OK. was the whole thing with the soup? I think it can only be one of two things:
1) A shout-out/reference to another piece of fiction. HPMOR does this a lot, and I would not be surprised if this was yet another one of those. I do not recognise what piece of fiction it is referencing though. Can I get confirmation from anyone on if they recognise it from anywhere?
2) Otherwise, it must be important to the story. Remember, HPMOR is a rationalist story. There there are not meant to be red herrings. You are supposed to be able to figure it out. So, if this is the case, how has this got to do with the events of the story. Perhaps some weird time travel thing? I do not know. I notice I am confused.
Not all solvable problems are puzzles. Real world contains solvable problems, and it’s more useful for one’s calibration to consider real-world-like problems. I would expect a rationalist story to include some red herrings, because they exist in the real world and people normally underestimate their probability.
Or intended to highlight the ‘pressure of Time’ on Trelawney—she’s about to finish giving birth to a prophecy in a few minute and might be a little more distracted & clumsy than usual.
OK. was the whole thing with the soup? I think it can only be one of two things:
1) A shout-out/reference to another piece of fiction. HPMOR does this a lot, and I would not be surprised if this was yet another one of those. I do not recognise what piece of fiction it is referencing though. Can I get confirmation from anyone on if they recognise it from anywhere?
2) Otherwise, it must be important to the story. Remember, HPMOR is a rationalist story. There there are not meant to be red herrings. You are supposed to be able to figure it out. So, if this is the case, how has this got to do with the events of the story. Perhaps some weird time travel thing? I do not know. I notice I am confused.
I don’t quite see why. Real world contains a lot of those.
Puzzles don’t, and EY has stated that he thinks of HPMOR as a solvable problem.
Not all solvable problems are puzzles. Real world contains solvable problems, and it’s more useful for one’s calibration to consider real-world-like problems. I would expect a rationalist story to include some red herrings, because they exist in the real world and people normally underestimate their probability.
Of course, but the story has been very high on foreshadowing and low on red herrings to date, so I suspect that will continue.
It could just have been an excuse to list the professors present and note Dumbledore’s absence.
Or intended to highlight the ‘pressure of Time’ on Trelawney—she’s about to finish giving birth to a prophecy in a few minute and might be a little more distracted & clumsy than usual.
In the context of the next chapter, I assume it’s a side effect of the temporal pressure building up before Trelawney’s next prophecy.