Definition of a genius.

Here is my thought on the matter.

Definition of a genius: a genius is someone who is only ever appreciated after their death.

Now, that is sad...for being too often true. What a society we humans have created.

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 deification of Arfa Karim Randhawa.

Arfa Karim Randhawa became the youngest Microsoft Certified Professional in 2004 at the age of just 9. This was a very early achievement. However, equally early was her death at the age of 16, following complications from an epileptic attack. Her life was filled with hope and tragedy. Yet, it is in death that the most remarkable things are beginning to happen. Arfa Karim Randhawa is rapidly being deified by her home nation of Pakistan.

Pakistan has just released a commemorative postage stamp on her birthday, February 2^nd, in her honour. I know of no other child prodigy who ever had their own stamp, at least when still a child. So, this strikes me as a particularly unusual honour for a child. So, too, the Ministry for Information and Broadcasting have announced that a book will be produced in homage to the life of Arfa Karim Randhawa.

Arfa is becoming in death, an icon, even larger than the one she was in life. Her brief days upon on this Earth, are becoming a national tale to inspire her whole nation. Now, I see in this something good and something unusual. It is good that a precocious child should be respected as much as she was, in Pakistan. It is good that Arfa Karim Randhawa’s achievements are held up as an example to inspire a nation. Indeed, there is something admirable in Pakistan caring so much, at a government level, about the achievements of an individual child. It seems that they see in her, a symbol of the striving of a nation to become great. Arfa Karim Randhawa is seen to inspire young people in Pakistan to achieve their best. She is also the source of much pride for Pakistan. There is a sense that her early achievements show the world just what a Pakistani can do. Partly, of course, Pakistan’s motivation is out of a sense of loss, that their promising child should have died so young. There is a wish to remember her life and to somehow ensure that her memory lives on, such that it would feel that she hadn’t truly died after all.

All of this wish to hold Arfa Karim Randhawa up as an example, to her people, is in sharp contrast to the way Singapore greeted Ainan. Whilst they were surprised at first, at his achievements, and covered them in the national press, in the spirit of surprise, eventually, as his achievements continued to grow, they turned to ignoring them, or, indeed, eventually, lying about him and us, to make themselves (as a state) look better than they had actually behaved in the situation. They stooped to mendacious propaganda, to defend themselves against the truthful perception that they had been rather negligent where he was concerned. At no time, was there a wish to hold him up as an inspiration. At no time did they seem proud of him. At no time, was there ever any wish to elevate him and make him a symbol of anything at all, to his people – the Malay Singaporeans. Indeed, the first newspaper to fall silent on the subject of Ainan and to begin to ignore him, was the sole Malay newspaper, Berita Harian. It was as if they had been instructed to say no more. It was all rather strange. A rational nation would have been so proud of Ainan. Yet, they didn’t seem to be. They seemed, in fact, to find him an awkward phenomenon they didn’t quite know what to do with. What, on Earth, was a half-Malay boy doing excelling so much younger than his Singaporean Chinese peers? At least, that is what I intuit was one of their concerns, since Singapore is very much a Chinese dominated state, in which the mythology is that the Chinese are somehow superior (or at least they believe themselves to be). They certainly appoint themselves to all the best positions and roles in Singaporean life. That, in itself, allows its own conclusions to be drawn.

So, Pakistan has begun to deify Arfa Karim Randhawa, whilst Singapore began to attack Ainan a couple of years ago. I find this very interesting. In a hundred years time, I am sure that Pakistan will still make mention of their wonder child, Arfa Karima Randhawa. She will, by then, have become a legend. Should Singapore still be run by the PAP however, I very much doubt whether there will be any mention of Ainan, in the Singaporean media, unless it is to attempt to put some perjorative spin on his life story, in some way. Yet, Ainan’s achievements are far greater in number and level, than Arfa Karim Randhawa’s were. So it is doubly strange that Singapore should have adopted this way of discussing him. It is also oddly self-defeating, since Ainan could contribute much to Singapore were he moved to do so, by a warm relationship with them. As ever the famed state of Singapore shows itself to be not as long term in its thinking as it might believe itself to be.

Given the contrasting responses of their home nations to Ainan and Arfa, it does seem unexpected, to me, how Pakistan has responded to Arfa Karim Randhawa. Our own experience led me to expect that negligence was the most likely response of a state to a child prodigy – or even a degree of malevolence – as we experienced – if the child should be from a put upon minority, as Ainan is. So, although I see Pakistan’s response to Arfa Karim Randhawa as unusual, perhaps, in fact, it is Singapore’s response to Ainan that is strange. It certainly feels more wholesome to watch how Pakistan are responding to Arfa, compared to how Singapore responded to Ainan. Singapore actually lied about him, in the national press. By contrast, Pakistan’s national press are being very kind to Arfa.

Personally, I hope the deification of Arfa Karim Randhawa continues. I hope she becomes an emblematic figure, to inspire her nation for many decades, perhaps centuries to come. Every nation needs such people. Perhaps she can, in death, fulfil some of her potential, through her posthumous influence on the psyche of her people. I hope so. At least, then, something wonderful would have been made out of her brief life.

Perhaps Singapore could learn a thing or two about how to value the talents of its people, by looking at the ways in which Pakistan clearly values Arfa Karim Randhawa. There is something touching in their response to her – and something unsettling in Singapore’s response to Ainan.

I wish Arfa Karim Randhawa’s family well. I hope the efforts of Pakistan to honour her memory bring them some solace.

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 last words of Pancho Villa.

There is a lesson for us all, in the supposed last words of Pancho Villa, the Mexican revolutionary who died in 1923.

Pancho, whose real name was José Doroteo Arango Arámbula is supposed by some, to have said: "Don't let it end like this. Tell them I said something."

Now, others think he died too quickly under a hail of bullets that hit him nine times, in the chest and head, to have said it at all, but let us consider it, as if it were actually spoken, for it sums up his predicament eminently. Pancho Villa no doubt, like most of us, looked forward to a future filled with planned deeds and contributions to life, that, in an instant, were never to be. One moment he was a living, breathing, thinking, planning, feeling, achieving man. The next moment he was dying. There is a sobering lesson in this for us all, whether or not we are prominent enough to be likely to motivate someone to assassinate us. Too many people assume, for themselves a long, healthy active life. Yet, there is no telling what one's future life will be like - how long, how short, how active, how fulfilled or how frustrated. Anyone's life can, of course, end in an instant. That is the peculiar truth of being alive: death is never further than the next femtosecond, potentially.

At the end, Pancho, supposedly, became conscious that death was imminent. He had not time to reflect on what his last words should be. He had not time to issue any more commands (he was a revolutionary General). He had not time to give any instructions of any kind. He had only time to die. Instead of true, intended, last words, he had only the opportunity to ask his followers to make something up for him - for he himself now no longer had the time for such reflection. He wanted, in this version of events, to leave behind some lasting impression, something that would echo on, after he was gone. His final thought, therefore, was a wish for immortality, at least, of the memic kind, if not of the by then impossible biological kind. He wanted his memory to live on, yet was unprepared for the last moment. He was not ready to die.

The question here is: how many of us are ready for our own passing? Some of us are lucky, in a way, to be given forewarning, by some predictable illness, but others die suddenly, in accidents, or like Pancho Villa, murders, or more mundanely sudden heart attacks or strokes. There may be no warning and no opportunity for final words and deeds, no chance to seek any lasting image in posterity.

The answer, of course, the only answer there can be is to proceed with one's plans and creative and other intentions, as rapidly as possible, making no assumption about how much time there might be to do so. This presents a problem to those whose intended works or deeds require many years - but in such cases, the initiator must judge the likelihood of being around to finish the works, before beginning them or ask whether other works, of lesser extent, might be wiser to embark upon.

In a way, Pancho Villa did leave a mark on posterity by his supposed final words: he gave us an opportunity to reflect on the awkward fact that many are completely unready and prepared for death when it comes, quite suddenly and unexpectedly, as he was. In that sense, perhaps, there is a message in the circumstances of all deaths: they have lessons extrinsic to any intended by the one who passes.

I have many life projects. I don't know whether I will complete them all, in the unknown time that I have. I hope, however, to do the most important of them (though one never knows whether life will allow that). I would like to thank Pancho Villa, for reminding me of where one's efforts should be placed and how life should be conducted, so that it is most likely that what is truly important is accomplished, in whatever time one has.

(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 at http://www.genghiscan.com/

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

Einstein's lost last words.

Einstein's last words will never be known. When he spoke them, the only person in attendance was a nurse, who didn't understand German. She was subsequently unable to remember what he had said, for others to understand.

It is quite a sad scene. That such a great man should be dying without any friends or relatives present strikes me as a pity. Why was it a nurse who witnessed his last moments? Where was everyone? In effect, Albert Einstein died alone for what would the nurse have meant to him?

Let us hope his last words were not significant ones.

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

Vincent Van Gogh and Doctor Who.

It feels odd to say it, but I was moved, two days ago, by an episode of Doctor Who, the saga of an immortal time traveller. Before you think me too eccentric in my feelings, I shall explain.

The episode in question concerned Vincent Van Gogh. Doctor Who travelled to visit him, at the beginning of his final year of life, upon seeing his art in the Musee D’Orsay. I will not spoil the episode for you, should you be interested in following the adventures of Dr. Who, but I do need to address one point.

Vincent Van Gogh was adjudged by all, himself included, a failure in his lifetime. His art was rejected. He only ever sold one work and that was to someone close to him. In the end, he so despaired of his life, of his social rejection, of his failure, that he took his own life at the age of 37. He died thinking that his entire life had been a failure. He died never knowing what impact he was to make upon art subsequent to his death.

None of us know what posthumous mark we will make. None of us know whether posterity will even give us one thought, or whether all that we did and were, will be lost when the last person who remembers us, dies. This is the common fate of Man. We cannot see what our lives provoke, in the time beyond our final day. We live and die, not knowing whether or not we will be forgotten.

The situation with regards to Van Gogh is particularly acute. His sense of failure was so strong, his conviction that his life amounted to nothing was so intense, that he actually killed himself. Yet, Vincent Van Gogh is accounted one of the greatest painters who ever lived. The tragedy is that he never knew it. The one person to whom this success would have mattered most, never got the chance to witness it.

In Doctor Who, Vincent Van Gogh is transported into the future, to the modern era. He is taken into the Musee D’Orsay to an exhibition of his own work. He is stunned to see that anyone would ever care enough about his works – which he was unable to sell in his lifetime – to exhibit them in a national museum. He is profoundly moved by this, to learn that his life was not a failure after all. Yet, that is not what moved him most. He overhears a museum art guide describe him as the greatest painter who ever lived. Tears well in his eyes. The failure in life, is to be a success in death.

I was deeply touched by this, for there is great tragedy in Vincent Van Gogh’s life. More tragic than his life, was that his early death deprived him of the knowledge of his own eventual acceptance and success. The greatest gift Van Gogh could ever have received, was knowledge of his own future reputation. Van Gogh, in Doctor Who, witnessed what none of us do: what the world thinks of us and says of us, when we are gone. He saw his impact on future time, long after his own death. What made it all the more poignant is that his success in death, should be in such contrast to his utter failure in life.

None of us know what final impact our lives will have, if any, on the world. Even people who are famous in their own lifetimes, may be unremembered just fifty or a hundred years after their deaths. Many a “famous” writer of the early twentieth century is now utterly forgotten. So, too, many of the early film stars. Their names would go unrecognized today, except by film historians. So, too, is it so, for those not known in their lifetimes, who may become famous in death. I find these cases peculiar, for everyone seems to know of them, except themselves: they never lived to see their own reputations blossom.

No matter what we think we know of our lives, we cannot know what will be thought of us after we are gone. Nothing is a guarantee that our memories shall endure – not even fame in one’s own lifetime. We cannot know whether, by having lived, we have changed the world in any enduring fashion. All we can do, in our lives, is to express our uniqueness, as best as we can and hope that the world and the future find value in it, even if we shall never know it. There is one mercy in all of this, however: that is, even if the future forgets us, we shall not be around to know about it. Yet, the opposite applied in Van Gogh’s case – the future remembers him – and he never knew.

(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, 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.

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 at http://www.genghiscan.com/

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

On leaving a mark.

Some of you may have wondered why I write so much, so consistently, across the years. It is not, after all, what most people do. The reason is simple but pervasive. I wish all that I have been, have felt, have thought and have seen could endure, forever. To my mind, it is not just death all Men should be afraid of, but forgetfulness – the loss of all that we knew, through the unadorned passage of Time.

I write so that one day, my children will see their own childhoods as I saw them, and my wife saw them. I write so that one day, I, too, will be able to look back on times past, with greater knowledge than mere remembrance, in old age, might afford. I write, too, so that long after I am gone, my words might remain to give some inkling of who I had been, and what my personal world had been like. Perhaps those words will find readers, perhaps not. However, it is likely, at least, that my own descendants will read my words and come to know their ancestor better, thereby. I am sorry, however, that such illumination shall be a one way casting of the light and that I shall not know who reads my words, or comes to understand, in some small way, who it was who wrote them and what was written of. Then again, that is how it is now. I do not, in general, know who reads my words. I do not, in fact, know most people’s reactions to these words, since few comment. I know this, however: that there are readers out there, in the unknown world of the Internet. Some of those readers have made it clear that they value my words, and find meaning in them. So, that is another reason to write: to create meaning in the minds and hearts of others, to communicate my understandings and the essence of my world, so that it might be remembered by and carried in other minds.

I realize, more than any other, perhaps, that even my greatest efforts towards making a written record is only the merest hint of what I have known, felt, thought and understood. I have not the time to record all my life as it is lived and experienced: I have only the time to select a moment here, or there, a thought now and again, and make of it, what I hope will be an enduring expression of it. Almost all of my life and the lives of my children and wife, will be lost, at the outset, for never having been recorded in any way, except in our minds.

I understand, too, that those to whom my words will mean most, are yet too young to grasp their import to them. My children will grow into an appreciation of what I am doing, or have done, depending on their temporal perspective. They will have a written record and reflection upon their earliest lives. To me, that seems a very valuable thing to have and something which is, I believe, very rare to have, since few parents spare the significant time and energy to make such a record. Few, in fact, would pause to consider its value, until it was too late to make it happen.

I don’t know, however, whether anyone outside of my descendants, will see value in my words, in the distant future, long after I am gone. However, whether it is widely valued, by others, or not, does not change the intrinsic value of making this record. It needs only one appreciative future reader to make it worth having been written. For then, my understanding would have been projected beyond my time, into the mind of another. I would, as it were, have left a mark.

(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, 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.

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 at http://www.genghiscan.com/

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

Changing the English language.

Today, someone arrived on my site, with the search terms: "Is Ainan a name?"

I found that most revealing. You see, to use Ainan's name, they must have heard it. Yet, to ask the question, they must also not be conscious of who he is. Thus, Ainan has influenced their knowledge of the world, by placing the word "Ainan" in their mind - but he has not informed them of his existence. This is very interesting and it is overwhelmingly likely to be because of my son, Ainan, for he is the most well known bearer of that name, in the world.

It is a funny thought, but by naming Ainan, Ainan, we have made that word better known. Of course, we could not have known, in advance, what Ainan was going to be like. However, in choosing such a rare name, we have had the effect of making a rare name, widely known. This person in Brighton, East Sussex, in England, who was searching today, has clearly heard our son's name - even if all other details of his story have been stripped from his name, such that the name stands alone and unadorned with any identity, as it appears to be in his or her mind.

It is a strange thought, that. Somehow, Ainan's name has become known to this person, without any other details of his life story or actual existence being known to them. Had they known that a boy called Ainan existed, they wouldn't have to ask whether his name was a name: his use of it, makes it a name, by definition, for he is so named. Thus, they know Ainan's name, but do not know of his existence. To me, this means one thing: Ainan is actually changing the choice of words available to English language speakers - and most probably speakers of other languages, too, around the world. The word "Ainan" is becoming known to them, perhaps by word of mouth, indeed most probably so, since were it by direct media, this person would know Ainan's story well and would know that a boy of such a name existed.

So, even if Ainan has no other effect on the world, (which I doubt), he has already left an imprint of his name upon it. That imprint is growing and spreading and becoming a word in the minds of people all over the world. Some know that he is a boy and of what a boy he is - but others, like my searcher, know nothing but the word. Ainan has, therefore, become part of the languages of the world, a sound in people's minds - a word that ranges from no attached meaning, to much attached meaning, depending on what else they know about who is the most famous bearer of the word.

The thought gets stranger as I hold it in my mind. Is this the first effect of a person upon the world, who is to change it? Do they first change the language...alter the choice of words and terms available in people's minds? Ainan is now a word in hundreds of millions of minds, where once there was not such a word. Over time, the meaning of that word, will grow and change. Should he affect the world enough, the word Ainan, might be a noun of more general meaning, than just a name - or even an adjective. It would have become a word that, perhaps, embodies not only the sound of his name, but the essence of his person. Ainan might one day become a concept, in people's minds: a word that captures what Ainan is. This process has already begun, for he is already a word in people's minds, who know so little about the word, that they do not even know it is a name.

I wonder what the word "Ainan" will one day, mean? What associations will accrue to it? Will they be permanent connotations, that never fade from the languages of the world? Will the word, Ainan, become a ubiquitous one found in many of the world's languages, carrying much the same meaning in each? This is possible, for the unitary concept behind them, at present, is Ainan himself. That he is one being, with this name, presently known and becoming more known to the world, could so easily mean that, one day, his name might enter all the languages of the world, in countries that communicate with mass media. His name might become a single concept present on all tongues.

For, now, however, he is my young son. I know what "Ainan" means for me - and it is something richer, deeper, more rounded and resonant than it could possibly mean for anyone else, except my wife and his siblings. Yet, I know this: something of Ainan is seeping into the world, and staining it with his hue: he is becoming an influence on the wider world, part of it, a shaper of it, slowly, and who knows what, eventually. Though he is but 10 years old, he has already become an idea in some people's minds - and a word, divorced from all attendant meaning, in others. He has began a journey, whose ultimate end cannot be known, in which what Ainan is, reaches out to the world, to touch it. I cannot know the full extent or nature of that touch or its reverberant effects: but that search today (and many other signs) tells me that it has already begun.

Ainan is my young son - but to the world, perhaps, one day, he will seem to be much more than one man's son. I cannot know what that will be, but at its core, there will be a concept, one that grows over time, deepens, enriches, until it is something rather complex indeed. It will be something known to all, understood by some. That concept will be the sum total of the effects of my son, upon the minds of the world.

The way I have written of this, it might all seem rather exotic - but it is not. This process of which I speak, is common to all who influence the world in any way. So, it is not just Ainan who is becoming part of the wider world - but all who become known, in any way, that impinges upon it, in any tangible fashion. To me, however, it is strange that it is Ainan, my son, who is becoming part of the world in this way. I see him as no others can - but I also see how others see him. I see the bridge between the two, as how I know him to be, connects with how others see him. The former, informs and flows to the latter. To my mind, it looks like others awaken to him. It looks like that, at first, all slept, but now some stumble around in growing awareness. We, however, are already awake to what Ainan is. Thus, we watch as the world awakens from its sleep - some to surprise (at him), others to delight, a few, perhaps, to envy...but more and more, awaken each passing year. It feels strange to watch it unfold. First it begins with a word in people's minds, whose origin they do not know, and one day, it might end in changes profound in the way things are. For that is what thinkers do: they change the world, at the level of our perception of it. The world is made anew in the minds of true creators. Ainan has the cognitive foundations of such a creator - but I cannot say what world he will make, one day, or how he may change the one we have.

I know, for sure, however: it all begins with a word, in people's minds, that appears there, one day, and puzzles them. Today, in Brighton, a person wondered: "Is Ainan a name?"

I don't think it will be long before they and all the people like them, will know the answer.

(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.htmlI 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.

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 at http://www.genghiscan.com/

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

What did Patrick Swayze do for a living?

Bizarrely, someone arrived on my blog having asked that very question. Now, where do you think this person came from? Togo, perhaps? Outer Mongolia? Pitcairn Island? Have a good think. Please come up with your own idea of where someone who didn't know what Patrick Swayze did with his life, might have come from.

Well, the answer is the United States of America. That is right, the person who asked that question was surfing from Indiana, in particular the Indiana Department of Education.

Now, personally, I was surprised that a US citizen would not know what Patrick Swayze was known for. Yet, it made me think. I don't think that this is Patrick Swayze's particular problem. I think he exemplified a simple phenomena that we might wish to forget about: most people, no matter how prominent at one time, are going to be forgotten.

Patrick Swayze was most famous for "Ghost" in 1990 and "Dirty Dancing" in 1987. He was, at that time, a "big name"...everyone knew who he was. Now, of course, that is not so. Many people - perhaps the one who searched - have been born since his heyday. These young people may never have seen his work. They may have heard the name, but not known any work to which the name was attached. Then again, others who did see his work, may have since forgotten him, or have reached the state of "not being able to quite place him". In time, this will happen to almost all film stars and similar people. They are able to attain intense fame, over a period of years, or decades, but that fame simply may not endure. The people who know them, grow old, they forget, and the young never know. In time, all who knew that person's work, directly, pass on - and those that are left probably never encounter the work of an "antique" actor.

So, the most famous of the famous, now, are almost all destined to be forgotten, before even this century is out. Very few will be remembered in centuries to come. Perhaps, not even the greatest film stars, will be remembered. Their fame is bright, but brief. It is not the kind that endures. That latter type subsists on work that future generations have reason to revisit, again, and again across the centuries and millenia. Modern film is unlikely to "fit the bill". Few people trouble themselves to watch films even twenty or thirty years old - so how many would bother to watch work that was a hundred or five hundred years old? Only historians would do so. Thus, in a remarkably short time, the people we now see as most famous, will be forgotten, known only to experts in the field.

The people who are remembered longest are not, paradoxically, I think, the ones whose work is most intensely regarded, necessarily, in their lifetimes. It is the work that offers most complexity, most difficulty. Thus, the less popular contributors, may, in the end, be the most famous, to posterity.

To those who doubt this, I invite them to name one actor from the time of Aristotle. It is not possible for anyone who is not a specialist dramatic historian, to do so. Yet, the average man can name at least three philosophers of the time: Socrates and Plato being the other two. Anyone even slightly knowledgeable about the era, can name a dozen more. Yet, none of these people would be able to name an actor, or a singer, or any other of those kinds, most given to attracting attention DURING their lifetime.

Thus, it is, that those whose work is more complex, and deeper, proves more enduring. This is so, because later man has REASON to revisit the earlier work: it still has something to offer.

To understand this, is to realize that attention is given to the wrong people, in our time. The ones least likely to be of interest to future generations, receive most attention. The ones most likely to be researched by future generations, live relatively quiet lives, perhaps in academe, or on the shelves of bookshops. They are not, necessarily, the "stars" of our time. The stars, on the other hand, are convinced of their own immortality based on their fulgurant public presences. Yet, that dazzling brightness will fade remarkably fast and this is something of which they are delusively unaware.

Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are now, known to all - but once they pass on, their memories will fade catastrophically fast. A century from now, only film specialists will ever have heard of any of them. There may even come a time, when they are too obscure even for film specialists to have heard of. Their "fame" is, in some ways, an illusion of our own, foreshortened view of time. We live brief lives, so it is difficult for us to conceive of what happens beyond the scale of a lifetime. To understand this phenomenon, however, we can just look up some old films, online...something from the 1930s perhaps. Doing this is a sobering experience, since the "stars" of the day, largely consist of forgotten names. So many of them, who might, in their day, have been "names" are now nothing more than arbitrary collections of letters, alongside each other. They have already become lost to the awareness of the common man. So, too, will it be for modern "stars". They won't shine brightly, for long.

If you want to know who will be remembered, by future generations, you need to look to thinkers and creators, whose work does something new. These people have a habit of being discovered, considered and respected by times to come. I can't tell you who they are, however, because their work can take some while to come to be appreciated. Yet, they are out there, perhaps sitting in a cinema, watching the "stars" unaware that future generations might think of them, more highly, than the people they spend their money to watch.

Yet, Patrick Swayze is not without a kind of victory, despite the fact that it is possible for an American not to know he was an actor. At least, they still know his name. One day, of course, not too long in the future, they won't even know that. Yet, he shouldn't despair - because alongside him will be almost all the other "stars" too.

(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.)