Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality

journal. Everyone knew that...

THE VILLAGE HIDDEN IN THE CLARITY

'Consider the computational power required to manifest over a hundred shadow clones,' the Uchiha genius said in his dispassionate tones. 'It is an error of rationality, Sakura, to say 'fluke' and think you have explained anything. 'Fluke' is simply the name one gives to data that one is ignoring.'

'But it has to be a fluke!' Sakura yelled. With effort, she calmed her voice into the careful precision expected of a rationality ninja; it wouldn't do to have her crush think she was stupid. 'Like you said, the computational power required to use over a hundred Kage Bunshin is simply absurd. We're talking the level of a major superintelligence. Naruto's the dead last of our class. He's not even jounin-level smart, let alone a superintelligence!'

The Uchiha's eyes gleamed, almost as though he had activated his Smartingan. 'Naruto can manifest a hundred independently acting clones. He must have the raw brainpower. But, under ordinary circumstances, something prevents him from using this computational power efficiently... like a mind at war within itself, perhaps? We now have cause to believe that Naruto is in some way connected to a superintelligence, and as a recently graduated genin, he, like us, is fifteen years old. What happened fifteen years ago, Sakura?'

It took a moment for Sakura to comprehend, to remember, and then she understood.

The attack of the Nine-Brains Demon Fox.

Just a small bone-white creature with big ears and bigger tail and beady red eyes. It was no stronger than an ordinary fox, it didn't breathe fire or flash laser eyes, it possessed no chakra and no magic of any kind, but its intelligence was over nine thousand times that of a human being.

Hundreds had been killed, half the buildings wrecked, almost the whole village of Beisugakure had been destroyed.

'You think the Kyubey is hiding inside Naruto?' Sakura said. A moment later, her brain automatically went on to fill in the obvious implications of the theory. 'And the software conflict between their existences is why he acts like a gibbering idiot half the time, but can control a hundred Kage Bunshin. Huh. That makes... a lot of sense... actually...'

Sasuke gave her the brief, contemptuous nod of someone who had figured all this out on his own, without anyone else needing to prompt him.

'Ano...' said Sakura. Only years of sanity exercises channeled her complete screaming panic into pragmatically useful policy options. 'Shouldn't we... tell someone about this? Like, sometime in the next five seconds?'

'The adults already know,' Sasuke said emotionlessly. 'It is the obvious explanation for their treatment of Naruto. No, the real question is how this fits into the outwitting of the Uchiha...'

'I don't see how it fits at all -' began Sakura.

'It must fit!' A tinge of frantic emotion flickered in Sasuke's voice. 'I asked that man why he did it, and he told me that when I knew the answer to that, it would explain everything! Surely this must also be part of what is to be explained!'

Sakura sighed to herself. Her personal hypothesis was that Itachi had just been trying to drive his brother into clinical paranoia.

'Yo, kids,' said the voice of their rationality sensei from their radio earpieces. 'There's a village in Wave trying to build a bridge, and it keeps falling down for no reason anyone can figure out. Meet up at the gates at noon. It's time for your first C-ranked analysis mission.'

ERDOS IN CHAINS

'How could you do it, Anita?' said Richard, his voice very tight. 'How could you coauthor a paper with Jean- Claude? You study the undead, you don't collaborate with them on papers!'

'And what about you?' I spat. 'You coauthored a paper with Sylvie! It's all right for you to be prolific but not me?'

'I'm the head of her institute,' Richard growled. I could feel the waves of science radiating off him; he was angry. 'I have to work with Sylvie, it doesn't mean anything! I thought our own research was special, Anita!'

'It is,' I said, feeling helpless about my inability to explain things to Richard. He didn't understand the thrill of being a polymath, the new worlds that were opening up to me. 'I didn't share our research with anyone -'

'But you wanted to,' said Richard.

I didn't say anything, but I knew that the look on my face said it all.

'God, Anita, you've changed,' said Richard. He seemed to slump in on himself. 'Do you realize that the monsters are joking about Blake numbers, now? I used to be your partner in everything, and now - I'm just another werewolf with a Blake number of 1.'

THUNDERSMARTS

'I am sick of this!' shouted Liono. 'Sick of doing this every single week! Our species was capable of interstellar travel, Panthro, I know the quantities of energy involved! There is no way you can't build a nuke or steer an asteroid or somehow blow up that ever-living idiot's pyramid!'

HE-MAN AND THE MASTERS OF RATIONALITY

'Fabulous secret knowledge was revealed to me on the day I held aloft my magic book and said: By the power of Bayes's Theorem!'

FATE/SANE NIGHT

I am the core of my thoughts

Belief is my body

And choice is my blood

I have revised over a thousand judgments

Unafraid of loss

Nor aware of gain

Have withstood pain to update many times

Waiting for truth's arrival.

This is the one uncertain path.

My whole life has been...

Unlimited Bayes Works!

THE NAME OF THE RATIONALITY