Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality

[momokaze]

wow
a fanfiction have a doujin.

 

[HSuke]

This fic itself is okay-ish to me and I do cringe when its fans tell everybody that it's the BEST LITERATURE TO EVER EXIST, but hey that goes for literally every fandom so it's not really special.

I've actually never read the story. I only know him tangentially for his indirect connection to Scott Alexander, and my favorite story is Unsong.

 

[SylB]

aaahahahahahahhh

Despite not being high-school or college-educated, Eliezer Yudkowsky is still widely considered one of the greatest and smartest philosophers of the modern era.

you are insane.

 

[lekhaka]

I've actually never read the story. I only know him tangentially for his indirect connection to Scott Alexander, and my favorite story is Unsong.

I've never read Unsong, though I mean to. Scott Alexander is the SSC blog guy yes? His blog is good. I was about to say I enjoyed his other fiction like The Metropolitan Man (superman ratfic) but after googling it I see that it's actually a different Alexander...

You may or may not enjoy HPMOR, I dunno. Let us know lol.

 

[Nixhou]

Always understood that the original author was a lunatic but I think the artist is doin a good job

 

[demilembias]

This is obviously going to go in some obnoxious puzzle box direction befitting its infamously technofetishism-addled cult leader author. But, as a manga? This is pretty damn good for a non-Japanese web-doujin. Makes me realize that I probably would read a decent manga adaptation of any HP fanfic, lmao. Good thing there's actually dozens of series like that.

 

[RemIpsum]

Always understood that the original author was a lunatic but I think the artist is doin a good job

Rather than a lunatic, he's just got a lot of unearned arrogance and is kind of annoying?

Also HPMOR is not very good, in addition to being weirdly problematic at times. But it's Harry Potter fanfic so like. It has company.

Not saying there are no good Harry Potter fanfiction out there, it’s just there’s a lot of garbage too. All things considered I’d place this as one of the more competently written, with caveats that some of what is written is batshit. Like eleven year old Draco Malfoy casually talking about his plans to SA Luna.

 

[bigmacMLPhusband]

Despite not being high-school or college-educated, Eliezer Yudkowsky is still widely considered one of the greatest and smartest philosophers of the modern era.

?

That being said, I have some rather tenuous hopes for this story. The first three chapters have been pretty interesting, and (in my honest, if not potentially ill-informed opinion) it’s shaping up to be a lot more interesting than the original. I beg god to not disappoint me, but I fear there is no god here.

I sort of disliked Harry being a sports-ball-wizard turning down any chance of learning more about Hogwarts, cause like. It’s magic world that upends everything we’ve known so far (fun!!! And I like that this story touches on that, at least briefly), and you want to… catch flying balls? But at the same time, I understand that decision narratively, power fantasy of a bullied kid suddenly being the star of the sportsball team and beating those meanie jocks. So, I look forward to this Harry potentially fleshing out the wacky world of Hogwarts better. Plus, I think it’d be pretty adorable to see this Harry stumble through a magical world with a completely different, curious mindset from anyone else and trying learn about everything (which is what Hermione was supposed to be, but she was buns as a character. Additionally, I wonder how this story will differentiate Hermione and nerd Harry here?) I don’t mind some scientific inaccuracies or expect a Dr. Stone kind of science-y story, I just expect it be, at the very least, half as thoughtful as Apothecary Diaries. The story seems to set up some sort of conspiracy, after all. “Ermm askhually” Harry Holmes, maybe??? Please?

I have a lot more thoughts about this story, but I want to hold off and see what it’ll actually offer. (P.S. I haven’t read the actual original fanfic. To people who have read it, you are free to enjoy your potential dramatic irony by yourselves. I want to see the actual story by myself while minimizing anyone telling me about it beforehand.)

 

[Elaborate]

This one is a 9/10.
But, like, maybe wait until there's more than 20 chapters before jumping in.

I've read the original fanfic, which is probably still available online, and it was actually pretty great.
Some really funny stuff, some cringe stuff, some pieces of philosophy that genuinely made me think.
(The author's basic reason to write this is to make the reader think about rationalist philosophy, so... mission accomplished.)

I don't read much fanfic because I want it to be as good as the original or better. This story definitely qualified for that IMO.

Basically, this is Harry Potter if most people had, like, 50 extra IQ points.
Harry isn't basically a jock, he's looking to be a scientist in the field of magic.
Voldemort isn't basically a power-crazed madman like in the original, he has an actual political philosophy.
Dumbledore is still basically a weirdo, but even more crazy-awesome.
It's a world where wizard kids learn predefined spells because magic is frickin' dangerous, especially transmutation, but it's implied adult wizards can design their own spells.

Note that the author killed off some characters, like Malfoy's mum or Dumbledore's brother, for extra wizard-war drama and to make the filial bond between Draco and Lucius stronger. Also, he's not afraid to make fun of some of Rowling's more contrived plot points, and make up better replacements.
Also also, he's definitely speed-running this thing; IIRC the story ends before the end of the first year.

 

[Seraphus]

Man, I'm so jazzed up to see one of the few worthy fan-fic get an adaption into visual art.

How many people claiming this dude is a cult leader (which he is plainly NOT) also read the source material, hmm? The TERF cult leader Rowling is far more odious than the person who wrote this hilarious diversion; and it IS a diversion, folks! Just a funny take on HP and what might happen if Lilly Evan-Potter had shown her sister just the smallest bit of compassion when she was a young adult!

I've read the original, and it's definitely something a normal publishing house would publish, were it not set in a previously established literary universe (I've proofread stuff for a publishing-house called "Baen Books," and the original easily passes the bar).

The source materials are grand, and the writing is fun, and it is drawn adequately; what more could a person want from a doujin?

 

[GullibleCynic]

I think one of the things that people sometimes miss about this story is that this Harry is basically always wrong, except when he is quoting the science, and even then he doesn't always understand the implications of the science. Almost every decision he makes is the wrong decision. Every hypothesis and deduction he makes is wrong, even if he's asking questions other people tend to overlook. The one consequential decision that he gets right, the one at the very end, isn't even really his doing, he was manipulated into doing it. Dumbledore wins the battle for the future and Hermione wins the battle for Harry's soul. Harry might be the protagonist, but the author out and out says that Hermione is the actual hero. Harry does not start the story as a paragon of rationality who has to educate all of the ignorant rubes. Yes, he has something to contribute, but he has an awful lot to learn too. And he makes mistakes along the way, catastrophic ones. Hermione is the one we ought to strive to emulate in a virtue ethics sense.

The author largely knows what he's doing, he didn't make a fix-fic. He knows Harry is annoying. The reader is supposed to think that Harry thinks he is the only smart one / has all the answers. The reader is also encouraged in many ways to notice that Harry is wrong about that. The outcome is better than cannon in a lot of ways, but hardly perfect.

I think the biggest failure is at the very end where there is a scene where "all the serious people sit around and decide what needs to happen." I think this represents a naive hope of the author at the time it was written. Remember, the whole point is to be a primer into Rationality, which itself is supposed to be an effort aimed at solving the AI alignment problem. The author was imagining that when the time came there would be a similar group of serious people in real life that would prevent the AI apocalypse. I don't think even he believes that will happen anymore.