Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality

What Hacker News says

1. dvdkonSep 2026
   > There are murders so why make it illegal.....

   The downsides of murder clearly outweigh the upsides. The fact that we're debating here shows that's not the case for copyright.

   > ...somebody having the rights to a cartoon mouse in perpetuity isn't actually holding society back is it?

   People want to adapt that mouse into their own works, as they have done with stories since stories started being told. They do so even if they know they're breaking the law. That alone should be reason to reconsider copyright.

   We all stand on the shoulders of giants, and reusing facets of modern stories isn't somehow less creative than reusing old stories or reusing lived experiences. You can take the general story beats of a popular work, strip out all copyrightable elements, and end up with something wholly derivative. You can also build on a known work and end up with something that's fresh, creative, maybe something that engages readers/watchers/listeners of the base work in a way that nothing fully original could. Take Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality; it clearly reuses another work's characters and setting, but it would be worse off without it.

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2. HDThoreaunSep 2026
   As far as manifestos go HPMOR is a pretty good one. I think that’s what a lot of the critiques about it miss. Yudkowsky is actually a pretty decent writer, especially in the fan fic scene. Not only is his prose actually acceptable which is pretty rare in fanfic it’s clear that he actually thought through a lot of the plot points ahead of time. Harry Potter universe fits very well for his story not only because it’s popular with the target audience, but because there’s a ton of unexplored authority figures in the original and the main goal of the manifesto largely boils down to rejecting blind belief in authority and blazing your own trail. I think it’s hard to separate the number of people who read it because it’s legitimately the best Harry Potter fanfic from the people who read it for the manifesto stuff which again points to the ingenuity of choosing it as a setting.
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3. elendilmSep 2026
   I remember reading back in 2014 (IIRC) Yudkowsky's explanation of the Bayes theorem. It was genuinely good. Some sort of first principles introduction.

   HPMOR was entertaining as well. Death as the last enemy to be destroyed placed his priorities where his mouth is.

   For a brief time back then I used to visit Lesswrong and many comments including Yudkowsky's were plain stupid (which was not hard to reason at all) but coming from folks who valued themselves as first principles thinkers was an oxymoron.

   But his timeless equations (IIRC), Bayes theorem explanation and HPMOR were all remarkable and I will always appreciate those works.

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4. furyofantaresSep 2026
   Is it strange that I

   1) Have no interest in Harry Potter (wasn't able to get through the first book, and maybe saw two of the movies)

   2) Have disdain for most of what I see from both rationalists and EAs

   3) Thoroughly enjoyed HPMOR

   I thought it was kind of like The Martian, but long

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5. bananaflagAug 2026
   HPMOR is one of those fanfics which make you feel a strong connection to the author, he really poured his soul into it ("rare vitamins" as he put it [1]), the good and the bad, kinda the exception that proves the rule. Probably this is why it was so successful.

   [1] https://hpmor.com/notes/progress-14-05-01/

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6. rationalistMay 2026
   Somewhat lesser-known sci-fi novels I read in the past:

   The Unincorporated Man (and three sequels)

   Cross between science fiction and fantasy: Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality ("HPMOR") - the premise is that Harry Potter is raised by a good aunt and uncle, and is taught the Scientific Method and so he uses that when encountering magic.

   Old Man's War (and sequels) by John Scalzi

   Redshirts by John Scalzi

   Science-reality: Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!

   Ra by qntm

   There is no Antiemetics Division by qntm

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