I think you hit on a key point that several are missing—Dumbledore wouldn’t want HJEPV to have the stone any more than Quirrell (well, maybe a little more, but certainly less than nobody having it or even than handing it off to, say, some random Hufflepuff). In canon Harry didn’t just not want to use it, he didn’t want it used—that was his entire motivation for getting it. Rational Harry would, probably quite literally given enough time to think on the situation, kill to use it, and use it repeatedly. And Dumbledore knows this.
Canon Harry was, in fact, a person Dumbledore would be willing to loan the stone to if necessary. Rational Harry is not. The mirror actually represents a pretty effective screening process for who does and doesn’t fall in that category, especially combined with what in theory should have been a screening test to ensure you were a capable enough wizard to protect it and/or had the approval of several people he trusted in a more general capacity. In fact now that I say that, it suddenly seems plausible that the mirror wasn’t in any way tied to how it was hidden, and instead was just the trigger used for retrieving it. In which case, actually, a sufficiently powerful wizard with sufficient time could probably deconstruct the spell and take it by force, simply because no lock is perfect, which is why it still needed to be guarded in the first place and why stopping Quirrell was necessary.
The problem is, Dumbledore’s not going to tell Harry what the condition is for getting the stone. Why would he? He didn’t tell canon Quirrell, who was standing there trying to figure out why he couldn’t get it. He didn’t even tell canon Harry until after the fact. The mirror as a screening process works even better if the person being screened doesn’t know what it’s testing for, and thus can’t fake it.
And Harry would want to use the stone, make no mistake. The first thing he’d do with it is make himself immortal, to make sure no accident or fluke could stop him from having time to mass produce the immortality elixir. And he’d be using it for study anyways. But the most important part is that even if he is capable of precommitting and one-boxing, and even if that kind of trick fools the mirror, he’d first need to know that that was the condition necessary to obtain the stone. And you can probably count the number of people Dumbledore trusts with that information on one hand.
But the most important part is that even if he is capable of precommitting and one-boxing, and even if that kind of trick fools the mirror, he’d first need to know that that was the condition necessary to obtain the stone.
Given the author, Harry could also be told after getting the stone that he could only get it if he would not use it, and therefore he would not use it. And he’s already been cautioned against magical paradoxes.
Ok. Valid point. But after trying at a few minutes Harry might be able to understand Dumbledore enough to realize what the trick is. On the other hand, that might take far more empathy for the viewpoints of others than Harry generally has.
This begs the question, if Harry figure out the secret of the mirror, would he be able to construct an Occlumency proxy personality who didn’t want the stone?
Of course there is no answer to this question except “Whatever the author decides.”
The problem with Occlumency proxy personalities is that you have to be very careful, otherwise you’re subject to Amnesiac Dissonance. The smarter the proxy personality, the worse a problem this is.
I think you hit on a key point that several are missing—Dumbledore wouldn’t want HJEPV to have the stone any more than Quirrell (well, maybe a little more, but certainly less than nobody having it or even than handing it off to, say, some random Hufflepuff). In canon Harry didn’t just not want to use it, he didn’t want it used—that was his entire motivation for getting it. Rational Harry would, probably quite literally given enough time to think on the situation, kill to use it, and use it repeatedly. And Dumbledore knows this.
Canon Harry was, in fact, a person Dumbledore would be willing to loan the stone to if necessary. Rational Harry is not. The mirror actually represents a pretty effective screening process for who does and doesn’t fall in that category, especially combined with what in theory should have been a screening test to ensure you were a capable enough wizard to protect it and/or had the approval of several people he trusted in a more general capacity. In fact now that I say that, it suddenly seems plausible that the mirror wasn’t in any way tied to how it was hidden, and instead was just the trigger used for retrieving it. In which case, actually, a sufficiently powerful wizard with sufficient time could probably deconstruct the spell and take it by force, simply because no lock is perfect, which is why it still needed to be guarded in the first place and why stopping Quirrell was necessary.
Loophole: Harry doesn’t want to use the stone, he wants to reverse engineer it, and mass produce more. So he can easily commit to not using the stone.
The problem is, Dumbledore’s not going to tell Harry what the condition is for getting the stone. Why would he? He didn’t tell canon Quirrell, who was standing there trying to figure out why he couldn’t get it. He didn’t even tell canon Harry until after the fact. The mirror as a screening process works even better if the person being screened doesn’t know what it’s testing for, and thus can’t fake it.
And Harry would want to use the stone, make no mistake. The first thing he’d do with it is make himself immortal, to make sure no accident or fluke could stop him from having time to mass produce the immortality elixir. And he’d be using it for study anyways. But the most important part is that even if he is capable of precommitting and one-boxing, and even if that kind of trick fools the mirror, he’d first need to know that that was the condition necessary to obtain the stone. And you can probably count the number of people Dumbledore trusts with that information on one hand.
Given the author, Harry could also be told after getting the stone that he could only get it if he would not use it, and therefore he would not use it. And he’s already been cautioned against magical paradoxes.
Ok. Valid point. But after trying at a few minutes Harry might be able to understand Dumbledore enough to realize what the trick is. On the other hand, that might take far more empathy for the viewpoints of others than Harry generally has.
This begs the question, if Harry figure out the secret of the mirror, would he be able to construct an Occlumency proxy personality who didn’t want the stone?
Of course there is no answer to this question except “Whatever the author decides.”
The problem with Occlumency proxy personalities is that you have to be very careful, otherwise you’re subject to Amnesiac Dissonance. The smarter the proxy personality, the worse a problem this is.