This is another case of an issue that’s supposed to be mysterious to the characters, but not to the readers. We know what actually happened: the Sorting Hat said “SLYTHERIN!” to try to scare the crap out of Harry, to make his life flash before his eyes, to make him think that his hopes and dreams were ruined, so he would get serious and vow right then and there not to become the next Dark Lord. But the Hat actually, truly meant him to go to Ravenclaw.
Harry acknowledges that this is what happened: “It had been an awfully cruel prank the Hat had played on him, but you couldn’t argue with the results on consequentialist grounds.”
No other characters know what happened, so it adds to Harry’s mystique for them, but we, who saw the whole thing from Harry’s point of view, ought to know better.
But Harry is a Slytherin. At his very core is his ambition to become immortal and reorganize the universe to his satisfaction. He wants knowledge, and he wants it for its own sake, but it’s not his deepest wish. If he looked into the Mirror of Erised he’d see himself as the benevolent and omnipotent lord of the universe, not himself surrounded by books.
Harry is wrong sometimes. From his point of view Quirrell is awesome, and engaging his Dark Side is a perfectly valid option whenever he runs into a problem hard enough (despite his vow to not become the next Dark Lord). He acts more Slytherin than Ravenclaw most of the time.
If Harry had an image of himself as belonging to Ravenclaw and not Slytherin, and the Hat told him “You deserve this too” and then yelled out “SLYTHERIN!”… and then after a few seconds of silence yelled out “Just Kidding, RAVENCLAW!”—given that Harry knows nothing about any of the major players, and has no idea how powerful Dumbledore is and his usual crazy-style of plotting—than to him the most probable explanation is likely “The hat must’ve played a cruel prank on me to teach me a lesson.”
But if he had knowledge of the politics and players in Hogwarts, didn’t have such a strong self-identity as Ravenclaw, and hadn’t had his “prank” mental network readily available due to the Hat scolding him about it just a few minutes beforehand, a neutral interpretation of the facts would’ve placed at least an equally high probability on someone meddling with his sorting, as on the Hat played its first prank in over 600 years.
Your “neutral interpretation of the facts” apparently ignores the facts that the Sorting Hat has never been self-aware before, that Harry is aware that the Hat is self-aware now, and that the Hat is borrowing a lot of knowledge and a little bit of personality from Harry’s own brain at the time of the prank.
I just fail to see how you can take an explanation that fits 100% of the known facts, and then somehow, by applying
Eliezer’s comments about how plots are better when they aren’t needlessly complicated and the point isn’t to trick the reader into wildly off-base or over-the-top-speculation
, you come up with a needlessly complicated and speculative idea that assumes the existence of secrets we have no clues about.
I don’t see how self-awareness makes any sort of difference?
Either explanation fits 100% of the known facts. Harry assumes the Hat pranked him because that’s what he wants to believe. But that Harry was actually sorted into Slytherin is considered more likely by several intelligent characters in the story. Regarding Quirrell’s belief of this, Harry even admits:
Professor Quirrell was wrong, but wrong in such a convincing way that Harry was starting to think that it simply was the rational judgment given the evidence available to Professor Quirrell. There were times, never predictable times but still sometimes, when you would get improbable evidence and the best knowable guess would be wrong.
What evidence does Harry have that Quirrell lacks? The only relevant special knowledge he has is that the Sorting Hat had some extra ability to appreciate humor at the time of his sorting, and wanted to steer him to Hufflepuff. I don’t consider that strong evidence. However it is the reason that I even allow a 50% chance that the prank really did occur, as opposed to being 80%+ certain that Harry is actually Slytherin.
And what sort of evidence did Quirrell have that Harry lacked? A knowledge of how Dumbledore works, how the various factions in the school mesh, and the history of the Sorting Hat’s lack of screwing around when it comes to the business of sorting. Harry knows all those now, but he’s already fixated on his previous answer and doesn’t want to abandon it.
We’ve been given more than just clues—we’ve been told directly by two characters that Harry is actually Slytherin, indirectly by at least one, and have Harry’s actions to judge him by. When the most intelligent and rational character in the fic considers this the simplest/most probable answer, I don’t think it’s that complicated or speculative. It may very well be a large flashing neon sign by the author saying “Hey! Consider this hypothesis! This one right here that I’ve repeated several times and pointed out how likely it seems!”
I don’t see how self-awareness makes any sort of difference?
You said:
a neutral interpretation of the facts would’ve placed at least an equally high probability on someone meddling with his sorting, as on the Hat played its first prank in over 600 years.
But you did not consider that since the Sorting Hat was sentient for the first time in its existence, it would be very likely to do other things for the first time in its existence.
The only relevant special knowledge he has is that the Sorting Hat had some extra ability to appreciate humor at the time of his sorting
Seriously? Harry knows the entirety of his conversation with the Hat, which no one else knows. In that conversation the Hat used all of Harry’s knowledge and vocabulary to try to convince him to go to Hufflepuff, Harry obstinately refused, the Hat got pissed at Harry’s obstinacy, and then, with Harry demanding to go to Ravenclaw, and the Hat admitting that only Harry’s choices can determine where he belongs, the Hat says “You deserve the scary thing I’m about to do to you” and calls out “Slytherin!” and lets Harry stew on that for eight full seconds before calling out “Ravenclaw!”
That is hardly a mere “extra ability to appreciate humor”.
the most intelligent and rational character in the fic considers this the simplest/most probable answer
Yes, he does, but he does not have all the information necessary to come to an informed conclusion. Harry does, and so do we. Harry and we are the only ones privy to his conversation with the sentient Sorting Hat.
And when thinking about the above passage on a more “meta” level, if Eliezer had intended us to have any lingering doubts about the Sorting, he would not have have flatly had our protagonist say “Professor Quirrell was wrong,” and he certainly would not have gone on to point out, in the very passage you quoted, that Quirrell did not have all the evidence available to him, so as to corroborate his statement.
I know you want this to be a mystery, but there are plenty of other mysteries in this story to wonder about that are far more deserving of your attention than this matter, which was settled many chapters ago.
I was under the impression Hogwarts was founded over a millennium ago. With a wizard’s lifespan being around 200 at most, the founders would need to have raised Hogwarts as infants for the hat to only have existed for 800 years.
You are here for the class that has been taught at Hogwarts for eight hundred years! Welcome to your first year of Battle Magic!
and
I’m the General of Sunshine, but even before that, I’m Hermione Granger of Ravenclaw, and I’m proud to be part of a House that’s eight hundred years old.
and
You told me that no one had matched the four founders of Hogwarts. So it’s been going on for at least eight centuries, then?
ETA: Oh, haha, maybe I should have just gone with
Harry winced. Hermione had been the one to explain to him about the Sorting Hat, but she certainly didn’t treat it like an irreplaceable, vitally important, 800-year-old artifact of forgotten magic that was about to perform intricate telepathy on her mind and didn’t seem to be in very good physical condition.
This is another case of an issue that’s supposed to be mysterious to the characters, but not to the readers. We know what actually happened: the Sorting Hat said “SLYTHERIN!” to try to scare the crap out of Harry, to make his life flash before his eyes, to make him think that his hopes and dreams were ruined, so he would get serious and vow right then and there not to become the next Dark Lord. But the Hat actually, truly meant him to go to Ravenclaw.
Harry acknowledges that this is what happened: “It had been an awfully cruel prank the Hat had played on him, but you couldn’t argue with the results on consequentialist grounds.”
No other characters know what happened, so it adds to Harry’s mystique for them, but we, who saw the whole thing from Harry’s point of view, ought to know better.
But Harry is a Slytherin. At his very core is his ambition to become immortal and reorganize the universe to his satisfaction. He wants knowledge, and he wants it for its own sake, but it’s not his deepest wish. If he looked into the Mirror of Erised he’d see himself as the benevolent and omnipotent lord of the universe, not himself surrounded by books.
Harry is wrong sometimes. From his point of view Quirrell is awesome, and engaging his Dark Side is a perfectly valid option whenever he runs into a problem hard enough (despite his vow to not become the next Dark Lord). He acts more Slytherin than Ravenclaw most of the time.
If Harry had an image of himself as belonging to Ravenclaw and not Slytherin, and the Hat told him “You deserve this too” and then yelled out “SLYTHERIN!”… and then after a few seconds of silence yelled out “Just Kidding, RAVENCLAW!”—given that Harry knows nothing about any of the major players, and has no idea how powerful Dumbledore is and his usual crazy-style of plotting—than to him the most probable explanation is likely “The hat must’ve played a cruel prank on me to teach me a lesson.”
But if he had knowledge of the politics and players in Hogwarts, didn’t have such a strong self-identity as Ravenclaw, and hadn’t had his “prank” mental network readily available due to the Hat scolding him about it just a few minutes beforehand, a neutral interpretation of the facts would’ve placed at least an equally high probability on someone meddling with his sorting, as on the Hat played its first prank in over 600 years.
Your “neutral interpretation of the facts” apparently ignores the facts that the Sorting Hat has never been self-aware before, that Harry is aware that the Hat is self-aware now, and that the Hat is borrowing a lot of knowledge and a little bit of personality from Harry’s own brain at the time of the prank.
I just fail to see how you can take an explanation that fits 100% of the known facts, and then somehow, by applying
, you come up with a needlessly complicated and speculative idea that assumes the existence of secrets we have no clues about.
I don’t see how self-awareness makes any sort of difference?
Either explanation fits 100% of the known facts. Harry assumes the Hat pranked him because that’s what he wants to believe. But that Harry was actually sorted into Slytherin is considered more likely by several intelligent characters in the story. Regarding Quirrell’s belief of this, Harry even admits:
What evidence does Harry have that Quirrell lacks? The only relevant special knowledge he has is that the Sorting Hat had some extra ability to appreciate humor at the time of his sorting, and wanted to steer him to Hufflepuff. I don’t consider that strong evidence. However it is the reason that I even allow a 50% chance that the prank really did occur, as opposed to being 80%+ certain that Harry is actually Slytherin.
And what sort of evidence did Quirrell have that Harry lacked? A knowledge of how Dumbledore works, how the various factions in the school mesh, and the history of the Sorting Hat’s lack of screwing around when it comes to the business of sorting. Harry knows all those now, but he’s already fixated on his previous answer and doesn’t want to abandon it.
We’ve been given more than just clues—we’ve been told directly by two characters that Harry is actually Slytherin, indirectly by at least one, and have Harry’s actions to judge him by. When the most intelligent and rational character in the fic considers this the simplest/most probable answer, I don’t think it’s that complicated or speculative. It may very well be a large flashing neon sign by the author saying “Hey! Consider this hypothesis! This one right here that I’ve repeated several times and pointed out how likely it seems!”
You said:
But you did not consider that since the Sorting Hat was sentient for the first time in its existence, it would be very likely to do other things for the first time in its existence.
Seriously? Harry knows the entirety of his conversation with the Hat, which no one else knows. In that conversation the Hat used all of Harry’s knowledge and vocabulary to try to convince him to go to Hufflepuff, Harry obstinately refused, the Hat got pissed at Harry’s obstinacy, and then, with Harry demanding to go to Ravenclaw, and the Hat admitting that only Harry’s choices can determine where he belongs, the Hat says “You deserve the scary thing I’m about to do to you” and calls out “Slytherin!” and lets Harry stew on that for eight full seconds before calling out “Ravenclaw!”
That is hardly a mere “extra ability to appreciate humor”.
Yes, he does, but he does not have all the information necessary to come to an informed conclusion. Harry does, and so do we. Harry and we are the only ones privy to his conversation with the sentient Sorting Hat.
And when thinking about the above passage on a more “meta” level, if Eliezer had intended us to have any lingering doubts about the Sorting, he would not have have flatly had our protagonist say “Professor Quirrell was wrong,” and he certainly would not have gone on to point out, in the very passage you quoted, that Quirrell did not have all the evidence available to him, so as to corroborate his statement.
I know you want this to be a mystery, but there are plenty of other mysteries in this story to wonder about that are far more deserving of your attention than this matter, which was settled many chapters ago.
I wonder, what was its last prank?
The actual quote is 800 years, which is how long the Hat’s existed.
I was under the impression Hogwarts was founded over a millennium ago. With a wizard’s lifespan being around 200 at most, the founders would need to have raised Hogwarts as infants for the hat to only have existed for 800 years.
and
and
ETA: Oh, haha, maybe I should have just gone with