Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (112 page)

The blast of power that came forth was like a wind of moonless night, it caught Marie-Susan before the pony could even flinch, and she was gone without a trace before any of them had the chance to rear in shock.

From the dark thing that stood in the center of the dais where the Elements had shattered, from the scarce-recognizable void-black outline of a horse, came a voice that seemed to bypass all ears and burn like cold fire, sounding directly in the brain of everypony who heard:

Did you expect me to just stand there and let you finish?

Twilight Sparkle stared at the space where Marie-Susan had been, where not a trace of the unicorn remained.
She - she just - she -
In the back of her mind, unheard, she was aware that Rarity was screaming.

That wasn’t a disintegration,
said the voice of Nightmare.
I sent her somewhere else.

Rarity’s scream stopped abruptly.

Twilight Sparkle felt like her own scream was only beginning. Seven. It took seven ponies to use the Elements of Inquiry. Everyone knew that no matter how honest, investigating, skeptical, creative, analytic, or curious you were, what really made your work Science was when you published your results in a prestigious journal. Everyone knew that. Could there be more than one Element of Peer Review at a time - how long would it take to find another one - and the Nightmare wouldn’t just stand there and let them do it -

“Where?” yelled Rainbow Dash. “Where’d you put her?”

I put the little pony in the same place I bound my pathetic sister, in the heart of her pathetic Sun.

“She’ll die!” cried Fluttershy, staring at the Nightmare in horror. “It’s too hot, she’ll burn!”

Oh, don’t worry. The power of the Nightmare surrounds your little friend, keeping her safe and cool, sustaining her without food or drink. She will suffer nothing more than boredom…

The void-black outline stepped off the dais, walking slowly, deliberately, past the remaining six ponies.

…so long as the Nightmare’s power is not broken. By any backup plans my sister may have set in motion, for example, and which may be known to you. In that case she will vaporize instantly. Such a lovely thing, friendship. It makes such a wonderful instrument of blackmail. Be sure to keep safe the Elements of Inquiry. You wouldn’t want anyone else using them on me, now would you?

“No,” whispered Twilight Sparkle, as the horror began to dawn on her.

Then a crawling sensation all over her skin, as the Nightmare walked past her, and the deadly power brushed her with its cold caress.

Now if you’ll pardon me, my little ponies, I have an eternal night to rule over.

THE VILLAGE HIDDEN IN THE CLARITY

“Consider the computational power required to manifest over a hundred shadow clones,” the Uchiha genius said in his dispassionate tones. “It is an error of rationality, Sakura, to say ‘fluke’ and think you have explained anything. ‘Fluke’ is simply the name one gives to data that one is ignoring.”

“But it
has
to be a fluke!” Sakura yelled. With effort, she calmed her voice into the careful precision expected of a rationality ninja; it wouldn’t do to have her crush think she was stupid. “Like you said, the computational power required to use over a hundred Kage Bunshin is simply absurd. We’re talking the level of a major superintelligence. Naruto’s the dead last of our class. He’s not even jounin-level smart, let alone a superintelligence!”

The Uchiha’s eyes gleamed, almost as though he had activated his Smartingan. “Naruto can manifest a hundred independently acting clones. He
must
have the raw brainpower. But, under ordinary circumstances, something prevents him from using this computational power efficiently… like a mind at war within itself, perhaps? We now have cause to believe that Naruto is in some way connected to a superintelligence, and as a recently graduated genin, he, like us, is fifteen years old. What happened fifteen years ago, Sakura?”

It took a moment for Sakura to comprehend, to remember, and then she understood.

The attack of the Nine-Brains Demon Fox.

Just a small bone-white creature with big ears and bigger tail and beady red eyes. It was no stronger than an ordinary fox, it didn’t breathe fire or flash laser eyes, it possessed no chakra and no magic of any kind, but its intelligence was over nine thousand times that of a human being.

Hundreds had been killed, half the buildings wrecked, almost the whole village of Beisugakure had been destroyed.

“You think the Kyubey is hiding inside Naruto?” Sakura said. A moment later, her brain automatically went on to fill in the obvious implications of the theory. “And the software conflict between their existences is why he acts like a gibbering idiot half the time, but can control a hundred Kage Bunshin. Huh. That makes… a lot of sense… actually…”

Sasuke gave her the brief, contemptuous nod of someone who had figured all this out on his own, without anyone else needing to prompt
him
.

“Ano…” said Sakura. Only years of sanity exercises channeled her complete screaming panic into pragmatically useful policy options. “Shouldn’t we…
tell
someone about this? Like, sometime in the next five seconds?”

“The adults already know,” Sasuke said emotionlessly. “It is the obvious explanation for their treatment of Naruto. No, the real question is how this fits into the outwitting of the Uchiha…”

“I don’t see how it fits at all -” began Sakura.

“It
must
fit!” A tinge of frantic emotion flickered in Sasuke’s voice. “I asked that man
why
he did it, and he told me that when I knew the answer to that, it would explain
everything!
Surely
this
must also be part of what is to be explained!”

Sakura sighed to herself. Her personal hypothesis was that Itachi had just been trying to drive his brother into clinical paranoia.

“Yo, kids,” said the voice of their rationality sensei from their radio earpieces. “There’s a village in Wave trying to build a bridge, and it keeps falling down for no reason anyone can figure out. Meet up at the gates at noon. It’s time for your first C-ranked analysis mission.”

(
This has now inspired an extended fanfiction, _Lighting Up the Dark_ by Velorien.
)

ERDﾅ心 IN CHAINS

“How could you do it, Anita?” said Richard, his voice very tight. “How could you coauthor a paper with Jean-Claude? You
study
the undead, you don’t collaborate with them on papers!”

“And what about you?” I spat. “You coauthored a paper with Sylvie! It’s all right for
you
to be prolific but not
me?
”

“I’m the
head of her institute
,” Richard growled. I could feel the waves of science radiating off him; he was angry. “I
have
to work with Sylvie, it doesn’t mean anything! I thought our own research was special, Anita!”

“It
is,
” I said, feeling helpless about my inability to explain things to Richard. He didn’t understand the thrill of being a polymath, the new worlds that were opening up to me. “I didn’t share
our
research with anyone -”

“But you wanted to,” said Richard.

I didn’t say anything, but I knew that the look on my face said it all.

“God, Anita, you’ve changed,” said Richard. He seemed to slump in on himself. “Do you realize that the monsters are joking about Blake numbers, now? I used to be your partner in everything, and now - I’m just another werewolf with a Blake number of 1.”

THUNDERSMARTS

“I am
sick
of this!” shouted Liono. “Sick of doing this
every single week!
Our species was capable of
interstellar travel
, Panthro, I
know
the quantities of energy involved! There is no
way
you can’t build a nuke or steer an asteroid or
somehow
blow up that ever-living idiot’s pyramid!”

HE-MAN AND THE MASTERS OF RATIONALITY

“Fabulous secret knowledge was revealed to me on the day I held aloft my magic book and said:
By the power of Bayes’s Theorem!
”

FATE/SANE NIGHT

I am the core of my thoughts
Belief is my body
And choice is my blood
I have revised over a thousand judgments
Unafraid of loss
Nor aware of gain
Have withstood pain to update many times
Waiting for truth’s arrival.
This is the one uncertain path.
My whole life has been…
Unlimited Bayes Works!

THE NAME OF THE RATIONALITY

The eleven-year-old boy who would someday become legend - slayer of dragons, killer of kings - had but one thought upon his mind, as he approached the Sorting Hat to enter into the study of mysteries.

Anywhere but Ravenclaw anywhere but Ravenclaw oh please anywhere but Ravenclaw…

But no sooner the brim of the ancient felted device slipped over his forehead -

“RAVENCLAW!”

As the table decked in blue began to applaud him, as he approached the dread table where he would spend the next seven years, Kvothe was already wincing inside, waiting for the inevitable; and the inevitable happened almost at once, exactly as he had feared it, before he’d even had a chance to sit down properly.

“So!” an older boy said with the happy expression of someone who’s thought of something terribly clever. “Kvothe the Raven, huh?”

TENGEN TOPPA GURREN RATIONALITY 40K

I have a truly marvelous story for this crossover which this margin is too narrow to contain.

UTILITARIAN TWILIGHT

(Note: Written after I heard Alicorn was writing a Twilight fanfic, but before I read _Luminosity_. It’s obvious if you’re one of us.)

“Edward,” said Isabella tenderly. She reached up a hand and stroked his cold, sparkling cheek. “You don’t have to protect me from anything. I’ve listed out all the upsides and all the downsides, assigned them consistent relative weights, and it’s just really obvious that the benefits of becoming a vampire outweigh the drawbacks.”

“Bella,” Edward said, and swallowed desperately. “Bella -”

“Immortality. Perfect health. Awakening psychic powers. Easy enough to survive on animal blood once you do it. Even the beauty, Edward, there are people who would give their lives to be pretty, and don’t you dare call them shallow until you’ve tried being ugly. Do you think I’m scared of the word ‘vampire’? I’m tired of your arbitrary deontological constraints, Edward. The whole human species ought to be in on your fun, and people are dying by the thousands even as you hesitate.”

The gun in his lover’s hand was cold against his forehead. It wouldn’t kill him, but it would disable him for long enough -

JASMINE AND THE LAMP

Aladdin’s face was wistful, but determined, as the newly minted street urchin addressed the blue being of cosmic power for one last time, prepared to leave behind the wealth and hope he had so briefly tasted for the sake of his friend. “Genie, I make my third wish. I wish for you to be -”

Princess Jasmine, who had been staring at this with her mouth open, not quite believing what she was seeing, just barely managed to overcome her paralysis and yank the lamp out of the boy’s hand before he could finish the fatal sentence.

“Excuse me,” said Jasmine. “Aladdin, my darling, you’re cute but you’re an idiot, do you know that? Did you not notice how once Jafar got his hands on this lamp, he got his own three wishes - oh, never mind. Genie, I wish for everyone to always be young and healthy, I wish nobody ever had to die if they didn’t want to, and I wish for everyone’s intelligence to gradually increase at a rate of 1 IQ point per year.” She tossed the lamp back to Aladdin. “Go back to what you were doing.”

RATIONALIST HAMLET

(
contributed by Histocrat
on LiveJournal, post 13389, aka
HonoreDB
on LessWrong)
(reposted with permission)

HAMLET
Interloper, abandon this strange prank,
which makes cruel use of the blindness of my grief,
and the good heart of my good friend Horatio.
Or else, if thou hast true title to this belov’d form,
tell me:
What drawing did I present to Hamlet King,
when six years old and scarce out of my sling?

Ghost
‘twas a unicorn clad all in mail.

HAMLET
What.

Ghost
Mark me.

HAMLET
Father, I will.

Ghost
My hour is almost come,
When I to sulphurous and tormenting flames
Must render up myself.

HAMLET
Thou art in torment?

Ghost
Ay, as are all who die unshriven.

HAMLET
Like every Dane this is what I’ve been taught.
Yet I did figure such caprice ill-suited to almighty God.
For all who suffer unlook’d for deaths, unattended by God’s chosen priests,
to be then punish’d for the ill-ordering of the world…

Ghost
‘twas not the world that killed me, nor accident of any kind.

HAMLET
What?

Ghost
If thou didst ever thy dear father love,
Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.

HAMLET
Oh God.

Ghost
My time grows ever shorter. Wilt thou hear the tale?

HAMLET
No.

Ghost
What?

HAMLET
My love for you does call me to avenge your death,
but greater crimes have I heard told this night.
If all those murdered go to Hell, and others as well,
who would have confess’d had they the time,
If people who are, in balance, good, suffer grisly
at the hands of God, then I defy God’s plan.

Good Ghost, as one who dwells beyond the veil,
you know things that we mortals scarce conceive.
Tell me: is there some philter or device,
outside nature’s ken but not outside her means,
by which death itself may be escap’d?

Ghost
You seek to evade Hell?

HAMLET
I seek to deny Hell to everyone!
and Heaven too, for I suspect the Heaven of our mad God
might be a paltry thing, next to the Heaven I will make of Earth,
when I am its immortal king.

Ghost
I care not for these things.
Death and hell have stripp’d away all of my desires,
save for revenge upon my murderer.