HPMoR and the Limits of Rationality
One woman's quest to understand the Harry Potter fanfic that created the modern world.
Interactive transcripts by Regina: https://hpmoralor.sepionics.com/
Email: hpmoralorcast@proton.me
HPMoR and the Limits of Rationality
Ep. 6: ...And Lose My Calm
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
In the second part of chapter 6, Harry descends into multiple black rages, Yudkowsky finally demonstrates a good example of the planning fallacy, and a plot twist is introduced. Anthea is dispirited, Jake and Elisa are unimpressed, and a dog makes a cameo.
This episode spoils a plot reveal from later in HPMoR.
Content warnings: this chapter mentions child abuse.
Citations and further reading, part 2
- HPMoR, Chapter 6. Eliezer Yudkowsky. https://hpmor.com/chapter/6
- Serial Podcast: The Preventionist, Dyan Neary. The New York Times, 15 Oct 2025. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/16/podcasts/serial-productions-the-preventionist.html
- “Occam’s Razor,” Philosophy Terms. Accessed 3 Jun 2026. https://web.archive.org/web/20260603191635/https://philosophyterms.com/occams-razor/
Intro and chapter 6 close reading
AntheaHey, welcome back to HP Moore and the Limits of Rationality. I'm your host, Anthea. Uh, once again, we are jumping into part two of chapter six. I would highly recommend going back and listening to the the previous episode to get where we are in the current shopping montage of Harry's Big Day. Uh yeah, uh thanks for listening. Um no real content warnings for this chapter. We're gonna touch on uh the topic of child abuse uh some in here pretty obliquely, but it's in there. Let's get into it.
SPEAKER_02Well, I for one feel pretty good.
AntheaSo, okay, right. So, um uh during the break, Alisa, you said something about uh about Harry.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I am pretty stunned. I know we talked about this before because previous chapter you were saying was like the introduction of like Harry Potter is a sociopathic manipulative little shit or whatever. Yes, yeah. Um I do find it pretty stunning how emotionally manipulative he is in that last exchange.
AntheaOh, where he's like, I'll think you're crazy, I think you're a crazy adult I can't trust, and I'll just I'll just get a dealer's kit myself.
SPEAKER_02Well I guess if you don't give me what I want, I'll have to think that you're a crazy, unreliable adult who can't possibly keep me safe, which you've already said is your job, um, and therefore something that you might find important um to your conception of self, and uh then I'll find a way to do it anyway. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, especially because we get some indication from the text that this all started because Harry was somewhat joking around just because he wants this kit. Right. Um, and that I and it makes me doubt the sincerity of his catastrophizing, even. Interesting.
AntheaI don't doubt the sincerity of his catastrophizing. I think he is uh constantly trying to think of the worst thing that could possibly happen. Like I I do believe that.
SPEAKER_02Okay, that's great. I mean, and you have more context than I do, but but so I will say, even without that, even if you are genuinely afraid of something, it's not okay to hold over someone's head like your bad opinion of them unless they do a thing that is the outcome that you want. Yeah. I think maybe some people would say, no, that's just a consequence. But no, no, that's the thing, like, that's the thing, like when you set boundaries, but they're not boundaries.
AntheaRight, they're rules. Yeah. Yeah.
JakeI wonder if Harry Potter is some cosmic entity being tortured across multiverses by writers that always turn him into a sociopath. Like Harry Potter's actually just a fine person, but Rowling and Joey Kowski just keep getting the royal hooks into him and turning him into a monster.
SPEAKER_02That's so interesting. Oh my god, Harry Potter's the rosebride.
JakeYeah, no, that's hit it in one, yeah.
AntheaI like it.
SPEAKER_02Stabbed by a million pens of hatred.
AntheaPoor guy. Poor guy. Yeah, again, like I I feel like this chapter really did some psychic damage to me just because I've been like hanging out with this with this version of Harry for so long now. Um, and we're only on chapter six.
unknownWoo!
JakeIt's like four or five more?
AntheaYeah, so it's a it's a four more.
JakeOkay.
AntheaYeah. I mean, you are correct. There are four or five more. And then after that. And then after that.
SPEAKER_01There's another like a hundred.
AntheaYeah. Um, yeah, yeah. Uh, what was I gonna say? Oh, in terms of emotional manipulation, what I think is interesting is that when he is interacting with Draco, that's like a very explicit intentional manipulation. And I don't think that this I don't think that we're meant to read this as him being manipulative. If anything, I think we're meant to read this as him being honest to McGonagall, but it is manipulative. It is manipulative. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like it's not. Yeah, I'm not saying it's not. Yeah, yeah. Just that I don't think like Harry does have moments where he is very explicitly and intentionally being like trying to manipulate people, and but I don't think that's intended to be one of them.
SPEAKER_02Which is honestly one of the other dumb shit, like villain-pilled aspects of Yadkowski's writing, because all of the most manipulative people I've ever known in my life were not doing it consciously. Yeah.
JakeThey were very it's like it's a reflex almost.
SPEAKER_02Who are incapable of accessing their fundamental sincerity and are incapable of just directly communicating that they want a. They instead have to move a couple of chess pieces around and tell somebody that they'll never forgive them and blah blah blah blah blah. And you know, all this kind of stuff. So I I think that's a really great call out in terms of like, we're not supposed to be viewing Harry as being manipulative here.
AntheaYeah, in that way.
SPEAKER_02But yeah, it it very much is like just because he's being honest in no way means he's not being manipulative.
AntheaYeah, yeah, absolutely. So he does have a moment of grace where he apologizes to the shop girl for traumatizing her, and she immediately is like, oh, it's okay. Yeah, it's great, cool. I'll make a point about that later. Um uh and he gets the healing pack. Good for him. He gets the heal he gets the healing. Oh my gosh, I'm still gonna get a big thing.
JakeHe'll have to traumatize two women to get it.
AntheaYeah, exactly. Um, and uh he puts it into his moeskin pouch and they move on. Um McGonagal uh says that if he wants to, like uh, you know, they're continuing shopping, and she says, if you want, you can get a pet, you could get an owl if you want.
JakeJust I just felt a sinking sensation thinking of this child with another living thing. Alright, Hedwig. Time to optimize. Exactly. What enhancements and tortures will this owl go through? Well But I'm sure they're gonna get a more rational pet this time.
AntheaLuckily, Harry agrees with you that he should not be in charge of an animal.
JakeWell, that's the first insightful thing I've heard the child say.
AntheaSo we don't get Hedwig? We do not get Hedwig. What the fuck, Yankowski? What the hell?
SPEAKER_03What the fuck, man? We know who Elisa's favorite character was. Hedwig is out!
JakeYeah. Did you want Hedwig to be subjected to this story?
unknownOh.
AntheaYeah, we're doing her a favor.
SPEAKER_02No, but she's been through enough, she died. I know, and now she won't. She probably she won't she won't get killed by a death eater in this universe. No, she adopted by some other nice kid. Yeah.
JakeYeah, and in the story, she and Hagrid are just flying through free.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, Hagrid gets her. Yeah. No, I don't Why take Whimsy out? You
An important came
SPEAKER_02know?
AntheaYeah, no, for sure. Yeah, yeah. Well, I'll tell you why. McGonagall asks, you don't think you could take care of a pet? I could, Harry said.
SPEAKER_01Leave it in.
unknownOkay.
SPEAKER_02Very smooth of you to put the squeaky snake on top of the kennel, and now he's got his little uh Kong type thing and he's going for it.
AntheaYeah, where were we? You don't think you could take care of a pet?
JakeInteresting.
AntheaI
Chapter 6 close reading cont.
Antheacould, Harry said. But I would end up obsessing all day long. It's a good one. I got this. I got this. I can't make fun of uh audiobook. I was telling it. The what the the narrators for one of the narrators for from AI to zombies, which is the like published version of the the sequences, um, which I've been listening to to you know continue to uh drive myself insane. Um to get further context about these things. Um there's a a chapter early or like an essay early on titled Um What's a Bias Again? But the narrator reads it as What's a Bias again?
SPEAKER_02Welcome back to Wrong Emphasis Theater. That's a other thing too is like, look, you I get that you maybe crunch for time and it's not hugely profitable to be an audiobook narrative. No, no. Um, but like, just do one more.
AntheaDo another take. Do another take.
JakeIt'd be great if they if you they also left in the uh should uh whatever.
AntheaNow that that pushes me over, I'd be back on board. I guarantee that audiobooks have gone out like that. I guarantee, based on based on my my brief, you know, voiceover class. You don't think you could take care of a pet? I could, Harry said. But I would end up obsessing all day long about whether I'd remember to feed it that day, or if it was slowly starving in its cage, wondering where its master was and why there wasn't any food. A poor owl, the older witch said in a soft voice, abandoned like that. I wonder what it would do. Well, I expect it'd get really hungry and start trying to claw its way out of the cage or the box or whatever, though it probably wouldn't have much luck with that. Harry stopped short. The witch went on, still in that soft voice. And what would happen to it afterward? Excuse me, Harry said. And he reached up to take Professor McGonagall by the hand, gently but firmly, and steered her into yet another alleyway. After ducking so many well-wishers, the process had become almost unnoticeably routine. I noticed it. Please cast that silencing spell. Quiet us. Harry's voice was shaking. That owl does not represent me. My parents never locked me in a cupboard and left me to starve. I do not have abandonment fears, and I don't like the trend of your thoughts, Professor McGonagall.
JakeSo meta.
AntheaThe witch looked down at him gravely. And what thoughts would those be, Mr. Potter? You think I was Harry was having trouble saying it. I was abused? Were you? No, Harry shouted. No, I never was. Do you think I'm stupid? I know about the concept of child abuse. I know about inappropriate touching and all of that, and if anything like that happened, I would call the police and report it to the head teacher and look up social services in the phone book and tell grandpa and grandma and Mrs. Fig, but my parents never did anything like that. Never, ever, ever! How dare you suggest such a thing? The older witch gazed at him steadily. It is my duty as deputy headmistress to investigate possible signs of abuse in the child's uh children under my care. Harry's anger was spiraling out of control into pure black fury. Don't you ever dare breathe a word of these these insinuations to anyone else. No one. Do you hear me, McGonagall? An accusation like that can ruin people and destroy families, even when the parents are completely innocent. I've read about it in the newspapers. Harry's voice was climbing to a high-pitched scream. The system doesn't know how to stop. It doesn't believe the parents or the children when they say nothing happened. Don't you dare threaten my family with that. I won't let you destroy my home. Hey, what the fuck?
JakeYeah. Lots of things. So is it is it again the classic game? Is it the writer or is it the character that thinks that the only abused kids are the ones too dumb to call the cops?
AntheaChrist, I hadn't even thought about that.
JakeYeah, no, again, that's at least that's just the first thing that came up chronologically. It continues to Yeah, and then it gets again it keeps keeps going.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah, the hits keep coming, as it were. I think another thing I would like to point out is the uh the idea that the system is full of people who are so keen to investigate child abuse that Yeah, child abuse notoriously over over investigated, taken too seriously. There's one time in all of history that child abuse was taken too seriously, and that was the satanic panic. Uh and it Right.
AntheaI mean, well, like what made what this made me think of was um uh uh serial, the serial the podcast has a has a mini-series called The Preventionist, which is really good, and you should go listen to it, which is about doctors in Pennsylvania who were like diagnosing babies with shaken baby syndrome and taking them away from their parents. It's fucked up! Yeah, it's fucked up. It this does happen because the system is set up to be over-protective. Well, okay, and here's what I would say But also to your point, oh yeah, child abuse, so really like over over-policed.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
AntheaEspecially for rich white kids.
SPEAKER_02Yes, as a rich white kid, I would say, like, yeah, I do huge caveat that like there is a there is a history of um, you know, governments uh kind of all over the place. Yeah. Um, but I know of United States, Canada, and Australia. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Penalizing um, especially like indigenous communities and indigenous parents. Um, also, unsurprisingly, in our country, black parents are uh are disproportionately targeted by kind of what I would categorize as overzealous um attempts to remove children from the home, yeah, uh put them in foster care. Um, and so that is very real. What this reminded me of more than anything else was Alex Jones.
SPEAKER_03Yes, you yes, be called.
SPEAKER_02Because he has this whole part of his whole worldview, and honestly, you can see this expressed in things like in in things like suspicion of government and social programs and things that are, you know, in things like Rage and Doge and all these other things that are hashtag not connected to Eliezer Yakowski.
AntheaThat's the official position of this podcast.
SPEAKER_02Official position of this podcast. Um, that uh that um, you know, there are social workers who are the only thing they get up in the morning and they want to take white children away from good Christian homes. And like that's the thing that they want to do. And so the idea that there are overzealous social workers who are looking for the white children of university professors to take away from them.
JakeYeah, they're all just the child catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
SPEAKER_02So, like, that is uh that is a take.
AntheaIt's wild, it's simultaneously like it's paranoid in every direction at once. Yeah, it's paranoid about like over policing, but it's also like of course I would tell the cops, like, but the cops will take you away whether or not you've like your parents have done anything wrong. It's it's crazy, it's a nuts response.
SPEAKER_02I think we can also think about the fact that, like, I mean, so your coffee is writing this now. What I don't know is what are we supposed to think about it? Sure. But I do know that what's on the page, how are we supposed to interpret it? But I do know that what's on the page is that Harry is absolutely losing control of himself.
AntheaIt continues. Harry, the older witch said softly, and she reached out a hand towards him. Harry took a fast step back, and his hand snapped up and knocked hers away. McDonagal froze, and then she pulled her hand back and took a step backwards. Harry, it's all right, she said. I believe you. Do you? Harry hissed, the fury still roaring through his blood. Or are you just waiting to get away from me so you can file the papers? Harry, I saw your house. I saw you with your parents. They love you. You love them. I do believe you when you say that your parents are not abusing you. But I had to ask because there is something strange at work here. Harry stared at her coldly. Like what? Harry, I've seen many abused children in my time at Hogwarts. It would break your heart to know how many. And when you're happy, you don't behave like one of those children, not at all. You smile at strangers, you hug people, I put my hand on your shoulder, and you didn't flinch. But sometimes, only sometimes, you say or do something that seems very much like someone who spent his first eleven years locked in a cellar, not the loving family that I saw. Professor McGonagall tilted her head, her expression growing puzzled again. Harry took this in, processing it. The black rage began to drain away as it dawned on him that he was being listened to respectfully and that his family wasn't in danger. And how do you explain your observations, Professor McGonagall? I don't know, she said. But it's possible that something could have happened to you that you don't remember. Fury rose up again in Harry. That sounded at all too much like what he'd read in the newspaper stories of shattered families. Suppressed memory is a load of pseudoscience. People do not repress traumatic memories, they remember them all too well for the rest of their lives. No, Mr. Potter, there is a charm called oblivation. Harry frozen place. A spell that erases memories? The older witch nodded. But not all the effects of the experience, if you see what I'm saying, Mr. Potter. A chill went down Harry's spine. That hypothesis could not be easily refuted.
SPEAKER_02Yes! Score one for McGonacle!
SPEAKER_01Finally.
JakeTwo points. Yeah. One, I feel like McGonacle should be able to clock an autistic kid by now.
SPEAKER_03Yes!
JakeLike the only explanation is basement torture. There's a whole house of them.
SPEAKER_03There's a whole house of the autistic kids. Woo-woo.
JakeSecond point, like, again, like we've said, a full day of discussion of wizard genocide, which includes some very serious abuse of children, doesn't flinch Harry, but the potential implication of the outside chance of CPS weaponization evokes the black rage.
SPEAKER_02The black rage! The black rage! Yeah. I mean, that certainly that level of reaction and specificity sounds like somebody, if I knew no other information, I would be like, well, I think that kid has taken on a huge amount of responsibility for covering up whatever secrets his family has.
AntheaYeah, it's been a while since we talked about how um adultified he was in the first chapter. We're back.
SPEAKER_02We're back, baby! Yeah. Um, I think, I mean, again, Shades of Alex Jones because of uh apparently when Alex Jones was a kid, and you have to take anything that this man says about himself with uh a pound of salt. A pound of salt.
AntheaUm iodine salt, because you don't get enough iodine. We get that deep earth stuff.
SPEAKER_02Oh my god. Um but uh but um he says that when he was a kid and injured himself on the way to the hospital, his dad was coaching him to say, like, now they're gonna ask you if I did this to you. Oh my god, what'd you tell him? So like that's at best what this sounds like. Yeah. Yeah. Like that that like some like that Harry's parents. Harry's been coached? Yeah.
AntheaYeah. Yeah. Yeah.
JakeBeen coached to freak out and not that part.
SPEAKER_02No, the level of freak out. I just mean the specificity of the freaking out and the like and the focus on like poor innocent parents who have never done anything. Um and yeah, I mean just the the the emotional register that this goes to is pretty jarring, which again, I don't know if that's bad writer or bad character. Yeah.
AntheaIt's a little tough to say I in this moment. I really do think that because I have spoilers.
SPEAKER_02Um wait, also, is that whole thing about the reason that he's acting like he was in a cellar for 11 years because there's some fucking tiny whimey bullshit going on?
AntheaNot exactly. Like, not exactly. I I don't have a full spoiler for this. I know, but like we know that we know that Harry is a horcrux. Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_03We all know that.
SPEAKER_02Oh, so it might, so the thing I forgot that I forgot that Harry was a horcrux. Um I actually did. Um though, uh yeah, so um, so okay, so he might be carrying Tom Riddles. Yeah, I believe, yeah, yeah.
AntheaWhich I think is Yeah, Jake. Yeah, that's famous.
JakeThe whore crux keeps the score. Yeah, no, I I I do follow at least enough. I remember enough of the story to follow, but it still seems dumb.
SPEAKER_02It's certainly not canonical. Also, Harry slash yud yud is not correct about how people remember trauma.
JakeI like yud yud.
AntheaYud yud is good, makes himself like an ewok.
JakeYeah.
AntheaEwok houski.
JakeNot shorter, but good. That one feels a little mean though. That's bordering on mean.
SPEAKER_02Plus, I looked up pictures of him to make sure that we had never connected on OKCupid when I lived in the bay in 2012. And uh, he's like a horseshoot gentleman. Sure. So I think Ewok would be extra mean in that sense.
AntheaYeah.
JakeOkay. We can stick with Edub or Yad Yad.
AntheaYeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Um Yeah, I also think uh uh if I were an educator observing this child who has what is clearly hyper-vigilance and like extreme emotional ability, I would certainly like I don't know that I would be like, this child has been abused, but I would be like, this child has PTSD.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
AntheaYeah. And while, yes, his parents were murdered in front of him when he was one year old, which I think would explain some amount of it, I would also be like, something else happened to you.
JakeYeah, that's a more complex and layered response. Yeah. Yeah.
AntheaLike, like, did your did a parent die? Did a did a you know, or or did another parent die? Sorry, excuse me. How many sets you got?
unknownYeah.
AntheaUm had any spares, back to you. Did you did you did you see a car crash? You know, like did you witness? Was there a school shooting? No, it's Britain.
SPEAKER_02But like let's go through the ACES list and just rule stuff out.
AntheaYeah, yes, exactly. Yeah, the the uh adverse childhood experiences.
SPEAKER_02Or event. I don't remember which.
AntheaUm but uh yeah uh now what's interesting is so uh McGonagall says, like, you something could have happened to you that you don't remember because because we are wizards and someone could have oblivated you, and Harry is like, well, not my parents, and she says, No, no, but like someone could have, but we can't, there's no way to check. Like, because you wouldn't remember. Um, Mrs.
SPEAKER_02Fig could have done it for his own good. Sure. Oh, she's a squib, but Oh, that's right.
AntheaYeah. Um, but like uh She could have called a buddy who did it for his own good. Sure, yeah, absolutely, right? Yeah. Um, so here, uh uh Professor, so yeah, okay. I'm like picking where to jump back in. Um so uh Harry decides to Harry's I mean I may as well just read what it says. Harry's rationalist skills began to boot up again. Oh my god. Professor McGonigal, how sure are you of your observations, and what alternative explanations could there also be? The witch opened her hands as though to show their emptiness. Sure? I'm sure of nothing, Mr. Potter. In all my life I've never met anyone else like you. Sometimes you just don't seem eleven years old or even all that human. Harry's eyebrows rose toward the sky. I'm sorry, Professor McGonagall said quickly. I'm very sorry, Mr. Potter. I was trying to make a point, and I'm afraid that came out sounding different from what I had in mind.
JakeI don't know, it sounds about right to me.
AntheaOn the contrary, Professor McGonagall, Harry said, and slowly smiled. I shall take it as a very great compliment. But would you mind if I offered an alternative explanation? Please do. Children aren't meant to be too much smarter than their parents, Harry said. Or too much saner, maybe.
SPEAKER_02Oh my god.
AntheaMy father could probably outsmart me if he was, you know, actually trying, instead of using his adult intelligence mainly to come up with new reasons not to change his mind. Harry stopped. I'm too smart, Professor. I've got nothing to say to normal children. Adults don't respect me enough to really talk to me. And frankly, even if they did, they wouldn't sound as smart as Richard Feynman, so I might as well read something Richard Feynman wrote instead. I'm isolated, Professor McGonagall. I've been isolated my whole life. Maybe that has some of the same effects as being locked in a cellar. And I'm too intelligent to look up to my parents the way that children are designed to do. My parents love me, but they don't feel obliged to respond to reason, and sometimes I feel like they're the children. Children who won't listen and have absolute authority over my whole existence. I try not to be too bitter about it, but I also try to be honest with myself. So, yes, I'm bitter. And I also have an anger management problem, but I'm working on it. That's all. That's all. Harry nodded firmly. That's all. Oh, sorry, wrong voice. Harry nodded firmly. That's all. Surely, Professor McGonagall, even in magical Britain, the normal explanation is always worth considering. Now I have some quibbles with that.
JakeBeing the smartest boy is such a burden. Of course I'm a bitter, spiteful little choad, but it's because I'm the smartest boy.
SPEAKER_03I mean, to your point about likeonical should be able to recognize an autistic child by now.
SPEAKER_02There's an element of that, but I'm also like I don't want an I don't want an owl because I already have pets, my stupid child parents. No, right?
AntheaI I also, like, as a as a kid who was smart, like, I mean we were all smart.
JakeI had those exact thoughts when I was a bitter, spiteful little 11-year-old choke.
SPEAKER_01And we were wrong. Like, well, okay. Like, I didn't disrespect my peers and parents because I thought they were inferior to me.
SPEAKER_02Right, yeah. They were clearly good at stuff I wasn't good at, like reading social cues.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_02Right. And being cool.
AntheaWell, and like I I find that I like having gone over this chapter way too many times at this point, one thing that stuck out to me on the most recent read was this thing about like even if adults respected me enough to talk to me, they would sound dumb, so I may as well just read Richard Feynman. And I'm like, that's such a that's such a bad way. Like, okay, so you want to be respected, but if you were respected, you wouldn't return it. Like if someone, if someone had the respect to to talk to you like an adult, which I try and do when I'm interacting with kids, right? Like I used to work with.
SPEAKER_02I don't try and do it, it's just what happens.
AntheaSure, yeah. Like I try to be like, hey, I'll I'm gonna talk to you like a peer, you know, within reason.
SPEAKER_02Like a peer and like you're at work or something, so you're trying to be like a full.
AntheaYeah, um, yeah, exactly, exactly. Like, um, uh, but like the it's it's so I don't know, it's so rude.
JakeWell, and it's a very bold child, as the Irish would say.
AntheaYes, nice. Yeah. Oh, that child needs a bit a bit of a smack.
SPEAKER_02Again, it's it's also this comes to me, this feels like it is in conversation with thinking about goods as opposed to rights. Respect is not something that people deserve because they have a spark, because they have dignity, because they exist in the same space as you or across the world from you. Respect is something that people earn by being intelligent, by being worth talking to. Yeah. Or by having something that you want, perhaps. Like, I don't know. In this case, all we're really establishing is that they have to be as smart as Richard Feynman. Yeah, yeah.
JakeYeah, and they have to talk to and respect you in the right way.
SPEAKER_02Yes. Yeah, yes, yeah. Um, and so, like, yeah, I I think that that I find that very uh I find that very interesting.
SPEAKER_05Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_02Um, and it is super sad.
AntheaYeah, yeah. I also am like I he he's he's I mean he's trying to apply Occam's razor, right? Is like, oh, the normal explanation. What's the what's the simplest explanation? And the simplest explanation is that I've been socially isolated, and he's so incorrect. Like, social isolation would not explain the level of hyper-vigilance and catastrophizing, and I just I just don't buy that. I don't think that's psychologically correct.
JakeWell, and the always ignored the first part of Occam's razor, all other things being equal. Right, right. There is something we need to equate, which is him freaking the hell out when someone mentions abuse.
SPEAKER_02Well, technically speaking, Occam's razor is not, so it's certainly not the normal explanation, which is a very interesting way of putting it. Right. Yeah, we're back to saying we're back to the one with the fewest.
AntheaThe Occam's razor is the explanation with the fewest pieces.
SPEAKER_02The fewest leaps in logic. Yeah. So something might have a lot of pieces. If it's a mystery novel, you have to go through a bunch of different, you know, you're getting different pieces of information at different times, and that's helping you build a different conclusion. Yeah. And maybe something does have many parts. But it's the thing that requires the fewest leaps in logic.
AntheaYeah, I'm actually gonna look it up because I want to make it make sure I'm getting it right.
SPEAKER_02Ooh, I want to make sure I'm getting it right.
JakeYeah, I'm worried I was actually just quoting contact instead of remembering the definition of that.
AntheaHang on one sec. Do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do. Uh, William of Occam.
SPEAKER_02Uh oh, he was of Occam, so it's not his last name. It's just like, so it's Occam's razor like we could also have Occam's Creek and Awesome's Occam's.
AntheaYeah.
SPEAKER_02Awesome's razor.
AntheaAwesome razor, dude. Um the philosophical razor advocates that when presented with competing hypotheses about the same prediction, and both hypotheses have equal explanatory power, one should prefer the hypothesis that requires the fewest assumptions.
JakeUm Yeah, it's the having equal explanatory power. Right. Sometimes something is a much clearer explanation, even if it's less simple.
SPEAKER_02Yes. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Exactly. And that's yeah, so based on based on the evidence that you have. So that yes, and assumptions, I think that's close to the same. Yeah, it's essential government thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Um Way to go, Professor Rivka Weinberg of uh Scripps College. Who taught me that successfully.
AntheaUm so yeah, so it's not the normal explanation. It's the it's the simplest explanation. And I do think that the simplest explanation is that somebody obliviated him in some ways. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I think the Certainly the reality of the situation is not what either of them are thinking. Simpless ex- Look, well, we can Okay.
SPEAKER_02We know that with meta-knowledge, but what we know is that Harry lost his family of origin at a really, really young age. Yes. Which at the part the the part of your life where your brain is forming really, really important neural connections that that's why Head Start is a thing, right? By the time that you're five, there are a number of things like in you, you know, in your brain that are already kind of set. It's not that there's no plasticity, but there are a lot of things really important that happen the first five years of your life.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
SPEAKER_02The first year of your life's incredibly important. You're supposed to have a nurturing adult with you during those time periods. And being, you know, being abandoned in whatever way can be really damaging. Um we know that Harry is simultaneously insistent that he is incredibly intelligent and and should be listened to. At the same time, we know that he is prone to flights of rage, paranoia, and catastrophizing. Um and so that's kind of what we got. Right.
JakeYeah, I mean, he's high and low whiz. You you honestly don't listen to those people.
SPEAKER_03I mean, super don't. Yeah, yeah.
AntheaOkay. Um, so that's that's wild. That's fucking crazy. All of that is fucking crazy. We still have two sections in this chapter.
SPEAKER_03I'm dying.
AntheaI'm happy. So they go and get Harry his wand. Um this I feed off of your negative emotions. That's good. That's good.
SPEAKER_02That's why we've been able to live happily together for so long.
AntheaYeah, yeah. Um, so this uh he goes and gets his wand. It happens off screen. Apparently, it's pretty much the same as it is in canon. Um uh Olivander tells Harry that his wand is the twin of Voldemort's. Um Harry acknowledges to himself that this could be a coincidence. Like, he he's like, to be fair, one in a thousand chances happen all the time. Um uh, which is also funny having recently reread Guards Guards, because there's a whole like running bit about like it's a one in a million chance, but it just might work. Oh, the chances of this might be better than one in a million, and that'll never work. We better, we better make this harder. Um uh uh he uh he figure he he he acknowledges that this could be a coincidence, but because there is further evidence, um evidence he had a spell cast on him by Voldemort's wand. Um he should update his priors and think that it's unlikely to be a coincidence, which fair enough. Like, yeah, fair. Um McGonagal is apparently unfazed by any of this, and Harry is like, why are you what? Why? To go to the text. Professor McGonagall had simply said how peculiar and left it at that, which had put Harry into a state of shock at the sheer overwhelming uncuriosity of wizards and witches. In no imaginable world would Harry have just gone, hmm, and walked out of the shop without even trying to come up with a hypothesis for what was going on. Which annoys me because I'm like, hey, maybe she's just got a better poker face than you.
JakeYeah. He is so smart he can read every adult like a book. Yes. Because he is the smartest boy, and it is a burden.
SPEAKER_02Yes. It's very rational to see one person at one time have one reaction to something and then go, wow, everyone in your category or group all have the same patterns of thought. That's social science, baby. I wish there was like a logical fallacy that had been introduced at some point in this fanfic about what happens when you attribute to personal character what could be better described as a contextual reaction.
JakeI think that was Aachen's razor, I want to say.
AntheaUh I think, yeah. I think that's the planning fallacy. Yeah, that's the planning fallacy. Yeah, yeah. So I'm gonna- Is that arbitrage?
JakeI think it's I think it's it's pronounced flensing.
SPEAKER_02And that's the true meaning of St. Patrick's Day. Yes.
AntheaSo McConagal is like, so what do you think about all this wizard stuff? And Harry is like, yeah, it's cool. I'm kinda hung up on the whole boy who lived thing, and I don't know why, which is silly. I mean, it's it's it clearly intentionally silly. Um uh McConagal, uh, Professor McGonagall, a hend. Really? You don't say. Harry nodded. Yes, it's just odd to find out that you were part of this grand story, the quest to defeat the great and terrible dark lord, and it's already done. Finished, completely over with. Like you're Frodo Baggins, and you found out that your parents took you to Mount Doom and had you toss in the ring when you were one year old and you don't even remember it. Professor McGonagall's smile had grown somewhat fixed. You know, if I were anyone else, anyone else at all, I'd probably be pretty worried about living up to that start. Gosh, Harry, what have you done since you defeated the Dark Lord? Your own bookshop, that's great! Say, did you know I named my child after you? But I have hopes that this will not prove to be a problem. Harry side. Still, it's almost enough to make me wish that there were some loose ends from the quest, just so I could say that I really, you know, participated somehow. Uh oh, said Professor McGonagall in an odd tone. What did you have in mind? Well, for example, you mentioned that my parents were betrayed. Who betrayed them? Sirius Black, the witch said, almost hissing the name.
JakeThat name sounds fake, says Harry.
AntheaWait till you hear about his werewolf friends.
JakeWhat kind of hack writer made up that name?
AntheaHe's in Azcaban, wizarding prison. How probable is it that Sirius Black will break out of prison and I'll have to track him down and defeat him in some sort of spectacular duel? Or better yet put a large bounty on his head and hide out in Australia while I wait for the results? Professor McGonagall blinked. Twice. Not lightly. No one has ever escaped from Azkaban, and I doubt that he will be the first. Harry was a bit skeptical of that no one has ever escaped from Azgaban line. Still, maybe with magic you could actually get close to a 100% perfect prison, especially if you had a wand, and they did not. The best way to get out would be to not go there in the first place. Alright then, Harry said. Sounds like it's been nicely wrapped up. He sighed, scrubbing his palm over his head. Or maybe the Dark Lord didn't really die that night. Not completely. His spirit lingers, whispering to people in nightmares that bleed over into the waking world, searching for a way back into the living lands he swore to destroy, and now, in accordance with the ancient prophecy, he and I are locked in a deadly duel where the winner shall lose and the loser shall win. Professor McGonagall's head swiveled and her eyes darted around as though to search the street for listeners. I'm joking, Professor, Harry said with some annoyance. A slow sinking sensation began to dawn in the pit of Harry's stomach. Professor McGonagall looked at Harry with a calm expression. A very, very calm expression. Then a smile was put on. Of course you are, Mr. Potter. Oh crap. If Harry had needed to formalize the wordless inference that had just flashed into his mind, it would have come out something like if I estimate the probability of Professor McGonagall doing what I just saw as the result of carefully controlling herself, versus the probability distribution for all the things that she would naturally do if I made a bad joke, then this behavior is significant evidence for her hiding something. But what Harry actually thought was, oh crap. So he comes to the conclusion that the Dark Lord is alive.
SPEAKER_01This is insane.
JakeAlso, before it slips away, I want to chime in. The only people in prison are the ones too dumb to think of not going to prison.
AntheaYeah, yeah. Just like the only kids who are abused are the ones too dumb to think of calling the cops.
SPEAKER_02Harry is so much smarter and better than all of the people in the wizarding world. Those people don't even ask questions. They don't question their basic assumptions. He hears prison is like, yeah, cool. Yeah, that's probably fine. Wizarding prison, yeah, makes sense. Yeah. Um, I also do want to say that, like, God, so much of that, that whole thing. Yeah. You guys let me go for a while there. I was I was being respectful. Thank you. Yeah. But I was also stunned into silence, thinking about Eliezer, too good for Trump's Junkowski. One, I hope that what Professor McGodagal is really doing is like, can I cut a hole in the bottom of the trunk of holding so that all of his sci-fi books fall out before he gets to Hogwarts? Because he should not be allowed to have access to so much narrative. Because, like, what ends up happening? I mean, this is another, unfortunately, this is kind of another Alex Jones similarity I noticed, where Yakowski is talking about rationalism in a lot of ways and rationality and deduction and the scientific method. Yeah. But what he's really engaging with are the narrative tropes of sci-fi that he loved as a kid. Yeah. And that, like, all of the the reason, like, look, sometimes in tabletop settings, I'm correct about stuff, but it's not because I actually like looked at the clues and picked up something. I'm going, what would be narratively interesting right now? What would be what would narratively make sense? Yeah. And it seems like Harry Potter, the rational, has picked up, has picked up on a thread that connects him to something a clue from McGonagall. But the reason that he gets there is because he's just like, well, the story of my life doesn't sound very tidally written. He just guessed.
SPEAKER_01Yep.
AntheaHe just guessed. He was j yes, no, you're absolutely you're you're absolutely right. Like, there have been clues. There's been at least one clue where in an earlier chapter, McGonagall started to say that Voldemort had been killed, and she stops herself and says, uh, he's gone. Yeah. Like, because I don't know, she's some ace sedai who can speak no word that is not true or something. I would believe that. I mean, I would, yes. Listen, sure. Uh, but like, that he didn't seem to pick up on that. There's nothing in this conversation that would lead him to jump to this conclusion.
JakeWell, no, I mean, she had a slightly weird look on her face, so it broke into Sherlock Mind Palace analysis mode.
AntheaAnd he and he comes to this conclusion when there are really reasonable alternative explanations for why she might be making that face.
SPEAKER_02Like, how many minutes ago was it when he made a joke about people dying and got scolded? Yep. Okay.
unknownYep.
SPEAKER_02And now here he is back to his old ways. Yeah. It's like that apology to that shop girl with no name meant nothing to him.
AntheaWow, weird. Actually, she does have a name. Her name is Bella. Okay. I just skipped it. That's but like, whatever. Not too. That's don't, we're we're not gonna give him that.
SPEAKER_01I can always count on Yud Yed to have answered my least pressing concern.
AntheaRight. It's not like it's he's just mind greeting. Like, he's just to he's he is looking at things and saying, oh, this would be a good trope, and then and then the narrative is in fact or organizing itself for him to be right. And this happens a lot. Like he and and like I I I realize this this this is from this morning. I was like, wait a minute. He never when he every time he presents an explanation or tries a tactic, he gets he's rewarded. Like the he barely ever suffers consequences for doing something wrong. He made this girl cry, like, okay, consequence, I guess, like he, but like every time he presents an explanation for something, he is correct. Every time he tries he tries to, he he uses ham-fisted social manipulation flattery on Draco Malfoy, and it works with no problem. Like, uh he he argues that he should be allowed to have multiple expensive magical items, and McGonagall says, sure, even though the only evidence he has for the idea that he's responsible enough to take care of them is I thought about it really hard. Like, he has the aesthetics of the scientific method, but he's not actually doing he's not having to struggle with the fact that you have to invent 999 light bulbs that don't work before you find the one that does.
JakeYeah, he's he's wearing smartface.
AntheaYeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's interesting too, like, that he doesn't. I don't know what if we're talking about scientific method, now it's not to say that to be rational or to be, to be whatever, inductive that you have to be using the scientific, the structure of the scientific method. Sure. But like, it's interesting that he doesn't really seem to form any hypotheses. Right. I mean, occasionally he will, but they're about very, very, very like, I mean.
AntheaYeah, he didn't, he was like, Oh, I have a hypothesis about the the the moatskin cou the couch pouch, about how this retrieval charm works. I'll do the scientific method on that, but I won't do it on people. Yeah. You shouldn't treat people like science experiments. I don't know that I should be like.
JakeI think what you're saying is I want narrative consistency.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Well, I think that there's interpretive like.
JakeYeah, no, don't like give like all other things, give up on it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. No, reject hope. Yeah. Well, I think I need to be more pessimistic. I think that there's well, I also think it's interesting when he's talking, instead of forming a hypothesis which is, you know, uh about um wizards and science, he's like, there's two, there's two options. And there's not. There's more than two options.
AntheaYes, absolutely.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. There's way more than two options. Yeah. Um that's already interesting and seems flawed. Um, and I think this is probably because of engineering brain, but it does seem like a lot of rationalist thought, at least that I've seen, that has that has prominence in the community, is like they get very annoyed when there's too many alternatives. Yeah. And so they try to reduce them down to as few as possible. Uh 80,000 hours does this a bunch. Yeah, yeah. Um, and uh, and so I'm like, well, that's fine. Most of us are not great with uncertainty, but it also is that means that like, okay, so so he has that thing. Yeah. And I would say, like, when you're talking to people, forming hypotheses, gathering evidence, revising if necessary, can also just be, well, I think this is going on with somebody, but this is what's going on with somebody. But I have the humility to know that there's a lot about them that I don't know. So I'm gonna observe, I might ask questions, and I'm gonna be flexible and listen to what they have to say. That is technically the scientific method, but I would think of it as also just being respectful and empathetic.
AntheaYes, and humble.
SPEAKER_02And humble.
AntheaYeah.
JakeShould we take bets if Harry ever asks what someone feels about something in this entire story?
SPEAKER_02You know what? I don't know the answer to that.
AntheaI am.
SPEAKER_02I can't remember. I am gonna say I think so, but only as part of a longer thing where he can demonstrate that he totally knew it. Probably, yeah.
AntheaI think that's I think that's fair. I think that's fair. Yeah. So Harry demands that McGonagall tell him the truth. Um, oh, he he says, at least tell me there's not really a prophecy, and then and McGonagall is like, mmm, and he's like, ah, fuck. Um uh so he demands that she tell him the truth. Uh, and she says, You are a child, do not tell anybody what you know, and he descends into a rage for the second time in the chapter.
JakeSee, I thought it was I thought you were gonna say, You are a child, don't demand things of me.
AntheaI mean exactly. Uh well, uh that wouldn't have worked because. As sometimes happened when Harry got sufficiently angry, his blood went cold instead of hot, and a terrible dark clarity descended over his mind, mapping out possible tactics and assessing their consequences with iron realism. Press X to doubt! Oh my god. Point out that you have a right to know. Failure. Eleven-year-old children do not have rights to know anything in McGonigal's eyes. They say that you will not be friends anymore. Failure. She does not value your friendship sufficiently. Point out that you will be in danger if you do not know. Failure. Plans have already been made based on your ignorance. The certain inconvenience of rethinking will seem far more unpalatable than the mere uncertain prospect of your coming to harm. Justice and reason will both fail. You must either find something you have that she wants, or find something you can do which she fears. Ah. Well then, Professor, Harry said in a low icy tone, it sounds like I have something you want. You can, if you like, tell me the truth, the whole truth, and in return I will keep your secrets. Or you can try to keep me ignorant so you can use me as a pawn, in which case I will owe you nothing. McGonagall stopped short in the street. Her eyes blazed and her voice descended into an outright hiss. How dare you? How dare you, he whispered back at her. You would blackmail me. Harry's lips twisted. I am offering you a favor. I am giving you a chance to protect your precious secret. If you refuse, I will have every natural motive to make inquiries elsewhere, not despite you, but because I have to know. Get past your pointless anger at a child who you think ought to obey you, and you'll realize that any sane adult would do the same. Look at it from my perspective. How would you feel if it was you? Harry watched McGonagall, observed her harsh breathing. It occurred to him that it was time to ease off the pressure. Let her simmer for a while.
JakeSo in this story, Harry's version of going Super Saiyan is turning into a sociopathic robot.
AntheaYeah, yeah. I have several thoughts. Please! Uh, okay. Um, I d I uh my notes say I find this gross for reasons I struggle to articulate, which is still true. I'm like, this is gross. No, you that that's I'm I'm where you're at. This is gross, but one thing I did, I do note is like he back to like like demanding back to the point about like if an adult even if an adult talked to me with respect, they would be dumb, so I don't I don't want to talk to them. I may as well just read Richard Feynman again. Like he doesn't what's happening? I'm like trying to trying to he is like you're mad, your your pointless anger at a child who you think ought to obey you. And he he's got this whole chip on his shoulder about how the adults in his life won't listen to him. And to me, those are the s he's he's doing the same thing, right? He he has this idea in his head that they ought to listen to him, and when they don't, he gets angry at them.
JakeYeah, like he's he's operating from a fundamental conceit that he is right about what he is feeling. Yeah, yeah, and like therefore anyone who doesn't respond that way is insane and irrational. Yes. And taking their anger out on a child.
AntheaYes, and like, and when and then he's like, oh, but it's it's pointless of you to be mad at me just because you think I'm not doing what you think I should. I does that make sense. Am I yeah, yes.
SPEAKER_03Am I saying something that makes sense?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yes, and I'm also thinking about I'm trying to, I'm trying to break through my own, like, you know, I have c I I do actually, I don't it's hypocritical.
AntheaI mean, like, it's it's hypocritical. Like, that's what it is.
SPEAKER_02It's hypocritical, and it also made me realize, like, you know, because we were talking about, oh, is Yudkowski just like a child's rights person, and the answer is no. Right. But the reason for that I now realize is that it's not that children deserve rights. Right, it's that he does. We're so fucking dumb. Exactly. Yeah, we were right thinking that he was talking about children. What he means is you don't respect me because of a bias you have against children. Uh so yeah, it's their bias against children. Yeah. Um, and despite the fact that the bias is usually correct, Harry Potter is so special and smart that he deserves people to take him seriously.
AntheaThat's a special exemption.
SPEAKER_02He doesn't have to take them seriously unless they prove that they are similarly intelligent. Yes. Um I do think it's also really interesting of like that when he gets extremely angry that he develops a superpower of turns into a sociopathic robot. Yep. Like you said. And that is not neurologically what happens to people when they go into an extreme a mode of extreme emotional animation. As a rule.
JakeBut you I mean, sorry, Harry is built different.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, he chooses to be sane.
JakeYeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. The issues, tropes. The other thing is that I note that Harry is, and look, this is not all this all I'm going to observe is what's written on the page. Harry is say stating that McGonagall doesn't want to tell him the secret, the thing that he doesn't know, doesn't want to give him the full, the full truth, because of an idea about what it means to be a child versus an adult. But he doesn't know what she knows. Right. Yeah. So there might actually be reasons to not tell him that don't have to do with that, and he's assuming.
AntheaTo be a hundred percent fair, a line that I did not read yet or did not read to you is um she says, These are dreadful and important matters. They are secret, Mr. Potter. It is a ca catastrophe that you, still a child, know even this much. You must not tell anyone, do you understand? So there is a certain he's it's a little bit fair for him to be like, she thinks this just because I'm a kid.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but we don't know why. Like he's describing, he's describing a specific meaning. Not only like when I say like what it means to be a child versus an adult, is like he says specifically, oh for you, this is all about this is all about controlling me.
AntheaRight, right, right, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I hate this. I hate this chapter so goddamn much. Um so Harry tells McGonagall that she can have time to think about his offer, like a little mafioso. Um and warns her not to try obliviating him, which she's like, I wasn't gonna. Uh but he says, you do, but don't too, don't try that memory spell on me because I have already sent a signal to myself that so that if I so that I'll know if anyone has tampered with my memory. And she was like, Why would you what? What are you talking about?
JakeEven if I forget.
AntheaHe's like, I got an idea from I got this idea from a Muggle science fiction book. God damn it! Uh I am really annoyed to say that I haven't been able to figure out what science fiction book he got this from, but it seems like he was reading something where somebody had their memory wiped and or, you know, otherwise tampered with, and he was like, huh, I wonder what I would do in that situation. Which to be fair is the kind of thing a nerdy little kid would do. Totally. I'm totally like, I am fine with that.
JakeLike give yourself a trigger.
AntheaThe signal is that he uh he chews on his lip hard enough to make it bleed. Or like chews on the inside of his cheek enough to hurt. So that if something happens, if if something happens between that time and later and he doesn't remember why he why his like lip is bleeding, uh he can be like, aha, something has fucked with my memory.
JakeUnless he forgets why that was important to him. Like, trust me, I've had times where I like, you know, my cheek is sore and it's not like Right. I'm like, when did I bite myself?
SPEAKER_03Right. Here's here's my question. Has Judkowski done this to himself?
SPEAKER_02When would someone have erased Judkowski's? I don't know.
AntheaNo, but like, has he ever been like, hmm, I better bite my like has he ever been hanging out with Peter Thiel and been like, I better chew on my lip just in case somebody roofies me.
JakeProbably sometimes in the way that like I occasionally have to check to see if I've developed telepathy or telekinesia.
AntheaYeah, right, no, yeah.
JakeYou gotta check sometimes.
AntheaJust you just like, hmm, kinda happened. Yeah. You know.
JakeSo far, still no, but we'll see.
AntheaSure, yeah, sure. Yeah. It's good to check. Uh so McGonagall agrees to take time to think, um, trusting that Harry won't talk to anybody about what he has deduced, by which I mean guessed.
JakeFelt.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. If I were McGonagall, I'd be calling in a second adult at this time. Right?
JakeMaybe perhaps from some service that protects children. They'll never believe what he tells me.
AntheaUh huh. She seemed to fold in on herself and suddenly looked very old and very tired. This has been an exhausting day, Mr. Potter.
JakeAgreed.
AntheaFucking right. Can we get your trunk and send you home? I will trust you not to speak upon this matter until I have had time to think. Keep in mind that there are only two other people in the whole world who know about this matter, and they are Headmaster Albus Dumbledore and Professor Severus Snake. So, new information. That was a peace offering. Harry nodded in acceptance and turned his head to look forward and started walking again as his blood slowly began to warm over once more. So now I've got to find some way to kill an immortal dark wizard, Harry said, and sighed in frustration. I really wish you had told me that before I started shopping.
SPEAKER_03There's more in this chapter, though! Oh thank you. Don't play the trombone yet!
JakeThank God.
AntheaOff they go to the trunk shop as their last stop of the day.
JakeAnd Harry's the trunk shop.
AntheaWhat whimsy? I hope that they go into another alley at some point. Harry picks out a trunk that is bigger on the inside, including a basement space large enough to fit 12 bookshelves, which is pretty sizable.
JakeI was thinking, you know, that's like 20 bodies.
AntheaYeah, right. That's like Newt's Commander's fucking suitcase. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, this does well pre-date, so maybe maybe Rowling stole it from him, you know? I mean, the idea of things that are bigger on the inside is well established in Harry Potter. They've got the tents during the Wizards Cup, right? The TriWizard uh no, during the Wiz uh the World the Quidditch World Cup. There it is. That's the one.
SPEAKER_02Anglof and Anglophile peep folks uh was all of us to an extent on in certain nerdy circ in nerdy fanfic circles of this time just because that was what was in the air. Yeah. Um they would know about the TARDIS. TARDIS, obviously.
AntheaYeah.
JakeWell I'm like Beg Holding goes at least back to the 70s too.
AntheaYeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So this is all this is all fine. It's fine. It's fine. Whatever. There's a bunch of description about uh there's a bunch of description about the shop. Um the salesman was dressed in robes of finery, only the salesman was dressed in robes of finery, only a cut below those of Lucius Malfoy. A man who fucks!
SPEAKER_01Lucius Malfony the hottest, sexiest executioner on the block. Wait, I have a question. Wait, also on listening to the last episode, I didn't spend enough time talking about how hot Jason Isaacs is. You know, sure. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02I do briefly want to say it because we watched The Death of Stalin and Yay! I don't trust the military. No.
JakeBut man, Jason.
AntheaOne of our listeners uh disagrees. One of our listeners thinks the American military is great.
JakeOh yeah, no, that's that's kids can think whatever they want to. That's one of the bottles any takes.
SPEAKER_01Yep, yep. You just but uh uh Dyson Isaacs in that movie. Yeah. So hot, so hot, so hot. So step one, yeah. Step two. This bothered me when he was introduced is like robes of the finest quality.
SPEAKER_02And I was like, how does Harry know what good robes are? I'm a fashion girly and I and I love high fashion, DIY, like anything from from like, you know, couture to whatever you know people are just making in their homes. Um and at this point I have a pretty good eye for like cut and quality. But how does Harry know? Yeah, Harry doesn't know the difference between a robe that's made of actual silk and a Shein robe, like he has he also has no interest that we are aware of of textiles or no interest in textiles.
JakeWell, he's he's so smart though. He's so smart. He's the smartest boy.
AntheaHe's so observant and smart. Okay.
JakeI get it's easy to forget when you're not the smartest boy.
SPEAKER_02No, that's so true.
JakeI'm such a dum-dum because I like fashion and stuff. Those aren't books.
SPEAKER_02Aw, heck, this isn't books. It's a big bowl of spaghetti. Not again.
JakeWhy I keep trying to redress, dress top book. Save me, Harry.
AntheaUh, so Harry, there's a bunch of description of the trunk and how uh how cool it is. That's pretty cool. It's pretty cool. Um That's fine.
SPEAKER_02And that is also in keeping with the original books where you would spend a little bit of time like going, like, oh, this was a fascinating whimsical magic thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
AntheaUh the the like I said, it's clearly Rincewin's luggage because, well, Rincewin's luggage has feet. This one um sprouts small clawed tentacles from its bottom to squirm after its owner. Clawed tentacles? Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Spoken like a man who thinks that diamond encrusted AI nanobots are gonna take over the world.
JakeThese tentacles just suddenly start using way more tokens without Dang, good one.
SPEAKER_02Thank you. Yeah, tenta tokens. Wait, so here's okay. Um so I know that like that cephalopods have like beaks and stuff. Yeah. But the beaks are not on the end of the Is there anything in the natural world that has a tentacle with claws? Not that I can think of. What would the utility be of claws on a tentacle? The tentacles already have suckers.
JakeIt's fun to say clentacle.
AntheaI like clenticle. Ooh, alright, I'm back in. Alright, cool. Um uh if they made luggages like this, Harry didn't know why anyone bothered owning a house. I do, uh, that's I wanted to call that out because he's like, you, you know, it there's a basement in this where that's got like space for like 12 bookshelves. And I'm like, Harry, Harry, there's no fire egress out of that. That's why you need a house.
JakeI mean, I take that kind of personal way.
SPEAKER_02I well, you know. Harry likes to think about the worst possible thing that could happen, and so he's like, why doesn't everyone just live inside their luggage? Yeah. I do love.
JakeI'm just imagining an open field in the wizarding world full of suitcases. To be like, oh, this is a great neighborhood.
AntheaIt's just a tiny home village. Like so true. Uh right. 108 golden galleons. That was the price of a good trunk lightly used. At around 50 British pounds to the galleon, that was enough to buy a secondhand car. It would be more expensive than everything else Harry had ever bought in his whole life, all put together. 97 galleons. That was how much was left in the bag of gold Harry had been allowed to take out of Gringotts. Professor McGonagall wore a look of chagrin upon her face. After a long day's shopping, she hadn't needed to ask Harry how much gold was left in the bag after the salesman quoted his price, which meant the professor could do good mental arithmetic without pen and paper. Once again, Harry reminded himself that scientifically illiterate was not at all the same thing as stupid. Finally.
JakeIt basically is.
AntheaBut like also like earlier in this chapter, he was have he was he went on a mental rant about kids who had memorized all of the about who knew how to do calculus but weren't actually smart. So Yeah, that's a great point. Actually, like, like it's uh it's such a fucking consolation price.
SPEAKER_02He's not really saying anything here. It's also interesting that we're talking like we talk about like we're talking about rigor and rationality and various things in here, but then there's also like this way of devaluing certain types of intelligence as they manifest.
AntheaUm finally he can acknowledge that Professor McGonagall has is not stupid because she can do math.
SPEAKER_02Yep.
AntheaThis girl does math.
JakeYep, exactly.
SPEAKER_02He well, he intuits based on her facial expression that she's doing math in her head. Yeah.
JakeUh she might just be thinking of dresses.
SPEAKER_02Maybe. Um, but it does, it's also, I mean, it kind of almost feels a little bit like to me, the thing that I think of. It's not that it I don't think these things are necessarily strictly comparable, and I don't think that it's because McGonagall's a woman at all. I just think it's because Harry is everyone is stupid. Everyone's stupid compared to Harry. Um but it does remind me of how, speaking of clothes, on Project Runway, when someone has a lot of technical skill, but the judges just don't like them, they'll say, but is she a designer or is she a seamstress? Right.
JakeDoes it have soul though?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. And so, like, and so I think that that's like it's really interesting. There are a lot of, you know, there are ways to be allegedly focused on peer competency, but then when competency appears to also devalue it.
AntheaYes. Yeah, yeah. So having uh having acknowledged that McGonagall has something to value, which is arithmetic skill, um, anyway, she apologi- she's like, I'm sorry, you know, I should have seen, I should have known that, you know, we I'm I'm sorry, I should have seen this coming. Um, and now you don't have enough money, so I guess we should go. Um and Harry decided that because she didn't completely lose it, uh, quote, when a child had dared defy her, i.e., when he had been like, you should tell me, like, oh, I know Voldemort is alive and you should tell me the truth. Um, since she didn't completely lose it, she might be able to handle it if he reveals that he stole extra galleons earlier. Um I am uh yeah, so uh he Yeah, okay. I wanna put I want to come back to the idea uh of that McGonagall's ability to stop and think when presented with an alarming situation uh instead of flying into fury is a point in her favor because uh in comparison, Harry decides quote, he needed to be a little angry for what he wanted to try now. There was no way he'd have the courage to do it otherwise.
JakeHasn't Harry flown into multiple flavors of rage this chapter? Yep, two at least. Yep.
AntheaThey're usually black. Yeah, this one's gold. This one's just a little angry. She didn't listen to me, he thought to himself. I would have taken more gold, but she She didn't want to listen. Focusing his entire world on McGonagal and the need to bend this conversation to his will, he spoke. Professor, you thought 100 galleons would be more than enough for a trunk. That's why you didn't bother warning me before it went down to 97. Which is just the sort of thing the research studies show. That's what happens when people think they're leaving themselves a little error margin. They're not pessimistic enough. If it had been up to me, I'd have taken 200 galleons just to be sure. There was plenty of money in that vault, and I could have put back any extra later. But I thought you wouldn't let me do it. I thought you'd be angry at me just for asking. Was I wrong? I suppose I must confess that you are right, said Professor McDonagal. But young man, that sort of thing is the reason why I have trouble trusting adults. Somehow Harry Copped his voice steady. Because they get angry if you even try to reason with them. To them, it's a defiance, an insolence, and a challenge to their higher tribal status. If you try to talk to them, they get angry. So if I had to do anything really important to do, I wouldn't be able to trust you. Even if you listened with deep concern to whatever I said, because that's also part of the role of someone playing a concerned adult, you'd never change your actions. You wouldn't actually behave differently because of anything I said. The salesman was watching them both with unabashed fascination. I can understand your point of view, Professor McGonagall said eventually. If I sometimes seem too strict, please remember that I have served as head of Gryffindor House for what feels like several thousand years. So Harry a so I don't even know why she would concede that much to him. I don't know why she's conceding anyway to him.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Also, when has Harry ever changed anything that he was doing or thinking because of output that input that he got from somebody else?
JakeWhy would the smartest boy ever need to think something wrong or different if he never thinks anything wrong?
AntheaAll of his all of his attitudes and and uh things are very well reasoned and therefore he never needs to change. Everybody else is wrong.
JakeThey're insane.
AntheaThey're insane!
SPEAKER_02Wow, that's so true. His black pits of rage are Yeah. They're so they're so well reasoned. Yeah.
AntheaHarry asks for McGonagall's assurance that it will be alright if he demonstrates a way to get more money, even though it would require him to, quote, violate the role of obedient child, and her to leave her role as Professor McGonagall. And the word role is very specifically used. Um he pulls 11 galleons out of his pouch and McGonagall asks how, and he says, magic. That's hardly an answer, snapped Professor McGonagall, and then stopped, blinking.
SPEAKER_03Yes.
SPEAKER_01Uh that the whole like the role thing. Yeah. I don't I can't justify this, but it gives me such big Nexium vibes.
SPEAKER_02Oh, interesting. Like, what would you lose if you gave up this role of thinking you had to be a professor? Yeah. Like, I don't know. It just I I and I say Nexium, and I guess I just mean like high control group type thing. Yeah, yeah. Like that, I it it also, I mean, I I know that allegedly he's saying that this stuff is all he's justified, he in his own mind, he is justified in saying that this is just a role that she's putting on because she's not actually following any of the actions that would come from being concerned, I guess. I guess. Or like maybe it I I don't know. That but I think ultimately, like, that falls apart because the the beliefs that she has and the actions that she would take as a concerned adult figure who has uh something called responsibilities. Indeed. Which are obligations, which are not just made up. Nope. Um, but uh but that means that she will do things that he disagrees with. That doesn't therefore mean that it's not genuine just because her actions wouldn't change if if he gave information to her. Right. That is actually maybe an argument for the fact that it's more genuine.
AntheaRight.
SPEAKER_02Uh now I think we can also say, okay, well, social constructs are invented, but they're also real. Yeah. So maybe that is it's not inherently necessarily sinister, but I do think that there's something that feels culty about the idea of like, why don't you put aside all these trappings of identity and tribe that make you think that you disagree with me and move into an imaginative space where you're free to acknowledge how right I am. Yeah. Yeah.
AntheaYeah. Um, I find it like I find the snottiness of him being like, it's magic, bitch, like kind of charming. I do like that. What is simply snotty is the next thing he says. No, it isn't, is it? I ought to claim that it's because I experimentally discovered the true secrets of how the pouch works and that it can actually retrieve objects from anywhere, not just its own inside if you phrase the request correctly. But actually, it's from when I fell into that pile of gold before, and I shoved some galleons into my pocket. Anyone who understands pessimism knows that money is something you might need quickly and without much warning. So now are you angry at me for defying your authority or glad that we succeeded in our important mission?
JakeAnd then she smacks the kid.
AntheaThe salesman's eyes were wide like saucers, and the tall witch stood there silent. Discipline at Hogwarts must be enforced, she said after almost a full minute, for the sake of all the students, and that must include courtesy and obedience from you to all professors. I understand, Professor McGonagall. Good. Now let us buy that trunk and go home.
JakeAnd then the salesperson stood up and clapped.
AntheaYou're close! Oh god. Uh uh, thank you very much, Professor. Can you finish up the purchase for me? I've got to visit the laboratory.
JakeThe salesman Hey, could you can you buy this for me, gal? I gotta go take a piss. You you're good for this, right? Cool.
AntheaThe salesman, uncuous once more, pointed toward a door set into the wall with a gold handled knob. As Harry started to walk away, he heard the salesman ask in his oily voice, May I inquire who as to who that was, Madame McGondigal? I take it he is Slytherin, third year, perhaps, and from a prominent family, but I did not recognize. The slam of the laboratory door cut off his words, and after Harry had identified the lock and pressed it into place, he grabbed the magical self-cleaning towel and with shaky hands wiped moisture off his forehead. Harry's entire body was sheathed in sweat which had soaked clear through his monkle clothing, though at least it didn't show through the robes. That's the end of that section. So yeah, the sail everybody clapped.
SPEAKER_05Yep.
SPEAKER_02Which is a I Wow, that kid's so impressive. He seems like he must be a rich, evil asshole. And at least 13.
JakeYeah, I was gonna say, like, you could this is an 11-year-old child. It's like, you know, they're they're in like 11th grade or something, right?
AntheaYeah, yeah. Um, I I saw someone pointing out that uh that like Yadkowski seems to feel obligated to have a laugh track in his in here. Like uh because I think he's not confident that his stuff is funny.
JakeUm that's a that's a fair concern.
AntheaWell, yeah, that's actually pretty self-aware.
SPEAKER_01It's not funny.
AntheaUm, like in the in the robe shop in the previous chapter, where which I think I skipped over a lot of it because I was like, this isn't adding anything to the story, where the sales girls are constantly in that in that whole thing, they're reacting the whole way. Yes. Yeah, I'm sorry I cut it out, like, because I was like, this isn't adding anything. But as he and Draco are doing their ham-fisted, like, you're so cool, no, you're so cool, the sales girls are suppressing laughter the entire time.
JakeLike having guy bystanders gasping in amazement is like classic tumblr this happened storytelling.
AntheaYeah, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. God, that's so embarrassing. It's so embarrassing. Uh oh, I did, I wanted to get to he clapped. Um, but I do want to, I will jump back slightly because uh I do want to make sure that I acknowledge this. Um uh McGonagall says, good, now let us buy that trunk and go home. Harry felt like throwing up or cheering or fainting or something. That was the first time his careful reasoning had ever worked on anyone. Maybe because it was also the first time he had something really serious that an adult needed from him, but still, Minerva McGonagall, plus one point.
SPEAKER_03I'd like to put forward the hypothesis that maybe your careful reasoning never worked on anyone because it was bad.
JakeYeah, no, for sure. It's like Well, clearly this has had a hundred percent fail rate because everyone else is wrong.
AntheaYeah. I know we're coming back to this several times here, but like, huh, uh, okay. Um so they go back, so they get the trunk. Oh my god, we're so close to time. Um, they go back to the the leaky cauldron so that they can get out of Diagon Alley. So here we part ways for a time, Professor McGonagall said. She shook her head in wonderment. This has been the strangest day of my life for many a year. Since the day I learned that a child had defeated you know who. I wonder now looking back if that was the last reasonable day of the world. Oh, like she had anything to complain about. You think your day was surreal, try mine. I was very impressed with you today, Harry said to her. I should have remembered to compliment you out loud. I was awarding you points in my head and everything. Thank you, Mr. Potter, said Professor McGonagall. If you had already been sorted into a house, I would have deducted so many points that your grandchildren would still be losing the house cup. Thank you, Professor. It was probably too early to call her Minnie. This woman sorry, I was gonna keep going. Just keep going. I I made a face of horror. Yeah, but you also made a face of amusement at your grandchildren would still be losing the house cup. Because I do I think that's a good one. That was very in character. That's very character line. Yeah, I like it.
SPEAKER_02She points to Yud Yud.
AntheaYeah, yeah. This woman might well be the sanest adult Harry had ever met. Despite her lack of scientific background, Harry was even considering offering her the number two position in whatever group he formed to fight the Dark Lord, though he wasn't silly enough to say that out loud. Now what would be a good name for that? The Death Eater Eaters? I'll see you again soon when school starts, Professor McGonagall said. And Mr. Potter, about your wand? I know what you're going to ask, Harry said. He took out his precious wand and with a deep twinge of inner pain, flipped it over in his hand, presenting her with a handle. Take it. I hadn't planned to do anything. Not a single thing, but I don't want you to have nightmares about me blowing up the house. Professor McGonagall shook her head rapidly. Oh no, Mr. Potter, that isn't done. I only meant to warn you not to use your wand at home, since the ministry can detect underage magic, and it is prohibited without supervision. Huh, Harry said. That sounds like a very sensible rule. I'm glad to see the wizarding world takes that sort of thing seriously.
JakeIt's good to surveil kids and not let them do things that they want. This is in line with things that I've felt so far.
AntheaYeah, right! Right! Professor Professor McGonagall also has trouble believing this. Professor McGonagall peered hard at him. You really mean that. Yes, Harry said. I get it. Magic is dangerous, and the rules are there for good reasons. Certain other matters are also dangerous. I get that too. Remember that I am not stupid. No, just fucking willful. I am unlikely ever to forget it. Thank you, Harry. That does make me feel better about entrusting you with certain things. Goodbye for now. Harry turned to go into the leaky cauldron and out towards the mugle world. As his hand touched the back door's handle, he heard a last whisper from behind him. Hermione Granger. What? Harry said, his hand still on the door. Look for a first-year girl named Hermione Granger on the train to Hogwarts. Who was she? There was no answer. And when Harry turned around, Professor McGonville was gone. Aftermath. Headmaster Albus Dumbledore leaned forward over his desk. His twinkling eyes peered out of Minerva. Oh my dear, how did you find Harry?
JakeTedious.
AntheaMinerva opened her mouth. Then she closed her mouth. And then she opened her mouth again. No words came out. I see, Albus said gravely. Thank you for your report, Minerva. You may go. End of chapter six.
SPEAKER_01Wow.
Discussion and outro
SPEAKER_02Um, okay, just a couple couple things. A couple things. Um, Minnie? How fucking dare you? You know when you know when it's not too soon to say Minnie? The day after you fucking die in House Eat. And we and we prick and we and we scrape some bone dust off your skeleton to revive you later, that's when you can say mini. When you're when your brain is in a freezer. When your brain is in a freezer, and or maybe his brain is going to be floating in some kind of gelatin. Sure, yeah, that's fine. I think it'll be green. Um, so that's one. That's pretty tropey of you, Alisa. What can I say? I'm a tropey bitch. Um so uh I have a few overarching thoughts, but I want to hear from you guys first. This is just this is not overarching at all. This is just really close reading on the last couple of things. Um I think that it I don't this might be unjustified of me, but I'm getting a sense that maybe Dumbledore is kind of being set up to be a villain of sorts.
AntheaThat's I'll never tell.
SPEAKER_02That's I feel like since I this is also partially because I have the um the spoiler that Quarrel is like a really great guy. Or uh he's influential. Influential. Yeah. Um, and then uh I also think it's really great to see that like Yatkowski is already looking ahead at the most important. He's always focused on this is really interesting to me. So far in the story, he's like, okay, well, these Darsleys are absolutely no good. We need to get somebody smarter in the mix here. We need a biochemistry professor or whatever the fuck Evans Varus is, or Varis, sorry. Yes. Michael Varus, is that it?
AntheaUh yes.
SPEAKER_02It doesn't matter. Um, who gives a shit? Not me. Um we need to get a biochemistry professor here in a paternal role. Yeah. Okay. Haggard is a dumb fuck. We can't have him, you know, taking Harry around. Because what if he got a good heart? What if he got a good heart? Fuck off. Um Ron! Ron is such a simpleton. Now, he happens to be really good at chess and there's implications, like he's strategic and stuff like that. So he's not actually stupid. He just like has his brain works in a different way. Yeah. Fuck that. We need to match make Harry and Hermione as quickly as possible because she's got a fucking brain, unlike Ron.
JakeYeah, Ron's too dumb to not be poor.
unknownYeah.
JakeIf he wasn't a dumb, he would have figured out arbitrage.
SPEAKER_02Yes. Yeah, yeah. Him and his whole family. Families should have they should have just lived in a suitcase for a while until they had saved up enough money to buy a proper house. Anyway. Um so I just think I I find this I find this very interesting that this trend continues. Yeah. Um I don't know what to say about that, but that's something.
AntheaNo, you're you're completely right. You're completely right.
JakeYeah, I I just had like this isn't this is more about going forward than the chapter as a whole, but I just had like this sinking realization that like none of these characters are gonna have emotional growth. Yeah, no, this isn't the kind of writer or kind of. No, nope, yeah, absolutely. He is going to be the same tedious child at the end of the story as he is exactly right now. Yeah. But he will have done cooler smart boy things.
AntheaYes, it's not that he's not gonna grow, it's just that he's he's gonna have more skill points. Yeah.
JakeHe's not gonna grow emotionally.
AntheaYeah, he's yeah, no, you're yes, you are also completely right.
JakeAnd like, I mean, I guess that is kind of my takeaway from this chapter, is just like, you know, this this is not a story that, like, they're not priming this character to realize the shortcomings and follies of their thought processes. Yeah. Because their thoughts are perfect. Yeah. So therefore, they're just going to keep doing the same things, and the only chain thing that's going to change is the amount of people giving them validations for being the exact person they already are.
SPEAKER_02Well, Harry has, you know, Harry has self-admitted anger issues, and I know that Yatkowski said not everything Harry does is rational, but that kind of seems to me like a bit of a cop-out. Um, because this is supposed to be a didactic work. Yeah. Um, and one, so like we are supposed to be learning things from this. Yeah. Uh from the way that Harry behaves. Uh and uh sorry, what was the other thing that I just said? I don't know, but like uh Oh, oh, right. Um uh so I think that one of the things that would certainly that would be Oh right, so Harry has self-admitted anger issues, and not everything that he does is supposed to be rational. Yeah. However, what we learn in this chapter is that his anger gives him superpowers. Yeah. He is twice able in this chapter to harness feelings of anger, even simulated or like working himself into a shoot feelings of anger in order to achieve heightened rationality. Yeah.
JakeLike, oh, keep going, please.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, no, and uh, and and I think um uh I think that that's interesting, and also um I think that it's there are some missed opportunities in these early chapters to demonstrate without a doubt, not just like, oh, well, if you pick at that one specific thing, Harry wasn't supposed to be rational there. Um that's I it that's totally you know intentional on my part. Um uh you're supposed to be learning how to be rational from Harry, but if you're looking at stuff and you're not totally sure whether that's an example of rationality, that's not me failing as the author of a didactic work. Right. That's you thinking that something always has to be no human being can always be rational. I'm making up a Yudkowski to get mad at a little bit. Sure, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I do think that the missed opportunities are places to very clearly demonstrate, hey, Harry's a child, and he, as such, he still has, I mean, that just means he hasn't been alive very long. There's a lot of situations he hasn't encountered yet, and he hasn't fully developed his own lens and his own his own critical thinking skills. Um, and even if he does, there'll be things where he encounters where, like, yeah, he'll get stuff wrong. He might, he might, there's there's no opportunity here for him to say, like, I'm so sorry, Professor. I was reacting with my first order thinking. Right, right. Or there's no, or for other, so far, there's missed opportunities for other people to really correct him in a meaningful way about like assumptions that he's making.
JakeYeah, and the fish is like they swap between child and author insert in the same sentence.
AntheaYeah. And it's not like there had like the the narrative, it has been established in the narrative that it like Yadkowski has previously switched into gone from close third person to omniscient narrator to say Harry is not being rational here. Like when in in whatever, like I think it was chapter three, when uh when he is learning about, oh, and when he's getting the lore dump from McGonagall, the narrative explicitly says he should have noticed that something was weird here, but because he was upset, his rationality failed him. It explicitly says that. Okay, so that's really so that's so it's not like it hasn't been established as a as a conceit of the fic that occasionally the narration can point out this is wrong. This is not correct.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah.
AntheaWell, therefore, when it doesn't happen, I am forced to assume that Yudkowski thinks that the things that are happening are fine.
JakeYeah, well, because like like when you're talking about anger, it's such an internet boy thing of like it's fine, like you can stop being rational when you're angry. Like, as you know, like it's you know, you can be angry and yell at someone, or you can be angry and be cruel towards someone. Like that's that's the emotion that's okay to feel, like especially And it's the only one. But yeah, like if you are righteous and justified, and as long as you're fundamentally right, which you are, which you're it doesn't matter, like you can act irrationally as long as that irrationality is anger.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's such a great point. But of course, like if anger's the only thing that you are allowed to feel, you would want to seek out that state, because it's like the only time that that's the only place that you can you can have that that part of yourself.
JakeYeah, it's like practically like a like an anime trope, like you know Yeah, like you know, he gets pushed so hard that he enters his elevated robot state and evaluates that and says that it's mean to a woman.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yep, yeah, yeah. I will say another reason that I specifically, Alisa the person, do not enjoy some of what uh robot Harry is bringing to the table is that uh I studied theater in high school and college, and there was a period of time in theater, in uh in playwriting, um I would classify it as like nine nineties to mid aughts. Um let's say that like Neil LeBute really like capped off this era.
SPEAKER_03Yes. Where like Let's go! I love to talk about angry white male playwrights, where there'd be a part.
SPEAKER_02Of the play where a man would just look at a woman and give her a monologue. Ah, yes. And he would peg that bitch. Like he had her dead to rights. He observed her so keenly, yeah, she couldn't even do anything about it. Which is like, by the way, as someone who's very smart um and observant, I will tell you that in uh in case anyone was wondering, in real life, when you accurately assess someone in a way that they find unflattering and just deliver it to them, how's that go? It doesn't go great.
SPEAKER_01You know, it doesn't eviscerate or destroy them or anything. They just will come up with a way to uh get back at you later.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, yeah, generally, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Like maybe they'll rate you inconsistent on your performance review.
JakeYeah, I was waiting for.
AntheaYeah, so this was I have I have three over overarching points, and and uh you guys are so smart that you already hit one of them.
JakeOkay, can you present them in riddle form?
AntheaGoing out of three feet back. No, I'm so tired, you guys.
JakePerhaps Tom Riddle form.
AntheaOh god, I'm so tired. I'm so tired.
SPEAKER_02Um this, my riddle three, before the point of the episode, ye see.
AntheaUm, okay, thing one. Uh at the end of the chapter, we have a good demonstration of the planning fallacy. We do! I've okay, yes, no, and that actually was a good one. Uh yeah, it's exactly what the planning fallacy is, which is you think that you are going to have enough money and you give yourself a little bit of buffer, and then that is not enough. I I have to wonder if the healing kit is what put him over budget. I don't know that. There's nothing to indicate that in the fic, but that's my headcanon now.
JakeUm is the that is your brain trying to prov protect itself.
SPEAKER_02Yes, yes well, technically it he was eight over, right? Uh it was the trunk called nine, no, he was he was eleven. He was eleven short. Oh, eleven short. Okay, yeah.
JakeWell the healing healing kit was five, so if he was 11 short, then it wasn't the kit.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_02It wasn't just the kit. But the kit probably didn't help. But they yeah, that's my that's my theory.
AntheaThat's my theory. Um can't prove it. Don't care.
SPEAKER_02Um it's also a little, I will say it's a little bit different because McGonagal was trying to assess this for somebody else.
AntheaYes, so and like here's the thing, right? Like McGonagall had maybe it it's we don't know what McGonagall's uh uh thought process was. She was like, I think a hundred galleons is enough for like a good trunk. Maybe she hasn't gone shopping for a trunk in a long time and she forgot to account for wizard inflation.
JakeI mean, her interiority isn't isn't important.
AntheaI mean, it doesn't really matter, so that yeah, for sure, for sure, for sure.
SPEAKER_01Um surely I'll be able to keep this kid from buying more superfluous shit.
AntheaRight, but she just didn't account for how smart and rational he would be. Um what I still feel is not a good application of the planning fallacy is Harry's assertion that one should attempt to envision the very, very, very worst-case scenario at all times. Um, what that sounds like to me is a way to induce obsessive-compulsive disorder and anxiety in a person.
SPEAKER_02I was gonna say that sounds like a mental illness.
AntheaWhat that sounds like to me is a mindset that, if lauded as genius within a certain community, might lead to someone creating a thought experiment about AI hell that was so hazardous to people's mental health that Yudkowski had to ban discussion of it on less wrong. What that sounds like to me is a mindset that might contribute to several people in the rationalist community having breaks with reality that caused real suffering to themselves and others. And what that sounds like to me is a mindset that might ossify in someone after they experienced a heart-wrenching tragedy at a young age that they didn't see coming. I don't know. Could be. Planning fallacy is a good thing to learn.
SPEAKER_02I'm gonna be honest, you sound fucking crazy, right?
AntheaThank you. Thank you. Um, we pretty much covered my second point, which is his emotional reaction is crazy to all stuff, and there's no reflection on his part or the part of the narration on like on what's going on here.
JakeHe'll eventually learn how to, right? I probably tell me, just lie to me and tell me it'll get better.
AntheaIt's that Natalie Portman and and uh Hayden Christensen baby.
JakeExactly.
SPEAKER_01Um I wonder Harry Potter and the methods of emotional regulation.
AntheaOh god, if only. I do want to point out though that like if the thing one should do is think about the very, very, very worst case scenario at all times, then McGonagall is actually being very rational by looking at him and going, I wonder if this kid was abused. Because that's a bad, that's a worst-case scenario. It is, right? It's not even that unlikely. Uh right. She says that she has seen many cases of child abuse at Hogwarts, which has to be true because she works with Severus Snape.
JakeYeah. But only that reminds me of something I thought.
SPEAKER_01If they don't come in bearing, they're gonna delete appearance.
JakeBecause that made me think of something earlier. She said it's like Hogwarts is the safest place for women and the hell is happening in these other places. Because like kids die a bunch, right? At Hogwarts.
SPEAKER_01I don't know if I die, but certainly are.
JakeThere's maming. There's a couple deads. There's a lot of things.
AntheaHe does, yeah, yeah, in the fourth book. Yeah, that won't happen until the future.
JakeSo that's at least one dead. Yeah. That's a bunch in terms of kids.
SPEAKER_02I think it might be how many kids should be dying.
AntheaI think it might be established in uh in the uh original books that moaning myrtle was the last time a kid died on campus.
JakeStill bad shit's happening to kids.
AntheaBad shit is happening to kids, yeah, absolutely.
JakeAlso, I want to rewind a little bit to when you said Harry Potter and the methods of emotional regulation. In that I want to read a fanfic where there is a precocious child as emotionally intelligent as this Harry Potter is, you know, smart's intelligent. I love it. But is a complete fucking moron, is as as book dumb as this Harry Potter is book smart, but is just the kindest patient. That sounds really nice.
AntheaI like it. I like it. Is that The Alchemist?
JakeI'm not familiar.
SPEAKER_02No. It's just a sex. If he was a huge Himbo, the Alchemist would have been way more readable. I had to read it for my sex ed class in Texas. You what? Yeah. What?
JakeYour Tex Ed class?
SPEAKER_02My Tex Ed class, we had to read The Alchemist.
AntheaWhy did not The Alchemist taught you about sex?
SPEAKER_02I think it was just like general, like, what do you want out of life?
AntheaThat's not sex ed.
SPEAKER_02No, it's not. It was like a good way to dodge the question, but see. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway.
AntheaUm, last point. I think that the thing about roles is going to be important as we continue. Um I haven't I'm too tired to go. I did not go looking for less wrong posts to support that, but I I from the stuff I remember about Ziz uh and and the role and the way she thought about the role of hero and knowing that she those thoughts were influenced by this fic specifically. Um and also um Yudkowski calling himself a hero for having invested in Cryonics.
JakeI'm so glad that was that was pretty wild.
AntheaYeah, we kind of we kind of glossed over that one. We had to, there was so much to do. Yeah, but like, yeah, let's put a pin in. Yeah, where he was just like, I am a hero anyway. Uh so Sir, excuse me? Yeah, so I think that this like role thing is gonna be important, so I want to kind of try and keep track of it.
SPEAKER_02Totally. No, I yeah, I think it's yeah, that's it's interesting to think about because it is like, okay, what is a a role is I guess I think it's a good thing. Yeah, I bet my degree in dramaturgy is gonna have some opinions on this.
JakeSo it's like I like this is just pure intuition. Like, I feel like the way he's going to approach roles is from an engineering perspective, like treat them as functions, not roles, right, right, right, right. This is, you know, this is how this type of human functions. Right. Therefore it is their role.
SPEAKER_02Right.
AntheaYeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. I think about I think about role in terms of like, at least the way that it's come up so far in the fic about like is like that roles seem to confer or proscribe uh autonomy in some ways, or like freedom or privileges. Like, at least so far.
AntheaI I think my sense of it when he's talking about like the like you I I again I've been I've been listening to uh from AI to zombies and uh and I gotta say, audio is not a good format for Yadkowski's theoretical writing.
SPEAKER_02What is a good format for Yadkowski's theoretical writing?
JakeIs there some kind of you know, like pill or injection you can do and just so gr if we could just matrix this, it would really make my life easier.
SPEAKER_02Um my god, but you know what it is? You know what it should be?
SPEAKER_01It's like in Dark City where we have like this montage and like our whole lives Yadkowski has been like teaching us rationalism, but then we're in the present day, so now we just get to like fight the big bad.
AntheaYeah, great Dark City poll. Okay, that's fun.
SPEAKER_02Um watch Dark City, great films.
AntheaWatch Dark City, uh, not Jason Isaacs, uh Rufus Sewell. Rufus Sewell. But also hot. I was about to say another hottie. Another hottie. This podcast is also just like hotties of the 90s.
JakeDevin Sawa, am I right?
AntheaWhich one?
JakeUh God, what the hell was he in? He was he was who Casper ended up being when he turned back to the shit and a bunch of other stuff, but that's apparently the only one I can remember.
AntheaThese days when I think about Casper, I think about that dad. Let's be real. I think about Bill Pullman.
JakeThat's right.
SPEAKER_03And I'm like, oh, look what a soft, floppy-haired guy. He's so earnest. He's a great dad. Yeah.
JakeI feel like they were kind of like, hey, let's make the dad from Beetlejuice again.
AntheaYeah, yeah. Dad. Yeah. Anyway. Um well, not the dad. Uh right.
JakeUh uh uh The Homeowner, the guy's the dead guy. The dead, yes. The dead dad.
AntheaYeah, yeah. Um yeah. I'm exhausted. Okay.
JakeShould we talk about Bill Pullman more? That was a pretty good movie.
SPEAKER_03Dispirited about doing this for another 116 chapters.
SPEAKER_02Okay, we're gonna, we can we can we're gonna talk this out. We're gonna talk it out and take it off after.
AntheaI think, no, I I I think the only way to do this, the only way out is through. That's not fair. That's not true. I could quit. Yeah, the only way out is through. Or giving up. Or give up. Um I I wish that Harry would uh have to experience actual consequences and learn any Oh actually he does. Okay, you know what? I'm gonna say um he I know that something happens with Neville Longbottom in a couple of chapters, um uh in which he is forced to accept some consequences. So does he grow? I don't know. I don't think that it like sticks absolutely.
JakeThat's the big important part.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but at this point, I'll settle for consequences. Yeah. As long as he's punished in some point, that's fine.
AntheaUm, alright, guys. Any closing thoughts?
JakeThis is the most wrecked I've ever seen you.
AntheaI know, I know.
SPEAKER_01It's okay, buddy. We're gonna go, we're gonna go get dinner after this.
AntheaOh my god, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go finish a beer after this. Yeah, and maybe start another one. Yeah, yeah. Um, hey, we passed 250 downloads.
JakeHey, nice.
AntheaYeah, yeah. Um Most of those are me. Just putting it on loop. Yep. Um, no, I this this chapter was was a lot. Uh I'm glad to be through it. The next chapter is also quite long. Um, and uh I can I can give you a preview that uh uh it's uh when I started this, I was like, oh, chapter seven, that's the one I'm gonna have to put a content warning for sexual assault in. Um it's not on screen. There's no sexual assault on screen. Um but uh uh look forward to that content warning.
JakeI do.
AntheaUm that's what's that's we're gonna we're gonna go to platform nine and three quarters and have to content warn for it. So um hey gang, thanks for listening. Uh this does have a website. It's HPmore and the limits of rationality.buzzsprout.com. I thought about making it HPmore alore, but I think that might actually be harder to for people to uh parse. Um you can find us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Pocket Casts, other places, not Amazon. Fuck Jeff Bezos. Fuck him. Uh if you like this podcast, tell your friends. If you don't like this podcast, it's crazy that you listened all the way to this outro, but thank you, tell your enemies.
JakeYeah, no, keep keep hate listening. Yeah. Spite spite sustains us.
AntheaUh leave a five-star rating or review in places that let you do that, and uh have fun on your boat. Have fun on your boat.
JakeHave fun on your boat.
AntheaThe Harry Potter universe is copyright to JK Rowling, and Harry Potter and the methods of rationality and the sequences are copyright Eliezer Yudkowski. This podcast may contain copyrighted material, the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner, for the purposes of commentary, criticism, and transformation, which are protected under the doctrine of fair use. This podcast is released under a Creative Commons Retribution Share Alike 4.0 international license. The music you heard in this episode is The Watchmaker's Secret by Nikolai Haydlas on HookSounds.com. Thanks for listening.
