Hyper Crab Tank posted:The difference is Rowling follows it with words that are uncommon and fanciful, which suggests a deeper intelligence and rich vocabulary of Dumbledore, in addition to his quirkiness.
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# ? Jan 6, 2016 01:51 |
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# ? May 17, 2024 16:24 |
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Chapter 17 – Locating the Hypothesis Part Twenty-One quote:
This is clearly intended to be a commentary on Eliezer himself, except I’m not sure he even has that “desire to know things”, given his total dismissal of the value of formal structured education and his valorization of natural talent over effort. quote:
Does Eliezarry lack pattern recognition? Given Dumbledore’s actions so far, the “secret” is likely to be something trivial or banal. quote:
It’s cryptic to me too. Has Eliezarry’s thirst being an ominous sign been mentioned or hinted at in the story before?
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# ? Jan 6, 2016 06:43 |
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JosephWongKS posted:Chapter 17 – Locating the Hypothesis It's the comed-tea thing.
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# ? Jan 6, 2016 07:25 |
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For how quick LW is to shout "SHUT UP AND MULTIPLY", Harry's fallacy seems to fly completely against it. Also just take the drat rock. You have a trunk don't you? Keep it there.
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# ? Jan 6, 2016 10:15 |
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SSNeoman posted:For how quick LW is to shout "SHUT UP AND MULTIPLY", Harry's fallacy seems to fly completely against it. Also just take the drat rock. You have a trunk don't you? Keep it there. Dumbledore insisted that even the pouch wasn't close enough and that Harry should have carried the rock at all times.
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# ? Jan 6, 2016 14:00 |
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JosephWongKS posted:This is clearly intended to be a commentary on Eliezer himself, except I’m not sure he even has that “desire to know things”, given his total dismissal of the value of formal structured education and his valorization of natural talent over effort. I'm sure he has plenty of desire to know things, just zero desire to put any effort into learning them. He just wants to make poo poo up and for it all to be 100% correct because of his inherent super genius.
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# ? Jan 6, 2016 21:14 |
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The main thing I got from Dumbledore's explanation of Ravenclaws is that a complete idiot who highly prizes the pursuit of knowledge will get into that house even if they are the dumbest person enrolled in the entire school and never actually learn anything while in the house. Which is the same logic behind Neville getting into Gryffindor in the books - despite being the least Gryffindor-ish person we see (for the first few books, anyway), he had a deep personal reverence of Gryffindor's values and those got him in despite not outwardly possessing any of those traits at the time of his sorting. Using the same logic, an incredibly smart person who was humble and valued hard work and teamwork above the pursuit of knowledge (traits that Eliezer's version of Harry emphatically does not possess) would become a Hufflepuff that gives the best Ravenclaws a run for their money academically.
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# ? Jan 6, 2016 22:27 |
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Zonekeeper posted:The main thing I got from Dumbledore's explanation of Ravenclaws is that a complete idiot who highly prizes the pursuit of knowledge will get into that house even if they are the dumbest person enrolled in the entire school and never actually learn anything while in the house. Well, yeah. It's the traits you prize, not the traits you possess. Hence, Hermione and Luna.
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# ? Jan 6, 2016 22:31 |
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Senerio posted:Well, yeah. It's the traits you prize, not the traits you possess. Hence, Hermione and Luna. And, sort of to drill it in, Neville. Neville isn't brave, but he values being brave, and he eventually becomes The Bravest. Part of the message of the books is anathema to Eliezer&Co, that if you work at what you value, you can develop it, even if you have no innate talent. It also suggest that Eliezer, who believes in a secret elite of superintelligent ubermenschen operating solely off first principals and ignoring actual empiricism, belongs in Slytherin, not Ravenclaw.
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# ? Jan 7, 2016 02:44 |
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Zonekeeper posted:Using the same logic, an incredibly smart person who was humble and valued hard work and teamwork above the pursuit of knowledge (traits that Eliezer's version of Harry emphatically does not possess) would become a Hufflepuff that gives the best Ravenclaws a run for their money academically. Yeah that's basically Cedric Diggory. Talented, brave and probably quite ambitious, but he goes to Hufflepuff, probably because above all else he recognized the work and dedication you have to put in to become talented, to be willing to face your fears and to actually accomplish your ambitions. Side note, but what about Crabb and Goyle? Clearly they're not all that clever and probably not too ambitious- do they value those traits though (in other people)? Or did they beg for Slytherin due to the pure-blood association and the hat caved when they might have been better suited for another house?
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# ? Jan 7, 2016 08:10 |
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They don't have to think they're better than everyone. They just need to think they're better than those people.
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# ? Jan 7, 2016 08:23 |
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Mazerunner posted:Side note, but what about Crabb and Goyle? Clearly they're not all that clever and probably not too ambitious- do they value those traits though (in other people)? Or did they beg for Slytherin due to the pure-blood association and the hat caved when they might have been better suited for another house?
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# ? Jan 7, 2016 09:01 |
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Mazerunner posted:Side note, but what about Crabb and Goyle? Clearly they're not all that clever and probably not too ambitious- do they value those traits though (in other people)? Or did they beg for Slytherin due to the pure-blood association and the hat caved when they might have been better suited for another house? As an aside, Dumbledore should have been in Slytherin, for both in-universe (he was exactly the type when he was young) and metatextual reasons (Slytherin not being Evil House).
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# ? Jan 7, 2016 09:47 |
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Doctor Spaceman posted:What other house would they be suited for? That assumes the tribalism that is clearly present in the Harry's era wasn't in Dumbledore's. The Sorting Hat obviously takes into account what people want as much, possibly even more so, than their individual characteristics which gives rise to a certain degree of self-selection in the houses. Whole families, generation after generation, end up in the same house, making friends and meeting future spouses there which reinforces the 'these are our kind' image, which get's passed onto their kids who project that into the Hat. The process was probably just that much more accelerated in Slytherin because of the value placed on pure-blood families.
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# ? Jan 7, 2016 11:17 |
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Crabbe and Goyle always struck me as the kind of people who are entirely comfortable with the concept of power by association with someone more prestigious and powerful than themselves, and by that token attach themselves to the Malfoys. Doing their bidding is a way of ingratiating yourself with those who, at present, have more power than you, and in turn gaining some of that for yourself, much like the way Lucius sucks up to Voldemort despite having a great deal of personal ambition himself. They both tend to revel in hurting others, too, presumably as a means of establishing themselves as above others in the pecking order. As for Eliezarry, wasn't the hat about to sort him into Slytherin and only under suspicious circumstances ended up jamming him into Ravenclaw?
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# ? Jan 7, 2016 11:28 |
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Mazerunner posted:Yeah that's basically Cedric Diggory. Talented, brave and probably quite ambitious, but he goes to Hufflepuff, probably because above all else he recognized the work and dedication you have to put in to become talented, to be willing to face your fears and to actually accomplish your ambitions. He went to Hufflepuff because he valued finding things. Test Pattern posted:And, sort of to drill it in, Neville. Neville isn't brave, but he values being brave, and he eventually becomes The Bravest. Part of the message of the books is anathema to Eliezer&Co, that if you work at what you value, you can develop it, even if you have no innate talent. It also suggest that Eliezer, who believes in a secret elite of superintelligent ubermenschen operating solely off first principals and ignoring actual empiricism, belongs in Slytherin, not Ravenclaw. I was mostly referencing Ravenclaw there, as it was the house in question, but yeah. Neville.
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# ? Jan 7, 2016 16:25 |
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(Cross-posted to the Dork Enlightenment thread.) SlateStarCodex, now rapidly descending into white nationalism: quote:What I want is a Harry Potter fanfic set in a world where blood purism is correct. As another Tumblr user points out, the "Interdict of Merlin" is fanfic-only bullshit made up by Yudkowsky for I Am the Way, the Truth, and the Methods of Rationality. But then again, Scott's an idiot.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 16:35 |
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Magical ability is canonically a dominant gene, as well. Once I found out rowling deliberately made quidditch nonsense so she could troll diehard sports fans, a lot of her declarations about canon suddenly made a shitload more sense.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 18:29 |
Tunicate posted:Once I found out rowling deliberately made quidditch nonsense so she could troll diehard sports fans, a lot of her declarations about canon suddenly made a shitload more sense.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 18:32 |
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Tunicate posted:Once I found out rowling deliberately made quidditch nonsense so she could troll diehard sports fans, a lot of her declarations about canon suddenly made a shitload more sense.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 18:38 |
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Nakar posted:And yet not one bit of the impossibility of even correctly playing it, to say nothing of its nonsensical scoring rules, has dissuaded fans from trying. Way back my roommate was one of the founders of the Quidditch club at my University. Mostly because his response to a bunch of out of shape nerds wanting to pretend fly brooms was to request to be the Slytherin captain. He then recruited a ton of players from the IM Ultimate Frisbee team and made the snitch catching pointless because they were always ahead by 300ish points.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 19:12 |
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Tunicate posted:Magical ability is canonically a dominant gene, as well. I always figured Quidditch was how it was to make it perfect for a YA novel sports scene, which would also be a perfectly acceptable explanation as well. This one is way better, though. Where did you find it?
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 19:15 |
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Curvature of Earth posted:As another Tumblr user points out, the "Interdict of Merlin" is fanfic-only bullshit made up by Yudkowsky for I Am the Way, the Truth, and the Methods of Rationality. But then again, Scott's an idiot. http://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/108797/does-the-interdict-of-merlin-appear-in-original-harry-potter-canon Replied to by the almighty himself, saying: quote:The Interdict is an added plot device (though something like it must surely exist elsewhere in the vast reaches of already-written fantasy). Emphasis mine, I have no clue what he means by opinion of god there, unless he means in his own fanfic which is besides the point. People will point out however that there is actual marginal evidence in the book for that not being a thing, including the Marauders learning the animagus form secretly. Moreover even in this fanfic, what would then be the point of keeping the unreadable books in the library, although I suppose that's just meant as a 'haha those wizards are so dumb and don't remove unreadable books from the library because tradition'.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 19:57 |
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Tunicate posted:Magical ability is canonically a dominant gene, as well. To be more precise, I think it's a parody of cricket. When a real-world sport has matches that can and do last for days with point-scores approaching the thousands and includes positions like 'cow corner', 'deep square leg', and 'silly mid-off', having a couple of Beaters launch Bludgers at their opponents while Chasers and Seekers desperately hunt for the Quaffle and Golden Snitch sounds positively normal.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 20:17 |
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The first time I saw cricket was on British TV while I was on a weeklong trip to London. India was playing the West Indies or something. The last day of the trip I saw the same match on TV again. It was not a replay or a second match. It was the same goddamn match. At least a quidditch game might be over by the end of the afternoon.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 20:22 |
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Red Mike posted:Emphasis mine, I have no clue what he means by opinion of god there, unless he means in his own fanfic which is besides the point. I assume he's as irritated by authors issuing spurious Word of God that they didn't bother putting in the text as I am. Another actually-good point to Yudkowsky. Curvature of Earth posted:SlateStarCodex, now rapidly descending into white nationalism: That's incredibly awesome. I hadn't flamed any LessWrongers on Tumblr yet today. Thank you. “i want “of course i haven’t actually read any harry potter, but let me tell you all about jensen” ssc is an intellectual blog. it was quoted in the atlantic, you know. and real-world intellectuals and public thinkers in 2016 go on about scientific racism all the time and how they can inject it into their transformative works of children’s stories
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 20:31 |
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divabot posted:“i want You're just letting your system 1 do the talking, my friend.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 21:12 |
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Night10194 posted:I always figured Quidditch was how it was to make it perfect for a YA novel sports scene, which would also be a perfectly acceptable explanation as well. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/10065868/JK-Rowling-invented-Quidditch-after-a-row-with-her-boyfriend.html "[Quidditch] was invented in a small hotel in Manchester after a row with my then boyfriend," she has written alongside the text. "I had been pondering the things that hold a society together, cause it to congregate and signify its particular character and knew I needed a sport. It infuriates men...which is quite satisfying given my state of mind when I invented it." So yeah, 100% spite-written.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 21:21 |
Tunicate posted:Magical ability is canonically a dominant gene, as well.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 21:55 |
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There's a whole subreddit, r/rational, devoted to this sort of cargo cult Yuddery. There was a thread there recently about how to make wizard racism a good thing, so this article might not even be original craziness.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 22:36 |
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Nessus posted:And clearly have nothing to do with one's whiteness or whatever, given all the non-white wizardlings running round. If someone wanted to try to model how magi-genes work based on the evidence in the books I suppose that would be harmless fan nerding. I thought one of the key points about magic was that it wasn't reliably hereditary (hence Mudbloods and Squibs), so Voldemort and other scientific-racist wizard-supremacists were completely full of poo poo? It's always treated as an innate talent (like being good at chemistry or having a great ear for music) that you can't breed for. A gift from God, if you want to tie it in with Rowling's Christian leanings.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 22:49 |
Darth Walrus posted:I thought one of the key points about magic was that it wasn't reliably hereditary (hence Mudbloods and Squibs), so Voldemort and other scientific-racist wizard-supremacists were completely full of poo poo? It's always treated as an innate talent (like being good at chemistry or having a great ear for music) that you can't breed for. A gift from God, if you want to tie it in with Rowling's Christian leanings.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 22:54 |
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Nessus posted:And clearly have nothing to do with one's whiteness or whatever, given all the non-white wizardlings running round. If someone wanted to try to model how magi-genes work based on the evidence in the books I suppose that would be harmless fan nerding. Someone has! http://web.archive.org/web/20150326...laining-how-the Basically the most plausible way for a genetic component to make any sense. Rowling should really have left magic as magic and not pulled a George Lucas, but genes are a lot better than midiclorians.
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 01:04 |
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i81icu812 posted:Someone has! http://web.archive.org/web/20150326...laining-how-the Did she pull a George Lucas, though? I never kept up with her comments as an author, but the books themselves consistently defied that line of reasoning where magic was concerned. I mean, consider the parallels with racism she did. Voldemort and company's whole problem is with trying to breed for something so complex, unpredictable, and... well... magical that you can't breed for it, just like the whackjob eugenics programs of the twentieth century trying to 'scientifically' produce moral, brilliant übermensch and eliminate the corrupting influence of the 'lesser' races.
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 03:13 |
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Rowling's statements about this, from a fan site that collected them Wizarding Genetics: More Complicated Than Mendel! “A Squib is almost the opposite of a Muggle-born wizard: he or she is a non-magical person born to at least one magical parent. Squibs are rare; magic is a dominant and resilient gene.” – jkrowling.com “Why are some people in the wizarding world (e.g., Harry) called 'half-blood' even though both their parents were magical?” “The expressions 'pure-blood', 'half-blood' and 'Muggle-born' have been coined by people to whom these distinctions matter, and express their originators' prejudices. As far as somebody like Lucius Malfoy is concerned, for instance, a Muggle-born is as 'bad' as a Muggle. Therefore Harry would be considered only 'half' wizard, because of his mother's grandparents…. The Nazis used precisely the same warped logic as the Death Eaters. A single Jewish grandparent 'polluted' the blood, according to their propaganda.” (Therefore, Half-blood would be defined as having one Muggle grandparent.) – jkrowling.com “How does a Muggle-born like Hermione develop magical abilities?” “Nobody knows where magic comes from. It is like any other talent. Sometimes it seems to be inherited, but others are the only ones in their family who have the ability.” – Barnes and Noble interview, March 19, 1999 “How can two Muggles have a kid with magical powers?” “It's the same as two black-haired people producing a redheaded child. Sometimes these things just happen, and no one really knows why!” – Online chat transcript, Scholastic.com, 3 February 2000
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 03:37 |
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Tunicate posted:“It's the same as two black-haired people producing a redheaded child. Sometimes these things just happen, and no one really knows why!” – Online chat transcript, Scholastic.com, 3 February 2000 That one's easy.
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 07:55 |
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MikeJF posted:That one's easy. Infidelity
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 10:09 |
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Tunicate posted:Infidelity
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 20:34 |
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divabot posted:I assume he's as irritated by authors issuing spurious Word of God that they didn't bother putting in the text as I am. Another actually-good point to Yudkowsky. ..What? So he was irritated by authors issuing Word of God statements, therefore he decided to issue a Word of God statement himself? I don't understand how that's in any way better.
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 20:51 |
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# ? May 17, 2024 16:24 |
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Red Mike posted:..What? So he was irritated by authors issuing Word of God statements, therefore he decided to issue a Word of God statement himself? I don't understand how that's in any way better. ... per his quoted words, which are in fact above, he was offering his opinion as the author, while explicitly disclaiming it as overruling other interpretations implicit in the work.
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 20:52 |