The genetic uniqueness of the Irish.

Being Irish, is about being different. Unless you actually are Irish, this is hard to appreciate.

The Irish have lived for thousands of years, relatively isolated, on the Western fringes of Europe. This has led to a curious situation: the Irish genome is not like other "Caucasians", in Europe, indeed, the Irish genome is turning out to be something very surprising indeed.

Brendan Loftus of University College Dublin has just finished sequencing the genome of an Irishman, chosen, by genotyping, as being "representative of the Irish". Surprisingly, this Irishman's genome has turned out to have over 400,000 NOVEL single DNA base mutations, as the New Scientist reports this week. This is an unexpectedly high number of unique differences. Indeed, so distinctive is this genome that Loftus said: "The Irish genome inhabits a hitherto untapped region of European genome variation".

So, there you have it. The feeling that I had always had, that the Irish were different from other white races, including the "British", turns out to be genetically proven. It is not just my own particular little family that is a bit unusual, therefore...but the whole Irish race, for one reason or another.

This study tallies well with another study that showed that Irish people from the West of Ireland (where my family is from), showed Neolithic haplotype markers which means that the genome has certain characteristics found 10,000 years ago, in the stone age.

I am sure that there are more genetic surprises in store for those studying the Irish genome. I will keep you posted.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 6 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, please go to:
http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html

I also write of gifted education, child prodigy, child genius, adult genius, savant, megasavant, HELP University College, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, Malaysia, IQ, intelligence and creativity.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at: http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/
Ainan's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3305973/
Syahidah's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

Our editing, proofreading and copywriting company, Genghis Can, is at http://www.genghiscan.com/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.)

A journey around the world

A few days ago, Syahidah, my wife, gave Fintan, our second son, a geography book. It was a substantial book tabulating geographical data on numerous countries around the world. Now, what use do you think this seven year old boy made of a pile of national data? Have a good think.

Well, Fintan began to study the life expectancy and average income per capita, data. His eyes were very intent upon these numbers as he evaluated them, page after page, listing after listing, country after country.

After a while, he looked up and announced: "Well, I definitely DON'T want to live in the Congo!"

Then he continued until he had read the whole book. Finally, he closed it, firmly and gazed at his mother, decision in his eyes.

"I want to live in Japan." he declared.

She smiled, at his words, fully understanding what he had done and appreciating the wisdom of his intent.

Fintan had scoured the world for the one place where he would live the longest and earn the most. It seems, indeed, that Fintan wants to live long and prosper - and has identified location as one matter relating to success in that field.

This action of Fintan, made me wonder about how he sees life. It seems, from this, that he is looking ahead to what is to come and is, already, though just seven, considering what might be a good strategy for living his life so that it is the best it can be, for him. Not that many young children, in my experience, take such a long term view of life. It is good to see Fintan do so, for that, assuredly, will help him navigate his way to his goals, whatever they may be.

Live long and prosper, indeed, my dear Fintan!

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 6 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, please go to:
http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html

I also write of gifted education, child prodigy, child genius, adult genius, savant, megasavant, HELP University College, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, Malaysia, IQ, intelligence and creativity.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at: http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/
Ainan's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3305973/
Syahidah's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

Our editing, proofreading and copywriting company, Genghis Can, is at http://www.genghiscan.com/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.)

Ainan's historical perspective on cars.

A few days ago, Ainan, ten, made a remark that, upon reflection, seems to echo with significance, for what it says about the history of our world.

"The losers in World War II," he observed, intently, "are the winners in modern cars."

He went on to explain himself, "The Germans and the Japanese make great cars...but British and American cars are just lame."

I was struck by the oddness of this observation - and its truth. Germans are famous for the quality of their cars - and some Japanese firms, too...but, though Americans like to crow about their technological superiority, they are not known for their great cars. They are mainly known, in the car field, to my mind, for poor mileage and that is about it.

Ainan had noted something odd: how is it that the two nations who LOST World War II should end up so superior in the design, manufacture and engineering of such a basic modern technology as the car? It instinctively seems the wrong outcome. It seems that the shock of losing World War II has energized something in these two nations and brought out a greatness they weren't quite able to muster in the War. Perhaps, indeed, losing the War was their making, in an unexpected fashion.

How funny that Ainan - whose primary interests are purely scientific and technological - should have noted this historical oddity.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 6 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, please go to:
http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html

I also write of gifted education, child prodigy, child genius, adult genius, savant, megasavant, HELP University College, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, Malaysia, IQ, intelligence and creativity.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at: http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/
Ainan's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3305973/
Syahidah's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

Our editing, proofreading and copywriting company, Genghis Can, is at http://www.genghiscan.com/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.)

The national archives of Malaysia and Singapore.

Today, I have come to understand that the national archives of Singapore and Malaysia, have rather different outlooks on the world. Each has a different view of what is worth preserving for posterity. The sadness of this, is that their priorities are not what might be expected.

Long-term readers may recall that the National Library Board of Singapore (NLB), started to archive blogs originating in Singapore, a couple of years back, to preserve them for posterity. I remarked at the time that their priorities seemed strange, choosing to archive airheaded, but popular commentators (who talked of little but shopping, sex and plastic surgery, for instance), whilst ignoring more substantial writers. I wasn't archived, for instance, even though my blog constitutes a record of a prominent young Singaporean (my son). My blog is one of the more serious ones that originated in Singapore - and certainly one of the most reflective and, though I observe it myself, substantial. However, it was shunned in favour of politically correct and insubstantial candy floss. As a result, Singapore's history will thereby be distorted, since, in the distant future, the only blogs to survive may be the ones that the PAP decided, in the present, should survive, thus altering the future view of what the blogosphere was like in these times. My voice will not be among the record, for instance, even though I raised many issues that others did not - and so those perspectives should be preserved, in a nation that values plurality. Clearly, Singapore doesn't.

Today, I found myself much surprised to see a new search listing, at the top of the search on Google for my name, under Malaysian search items. It is a listing in the Malaysian national news archive, News Image Bank found at www.nib.my

This national archive gathers together news items, be they cover pages, interior news pieces or photos, from three leading dailies: The New Straits Times, Harian Metro and Berita Harian. I found myself rather surprised to note stories listed from these newspapers that I had never heard of, living, as I had been at the time, in Singapore. Ainan, too, had his own set of listings, including quite a few front pages.

I found this revelation rather sobering. You see, Ainan was born a Singaporean Malay, in a Singaporean hospital. Yet, Singapore has not, to my knowledge, chosen to archive anything relating to him, or his family. Indeed, we were explicitly not included in a national blog archive. However, Malaysia has chosen to archive material relating to our family. Indeed, they have listings for Syahidah Osman Cawley, too. Now, it is true that Ainan has Malay blood running through his veins...half-Malay, anyway - but is it not telling that the nation in which he was BORN and has citizenship, does not accord him the same status?

What a nation chooses to archive of the present, shows what a nation would like the future to know of its world. Malaysia wants its future descendants to know of Ainan and his achievements. Singapore doesn't. Singapore wants Ainan to vanish into the pages of unrecorded history. Malaysia, on the other hand, would seem to want him to remain in cultural memory as, perhaps, an example to others, an inspiration even, to the achievement and aspirations of others.

Malaysia wishes to learn from its present and its past. Singapore wishes to rewrite it. By not archiving matters relating to Ainan, in publicly available archives (as Singapore appears not to be doing, since there is no such presence online), Singapore is editing its past, such that certain matters, will, in time, be forgotten and lost.

Thankfully, however, other nations, like Malaysia, will hold onto the memories, so, ultimately, Singapore will fail in its objectives, no matter how hard it tries. Ainan's memory may fade in Singapore, as the decades and centuries pass, with no publicly archived records to remind people...but other nations will not be so forgetful.

How sad it is, however, that the nation of his birth, should be so set on repressing his memory, when it should be upheld, along with all other exemplars, of all races. Perhaps, of course, that is the reason for this seeming neglect. Perhaps Ainan, not being a member of the dominant race in Singapore (the Chinese, for those unfamiliar with the city state) is not thought worthy of long-term record. Perhaps, to be thought worthy of archiving, one would have to be a Chinese Singaporean...being a Singaporean Malay is just not good enough, not important enough from the perspective of those-who-decide.

Singapore will always be part of Ainan's personal history and the story that his life tells...but the question is: will Ainan always be part of Singapore's national history...or will his memory be edited out and eventually silenced and forgotten, as already seems to have begun?

One thing is sure, however: this young boy, of Malay descent, will never be forgotten, by our present home: Malaysia.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 6 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, please go to:
http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html

I also write of gifted education, child prodigy, child genius, adult genius, savant, megasavant, HELP University College, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, Malaysia, IQ, intelligence and creativity.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at: http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/
Ainan's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3305973/
Syahidah's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

Our editing, proofreading and copywriting company, Genghis Can, is at http://www.genghiscan.com/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.)

The new Hollywood villains.

Once it was Russia, that was the staple villain, in Hollywood films; then it became the Latin American drug lord - and, more recently, the Islamic terrorist, from an ill-defined country somewhere in the Middle East. No doubt you are all familiar with these stock villains...but there is, now, a new Hollywood villain. I would like you to consider, for a moment or two: whom do you think has now been labelled as villainous by that moronic town, Hollywood?

Well, it might surprise you, as it did me, but the new Hollywood villain - is...the child prodigy father.

Yes. Hollywood actually believes and wants you to believe that the father of a child prodigy is good villain material.

In an episode of Law and Order: Criminal Intent, entitled: "Bright boy" (season 2, episode 2), detectives find a "slain social worker killed trying to protect a child prodigy from his ruthless father."

Now, that is an absolutely MAD plot - and one extremely damaging to all prodigies and their parents everywhere. It creates, in people's minds, the idea that the prodigy is somehow created through ill-doing - that the father (or other parent) of such a one, is a kind of villain...even a monstrous villain who would kill a social worker.

Then again, why is there a social worker involved at all? The clear implication is that the prodigy is a put upon person, who needs social protection from their family dynamics. Again, this is not reflected by reality. It is, in my view, impossible, absolutely impossible, to create a prodigy through any form of coercion or enforcement of a regime: if the child doesn't want to learn, the child will not learn. It is that simple. There is no possibility of a "villainous" father creating such a high performance child.

In a way, this episode of Law and Order, is profoundly sad. It is sad because of what it says some sections of society believe about gifted children and their performance. This idiotic episode, with its crass misunderstanding of human nature, is perpetuating the idea that prodigious children are "forced" to be the way they are. The promulgation of this toxic view is very harmful to the families of gifted children everywhere. Indeed, so harmful is the plotline to this film, that I wonder if the families of prodigious children could take a class action lawsuit, for the damage this film will do to their reputations as a minority, in society.

That an American company would actually make a film with a plot as absurd as this, just gives me one more reason (among many others) why I wouldn't want my family to live in the US. What morons.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 6 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, please go to:
http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html

I also write of gifted education, child prodigy, child genius, adult genius, savant, megasavant, HELP University College, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, Malaysia, IQ, intelligence and creativity.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at: http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/
Ainan's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3305973/
Syahidah's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

Our editing, proofreading and copywriting company, Genghis Can, is at http://www.genghiscan.com/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.)