Talk:Dark Arts
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[edit] Flight
Flight? Wouldn't that 'flight' thing just a non-verbal self-'Wigardium Leviosa', very hard to accomplish without being an advanced wizard?--Kirochi 19:32, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
- Possibly not. In Quidditch Through the Ages (real), it notes that no spell exists to make a wizard truly fly. Until Voldemort does it in Deathly Hallows, it is unheard of. - Cavalier One 22:39, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
- Oh, right (same person speaking than above, my nickname's Kirochi). But does Wingardium Leviosa work on living beings, such as Humans? Kennilworthy Whisp could just have meant that none has ever tried it on himself, let alone without a wand and non-verbally.--Kirochi
- Quidditch Through the Ages (real) lists the following methods of flying without a broom - transfiguration into a flying animal (although you lose you Human self in the process), and being an Animagus and turning into a flying animal. Wizards can perform levitation spells to hover approx. five feet off the ground, and this may be Wingardium Leviosa or a variation such as Levicorpus. To my knowledge, Wingardium Leviosa has never been used in such a fashion in the books - in Deathly Hallows, when he sees Hagrid falling, Harry tries to Summon him rather than levitate him. - Cavalier One 22:38, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
- Oh, right (same person speaking than above, my nickname's Kirochi). But does Wingardium Leviosa work on living beings, such as Humans? Kennilworthy Whisp could just have meant that none has ever tried it on himself, let alone without a wand and non-verbally.--Kirochi
[edit] Antonin Dolohov's Curse
I added the curse Dolohov used in the Battle of the Department of Mysteries to the list of Dark curses. It seems to cause significant internal injury - this is the passage about Hermione's suffering of it from the last chapter of OotP:
- She winced slightly and put a hand to her ribs. The curse Dolohov had used on her, though less effective than it would have been had he been able to say the incantation aloud, had nevertheless caused, in Madam Pomfrey's words, `quite enough damage to be going on with'. Hermione was having to take ten different types of potion every day...
That implies that Hermione suffered considerable internal damage from the curse - and it was weaker than it normally would have been, if said aloud. She also seems to be suffering mild pain, even though Harry notes that she is "improving greatly". Also, when Dolohov first uses it on her:
- Dolohov grinned. With his free hand, he pointed from the prophecy still clutched in Harry's hand, to himself, then at Hermione. Though he could no longer speak, his meaning could not have been clearer: Give me the prophecy, or you get the same as her…
- "Like you won't kill us all anyway, the moment I hand it over!" said Harry.
That implies that the curse is potentially fatal. We don't see it any other time either, so I doubt it has a different, less nasty use. 24.141.37.177 17:38, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Merge with Dark Magic?
This article and Dark Magic overlap a great deal, but this one seems to be more comprehensive. I think the two should be merged, unless there is an actual difference between the two, which should be made clearer. Oread 03:51, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Did not Harry Potter and Delores Umbridge practice dark magic?
I added earlier that both did, but it was removed.
Harry Potter cast Crucio twice (once on Bellatrix Lestrange, once on Amycus Carrow) and Sectumsempra twice (once on Draco Malfoy, once on Severus Snape).
Delores Umbridge almost cast Crucio once (on Harry), released dementors on Harry in London, and had Harry write with a quill that literally drained blood from his hand and caused a scar on the back of his hand of what he was writing ("I must not tell lies").
I am fairly sure these incidents are both in the books and movies. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Nochthikus (talk • contribs).
- Yes they did. But you cannot say that the sporadic use of one or two curses over the course of one's entire life is "practising" the Dark Arts. They used it, but didn't practise them. -- Seth Cooper owl post! 02:46, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
- I agree with Seth that occasionally using Dark Magic doesn't make someone a practitioner of the Dark Arts. After all, people are only human, and they're bound to make mistakes sometimes, acting out of anger, fear, necessity, or a well-meaning but misguided desire to help. It's kind of like how Snape isn't a pure-blood supremacist because he called Lily a "Mudblood" once in a moment of vulnerability. However, while I don't think Harry's three Crucios make him a Dark wizard (the second Crucio was aimed at, and blocked by, Snape in HBP28), I'm less sure about Umbridge. Harry used Crucio in anger, and Imperio out of necessity, but Umbridge used the blood quill in a much more calculated and self-serving manner. ★ Starstuff (Owl me!) 08:56, 15 August 2009 (UTC)
[edit] Logical fallacies and missing evidence
"The Dark Arts are generally regarded as corrupting those who use them." --
'Are regarded' - by whom and where? In general Fantasy literature? I don't remember anyone in HP Canon 'regarding' them as such. That they are 'addicting' and 'corrupting' seems to be Fanon invented.
"After engaging in them extensively for many years, even Tom Marvolo Riddle's appearance demonstrated his corruption — he lost his former handsomeness, eventually taking on serpentine physical qualities and red eyes" --
At the very least, this is questionable. Yes, he looked changed, and yes, he *probably* used Dark Magic, but does that necessarily have to mean that the two parts are correlated? To offer an alternate explanation, I always assumed that it were the Horcruxes he made that changed his appearance. That *assumption* would work just as well. There's no hard evidence to make *either* more than an assumption.
"Albus Dumbledore, in particular, suggested that engaging in the Dark Arts was damaging to the soul; for instance, he told Severus Snape that Draco Malfoy's soul was "not yet so damaged" that he would be capable of murder, and that if he did go through with murder, his soul would be "ripped apart"" --
He did not suggest that! He repeats what we already knew, that *killing* damages your soul, the idea behind the Horcrux magic. That has nothing to do with the Dark Arts in general!
"This suggests that using very Dark magic, such as the Killing Curse, damages an individual's soul." --
That's a logical fallacy. 'Because a is part of b, and a is x, it means that the entirety of b is x as well.' It's hasty generalisation; we don't know nearly enough Dark Arts spells and how they work to conclude that *every* use of Dark Magic damages the soul, just because one(!) particular spell does.
"Powerful Dark spells also require malicious intent in order to be successful. To cast the Cruciatus Curse, for instance, one must truly desire to cause pain in and of itself, according to Bellatrix Lestrange" --
Same here. Just because the Cruciatus curse needs the desire to cause pain to work efficiently, does not mean that every other spell needs malicious intent as well. For that matter, when Harry successfully cast the Sectumsempra on Draco, he had no actual intent at all -- because he didn't even know what the spell would do.
"Injuries caused by Dark magic never fully heal, such as George Weasley's ear after it was cut off by a Sectumsempra he was struck with during the Battle over Little Whinging" --
Etc.
In general, that article could work if it was made clear that these are all assumptions, some more likely, others less so. However, stating it as facts and absolutes ("Injuries caused by Dark magic never fully heal"), as well as using interpretations of quotes as opposed to the quotes themselves as evidence, is simply not any acceptable kind way to either present an argument or write an article for a lexicon. -- 16:03, 24 September 2009 (UTC)
