Invisibilty Cloaks

[Steve <bboy_mn@yahoo.com>]

No: HPFGUIDX 48964

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Susan Atherton" <suzloua at h...>
wrote:
> Hmmmm.
>
> ,,,edited,,,
> 
> If Mad Eye Moody's magical eye and the Marauder's Map can see Harry
in his Cloak, it would indicate that the Cloak is not completely
impervious. (It's been hinted in PS and CoS that Dumbledore can even
see through it, magical eye or not) So do the same old laws of physics
that bind the rest of us bind someone wearing a Cloak? If they can be
felt and touched, they obviously don't disappear, they are just
concealed. So do they cast a shadow? And if, as I suspect, they do,
why doesn't anyone notice?!
> 
> Just a thought.
> 
> Susan

bboy_mn:

Well, this is more general thoughts on Invisibility cloaks that an
direct answer to your question, but you might still find the answer
embedded in here some where.

First, to the question posed by someone, 'If it's invisible, how do
you find it?' Personally, I subscribe to the movie's theory. That the
cloak  has a visible side and an invisible side. The visible side has
either been printed with a pattern or impregnated with some color, or
possibly layer with a visible fabric. If you're going to drop it, try
 to drop it with the visible side facing up, otherwise, it's going to
be real hard to find.

Others have give theories about how the cloak may absorb or bend light
to prevent you from seeing it. A thought along those lines is, if it
works by magic rather than physics, does the cloak enchant the wearer
and make him invisible, or does the cloak enchant the viewer and make
him unable to see? Just a thought. 

As far as Moodies eye, it's possible that Moodies eye picks up
infrared light spectrum allowing him to see heat, and among other
things, do a reasonably good job of seeing in the dark. So when he
sees through Harry cloak, all he may really be seeing is heat patterns. 

An alternate, is that the eye enhances Moody's psychic abilities, so
that it is in his minds eye, or inner eye, his preception rather than
in his visual eye that he sees things.

Now Dumbledore's eye, if we assume that the cloak somehow bends light,
it may cause some very almost impreceptable visual distortions in the
air. So minor that most people would never notice them. Someone as
preceptive as Dumbledore may see these and knowing that the only
person under an invisibility cloak likely to be in Hagrid's hut, is
Harry with Ron and/or Hermione.

If we assume that it is not a physical charactistic of the cloth, but
a way in which the cloth enchants the wearer or the viewer, a wise,
old, and powerful wizard like Dumbledore may not be enchanted or
fooled so easily. 

So, in summary, as with Moody, Dumbledore may not necessarily see
Harry or see through the cloak, as much as he merely preceives their
presents and general location. Clues could come from heat, sound,
slight visual distortion, gravity, foot prints on the floor, there
could be lots of tiny little clues that are missed by most people.

Nothing special here, just a few ideas that I thought I would throw in.

bboy_mn