The decline in science.

Does science have a future? I ask because science is in decline - the young simply aren't studying it anymore.

I have seen three different studies of scientific decline in the UK recently.

One piece of evidence was the number of A level students (equivalent to part of a college degree in America), studying Physics. In 1985 there were about 46,000 A level Physics students in the UK, by 2005 that number had declined to 28,000.

Another item of data is comparative statistics for O level (an exam no longer taken in the mainland UK, though still popular overseas) and GCSE physics. At its height, there were FOUR times as many O level Physics candidates as there were GCSE (a weaker replacement exam of much lower standard) Physics students in the UK in 2006. Thus, if we think of the educational process as a funnel, there were four times fewer people entering that funnel for the physical sciences in 2006, than there were in the 1980's. That is a huge loss in scientific potential and understanding.

The final piece of evidence comes from data on the relative decline in doctoral science degrees in the UK. Over the last ten years, the proportion of doctoral degrees (PhD and the like) that were in science has declined from 65% to 59% of the degrees. This occurred against a backdrop increase of 79% in doctoral degrees, in general, in the UK in the same period. Physics, Chemistry, Engineering and Technology degrees were all affected by this decline.

I found these three pieces of evidence very disturbing. You see, they indicate a decline in interest in pursuing science at all levels and ages of the educational system in the UK. I have detailed figures for the UK, but the UK is not the only country facing challenges in this area: I have read of complaints of similar problems in the US. No doubt, other developed nations face similar issues. Quite simply, the enlightenment that science brings will soon be no more. A new darkness of ignorance threatens the happy future so many envisage for our civilization.

Think about this. In the UK, there is only a quarter of the former levels of people receiving an education in Physics, at O level. That means that almost all those who would once have come to understand the basic workings of the world, now no longer do so. They study other things instead: perhaps "mass communications" and the like. These non-science students, become adults who do not understand how the world works. They do not value or respect science. They will not understand it and may not support it. They cannot make scientifically informed decisions about what is meaningful in the things they are told. In all, it means that science will become ever more marginalized - both science and scientists, seen as something unnecessary, "uncool" and perhaps even undesirable. The fact that science underpins the entire edifice of modern civilization will be overlooked by most of them.

The big problem with declines in understanding of science at the population level - as this is - is that it denudes the future generations not only of scientists, but of science teachers. Fewer people will be equipped to prepare future generations of scientific thinkers - and so fewer children will get the opportunity to be taught science by those who understand it - and so it goes on, in a self-pertuating cycle. Each generation threatens to become more ignorant than the one before it.

At first, the effects may be unnoticeable, because not so long ago, it was difficult for every scientist who wanted to work in science, to do so: there was too much competition for jobs. Well, that competition will diminish. Yet, there will still be people, at first, to fill the jobs. They may, however, be of lesser quality (since the pool from which they are drawn is now four times smaller). The quality of their output may not match their predecessors. Science as a discipline will begin to decline.

In just two decades, the UK has shown a four fold decline in basic physical science education. That is a trend that very quickly leads to complete ignorance, should it continue. What is even more telling about this is that there once were four times as many students taking a MUCH MORE DIFFICULT Physics exam (which the O level is, compared to the GCSE). So, not only is there a decline in numbers, but there is a decline in standard of knowledge, too. How is it that just a generation ago, four times as many students met a more difficult scientific challenge than today's children are meeting? It is all very worrying.

I am surprised that so little is being done about this, by the UK government. I see no concerted effort to reverse this trend. What they appear to be oblivious to is that what is being lost is the very expertise needed to support a technological civilization. The older, scientifically educated generation will retire and die - and in their place, there will be a much smaller generation of scientifically educated Britons. Will they be enough to sustain the UK's technological base? Perhaps not...so Britain will import Indians and Chinese - just like the Americans are doing. Yet, that is no solution, for there are only so many of those to go around - and they have many other nations enticing them, too.

Science is dying, in the UK. I do not say this lightly or without justification. I draw your attention to one other fact. In the last 8 years, 30% of Britain's Universities have closed their Physics departments, owing to a lack of students and consequent support. Anyone who cares about the future of science and technology should be very alarmed by that. There is a steep contraction in Britain's science base, underway. It remains to be seen what long-term effects this will have on the British nation as a whole.

There are, no doubt, many reasons for this decline. One is that science is hard and so many other things are much easier. Many students decide to take the easy options, lured by the promise of glamorous careers and high salaries. Then again, science offers relatively poor pay and career progression. If this trend is to be reversed, students must see science as attractive: it must be a well-paid career that offers intellectual rewards, glamour, security, benefits and prestige. If that were so, this decline would soon be reversed. However, if this is to be so, there must be a genuine change of priorities in society: from the highest levels, science must be prioritized and valued. Science must become the career that kids dream of - for then the scientific and technological future of the modern world would be assured. If this is not done, in the UK and, perhaps in other countries, too, science doesn't seem to have much of a future.

If anyone has figures for other nation's regarding science education, I would welcome them: please post them below.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, a scientific child prodigy, aged eight years and seven months, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, five years exactly, and Tiarnan, twenty-eight months, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, College, University, Chemistry, Science, genetics, left-handedness, precocity, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, wunderkind, wonderkind, genio, гений ребенок prodigy, genie, μεγαλοφυία θαύμα παιδιών, bambino, kind.

We are the founders of Genghis Can, a copywriting, editing and proofreading agency, that handles all kinds of work, including technical and scientific material. If you need such services, or know someone who does, please go to: http://www.genghiscan.com/ Thanks.)

How old is democracy?

How old is democracy? I asked this question, once, of a group of foreign students in Singapore. The answer was telling: silence fell across the room. Then, hesitantly, an Uzbek girl raised her voice: "It is an American invention."

I shook my head and repeated the question: "How old is democracy?"

The Uzbek woman, in her twenties, said: "Fifteen years."

Again, I shook my head.

"Twenty years."

I pursed my lips.

"Twenty five years." she said, stretching it a bit.

My unacknowledging gaze said it all.

Finally, in one huge last effort at pushing the origin of democracy back to the deep past, she guessed: "Forty years!"

"No." I said, quietly, to a listening room.

I found myself amazed. In a room of perhaps twelve Asian students, from China, Russia, Uzbekistan, and Indonesia, not one had any idea of the origin of democracy, or just how old it was. That these were not children, but students in their twenties (some as old as 28) gave me further pause to consider the state of modern education.

"Two and a half thousand years." I said, to surprise and disbelief all around. "No!" some of them actually said.

"Yes. Democracy was invented by the Ancient Greeks."

"Where?" said the Uzbek girl with the encylopaedic knowledge.

"Greece."

The name didn't seem to register with her at all. It seems that she had not even heard of the country, itself.

"In Athens."

For, as you probably know, a direct democracy (direct voting by the people, not through representatives) took root in Athens in around 510 B.C, owing to changes implemented by Cleisthenes.

Democracy succeeded in Ancient Athens, though it was only adult male citizens who could vote. The model spread throughout the Mediterranean, though none was so successful as Athens (the others tended to restrict voting too much, to those, for instance, who owned their own homes, ie. the rich).

Had Rome not come along the whole world would, no doubt, soon have been democratic...but Rome squashed the flowering democracies and stamped them out in about 100 B.C. That was the end of democracy, for a thousand years, when it was adopted, once more, by some Italian city states (ironic, that, given the history of Rome regarding its suppression), in Pisa, Venice, Florence, Genoa and Siena.

The ignorance of my Asian students regarding democracy left me to wonder about the state of the modern world. How is it possible that some can reach their late twenties (as some of them were) and still not know the first thing about how many modern societies are run? It points to a system of global education (for they came from many different countries) that is simply not preparing the modern, young person, for fully aware participation in modern life. I am left to wonder whether this is a reflection of the dullness of the individuals, or the deficiencies of the system. If it is the former, then it is unfortunate, but largely unavoidable; if it is the latter, then I wonder whether the deficiencies are due to systemic incompetence, or deliberate policy. Perhaps, in some societies, it is deliberate policy to ensure the ignorance of their people, for ignorant people are always easier to deceive and manipulate than an informed populace. Whatever the cause, deliberate or incompetent, the effects remain the same: young, modern people, from around the world, simply know nothing about the world, these days. They have no grasp of what is going on now, around them - and no historical perspective to set it against. They do not have the basic equipment to allow them to begin to reason about what is happening in the world. It is quite shocking to see.

Those who teach, or who have taught, are in a privileged position that allows them to gauge the understanding of their students, on many issues. From that vantage, at the front of the classroom, it is possible to learn much about what is happening in the world, in other countries, particularly in the minds of their people. What I have so often discovered is ignorance, a very profound ignorance on so many basic matters. It leaves me to wonder what they spent their childhoods learning in classrooms, back in their home countries - for little seems to have left a mark.

These classroom observations are supportive of a trend that has been noted, by researchers into intelligence. There is a generation on generation decline in genetic intelligence, throughout Mankind. For the last 150 years or so, each generation of Man has been dimmer than the last. (see Richard Lynn). What I see in the classroom does nothing to disconfirm this finding. I am coming to think that the future of Man may be less bright than the past - in every sense of the word "bright". In such a situation of global decline, every gifted child should be supported to be the best they can be: for such bright people will be needed more than ever, to support the structure of their societies, as engineers, scientists, artists, lawyers, architects and business people etc, as the quality of people in general declines.

I only hope that gifted children are given what they need to flower. They seem all the more exceptional against the backdrop of what I have seen in the classroom over the years.

A final thought: if young people don't know anything about democracy, how difficult would it be to take it away from them? Perhaps that is just why they don't know anything about it...

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, a scientific child prodigy, aged eight years and seven months, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, five years exactly, and Tiarnan, twenty-eight months, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, College, University, Chemistry, Science, genetics, left-handedness, precocity, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, wunderkind, wonderkind, genio, гений ребенок prodigy, genie, μεγαλοφυία θαύμα παιδιών, bambino, kind.

We are the founders of Genghis Can, a copywriting, editing and proofreading agency, that handles all kinds of work, including technical and scientific material. If you need such services, or know someone who does, please go to: http://www.genghiscan.com/ Thanks.)

Conversation meant for few.

Ainan's conversation is an art in itself. To understand him, first one must understand many other things. In a way, it is both exhilarating and saddening to hear him speak the way he does.

Perhaps, I should explain. Today, for instance, with great interest in his voice, he revealed: "Daddy, carborane superacid is the only acid known to protonate fullerene without destroying its structure." This fact evidently had deep appeal to him. I am used to this kind of remark, so it takes some effort to step back from it and realize that this is not the normal conversational observation of a typical eight year old. I feel, in reflecting on his scientifically laden speech, that I am happy that I was scientifically educated so that he has someone to talk to. I cannot imagine how alone he would be, were that not so.

Ainan, eight, has interests and understandings that set him apart from other children his own age. In fact, so far apart do they set him, that it is only with scientifically expert adults that he can find conversational partners. This could be an intolerable situation were it not that I am able to understand his thoughts - and that he is at Singapore Polytechnic with other scientifically interested - though older - people.

So, I find myself with mixed feelings. It is beautiful to hear his thoughts, from the point of view of enjoying his scientific thinking (which, as a former scientist, I do). However, I am acutely aware that he cannot share his thoughts with his age-mates: this is simply an impossibility. So therein lies the sadness, too - not a sadness that he should think so, for that is beautiful, but a sadness that it makes it impossible to speak to others, as he would wish.

Yet, Ainan is happy. He is growing in his interests. He can express his fullest thoughts with me. He has others to relate to at Singapore Polytechnic and he is in an altogether better position than if his sole social milieu were a primary school with children of his own age. Then, he would truly be intellectually isolated.

As each year passes, Ainan's thoughts and interests become ever more rarified. His observations become ever more arcane. More understanding of more scientific matters is required to understand where he is coming from...it is an endless process of growth. I suppose this is a process that all scientists go through - though almost all would not do so until they were adults. Ainan is experiencing the intellectual isolation that comes from knowing what others do not know and understanding what others do not understand. My task is to ensure that he always has a conversational outlet and that at least one person understands what he is thinking. If I can satisfy that, then he will never feel the intellectual isolation that is logically his - until such a day as he is a working scientist with equally understanding colleagues and the issue is never more an issue at all.

In the meantime, I shall serve as his primary outlet for his thoughts. How lucky I am to have the background necessary to understand them - and how lucky he is, too.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, a scientific child prodigy, aged eight years and seven months, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, five years exactly, and Tiarnan, twenty-eight months, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, College, University, Chemistry, Science, genetics, left-handedness, precocity, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, wunderkind, wonderkind, genio, гений ребенок prodigy, genie, μεγαλοφυία θαύμα παιδιών, bambino, kind.

We are the founders of Genghis Can, a copywriting, editing and proofreading agency, that handles all kinds of work, including technical and scientific material. If you need such services, or know someone who does, please go to: http://www.genghiscan.com/ Thanks.)

Nuclear Power in Singapore.

Are we, I wonder, being prepared to accept nuclear power, in Singapore? I ask because some of the members of Singapore's Ministry of Trade and Industry's International Advisory Panel on Energy are pro-nuclear power, in the city state.

Dr. John Deutch of MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) thinks that "Nuclear power should not be taken off the table, especially since it may become more prominent in the region." He does add that long-term costs, safety and waste management had to be studied.

I find this alarming. Firstly, I don't think Singapore should consider what the region is doing. If the region goes nuclear, let it - but I wouldn't advise that Singapore should follow their example. You see, Singapore is just too small for safe nuclear energy. Last year, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said it was not feasible for densely populated, compact Singapore because it lacked the minimum 30km distance for evacuation in case of fallout. (Source: Today newspaper, 4th November 2008).

Think about that. There needs to be a minimum of 30km distance between people and the reactor to give some measure of safety in the event of an accident. The last time I looked almost nothing was 30 km away from anything else in Singapore - never mind 30 km away from EVERYONE.

I think Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong had it right the first time: Singapore would not be safe with nuclear power. He should not be persuaded by bright eyed foreign academics who may be just looking at the upside, and overlooking the peculiar dangers of the Singaporean situation.

There is no such thing as 100% safety with any machine. There is always the possibility of a series of events leading to disaster. With nuclear power, a huge clear area is needed around the plant, to protect people from the consequences of a disaster. I think even 30km is being cautious - just look at the widespread devastation caused by the Chernobyl disaster (increased radioactivity was noted in the UK!)

If Singapore acquires nuclear power plants, one day there will be an accident. It might be in twenty years or a thousand - but one day, something will go wrong. When that happens, there will not be a Singapore left. Singapore will be uninhabitable. As for the people of Singapore - some of them could face death in the short-term from radiation poisoning - and many would face a slow death in the long-term from radiation induced cancers. All that Singapore has striven for will be at an end. Is it worth it? Aren't there other sources of electricity?

If Singapore had a hinterland in which one could place nuclear power stations comfortably far from human habitation, then they might be a viable option. Yet, the fact is that Singapore has no hinterland. Singapore is an overcrowded little dot. It cannot afford to take the "one in a million" chance that something will go wrong with a nuclear power station one day. You can acquire the "safest" designs and hire the "best" engineers - but one day, something could happen. Don't say that Chernobyl happened because the Russians don't know what they are doing - the Americans also had a nuclear accident at Three Mile Island. If America can get it wrong, Singapore can too. It just isn't worth it.

If Singapore goes nuclear, I would certainly look for another location to live - for I, for one, would not take the risk of my family being caught near to a nuclear plant that went wrong, one day. In fact, maybe that is how this plan will work out. The nuclear power stations will move into our small island - and all the people will leave, creating the comfortable 30km exclusion zone required. Then Singapore can have all the power it wants, even if it hasn't got citizens willing to live near the stations in question.

Technological advocates like Dr. John Deutch often have too much faith in their machines. Such people often forget the times and consequences of when such machines fail. Nuclear power is for those with room to isolate it from major population centres. It is not something a wise nation places next to a major population centre. Not unless, of course, they don't value their people...

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, a scientific child prodigy, aged eight years and seven months, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, five years exactly, and Tiarnan, twenty-eight months, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, College, University, Chemistry, Science, genetics, left-handedness, precocity, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, wunderkind, wonderkind, genio, гений ребенок prodigy, genie, μεγαλοφυία θαύμα παιδιών, bambino, kind.

We are the founders of Genghis Can, a copywriting, editing and proofreading agency, that handles all kinds of work, including technical and scientific material. If you need such services, or know someone who does, please go to: http://www.genghiscan.com/ Thanks.)

What if Barack Obama does not win?

Senator Barack Obama is leading in all polls in the race to be the American President. As I write, he leads 51.1 % to 44.2 % against Senator John McCain, on the Yahoo poll. He should therefore win by a landslide, but will he?

I wonder because of historical reasons. There is the so-called Bradley effect, named after a black politician, Tom Bradley, who led by a long way, in the polls, in the race to be California governor in 1982 - but then lost the election. The common understanding of that situation is that white people did not wish to be seen as racist, in polling, so declared that they would vote for him - but that in the privacy of the polling booth, their true opinions showed - and they voted against him. One concern is that the same thing might happen to Obama: if America is still sufficiently racist, there might be a surprising degree of votes against him - and votes for the other candidate, John McCain, simply because he is not black.

There are other concerns too. Many believe that the 2004 election of George Bush was flawed, owing to electoral fraud. There were some shocking practices at work. In one case, an area received more votes for the Republican Bush than there were actually voters in that area! Clearly, fraud was at work here. There were also allegations of interference with the electronic voting machines, with staff from the company that made the machines seen entering instructions into the machines shortly before a change of voting pattern of against Bush, to for Bush.

Worse still, in some Democratic areas of America, voting machines were unavailable for up to seven hours, leaving potential voters unable to vote AT ALL. They either had to queue for many hours - or give up and go home without voting. Of course, many of them did just that, giving the election to Bush. Will there be voting machine shortages in Democratic areas in this election?

In the present election, too, there are other worrying developments. In some areas flyers have been distributed, on official looking paper, saying that Republicans are to vote on November 4th, and Democrats on November 5th. Should any Democrat believe this, they would turn up on the 5th to find the election over.

I find all of this very disappointing. America is supposedly the world's leading democracy - but it suffers a little too much from the dishonest actions of individuals trying to influence the outcome of the election, by any means possible. This needs to be curbed. It would be wise to trace the culprits in all irregularities and confer long prison sentences upon them, to discourage such practices in future. Whether the Americans will do so, is another matter - after all, if the practices are too widespread, the winner of the election may have been "elected" by them - and would hardly, therefore, be interested in punishing those responsible.

Senator Barack Obama is leading consistently in all polls, across the board, with margins in some polls of up to 13%. If he does not win, therefore, there will be the widespread belief, in America, that the polls have been rigged and that the election has been stolen. (There will be this belief even if the true cause is that of racism: such is the effect of the instances of electoral irregularities that have come to light, so far.) This belief can only lead to trouble on a grand scale. It is quite possible that America will see nationwide riots, if it is President McCain, rather than President Obama.

Even if President Obama is duly elected. I have one further concern: what if he is assassinated? America nurtures a fairly large body of white supremacists: surely they would find the election of a Black President, insufferable? It is likely that, upon election, President Obama will become the target of many plots, from white supremacists, to remove him by force of the bullet or the bomb. Should he be assassinated, of course, chaos is likely to ensue in the United States, with the nation divided along racial lines. No doubt President Obama's death would not be the only one to occur should he be assassinated.

America is in a difficult position therefore. If Barack Obama does not win, America will face chaos; if he does win, but is then assassinated, America will face chaos. So, whether or not President Obama is elected, there could be trouble to come, for the United States of America.

As an observer, I find it intriguing that all of these problems come at a time when America is facing its biggest economic crisis in modern times. Whoever is elected, America faces interesting times ahead (in the Chinese sense of the term).

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, a scientific child prodigy, aged eight years and seven months, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, five years exactly, and Tiarnan, twenty-eight months, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, College, University, Chemistry, Science, genetics, left-handedness, precocity, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, wunderkind, wonderkind, genio, гений ребенок prodigy, genie, μεγαλοφυία θαύμα παιδιών, bambino, kind.

We are the founders of Genghis Can, a copywriting, editing and proofreading agency, that handles all kinds of work, including technical and scientific material. If you need such services, or know someone who does, please go to: http://www.genghiscan.com/ Thanks.)

Halloween Victory for the kids.

I wrote, some time ago, of an objector, who managed to stop an official Halloween celebration at our estate. His one, anonymous voice, was enough to cancel the event for all of our estate. Warmingly, however, the parents of the estate did not let this official disapproval stop them.

On October 31st, trick or treating went ahead, on our estate, despite the cancellation. A group of parents got together, in resistance to the ban, and formed their own Halloween celebration. A list of houses was put together, which had explicitly given their permission to be "tricked or treated" and everyone got together at the appointed hour on Halloween.

I find it refreshing that, despite the unwillingness of the estate management to hold a Halloween celebration, that the parents themselves should do so. It just shows that not everyone living in Singapore can be cowed by official disapproval. Officialdom had said no to a celebration - but the children wanted a celebration - and so a celebration was arranged. I like that spirit.

Usually, my wife and I would take our children around from house to house, dressed up in various horrible ways, to "trick or treat", on our estate. This Halloween, however, we thought to celebrate in a different way. Ainan, Fintan and Tiarnan, went trick or treating accompanied by adults and their friends - while we went home, to surprise the children who came trick or treating.

Our house was dark. Just a single candle lit the living room onto which the front door opens. The large, wooden door to our home, lay closed, but for a tiny gap, waiting for the children to arrive.

It was funny what happened when they did. Most of them would see our silent, waiting front door and hesitate (I was looking through the spyhole). They would nudge and urge each other forward, and each would, in turn, resist being the first. Eventually, they would muster enough courage to begin to approach.

I would then begin to open the door very slowly - which, to them, would appear to open by itself. This would always stop them in their tracks. One pair even ran away, to leave their lonesome friend rooted to the ground: "You can't run away!" she cried, "Come back!". After much persuasion, they crept back, hesitantly.

The large, dark brown door to our home would continue to open, slowly, creakingly.

The kids would stop, fearful to proceed.

Then, they would see a ghostly figure in the room, revealed: white sheeted and still, lit from below by a single candle, carrying a basket full of sweets.

"Cool!", opined one brave kid, "Cool!"

The ghost would waft forward, slowly steadily, in silence, holding out the basket. Tellingly, some kids could not bring themselves to approach - and would, instead, let their friends take the sweets for them. Then they would hurry away, to safety.

One teenage girl, who should have been old enough to be brave, wouldn't approach at all. "No tricks, right? No tricks!". She looked and sounded nervous.

Her friends took the sweets for her and gave a pat on the head, touched by her sensitivity.

Once the sweets had been taken, the ghost wafted back into the room and the door began to close slowly, creakingly upon them. Children's eyes would follow the movement of the door, as if hypnotized - and then they would turn to leave, looking back, several times.

One group of boys could still be heard, walking away into the distance, shouting: "Cool! That was cool!"

Neither the door, nor the ghost, spoke a single word.

That was how we celebrated Halloween.

My thanks go to Syahidah, the "ghost", who had covered herself in a white blanket for the occasion. Lighting design by Syahidah. Self-propelled door by Valentine, creaks, by Nature.

We had a great time, successfully spooking quite a few kids, which, I think, should be the aim of Halloween.

I am glad that our estate has enough spirit not to be suppressed by the naysaying of one, childless, anonymous curmudgeon.

The children of the estate had a great time...my thanks to all the parents involved in arranging our Alternative Halloween Celebration. In particular, I would like to thank Karen McDowell and Christine, as organizers of the evening.

Special thanks goes to Syahidah, for suffering the heat of her costume and being such a scarey ghost.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, a scientific child prodigy, aged eight years and seven months, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, five years exactly, and Tiarnan, twenty-eight months, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, College, University, Chemistry, Science, genetics, left-handedness, precocity, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, wunderkind, wonderkind, genio, гений ребенок prodigy, genie, μεγαλοφυία θαύμα παιδιών, bambino, kind.

We are the founders of Genghis Can, a copywriting, editing and proofreading agency, that handles all kinds of work, including technical and scientific material. If you need such services, or know someone who does, please go to: http://www.genghiscan.com/ Thanks.)