Basically the short answer is Harry used the time turner, invisibility cloak, and Quirrel to fake all of the evidence.
The long answer is, Harry waits until the end of the trial, goes back in time to the start of the trial and steals Lord Jugson’s wand out of his pocket. He then heads over to the magical law enforcement department in the Ministry which is of course around the wizengamot. Harry knows that Quirrel is probably being held there for questioning since he didn’t return to Hogwarts. Harry then steals the wand of Hermoine and Draco out of custody (or possibly heads over to St. Mungos to get Draco’s wand from him there if it is there instead) and then finds Quirrell.
Using the invisiblity cloak and the time turner Harry goes back in time further with the defense professor tampers with all the wands to fake the spells properly either by using some spell, or just brute force recasting all the spells in its history far enough back that the tampering can’t be detected. Harry then gets Fred and George to volunteer to be false memory charmed with the memory of Lord Jugson entering the Trophy room, and obliviated of the memory of volunteering. He then puppet masters it so that whichever Professor brings them to the trial shows up at exactly the right time. The defense professor returns him to the ministry, he replaces the wands of everyone involved a split second after they are taken in the first place and replaces the first Harry seconds after he goes back the first time.
Okay now some criticisms I have of my plan is that its hard to imagine why Lord Jugson wouldn’t remain disillusioned the entire time. However perhaps Fred and George could say they used their wardbreaker monocoles Dumbledore gave them which allowed them to see dislliusioned people.
Another thing is that Harry could theoretically go back in time and get Dumbledore or Snape to fake the evidence instead but I think it would be more likely for Quirrel to do it. Quirrel is probably ambivalent over whether Hermoine gets nailed or not but he would have a motivation. The first way Harry develops a deep hatred of the Ministry and wants to overthrow it as he intends. The second way Harry still develops the deep hatred of the Ministry but sees Quirrell as even more of a valuable ally/mentor. Quirrel did after all prevent Hermoine from getting killed by the wizarding world establishment which Quirrel wants to overthrow. Lord Jugson could have some alibi but thats unlikely. Stealing and replacing Lord Jugson’s wand could be tricky but certainly within Harry’s power. Same with finding and freeing Professor Quirrell.
Above all I like this plan because it ends up with the best possible ending for Harry out of any plan I’ve seen. He saves the girl, regains his friend, and vanquishes a powerful enemy. He also does in a way that doesn’t break the rest of the plot because things can go back to normal afterwards. The attacking Azkhban plan would completely destroy the rest of the in Hogwarts plots that have been set up, and freeing Hermoine on a technicality such as marrying her or trading in all of his Blood debts would still leave the magical world thinking Hermoine is a murderer and that Harry doesn’t give a shit that Hermoine is a murderer. It also has the irony of fighting fire with fire, using False memory charms to fake someone else using False memory charms.
Adding details to a story makes it seem more probable to humans (it fits together making a better story), when in fact every additional detail reduces the probability. malthrin linked this earlier, you should read: http://lesswrong.com/lw/jk/burdensome_details/
I think your scenario is a conjunction of unlikely events. I think the chance Harry will use a time turner in the solution is quite low, less than 10%, because the set up is such that he won’t have access to it until more than 6 hours have passed. I’ll give only a 50% chance that Harry will frame anyone at all, and if he does frame someone, I have no reason to believe that it will be Jugson—I’d say 50% of the time he’ll frame Dumbledore (just because it’s easy), with decreasing chances for Quirell, Snape, other professors, and finally Jugson occupies such a small bit of my probability mass here that it wouldn’t even occur to me.
Just these three items (time turner, frame, Jugson) reduce your scenario’s probability to something very small; I put 2% on predictionbook, but my true probability is probably much lower.
(ETA: I realized on a re-read that my usage of “frame” above is non-standard; I was thinking broadly of turning the blame onto someone, not just of retroactively planting evidence, to which I give a much lower probability.)
I’m sure I got many things wrong, the only thing I’m feeling pretty confident about is that Harry is going to frame someone else, and Lord Jugson looks like he has been being fattened up to be framed. The rest is just the story I came up with as most likely when figuring out how Harry could do it. I could be completely wrong, I could be right about the what and wrong about the how.
Hmm. It was foreshadowed that Harry might frame Jugson if the latter pokes him. And Jugson did come up a lot in the later chapters. I think it was Jugson that cried for Azkaban first, which could be taken as poking. “Jugson did it because Hermione bested his son, and wants to ‘replace’ Malfloy (Jugson’s is an ancient family)” sounds like something one might convince Lucius of, or at least make him highly suspicious. Sending Hermione to Azkaban would be convenient in the scenario, getting rid of a possible clue. Though if it was Jugson that asked for Azkaban, it might have been at Lucius’ bidding.
You’re right, of course, all the details make it seem likely, but there are in this thread lots of details for other conflicting possibilities, and I can’t quite see how Harry might actually do it. (All theories I’ve read don’t seem to actually work IMO.)
And I interpret Eliezer’s words as if we should be able to find at least Harry’s solution, and that the latter will work at least partially.
But Harry’s not aware that Jugson was watching in chapter 78.
I think it was Jugson that cried for Azkaban first, which could be taken as poking.
Good point, he’s described as having a scar in 78 as does the man who does the shouting in 80. However, Harry wouldn’t be able to identify him (unless he looks sufficiently like his son).
But given that, I’ll now agree that if Harry identifies Jugson, he might think of attempting a frame.
Basically the short answer is Harry used the time turner, invisibility cloak, and Quirrel to fake all of the evidence.
The long answer is, Harry waits until the end of the trial, goes back in time to the start of the trial and steals Lord Jugson’s wand out of his pocket. He then heads over to the magical law enforcement department in the Ministry which is of course around the wizengamot. Harry knows that Quirrel is probably being held there for questioning since he didn’t return to Hogwarts. Harry then steals the wand of Hermoine and Draco out of custody (or possibly heads over to St. Mungos to get Draco’s wand from him there if it is there instead) and then finds Quirrell.
Using the invisiblity cloak and the time turner Harry goes back in time further with the defense professor tampers with all the wands to fake the spells properly either by using some spell, or just brute force recasting all the spells in its history far enough back that the tampering can’t be detected. Harry then gets Fred and George to volunteer to be false memory charmed with the memory of Lord Jugson entering the Trophy room, and obliviated of the memory of volunteering. He then puppet masters it so that whichever Professor brings them to the trial shows up at exactly the right time. The defense professor returns him to the ministry, he replaces the wands of everyone involved a split second after they are taken in the first place and replaces the first Harry seconds after he goes back the first time.
Okay now some criticisms I have of my plan is that its hard to imagine why Lord Jugson wouldn’t remain disillusioned the entire time. However perhaps Fred and George could say they used their wardbreaker monocoles Dumbledore gave them which allowed them to see dislliusioned people.
Another thing is that Harry could theoretically go back in time and get Dumbledore or Snape to fake the evidence instead but I think it would be more likely for Quirrel to do it. Quirrel is probably ambivalent over whether Hermoine gets nailed or not but he would have a motivation. The first way Harry develops a deep hatred of the Ministry and wants to overthrow it as he intends. The second way Harry still develops the deep hatred of the Ministry but sees Quirrell as even more of a valuable ally/mentor. Quirrel did after all prevent Hermoine from getting killed by the wizarding world establishment which Quirrel wants to overthrow. Lord Jugson could have some alibi but thats unlikely. Stealing and replacing Lord Jugson’s wand could be tricky but certainly within Harry’s power. Same with finding and freeing Professor Quirrell.
Above all I like this plan because it ends up with the best possible ending for Harry out of any plan I’ve seen. He saves the girl, regains his friend, and vanquishes a powerful enemy. He also does in a way that doesn’t break the rest of the plot because things can go back to normal afterwards. The attacking Azkhban plan would completely destroy the rest of the in Hogwarts plots that have been set up, and freeing Hermoine on a technicality such as marrying her or trading in all of his Blood debts would still leave the magical world thinking Hermoine is a murderer and that Harry doesn’t give a shit that Hermoine is a murderer. It also has the irony of fighting fire with fire, using False memory charms to fake someone else using False memory charms.
Adding details to a story makes it seem more probable to humans (it fits together making a better story), when in fact every additional detail reduces the probability. malthrin linked this earlier, you should read: http://lesswrong.com/lw/jk/burdensome_details/
I think your scenario is a conjunction of unlikely events. I think the chance Harry will use a time turner in the solution is quite low, less than 10%, because the set up is such that he won’t have access to it until more than 6 hours have passed. I’ll give only a 50% chance that Harry will frame anyone at all, and if he does frame someone, I have no reason to believe that it will be Jugson—I’d say 50% of the time he’ll frame Dumbledore (just because it’s easy), with decreasing chances for Quirell, Snape, other professors, and finally Jugson occupies such a small bit of my probability mass here that it wouldn’t even occur to me.
Just these three items (time turner, frame, Jugson) reduce your scenario’s probability to something very small; I put 2% on predictionbook, but my true probability is probably much lower.
(ETA: I realized on a re-read that my usage of “frame” above is non-standard; I was thinking broadly of turning the blame onto someone, not just of retroactively planting evidence, to which I give a much lower probability.)
I’m sure I got many things wrong, the only thing I’m feeling pretty confident about is that Harry is going to frame someone else, and Lord Jugson looks like he has been being fattened up to be framed. The rest is just the story I came up with as most likely when figuring out how Harry could do it. I could be completely wrong, I could be right about the what and wrong about the how.
Hmm. It was foreshadowed that Harry might frame Jugson if the latter pokes him. And Jugson did come up a lot in the later chapters. I think it was Jugson that cried for Azkaban first, which could be taken as poking. “Jugson did it because Hermione bested his son, and wants to ‘replace’ Malfloy (Jugson’s is an ancient family)” sounds like something one might convince Lucius of, or at least make him highly suspicious. Sending Hermione to Azkaban would be convenient in the scenario, getting rid of a possible clue. Though if it was Jugson that asked for Azkaban, it might have been at Lucius’ bidding.
You’re right, of course, all the details make it seem likely, but there are in this thread lots of details for other conflicting possibilities, and I can’t quite see how Harry might actually do it. (All theories I’ve read don’t seem to actually work IMO.)
And I interpret Eliezer’s words as if we should be able to find at least Harry’s solution, and that the latter will work at least partially.
But Harry’s not aware that Jugson was watching in chapter 78.
Good point, he’s described as having a scar in 78 as does the man who does the shouting in 80. However, Harry wouldn’t be able to identify him (unless he looks sufficiently like his son).
But given that, I’ll now agree that if Harry identifies Jugson, he might think of attempting a frame.