R&D in the Wizard World

ftah3 ftah3 at yahoo.com
Wed Jan 16 20:01:56 UTC 2002


No: HPFGUIDX 33564


I asked:
> f> If arithmancy is straight divination per the definition above, 
why 
> f> doesn't Trelawney teach it?  And why does Hermione, who 
absolutely 
> f> poo-poo's Trelawney's class, love her arithmancy class?  
> 
> f> Not making a point; just wondering out loud.
> 
> f> Mahoney

Alexander wrote:
>   Being slightly familiar with the subject, I can suppose
> that these are two different things. Divination conveys
> knowledge that is either remote or in future (or in the
> past), but it conveys the knowledge about some events.
> Arithmancy, on the other hand, does not give such
> information. Instead, it deals with "general trends". That
> is, Arithmancy can possibly say that a ship named "Madam
> Maxime" will be unlucky and prone to sinking despite all
> efforts, but will be unable to predict if it will sink at
> all or not, where will this happen and so on.

Ah, I see the difference between Trelawney's divination and 
arithmancy.  But it makes me wonder still more at Hermione enjoying 
it.  It has going for it that it doesn't attempt to pin things down 
too narrowly, making it seem, on one hand, a bit less wishy-washy; 
yet it's still incredibly vague, and seems to be to be 
somewhat...useless.  

I guess I imagine Hermione enjoying classes with much more basis in 
concrete & reliable evidence/outcome.  Arithmancy has the concrete, 
in that you have formula = theoretical outcome.  But 
reliability...you could just as well toss the dice, and say that if 
you get snake eyes you will have a terrible accident...sometime, 
somewhere, maybe.  And it doesn't seem like the kind of thing that 
would appeal to Hermy.

But, I suppose, not one of the most earthshattering topics of 
query....  %-)

Mahoney





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