldn’t Quirrelmort realize that after the Stanford Prison Experiment other venues for reaching his goal might be more attractive?
I do believe that Quirrelmort is currently trying to get Harry into thinking Dark and acting Light. [ADDED] At least that would make extreme amounts of sense to me for Controlling Britain purposes.
Framing someone else who is already an enemy (Snape?)…
This can be done through a false memory charm on ie. Harry. This could be a good way for Quirrelmort to get Harry darker, make him appear lighter and earn more trust points all in one move. This would also qualify as a taboo trade-off. It could easily also be done on the Weasley brothers. All it’d take would be to find out who didn’t have a strong alibi at midnight (most people) and/or a time turner.
From a strategic point of view having Light-Harry as a gullible ally is worth way more than having Dark-Harry be so knowingly. If the plot is to gain control of Magical Britain under one single leader who you puppeteer (him being embedded with your brain patterns and all) there’d be no sense in turning him dark now. The political strategist would rather:
Put Dumbledore in a bad position by allowing Harry to be the one to stand up for the students. Possibly in a way that humbles Dumbledore by the great “wisdom” of Harry, but meanwhile in a way that doesn’t alienate Harry from Dumbledore’s political allies before he’s been groomed and positioned to lead them. A way to do this would be to present evidence that Harry would be able to deduct and present on basis of being the Boy-Who-Lived AND someone who actually thinks. It might very well involve Harry find out, and proof, that Snape burned the letters. Snape being a double turncoat means that he’d be an easy suspect. Quirrelmort already has good reason to see him gone (that’s how he deals with traitors if you recall) plus it’d severely weaken Dumbledore’s hold on the Slytherin part of Britain. Here the taboo trade-off is Snape’s future who Dumbledore trades to keep the school.
Quirrelmort might already have been there for the duel between Hermione and Draco. Hence he’d have a memory of it and be able to pull that memory to a pensive. That memory would be enough to proof Hermione innocent. If this is the case Quirrelmort ends up distancing Harry from Lucius; which might be a good idea considering that Quirrelmort probably prefers to be the one in charge of the dark side and have Harry as a champion of the light. The taboo trade-off would then be Draco’s father.
I see no reason to make Harry appear dark. Actually I’d consider that extremely stupid since Quirrelmort has obtained all the political power he could hope to and now knows that that is not enough. He needs both the wolves and the sheep.
The Danish army, which I’m currently a part of, do not condone steroids; they particularly campaign against them. Long term use isn’t worth it compared to the investment they make in the soldiers. But it’s probably fair to note that the Danish army and the American one aren’t quite agreeing on a lot of issues regarding the health of their soldiers. Mental or otherwise.
My bad. Speed reading and sleep deprivation is a bad cocktail if you want a keen eye for detail. Thank you. Given that I’ll retract my previous comment.