Time-turning (Was: World Building And The Potterverse)

[Zara]

No: HPFGUIDX 167421

> Magpie:
> Since we experience time in a linear way, isn't there an unknown 
> pocket here? What happened in that pocket of time after Harry #1 
met 
> the Dementors, but before Harry#1 became Harry #2 and saved 
himself? 
> We don't see that pocket of time in JKR's narrative stream, but 
> wouldn't it exist? (And why should the alternate versions of the 
> characters conveniently go away when they're finished?) How did 
> Harry #1 go on to become Harry #2 without the help of Harry #2 who 
> did not yet exist? 

zgirnius:
Assuming the 'time happens once and the past cannot be changed' 
paradigm of time-travel in the Potterverse:

Harrys #1 and #2 were both physically present in the scene in 
question the first, and only, time it actually happened. Harry #2 was 
already present back when he rescued Bucky, which was before Harry #1 
ever met a Dementor.

Harry #2 popped into being, always, though we were not shown it, in 
the hospital wing at the precise time Harry #1 was about to leave the 
castle to go see Hagrid. Harry #2 then had the string of adventures 
described in the books, which had already been described to us by 
Harry #1, including the rescue of Bucky, which is why Harry #1 heard 
Hagrid's cry of glee and heard the headsman cut the pumpkin. Of 
course, Harry #1 *thought* he was hearing a cry of grief and a 
decapitation, but this is hardly the first time Harry has been 
mislead by appearances.

Harry #1, to an outside observer, disappeared with Hermione after 
they had their little talk with Dumbledore. (Of course, this was 
because he went back in time at that point).

The events recounted by Harrys #1 and #2 in the books, though 
recounted in order because that's how the author wrote them and how 
Harry subjectively lived them, occured *simultaneously*. And were the 
*exact same events*, simply described from different points of view.

There was no 'before Harry 1 became Harry 2' with the Dementors, 
because Harry 1 became Harry 2 before Harry 1 ever left the castle.

It's not what Harry sees or does not see that determines whether the 
past can be changed. It cannot be changed, period. If Bucky had been 
killed, he could not be rescued, according to this theory. We don't 
know for sure that he was always rescued, since we were not shown 
that scene by the narrator, but if I am assuming the correct paradigm 
of time travel, then he was not killed. I believe Dumbledore's 
cryptic remark about saving not one but two innocent lives, indicates 
Bucky always got away and is a clue that this is the right paradigm, 
in the sense that it is what Rowling intended.

It follows, if the paradigm is the correct one, that if someone went 
back in time to save Sirius at the MoM, nothing would change in the 
past. We know, as an objective fact, that Sirius fell through the 
Veil, so this is what happened, period. To go back with this end in 
mind would be pointless and dangerous. Sirius would still die; the 
time-traveler would be risking danger to him/herself for no possible 
gain. (While we know Sirius died, we could not say one way or the 
other whether a mysteriously 2-years-older Harry Potter also met a 
grisly end during those events, just out of our field of view. If he 
did, way back then, we would have been able to see it in OotP, if 
Rowling had only described it to us, for it would have happened 
*then*).

> Magpie:
> so then where is the moment where Harry makes his choice? 

zgirnius:
He made his choice when we saw him make it, in the hospital wing 
after Dumbledore made is suggestion. If he had made a different 
choice, Sirius would have died shortly thereafter. And the escape of 
Bucky and the rescue of Harry and Sirius (neither of which was either 
known or explained at that point) would turn out to have had a 
different explanation. Dumbledore can't always be right. <g>