Children’s conversation, overheard.

Fintan and Tiarnan were deep in conversation, when their mother, Syahidah passed by, a few days ago, and caught a little snippet of what they were saying.

“What is important?”, asked Tiarnan, just turned 7, over a week ago.

“Many things are important,” began Fintan, 9, very seriously, “wearing underwear is important – and COMPUSLORY”.

Syahidah was too overtaken with the hilarity of the moment, to investigate further, and find out the context.

This kind of slightly surreal comedy is not uncommon with our younger two sons. They speak in somewhat off the wall ways, that reveal a characteristic and appealing view of the world. The most bizarre of our sons is Tiarnan, but perhaps the most comedic, is Fintan – though, Ainan, too has a penchant for comedy.

Syahidah left them to discuss the Rules of the World, in their very sober tones, allowing herself a wide smile, at her glimpse into their world.

Posted by Valentine Cawley

(If you would like to support my continued writing of this blog and my ongoing campaign to raise awareness about giftedness and all issues pertaining to it, please donate, by clicking on the gold button to the left of the page.

To read about my fundraising campaign, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-in-support-of-my.html and here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-first-donation.html

If you would like to read any of our scientific research papers, there are links to some of them, here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/02/research-papers-by-valentine-cawley-and.html

If you would like to see an online summary of my academic achievements to date, please go here: http://www.getcited.org/mbrz/11136175To learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 5, 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.

There is a review of my blog, on the respected The Kindle Report here:http://thekindlereport.blogspot.com/2010/09/boy-who-knew-too-much-child-prodigy.html

Please have a read, if you would like a critic's view of this blog. Thanks.

You can get my blog on your Kindle, for easy reading, wherever you are, by going to: http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Who-Knew-Too-Much/dp/B0042P5LEE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1284603792&sr=8-1

Please let all your fellow Kindlers know about my blog availability - and if you know my blog well enough, please be so kind as to write a thoughtful review of what you like about it. Thanks.

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 athttp://www.genghiscan.com/This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.) 

Prophecy in a child's eyes

Not infrequently, Fintan’s thoughts turn to the future. On the matter, he is always sober and ruminative. He peers forward and seeks to imagine what he will find one future day. I usually find his views reasonable and likely. He seems to have a good grasp on what may happen. Is it logic that guides him, or intuition? I rather think it is the latter, from the way he seems to feel out a picture of tomorrow.

Yesterday, Fintan, 9, asked me:

“Do you think technology will keep on getting higher?” He seemed to be holding a hidden thought in his mind, as if he were seeking to measure his own thought, against mine, but was holding it back so that I wouldn’t be influenced by his.

“I think it will get better, yes...what do you think?” I held my thought lightly on my tongue, so that it would not pressure his into conformity.

“I think we will have better technology, but will use less of it.” He almost seemed to see this diminished world, before his inner sight.

“Why? Is that because of energy supply problems?”

“Yes.” He was both matter of fact and certain.

“So, although the technology is available, most people won’t be able to afford the energy for them?”

He just gave an affirmative nod, his silence holding an opinion about this yet to be seen world.

As with many conversations with Fintan, I found his conclusions uncomfortably likely. Whatever reasoning processes he went through, the outcome is quite a convincing possible tomorrow.

It is funny to hear him speak so. He is just 9 years old – and what, one wonders , can a 9 year old know of the world? Well, it seems he knows enough of TODAY, to anticipate a far TOMORROW, by some inner projection. He can see where the world is headed. What is darkly funny, of course, is that many of our leaders, with many more than just 9 years, don’t seem to be able to anticipate outcomes, with the same proficiency. He seems to be thinking more, in this way, than many do.

Is Fintan right? Do we face a diminished tomorrow, in which, although our powers of technology are greater, we simply don’t have the energy to power them, to the ubiquity we would like? Is technology to be rationed to the rich?

If we look around us and see that fossil fuels are running out; Uranium is in short supply, and renewables are just not ready, it does seem clear that Mankind faces an energy crisis in the decades ahead. A 9 year old child can sense this...so why are the world’s leaders not making more of it: why are they not preparing more actively for such a world by investing in alternative ways to power it?

The answer seems clear, my little 9 year old son, has a longer term view than most world leaders. Now, that IS sobering.

I like these chats with Fintan, for he prompts me to reflect on times ahead, some of which I may never see. It is good, though, that he considers the future he may one day live through. I think, he will have prepared himself, mentally, for the challenges ahead, for having modelled them, in advance. There is no better preparation than forethought – and Fintan does plenty of that.

Posted by Valentine Cawley

(If you would like to support my continued writing of this blog and my ongoing campaign to raise awareness about giftedness and all issues pertaining to it, please donate, by clicking on the gold button to the left of the page.

To read about my fundraising campaign, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-in-support-of-my.html and here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-first-donation.html

If you would like to read any of our scientific research papers, there are links to some of them, here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/02/research-papers-by-valentine-cawley-and.html

If you would like to see an online summary of my academic achievements to date, please go here: http://www.getcited.org/mbrz/11136175To learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 5, 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.

There is a review of my blog, on the respected The Kindle Report here:http://thekindlereport.blogspot.com/2010/09/boy-who-knew-too-much-child-prodigy.html

Please have a read, if you would like a critic's view of this blog. Thanks.

You can get my blog on your Kindle, for easy reading, wherever you are, by going to: http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Who-Knew-Too-Much/dp/B0042P5LEE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1284603792&sr=8-1

Please let all your fellow Kindlers know about my blog availability - and if you know my blog well enough, please be so kind as to write a thoughtful review of what you like about it. Thanks.

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 athttp://www.genghiscan.com/This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.) 

The beginnings of scientific curiosity.

Children are a distillation of human curiosity. On their tongues may be heard questions that adults would never think to ask, partly because many adults have stopped actively thinking about the world around them: they just take it for granted. Therefore, the most interesting of questions, can often come from the youngest of interrogators.

Recently, Fintan, 9, has displayed a notable increase in the number of scientific questions, he asks. This is not an entirely expected development since his early interests were elsewhere than science.

A couple of weeks ago, at bedtime, Fintan spoke into the darkness, his voice most thoughtful.

“Daddy: can you shoot bullets in space?”

What a wonderful question, I thought, before answering.

“Yes, in fact the bullet in space would go faster and further than in the atmosphere, because there would be no air to slow it down. What I mean is that if you shoot a bullet in the air, it is at its maximum speed as it leaves the gun. Then it begins to slow down owing to friction with the air. In space, it just wouldn’t slow down.”

The silence was ruminative as he listened to me.

“However,” I continued, “that assumes that you are using an explosive for the bullet that doesn’t need oxygen to work. As long as that is so, you can shoot bullets in space.”

I thought this a very interesting moment, for it called to mind the periods of questioning that Ainan went through and Tiarnan is going through – and the flavour of the question is much the same, too. Perhaps, an interest in science might prove to be universal in my children – which makes me wonder whether it is potentially universal in all children. Do parents snuff out an interest in science, by not answering a child’s questions and engaging with them properly? Why is science seemingly a minority interest, when the questions of children can be so scientific, at their core?

I like the style of question that Fintan comes out with. Typically he identifies, in his question, a problem that is not immediately explicable, or sometimes seems contradictory or impossible, at first glance. His mind is attracted by the exceptional and the bizarre, as well as the mysterious in everyday life. This is a valuable kind of thinking since it is often in an interest in such phenomenon that new things will be noticed – if not new to the world, at least new to the child – and in such thinking such thoughts, does a mind grow and does a child’s conception of the world, deepen.

I am left with one thought, though. What would it be like for my children asking so many scientific questions – as they all do or have done – were I a typically scientifically illiterate parent? Were such a circumstance so, I would be unable to answer their questions, their curiosity would go unfed and it is quite possible that their questioning tongues, would eventually fall silent as they learnt, by disappointing experience that it was pointless to ask, or think of such matters, since no enlightenment would ever be forthcoming. In an uneducated household, the scientifically curious child may find their minds stifled. We are fortunate, therefore, that I lived a childhood of scientific curiosity myself – for that experience has better prepared me for the challenge of raising scientifically curious children. Of course, I am not unaware that one circumstance may cause the other: that being disposed to science, may be reflected in one’s genes, and so, too, reflected in the children. Not only that, but one’s interest (an environmental factor), may spark the interest of the children. I think, however, it is more genetic than environmental, since I have never pushed my interests on to my children, but have always waited for them to take the initiative by asking relevant questions: I have let their characters emerge naturally. Thus it is, I see some genetic influences at work, in how their minds are formed and in the ways in which their thoughts are guided to certain kinds of curiosity.

In all, the situation is very rewarding. For I get to have the chance to nurture minds akin to my own, in some way, just as once I attempted to nurture my own mind, largely unaided (since the nature of my interests created an enforced self-reliance on the matter). It is pleasing that, at least, I can be there for my children, when their curiosity strikes.

Carry on questioning, Fintan...and all my boys!

Posted by Valentine Cawley

(If you would like to support my continued writing of this blog and my ongoing campaign to raise awareness about giftedness and all issues pertaining to it, please donate, by clicking on the gold button to the left of the page.

To read about my fundraising campaign, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-in-support-of-my.html and here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-first-donation.html

If you would like to read any of our scientific research papers, there are links to some of them, here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/02/research-papers-by-valentine-cawley-and.html

If you would like to see an online summary of my academic achievements to date, please go here: http://www.getcited.org/mbrz/11136175To learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 5, 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.

There is a review of my blog, on the respected The Kindle Report here:http://thekindlereport.blogspot.com/2010/09/boy-who-knew-too-much-child-prodigy.html

Please have a read, if you would like a critic's view of this blog. Thanks.

You can get my blog on your Kindle, for easy reading, wherever you are, by going to: http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Who-Knew-Too-Much/dp/B0042P5LEE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1284603792&sr=8-1

Please let all your fellow Kindlers know about my blog availability - and if you know my blog well enough, please be so kind as to write a thoughtful review of what you like about it. Thanks.

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 athttp://www.genghiscan.com/This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.) 

Fintan's philosophy of gamesmanship.

Fintan, eight, is a quirky boy, in some ways. Yet, there is wisdom in his offbeat viewpoints. Today provided an example.

Fintan played Gaelic football, today, with his little brother Tiarnan. After he came home, he told his mother of a stratagem he had used.

“If you want to win a game,” he began, with a sense of revelation, “pretend you are not playing.”

That thought sunk teasingly into his mother’s mind and jogged her interest.

“Walk slowly across the pitch, as if you are not really there, then, when the ball comes near you, leap on it and kick it as hard as you can!” He laughed, joyously, at his own cunning ploy.

Syahidah laughed too.

Later on, my laughter sounded too, when I heard the tale from my wife.

“Fintan is a social strategist.”, I observed to her. “That will take him far in life.”

She agreed.

I think this incident speaks clearly of the nature of Fintan’s thinking. He is very much aware of the social sphere and of the content of other’s people’s thoughts. He uses his predictions of what they will think, to devise strategies to achieve his goals. He does this automatically and is probably unaware of any effort attached – he just sees, reflexively, what to do, in a social situation to make it work out well for him. This, of course, means that he has plenty of friends. Indeed, people of all ages respond well to Fintan. This is a kind of gift which is too often overlooked – but I think that, of all the gifts one could have, it is undoubtedly among the most useful in life and the most helpful in achieving success. It is the one gift many intelligent children lack. Without it, they are most unlikely ever to achieve their “potential”. That, at least, shall not be Fintan’s fate. I expect him to grow to be most comfortable in the social world and adept within it. What he will make of that skill I do not know, but, from the hints of his attitudes, I would be unsurprised to find him becoming a businessman of some kind. Whatever he chooses to do, I know this: he won’t be alone and there will always be friends in his life. Oh and he will be pretty good at any game involving people.

Posted by Valentine Cawley

(If you would like to support my continued writing of this blog and my ongoing campaign to raise awareness about giftedness and all issues pertaining to it, please donate, by clicking on the gold button to the left of the page.

To read about my fundraising campaign, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-in-support-of-my.html and here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-first-donation.html

If you would like to read any of our scientific research papers, there are links to some of them, here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/02/research-papers-by-valentine-cawley-and.html

If you would like to see an online summary of my academic achievements to date, please go here: http://www.getcited.org/mbrz/11136175To learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 5, 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.

There is a review of my blog, on the respected The Kindle Report here:http://thekindlereport.blogspot.com/2010/09/boy-who-knew-too-much-child-prodigy.html

Please have a read, if you would like a critic's view of this blog. Thanks.

You can get my blog on your Kindle, for easy reading, wherever you are, by going to: http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Who-Knew-Too-Much/dp/B0042P5LEE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1284603792&sr=8-1

Please let all your fellow Kindlers know about my blog availability - and if you know my blog well enough, please be so kind as to write a thoughtful review of what you like about it. Thanks.

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 athttp://www.genghiscan.com/This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.)

A way with words.

Fintan, eight, is a young boy of much whimsy. I am particularly fond of the way he expresses himself, with words, coming up, as he does, with striking expressions at times.

A couple of days ago, Tiarnan had been off school for three days in a row, sick. Fintan stood appraising his younger brother, then 5, with a somewhat cynical gaze.

“He’s coughing for freedom.”, he remarked, tellingly, on noting yet another seemingly theatrical cough from Tiarnan.

I had to laugh. That little sentence said so many things at once, about his outlook on Tiarnan’s situation. It had an admirable semantic density to it. As you probably note yourself, it spoke of Fintan’s belief that Tiarnan was not really sick and that his coughing was faked for the purpose of getting off school – and thus being “free” from constraint. Hence he is “coughing for freedom”.

It should be said, however, that Tiarnan did genuinely have a cough and a wheezy chest, which had woken him up in the night – so, as parents, we were not entirely mugs to allow him off school. However, Fintan believes otherwise, perhaps because Tiarnan is able to cough apparently on cue, when attention is upon him.

Fintan has made no indication of being interested in becoming a writer. However, as an observer of him, I have noticed that he is able to encapsulate thoughts in a pithy way and that he has his own characteristic style of expression. Furthermore, he likes to play around and joke with words, twisting their meaning to comic form. So, even though he hasn’t said he wants to be a writer, I do think it possible that, one day, he may very well be one – or at least someone who finds a creative use for words in life.

Posted by Valentine Cawley

(If you would like to support my continued writing of this blog and my ongoing campaign to raise awareness about giftedness and all issues pertaining to it, please donate, by clicking on the gold button to the left of the page.

To read about my fundraising campaign, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-in-support-of-my.html and here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-first-donation.html

If you would like to read any of our scientific research papers, there are links to some of them, here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/02/research-papers-by-valentine-cawley-and.html

If you would like to see an online summary of my academic achievements to date, please go here: http://www.getcited.org/mbrz/11136175

To learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 5, 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.

There is a review of my blog, on the respected The Kindle Report here:http://thekindlereport.blogspot.com/2010/09/boy-who-knew-too-much-child-prodigy.html

Please have a read, if you would like a critic's view of this blog. Thanks.

You can get my blog on your Kindle, for easy reading, wherever you are, by going to: http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Who-Knew-Too-Much/dp/B0042P5LEE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1284603792&sr=8-1

Please let all your fellow Kindlers know about my blog availability - and if you know my blog well enough, please be so kind as to write a thoughtful review of what you like about it. Thanks.

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 athttp://www.genghiscan.com/

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

The discerning logic of a child.

Before I became a father, I was unaware of the wonderful, often deliriously enchanting logic, that children use. To be able to witness such logic, now, on a regular basis, is one of the more refreshing and rewarding aspects of fatherhood.

Today, Fintan, eight, made some remarks about food.

“Fish is seafood.”, he announced, to no surprise.

“Chicken is meat.”, he continued, again, in the same deliberate manner, with a slight air of puzzlement.

“...but birds are AIRFOOD.”, he concluded, with perfect logic.

I exploded with laughter. It was such an unexpected categorization – yet so apt, that I had no choice but to laugh. Why, I wondered, had no-one else, in all my life, so described birds? They WERE “Airfood”. Yet, no-one speaks of them as such.

The perfect, ineluctable logic of children, often leads us to understand the hidden truths in the world around us – the things which are always there, but which we are not able to see. One of them is “air food”...it is a thought that has been implicit in the structure of the English language, since the very first day someone described fish as “seafood”...but, until now, perhaps, no-one has ever said it. Fintan is the first, to my knowledge, to describe birds as “airfood”.

It is intriguing to observe that, although the logic is clear and implicit in the words and their relationship to each other, in English – that no-one actually uses the term “airfood”. This seems to suggest that we don’t, as a society, think too logically about what our language is suggesting. We don’t see what is implicit within it. Today, it took a young boy to see that logic and remark upon it. Fintan saw what no adult, to my knowledge ever did – the implicit categorization lying in wait in the language itself, waiting to be spoken.

Thank you Fintan, for your description. From now on, in our household, birds shall be known as “airfood” in honour of Fintan’s uncannily appropriate thought.

Posted by Valentine Cawley

(If you would like to support my continued writing of this blog and my ongoing campaign to raise awareness about giftedness and all issues pertaining to it, please donate, by clicking on the gold button to the left of the page.

To read about my fundraising campaign, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-in-support-of-my.html and here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-first-donation.html

If you would like to read any of our scientific research papers, there are links to some of them, here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/02/research-papers-by-valentine-cawley-and.html

If you would like to see an online summary of my academic achievements to date, please go here: http://www.getcited.org/mbrz/11136175

To learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 5, 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.

There is a review of my blog, on the respected The Kindle Report here:http://thekindlereport.blogspot.com/2010/09/boy-who-knew-too-much-child-prodigy.html

Please have a read, if you would like a critic's view of this blog. Thanks.

You can get my blog on your Kindle, for easy reading, wherever you are, by going to: http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Who-Knew-Too-Much/dp/B0042P5LEE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1284603792&sr=8-1

Please let all your fellow Kindlers know about my blog availability - and if you know my blog well enough, please be so kind as to write a thoughtful review of what you like about it. Thanks.

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 athttp://www.genghiscan.com/

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

Of Casinos and confectionery.

“Mum,” began Fintan, eight, with a certain puzzled intensity, “Why is gambling a sin?”

Syahidah’s curious eyes appraised his puzzled eyes, a little surprised at the question.

“It is a sin because gambling is addictive and it ruins your life.”

“Oh my God!”, Fintan exclaimed, with shocked, widening eyes, “What is chocolate, then? I am addicted to chocolate!”

She had to smile, at the connection he drew – and reassured him that chocolate was fine.

This little conversation didn’t stop him eating chocolate, subsequently, though perhaps he indulged a little more appreciatively of his “addiction”.

I like Fintan’s question. It shows that he is trying to understand the moral codes of adults and come to an appreciation of why it is that certain behaviours are thought bad and others not. It also shows that he considers that this adult labelling is not intrinsically clear – that is, things which we deem wrong, do not necessarily appear wrong to him. He could not, himself, understand why gambling would be a “sin”. He must have considered the activity – the playing of games for money – and not been able to see what was wrong with that. This suggests that the innate morality of a child and the constructed morality of adults are not the same thing. He appraises the morality of things from a fresh, innocent and largely uninfluenced position, not yet having been indoctrinated into adult thinking. It is refreshing to see him come to his own viewpoints as to what is wrong and what is not. Of course, by asking his mother for her understandings, he is seeking to teach himself the adult world’s moral stance – or at least the moral stance of my wife’s adult world. However, I see that, in him, there is another morality, already extant, to which he is comparing his mother’s views.

This leads me to wonder what his moral views would be, were he not to be instructed at all in the constructed adult world’s ones. Would his views remain as they are now – the moral outlook of a child? The experiment cannot be done, and should not be, for moral reasons, ironically...but it is interesting to speculate how much of our moral views are indoctrinated as we grow up, and how many are intrinsic. It is clear that Fintan has intrinsic views, but that he is seeking an understanding of the extrinsic ones. This suggests that he is prepared to believe that those outside himself, have more moral understanding than he does. His outlook therefore, is that he is prepared to learn what people he trusts believe to be so.

It is revealing that he considers moral issues at all. I am not sure how many kids these days, actually think of moral matters...but Fintan does. He is concerned that he lives his life, in the right – but to do so, he must first come to an understanding of what is right, and what is not.

I mustn’t let him spoil his enjoyment of chocolate, though...for that would be an unnecessary loss. Now, I am just going to give him a piece of one of his favoured chocolate bars...

Posted by Valentine Cawley

(If you would like to support my continued writing of this blog and my ongoing campaign to raise awareness about giftedness and all issues pertaining to it, please donate, by clicking on the gold button to the left of the page.

To read about my fundraising campaign, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-in-support-of-my.html and here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-first-donation.html

If you would like to read any of our scientific research papers, there are links to some of them, here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/02/research-papers-by-valentine-cawley-and.html

If you would like to see an online summary of my academic achievements to date, please go here: http://www.getcited.org/mbrz/11136175

To learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 5, 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.

There is a review of my blog, on the respected The Kindle Report here:http://thekindlereport.blogspot.com/2010/09/boy-who-knew-too-much-child-prodigy.html

Please have a read, if you would like a critic's view of this blog. Thanks.

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Please let all your fellow Kindlers know about my blog availability - and if you know my blog well enough, please be so kind as to write a thoughtful review of what you like about it. Thanks.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at:http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/

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

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

Mischievous marketing to children.

A few days ago, my son Fintan, 8, asked a question that made me wonder at the deviousness of marketers.

“Do Smarties make you smarter?”, he asked, most innocently. He seemed quite prepared to believe that they did.

“No, Fintan, it is just a name.”

He didn’t seem entirely satisfied with that. I intuited his unspoken thoughts as being along the lines of: “If they don’t make you smarter, why call them that, then?”

This little exchange drove me to ponder the freedoms we give marketers: they are allowed to call their products anything at all – yet, sometimes, they don’t seem to use this freedom honestly. Fintan was right. There IS the suggestion in the name “Smarties”, that the product is connected, somehow, to smartness. It IS a fair and quite reasonable step to infer, as Fintan had, that the product must be so called, because, somehow, it induced “smartness”. Indeed, perhaps that is exactly the reason they were named “Smarties” in the first place. Perhaps, they wanted children, all over the world, to associate their product with smartness and consume them, therefore, in increased numbers, motivated by the illusion that they were going to enjoy positive cognitive change.

Children and unintelligent adults are susceptible to manipulation through the naming and marketing of products. It would seem wise, to me, to place safeguards on the naming of products so that false associations and inferences are not attached to products, for the purpose of increasing sales to vulnerable groups. Fintan is a bright child. He is socially very switched on. Yet, his conclusion when faced with a product named: “Smarties”, is that they must induce smartness – for why else call them that? How many other children, around the world have the same, perhaps unvoiced thought? How many of them UNCONSCIOUSLY make that link and are motivated to buy them? It is a somewhat disturbing thought. In a way, there is something unethical about naming a product with a reference to a property it doesn’t have, creating an association it cannot fulfil. Smarties don’t make you smart – but they might make you fat, or your teeth rot, if overly consumed. That would be a fair set of truer associations to link to the product, than “they make you smart”.

The funny thing is, that, until Fintan pointed it out, I had never reflected on the implications of the name “Smarties”. Sometimes, children are quicker to see the broader truths of things, in their world, than we are. Perhaps that is because they are thinking about them for the first time, and trying to find meaning in them – whereas adults, in some ways, have lost that habit, to some extent.

Thank you, Fintan, for your question. Smarties won’t make you smarter – but perhaps thinking about them will.

Posted by Valentine Cawley

(If you would like to support my continued writing of this blog and my ongoing campaign to raise awareness about giftedness and all issues pertaining to it, please donate, by clicking on the gold button to the left of the page.

To read about my fundraising campaign, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-in-support-of-my.html and here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-first-donation.html

If you would like to read any of our scientific research papers, there are links to some of them, here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/02/research-papers-by-valentine-cawley-and.html

If you would like to see an online summary of my academic achievements to date, please go here: http://www.getcited.org/mbrz/11136175

To learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 5, 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.

There is a review of my blog, on the respected The Kindle Report here:http://thekindlereport.blogspot.com/2010/09/boy-who-knew-too-much-child-prodigy.html

Please have a read, if you would like a critic's view of this blog. Thanks.

You can get my blog on your Kindle, for easy reading, wherever you are, by going to: http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Who-Knew-Too-Much/dp/B0042P5LEE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1284603792&sr=8-1

Please let all your fellow Kindlers know about my blog availability - and if you know my blog well enough, please be so kind as to write a thoughtful review of what you like about it. Thanks.

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 athttp://www.genghiscan.com/

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

Lack of creativity in adults.

Yesterday, Fintan, eight, was listening to the radio. There was a song playing which caught his attention.

“Mummy, was that song made by a kid, or an adult?”. Genuine puzzlement had settled in his eyes and inflected his tongue.

His mother, Syahidah gazed down upon him, knowing the answer, but wondering how there could be any doubt.

Fintan explained. “They keep repeating the words.” It was clear he thought this both silly and evidence of an undeveloped mind.

“It is by an adult.”, she assured him, a little unimpressed herself that it should be so.

Fintan didn’t know what to make of that. It seemed that he didn’t believe it worthy of a child, never mind an adult.

She didn’t explain to him further about the parlous state of modern culture – about how many “artists” produce trite and empty work. Perhaps she should have done.

It is interesting, however, that a young child of only eight was able to identify the essential emptiness of a song that had too much repetition in it. He already expected more from a song – more complexity, more variety, more of a story than this particular “artiste” was able to give. This, of course, prompts the question: if a young boy can see modern music as lacking, how can the adult audience not do so as well? Why is there even a market for such trivial “music”?

In moments like this, it is becoming apparent that Fintan is growing in awareness of the mental and cultural limitations of the modern adult world. He is beginning to see a mismatch between his expectations of that world and what it actually is and delivers. It is both telling and somewhat sad, that even an eight year old boy can expect greater quality and complexity from the adult world than it is able, in this instance, at least, to offer. In his innocent question, there lies a potent criticism of the state of modern music , in particular, and modern culture in general. It has degenerated to the point that even a young boy sees that something is missing. That something, of course, is intelligence and creativity. Once, one might have expected it in the typical cultural product, now, however, it has become a rarity. In its stead, we have derivativeness, “sampling”/plagiarism, simplicity to the point of banality, and a general sense of stupidity, in the “creator”. Even a child can sense it and wonder why it is so.

I hope that the future is better than the present, culturally, because much that is modern seems to have declined from the past. I hope that this decline does not continue and that the future holds music and other culture that children won’t puzzle at, that an adult could possibly have produced it. However, looking around, there is not much hope for the near future. It may be a distant future, before human culture recovers the complexity, depth and originality it once had – at least, in terms of popular expressions in any media. Right now, much of the work can be described by one word: mindless. Even a child can see that - or hear it, anyway.

Posted by Valentine Cawley

(If you would like to support my continued writing of this blog and my ongoing campaign to raise awareness about giftedness and all issues pertaining to it, please donate, by clicking on the gold button to the left of the page.

To read about my fundraising campaign, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-in-support-of-my.html and here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/01/fundraising-drive-first-donation.html

If you would like to read any of our scientific research papers, there are links to some of them, here: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2011/02/research-papers-by-valentine-cawley-and.html

If you would like to see an online summary of my academic achievements to date, please go here: http://www.getcited.org/mbrz/11136175

To learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 7 and Tiarnan, 5, 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.

There is a review of my blog, on the respected The Kindle Report here:http://thekindlereport.blogspot.com/2010/09/boy-who-knew-too-much-child-prodigy.html

Please have a read, if you would like a critic's view of this blog. Thanks.

You can get my blog on your Kindle, for easy reading, wherever you are, by going to: http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Who-Knew-Too-Much/dp/B0042P5LEE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1284603792&sr=8-1

Please let all your fellow Kindlers know about my blog availability - and if you know my blog well enough, please be so kind as to write a thoughtful review of what you like about it. Thanks.

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 athttp://www.genghiscan.com/

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

Fintan and the secrets of the Sun

I like Fintan's outlook on the world. It is one crafted of reason and imagination - and one that is uniquely his own. He has his own means of expression which I have tried, occasionally, to capture, but perhaps have not yet fully succeeded: I call it Fintanism. By this I mean that he says things in ways that others wouldn't. It is his own outlook, his own vision that speaks. I think is important - for everyone who becomes an artist - as he promises to do, with the way he sees the world and the way he interacts with it - must have their own point of view. This is the defining characteristic - more than any technical skill or ability to produce art - the defining, foundational attribute is that of a unique viewpoint. If there is no uniqueness, there can be no original art. The work would just be as others' is. It would say nothing new and be nothing interesting. Thus, when seeing if a child can be an artist, we must first look to the question: are they different, somehow? Are they moved in different ways? Do they see the world differently? Are their responses their own? Are their utterances unique, in some way - do they, basically, have their own personality and their own outlook?

If the answer to these questions is yes and they show an additional interest in creative production in some artistic medium - then there is promise for them. If, however, they just show production in a medium - without any uniqueness in their responses - I would argue that there is little artistic promise at work. The first property of an artist is individuality - if it is not possessed then there is no artist - or artistry.

About three weeks ago, after we had been in the pool and I had managed to coax them through the sometimes long process of actually leaving the pool, Fintan, three, took it upon himself to stand under a palm tree.

"Look Daddy!" he said, excitedly, "The tree doesn't make me hot."

I was struck by the quirkiness of this way of looking at things: that the tree should not be the giver of heat, entertained the thought that it might have been.

There was Fintan, standing in the shade of the palm tree, by the pool, observing that, in the shade, he was not hot.

Then he did something that any scientist might. He moved to another tree, and stood under it, to see the effect of this one.

Again he pronounced his verdict: "The tree doesn't make me hot."

He was quite pleased with this - not alone because the observation was correct, in its own oddly expressed way - but because Singapore is hot, from his stocky perspective, and thus finding a place that isn't so hot is quite a pleasant discovery.

He did it once more, with a final, larger tree, before leaving the environs of the pool.

"The tree doesn't make me hot." He announced, finally, his observation most thoroughly investigated.

What is interesting about this, besides the quirkiness of his way of thinking and expressing himself, is what it says of his awareness of his environment. These palm trees let quite a lot of light through their leaves - for there are large gaps between them, and few leaves - so the difference in temperature is marginal. Yet, Fintan was sensitive to the change which he had first noticed simply because he had walked under the tree and felt the difference - then stopped and made his observation.

So, Fintan is not only visually aware. He is aware of temperature as well. I would say that it is becoming likely that Fintan is very aware in ALL of his senses. Being aware is part of his nature. If there is something to observe, in his surroundings, it is characteristic of Fintan that he does not fail to observe it. This too is the mark of an artist in the budding.

Who knows, perhaps he will draw beneath the shade of a palm tree. There are certainly plenty to choose from, around here.

(If you would like to learn more of Fintan, three, or his gifted brothers, Ainan Celeste Cawley, seven years and four months, or Tiarnan, fifteen 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, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, the creatively gifted, gifted adults and gifted children in general. Thanks.)