Prophecies Always Come True?

[jlv230]

No: HPFGUIDX 131359

> Maybe it's because a lot of my mind still lives in the Buffyverse 
when 
> it comes to prophecies, but in HP land, do the prophecies always 
come 
> true? Or can they be thwarted?
> 
> Tamara

I have a great deal to say about this, as the philosophy of time and 
causation is one of my favourite topics (apart from Harry Potter).

It is my opinion that the 'real' prophecies in the books (like the 
ones held in the DoM) *always* *always* do come true. This is because 
I picture the predictions as if Trelawney was repeating something 
told to her by someone travelling back from the future for a just a 
moment, and this future was the future of a time in which she had 
already made the prediction. (Our language is actually quite 
inadequate to communicate things like this so I apologise for the 
lack of clarity here).

Effectively, Trelawney's prediction may be regarded as one of the 
causes that made the future turn out the way it did when she 
predicted it. The reason why this is confusing is that it constitutes 
a causal loop - the future events cause the past which caused the 
future. If the future did not turn out that way, the prediction would 
never have been made in the first place. The people who know the 
future cannot set about changing it because, to some extent, it must 
have already happened for them to know what it was in the first 
place... (I realise I sound crazy, but this is how I think things 
are.)

This, to me, ties in nicely with the time turner episode in PoA. TT!
Harry and TT!Hermione appear, apparently out of nowhere, at Hogwarts 
during that fateful evening, and cause a chain of events. It is only 
when we get to midnight that we find the 'cause' of their sudden 
appearance  - they time turned. This is also a causal loop.

There is much debate amongst modern philosophers and physicists about 
whether or not causal loops are possible, but one of the more popular 
modern theories is that if causal loops are possible, and objects may 
interact with the events of the past (like TT!Harry), they may only 
do so in a *logically* consistent way, i.e. in a way that preserves 
the already established events of the past. This is perfectly 
demonstrated by the TT episode in PoA, particularly by Harry's 
patronus, but is inconsistent with Hermione's remarks about wizards 
who have killed their past selves (which is *logically* impossible). 
But this is the wizarding world and a fictional world, so logic may 
go amiss once or twice. The point is that the actual book events are 
logically consistent. And, IMO, Hermione should learn not to believe 
everything she's read/been told by teachers - especially when the 
logic breaks down. Back to the Future this ain't.

Apart from the TT episode, my other evidence I have for thinking that 
prophecies must come true is that Dumbledore says that Lord Voldemort 
was not trying to 'thwart' the prophecy when he went to kill Harry; 
instead he thought he was fulfiling its terms. In fact, he *did* 
fulfil its terms, but not in the way he was expecting. and so I 
conclude that the real magic of the prophecy is the way it is worded 
so it shapes events in just the right way to make itself come about, 
but without giving the whole plot away. And this magic is performed 
by Jo Rowling, not by a wizard. And, for the record, it is her that I 
picture whispering in Sybil's ear.

I hope this makes sense!
JLV xx