this post was submitted on 24 Jul 2023
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Harry Potter
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The internet is the term for all of these objects. So I say it is a single object.
"The internet has revolutionised our lives"
If we can speak of it as a singular thing -- and we do -- then I argue I can treat it as such.
My phone, my laptop, my smart speaker, my stove, etc. just like tens of millions of other similar devices out there can all connect to the internet. Many of them have the ability to connect physically through cables. That doesn’t suddenly make them all one big device.
See, I was just going to let this go, but you've annoyed me now so I am going to argue this until you give in.
Your laptop is made up of dozens of sub devices -- a hard drive (solid state or scsi, I don't know and I don't care), a video card, a mother board, a network card, a keyboard with around 92 keys on it, a membrane to interface to all of those keys to the motherboard, a bios chip and a boatload of other things.
And yet you treat it as a single device because they all fit together to work together as one device.
Now -- if I were to make your laptop my horcrux then, okay, that would be weird, because I would be giving you complete control over a part of my soul. But lets set that aside and focus on the real issue.
I would be planting my horcrux in the laptop which is made up of dozens of subdevices and yet most people consider a laptop to be a single device.
Same with a TV, or a mobile phone, or a computer monitor, or a mouse, or a living being.
We saw Slytherin's Locket -- that was clearly two bits of metal attached by a hinge. Three separate bits of metal attached together. On a chain. Which was made up of dozens of sublinks. How is that different from the internet, really?
The Diadem of Ravenclaw was even more ornate and complicated, from what I recall.
The internet, as a concept, is a single entity. Just because it has a lot of working parts, doesn't mean you can't view it as a single entity
That's my argument and I am sticking to it.
Completely wrong. I can’t place a phone call on my stove, just as I can’t cook dinner on my smart speaker or browse the internet on my WiFi-enabled ceiling fan. They are all very different types of devices that serve very different purposes. The fact that they all share a standard communication protocol doesn’t suddenly mean they’re the same.
Wrong again. First of all, the internet isn’t a concept but a reality. And the reality is that it’s made up of millions of different networks that do nothing more than share data in a common format among one another.
Here’s a perfect example. Back in 1999 as an April Fools joke a proposal was made to support the transmission of internet traffic over “avian carrier”. In short it described sending & receiving internet traffic via carrier pigeons. In 2001 a Linux user group in Norway teamed up with a group of carrier pigeon enthusiasts and actually implemented the protocol, sending a handful of packets of data over a distance of a few kilometers.
By your logic, carrier pigeons are a part of this one global device because they have been used to transmit internet data.
Your argument about calling someone from your stove is entirely pointless, because you can't use your hard-drive as a network card. But that doesn't make it any less useful as a network card. You also can't cook tea on your laptop (I am guessing) but that doesn't make it any less useful as a laptop.
The laptop is still a collection of functioning devices that make up a larger whole. You can take one out and put it in another device, and both devices (both laptops) will still function just as well.
The internet is made up of lots of little functioning devices, all of which are interchangeable, but it can still be viewed as one large thing.
And hey -- the wider the internet becomes, the harder it is to destroy Horcrux Number 3, so you don't see me complaining.
I propose an end to the argument here stating that the lore isn't clear on whether a collection of objects can be simultaneously made into a single Horcrx.
I entirely agree.
However it was a lot of fun, so thank you :)