Old people, & people immersed in the traditional wisdom of old cultures, believe many things that have playtested as useful beliefs over a very long period. It doesn't follow from this that no dross creeps in.
The laws of Wizarding society are, broadly speaking, insane.
There is a vast gulf between twisting or breaking a rule that makes no sense and violating the trust of a friend like Hermione.
Circumventing Horcruxes would be one option, certainly.
Harry has already thought how blindingly stupid it is that the killing curse must be cast using hate in order to work. If he were going to change anything about it I would imagine that that observation would feature.
I do wonder whether the Source of Magic, or whatever it is that determines whether a Horcrux can be made, draws a distinction between deaths in combat, deaths accidentally caused and deaths deliberately and avoidably caused.
You're correct, but I was responding to the whole statement:
I wouldn't want to rule out the possibility that Dumbledore deemed himself indispensable >and his soul's contiguousness dispensable to the war effort.
If our dear Headmaster murdered Narcissa because he thought his continued availability to Magical Britain was more important than avoiding that kind of atrocity, or keeping his soul whole then that means that he used the murder to protect himself from death, and in this context that means that he made a Horcrux.
I hadn't previously seen any clear motive for Dumbledore to kill Narcissa. That he might have done so to help keep himself ready to defend Magical Britain at least provides a possible explanation.
Assuming that he did, in fact, do broadly what Draco said, anyhow.
Pedanterrific, I'm not conflating the two acts, merely observing that one may illuminate the other.
Wouldn't he? I though he got madder & less reliable as he shaved off more & more of his soul; less & less recognizably human, too. If it had been the case that he could make a small Horcrux later on when that decay was already advanced then it might have made a sort of sense to take a smaller fragment of himself away from the already damaged original.
No. Madam Bones said that the man she suspects Quirrell of being just disappeared (and, indeed, was the last of his family before he did so).
Granted we don't know where most of Wibble went, but 1) he had a family, and they were peeled as well, and 2) I don't think having your skin found flapping loose in your office counts as a mysterious disappearance.
I feel that I should point out that when the black mist lifts and Hermione recognizes the face of her assailant we have no reason to believe that the face she recognizes is not itself an illusion.
Since we already know that she has been obsessing about Draco, I suspect that it may even have been his face (though with the information we readers have it is obvious that H&C is not actually he), though I don't put a great weight on that suspicion.
I was under the impression that Quirrellmort's zombie-time meant that the Quirrell host-body had been lobotomized. If so, any intelligence that Voldemort can bring to bear is already native to him.
Of course, there is that comment in one of his early discussions with Harry about never being able to fully disentangle the mind from the body that it wears...I'm not yet entirely sure what to think about this.
I don't think we have any direct evidence that Voldemort can step out of Quirrell without great inconvenience.
Hat and Cloak uttered that line by way of drawing attention to the reason that blood-purists have taken her for an enemy (which is relevant because H&C wants to give the appearance of courting Hermione as an ally).
As an explanation of that hatred and danger it makes sense say it no matter who H&C turns out to be.
Harry froze in place. "A spell that erases memories?"
McGonagall nodded. "But not all the effects of the experience, if you see what I'm saying, Mr. Potter."
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"Obliviation cannot be detected by any known means"
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"Miss Granger has been obsessing over Mr. Malfoy since the day that Severus... yelled at her. She has been thinking of how Mr. Malfoy might be in league with Professor Snape, how he might be planning to harm her and harm Harry - imagining it for hours every day
The reverse halo effect you describe is called the horns effect.