Reference in Methods of Rationality.

[BlueSkySprite]

Ooh the melting ice could also be Loki! Because she is sort of a frost giant?

[Eva]

- A leaf in green, white and purple.

I'd say this is likely Amariah's Joker, Kas. He has a bayleaf tattoo she gave him.

[Alicorn]

Today Eliezer apologized for the last-minute nature of the potion (he didn't have time for a consult after his last batch of changes). He suggested that we could go over it and fix it for posterity. If anybody's got ideas on how the references could be better references, I'm thoroughly open to collecting these ideas to pass up. Eliezer may choose to ignore anything we say, of course.

[DanielH]

In that case it might be helpful to know what all the references are supposed to be now. There are some we don’t have guesses for, and others we do have guesses for but I’m fairly sure the guesses are wildly inaccurate.

[Alicorn]

I'll probably go through tomorrow and explain what they're supposed to be. I have a headache right now and if I perk up there's a party to attend.

[Kappa]

I for one am interested in the Improve the References project!

[Alicorn]

I have gone through the chapter and my commented version; let me know if I missed something, which I may easily have done.

bellflowers; the indigo petals seemed luminous in the white light of the walls, and curved inward in a way that gave the impression of a desire for privacy

So, as was painfully obvious, bellflowers are bells. Bellflowers in real life come in colors that include indigo. Most Bells do not have serious color schemes, but one who does is Juliet, and her color is indigo; so when he was trying to make the flowers colors that were not real bellflower colors I suggested making them indigo.

a glowing red hexagon

It's a Stella-wishcoin.

a leaf colored in vivid shades of white, green, and purple.

Eliezer did not consult me on this, but it's the Joker color scheme; I don't know why it's a leaf. I think Eliezer likes Sherlocks more than Jokers and allocated attention accordingly so this is the only nod to a Joker.

a bellflower and a white glittering stone

This is Twivamps (and thus, Golden) but I didn't produce the specific "white glittering stone" reference (it was there and not marked for comment when I looked at the potion draft).

a gray-flecked white feather and a bellflower

Angela. This reference made it in as I suggested it.

dribbling crushed seashell into the cauldron, while his right hand dropped in another bellflower

Shell Bell. Eliezer did this part by himself (he has read Shell Bell's sections) and I am happy with it as-is.

His hand tapped a bellflower with a strip of copper before dropping it in

Aegis. I intended to suggest the copper as an ingredient, but this isn't far off.

crushing a rose as though to squeeze the juice out of it, still using his bare fist.

The rose is Rose. Originally I had her in a different point of the potion, but Eliezer wanted Quirrell to crush something, and Butterfly and Shell Bell were taken and Sarion not readily potionable, so I moved the rose, since at least roses are the sort of thing you can crush. Room for improvement.

a strand of what looked like unicorn hair

Clarity. I suppose it could be clearer (ha ha) if it were green, since it's already been established that HPMOR unicorns come in colors.

a pinch of golden hair

The "bright hair" thing is strictly etymological; I told Eliezer that Sherlocks are by and large brunettes. So this is nothing in particular.

a loose thread of gold wrapped around a pinch of foul-looking substance

Eliezer had specific tonal desiderata for this ingredient, but I did my best to make it refer to Chelseas, who tend to be blonde.

dropped a pale beige-pink twig into the cauldron, and its color changed to white just as it touched the surface.

The desideratum for this one was that it involve a change of appearance. I made several suggestions; this is modified from one (I thought the potion itself should change color) but is derived from Twivamp turning change-of-appearance.

dropped two bellflowers at once into the potion, and they seemed to merge as they touched the bubbling liquid

This was not marked for comment. I don't know what it is unless he's equivocating on how many Bells he wanted to count as part of the potion and it's one of the fork-and-merges.

dipped a bellflower into a jar of liquid labeled with the Potions symbol for rainwater.

Stormy. Not precisely what I suggested but just fine.

Another lock of bright hair, seeming white but not with age, was gently dribbled into the cauldron

Was not marked for comment in the original copy I got; I gave him some Sherlock references to put wherever he wanted and as far as I can tell he didn't use any. He mentioned that he "presumably" meant to refer to a vampire but obviously none of the vampire Sherlocks have white hair.

another bellflower into the potion, accompanied by a plant-shape like a tiny cross

Not marked for comment, I have as much idea as you do.

dropped a bellflower and a scrap of parchment into the cauldron.

Generic.

blew on the potion as though to cool it, though the fire still burned under the cauldron; then added a pinch of dirt and a drop of water and a bellflower

Chi; made it in as I suggested.

a chip of ice, slowly melting as it touched the surface froth

This was supposed to be the White Witch, actually, because it was supposed to signify the decline of something evil, but as people have pointed out ice could be lots of things.

what looked like a white-grey rubber band and held it over the cauldron; as the rubber was held within the steam, it turned black.

He ignored a significant amount of my suggestion here; he wanted something symbolizing someone mostly good turning evil. I proposed Stevens, who may morally deteriorate if not rescued; the rubber band is a reference to Nathaniel's rubber band ball hobby (even though he in particular has not undergone this deterioration) and it was supposed to then turn transparent (c.f. Voice's unwillingness to be seen). Needs improvement.

A pinch of red-brown dust

Mars; Opportunity.

mallet made an unusually loud thud as it crushed white butterfly wings, mixing them with another bellflower

Butterfly.

struck a bellflower and then a different pale flower with two more thuds.

Katie. Could stand to be clearer.

turned up the fire

Kiri. Possibly too subtle.

casually chopped a small worm into bits

This was marked for comment, but Eliezer didn't take either of my suggestions, so this is currently a non-reference. The handling of the ingredient should indicate casual slaughter of something.

delicately peeled bits and small strips from a chunk of candle-wax

He wanted a metaphor for dawning understanding and required the peeling motion for some reason, so I said any alethiometer symbol would work and suggested candle wax. Could stand to be clearer.

sifting grass clippings into the cauldron, bit by bit

"Hi! We're grass! Hi! Hi! Hi! We're grass! Hi!"

a tuft of horsehair

Silver Streak. The only "lock of bright hair" that makes sense.

gently crumbled one of the last bellflowers together with a strand of long blonde hair and then dropped it into the potion

Rapunzel. I don't know why he's crumbling it.

He picked up a jar of what looked like dragon scales.

Nika.

dropper of mint oil

He wanted a "dawning realization" thing with the drip by drip part; mint oil refers to Phaeton!Bell's lie detection spell, which called for it as an ingredient.

a burst of glowing bubbles

I could not begin to tell you.

[Kappa]

The burst of glowing bubbles seems like a reasonable potential Linya reference; that was what came into my mind when I read it. If the bubbles were blue and turquoise that would strengthen that connection.

If I wanted to make Sarion a potion ingredient I would probably use a bellflower with a small ribbon tied around it.

If I wanted to generically reference Jokers in a potion ingredient, I would make it a playing card (not necessarily specified as a joker), or something green and purple, or something red and black and white (although those are also Luminosity-themed colours so that could be a confounding factor), or I'd think about it more and come up with something else (especially if I knew other desiderata for the reference). But a green-and-purple-and-white leaf passes muster, especially if Eliezer doesn't like Jokers.

Pondering the candle-wax and the casually slaughtered worm and the rubber band. Nothing brilliant springs to mind immediately.

[DanielH]

Dawning realization + peeling to me means that something is hidden, and you slowly peel away whatever’s hiding the inner part. This thematically would fit with Angela’s dawning realizations that Jovah is not a god, but I don’t know how to turn that into potion ingrediants. Another possibility includes trying to turn it into a pun about pealing, where a Bell is learning about the multiverse and the rest of the group. This doesn’t fit with the kind of realization necessary, though, and I don’t know how to turn it into a potion ingredient.

If I wanted to turn Sarion into an ingredient, I’d take a bellflower and pull the inward-curving leaves outward (thus removing the privacy implications) while crushing it.

I’d try to make the moral deterioration either a Gotham!Joker reference, or a Sunnyvamp reference. Neither seems to work particularly well thematically, though.

Casual slaughter, as an action in HPMoR, doesn’t have to match up with casual slaughter in Effulgence. I’m thinking of burning something alive with a match, as a reference to torching.

[BlueSkySprite]

For the rose being crushed: it could more clearly be about her if it was glowing sky blue, or just sky blue, like her coin color. It would also be more clearly magical because roses don't come in that color. It could be surrounded in a shield or circle of thorns he needs to break through or remove, like the thorns around her mindscape.

For the mostly good turning evil: perhaps a rubber band turning into a spider (maybe specifically a black widow?), because an evil Steven is the serial killer the Spider. Maybe it wriggles and tries to bite or attack before it is dropped into the potion and vanishes? Or if that wouldn't make sense for the potion (as an effect of the steam, turning black or transparent seems more plausible than turning into a spider) Maybe a light brown bird feather that curls up and blackens like it's being burnt? Like one from his daemon. Or maybe a rubber band or something else shrinks away from wherever Quirrell is touching it (because Voice is unwilling to be touched) and grows poisonous spikes or something similar.

For Clarity, I agree it would be more clearly her if they green. Since her hair is two shades of green, maybe it could be described as two harmonious shades of green, because she wields an Element of Harmony.

To represent a Sunshine vampire, which is the only kind Sherlocks are, he could have Quirrell remove a hair from a darkened container and describe it as burning where the light from the potion touched it. But the that might not go as well with reminding Harry that time is passing.

For the ice: maybe if it were described as sharp, serrated, or jagged, to make it seem more clearly evil and not something else.

For Katie: it would maybe be clearer if the different flower were described as having wing-like petals. If it wouldn't work to have Quirrell crushing two ingredients with wings so close together, maybe it could be described as bright orange, like she likes her hair to be?

To make Kiri's less subtle, he could add a bellflower at the same time, to make it clear that this is a Bell that the action is related to?

The candle wax might more clearly be about dawning understanding if a different color or texture of wax was revealed in the chunk he peels the strips from.

I agree with DH about how I would add a Sarion flower, although I would suggest using a dragon scale or another dragon-related potions ingredient to do it, to more clearly reference how it is done.