The dumbest man in the world.

Recently, I wrote about the Samantha Schermanhorn and Kaylie George case of youthful stupidity. Some people thought I was being harsh on them or that I was picking on them – not so, I was merely using them as a specific example of a general phenomenon – people are just rather dumb, these days. Stupidity is not just reserved for the young –mature individuals are quite capable of it, too, as I will now reveal.

I once met an actor who was a tall, muscular body builder. He was enormous. He was a strong, aggressive, very confident man, who had a certain arrogance about him. He really believed in himself. He was an actor on the cusp of becoming famous – he was getting decent sized roles in popular TV series and was, at the time, working on an epic feature film. He would soon be known to the world. He already had a following in certain quarters.

Now he liked to boast. One of the things he boasted about was his Mensa membership. He would actually whip out his Mensa card at random moments in conversation, to prove his intellectual worth. It was quite funny, if a little sad. He would use his Mensa membership as a reference to support his side of an argument, as if to say, “I am bright…so I am right”.

His primary characteristics were size, strength and aggression – but he was fond of referring to himself as “one of the brightest people in the world”. I think he was rather overstating what Mensa membership connotes – since it takes the top 2 % and that is not very exclusive in terms of intelligence, at all.

Anyway, one day, he really gave me pause to doubt his intelligence.

Can you guess what he said that convinced me he was the dumbest man I had ever met? Think carefully.

Well, he began boasting, one day, of how he refused to wear a condom during relations with his HIV positive girlfriend. He considered one completely unnecessary and thought that he had no chance of catching HIV from her, during normal relations.

That really brought a silence to the room.

It seemed that he thought he was so big and tough that nothing so small and puny as a mere virus could harm him. It was quite a mad moment.

Now, I don’t know how long he had had this particular girlfriend – but it was immediately clear to me that this very tall man would have a very short life. He lived in a part of the world notorious for its HIV rates – and he refused to wear condoms. I have seen two estimates of the rate of transmission of infection if unprotected in heterosexual relations – one in three hundred and one in five hundred. If it is the latter, five hundred instances of unprotected relations – quite possible in say a year or so of a new relationship – would result in a two in three chance of infection. If it is the former, that same year would result in a much higher chance of infection.

So, for all his boasting about his intelligence, his actions prove otherwise. Here was a man dumb enough to think himself invincible, who daily put himself at risk of HIV in a pretty suicidal manner, with a girlfriend known to be HIV positive.

I won’t name him, since he is becoming famous. However, if you are the sort who consorts with film stars, be very careful of those who are tall and muscular – for one of them is very likely to be HIV positive. He will also refuse to wear a condom.

Now, reflecting upon his behaviour I see a comparison with the Samantha Schermanhorn and Kaylie George case. Both are instances of people doing things which have an inevitable outcome, given long enough. Both actions are certain to lead to death or injury if pursued for any length of time. Yet, in both cases, the participants seem unaware of the risks.

So Samantha Schermanhorn and Kaylie George are not alone, in their foolishness. Hollywood has its fair share too. Considering that the actor is at least three times older than the girls, it seems fair to consider him even dumber than them. I hereby propose him as the dumbest man in the 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.)

David Carradine's posthumous fame.

It is bizarre. David Carradine is already more famous for dying, than for living. His death, in mysterious circumstances, has ensured that, far from being largely unnoticed, at death (as I suspect he would have been, had he not died in the way he did), more attention is being paid to him now, than he ever received in life.

It is notable that, after David Carradine's Kwai Chang Caine role in "Kung Fu", that he led a rather quiet career, for the most part, from the viewpoint of the public. Yes, it is true that he appeared in around 200 shows...but it is also true that most of these roles went largely unnoted. David Carradine was very much an "under the radar", actor, until he was cast as Bill, in Kill Bill, by Quentin Tarantino. Then, again, for a brief time, David Carradine was noticed by the global public - or at least that part of it which likes Quentin Tarantino films (by no means a majority of people, but certainly a fair proportion).

David Carradine's last scene will be forever remembered. Unfortunately, it is a scene of peculiar death: a still shot, imagined in the minds of most readers, of a naked man, bound and suspended from a closet railing. However, this situation has one effect that, as an actor, David Carradine might have appreciated: his career and work may now gain much more notice than they would have done had he quietly slipped away, from natural causes, as most actors (and most people) do. David Carradine's misfortune has the one redeeming feature that he will now never be forgotten - at least, in the lifetime of anyone now living in the developed world, with access to the media.

Yet, there is a tragedy in this situation, too. For is it not sad that a man can be more noticed for dying bizarrely, than for making a creative effort in 200 televisual and filmic productions, throughout five decades? This speaks for the modern world's appetite for strange news, over their appetite for film. It seems that people are more interested in the oddities of the real world, than in anything film has to offer.

Perhaps it all comes down to the power of gossip. David Carradine has died in an eminently gossip worthy fashion. Now, even if the truth turns out to be a rather simple, if odd, case of auto-erotic asphyxiation, that truth will never be allowed to live alone. Alongside it will be spoken any number of theories of why and how he died. Forevermore, there will be tales of murder, of another, or others, present in the room at his death and discussion of whether it was all accidental or suicidal. No matter what the results of the autopsy are, no matter what the police decide, the conspiracy theorists will yabber on, gossip will continue to circulate and the tale of David Carradine's death will just grow bigger and bigger. Not until everyone on Earth has heard of it and discussed it to, excuse me, death, will the gossiping cease. By then, of course, everyone will know of David Carradine, even if they had never before seen any of his work (which is quite possible, particularly if the people concerned are too young to have seen the first run of Kung Fu from 1972 to 1975).

David Carradine is dead. However, in another sense, David Carradine is immortal. By dying as he has, he has, most probably inadvertently, ensured that he will never be forgotten. David Carradine's posthumous fame, is far greater than David Carradine's fame in life ever was. That, perhaps, is the strangest thing of all - even stranger than to end up hung naked from a closet in a Bangkok hotel two days into filming the appropriately named French film production, "Stretch".

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

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

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication prohibited. Use Only with Permission. Thank you.)

David Carradine, "Kung Fu" actor, dead in Bangkok

David Carradine has died, in a Bangkok hotel room. The initial police report says "suicide", his family and friends say "No way", his manager, too, disputes the suicide theory. Whether or not his hanging was a voluntary act, accidental or assisted by another, may never be determined. That David Carradine will be missed, however, is certain.

David Carradine came from an acting family...his father John was a noted and busy actor from the 30s to the 80s and his brother Bruce Carradine, his half-brothers Keith and Robert Carradine, his niece Martha Plimpton and nephew Ever Carradine, are all actors, too. His case, therefore, calls to mind the recent death of Natasha Richardson, also from an extensive acting dynasty, though of the British variety.

I am not going to write a potted biography of David Carradine: many other sites have done that. I am, however, going to look at his effect on many children around the world.

Ever so long ago, from 1972 to 1975, David Carradine appeared in the lead role of "Kung Fu", the series, as Kwai Chang Caine, a wandering half-Chinese monk. His adventures captivated me, as a young boy and I watched him avidly, imagining myself doing, as he did, as, no doubt, many young boys did.

Kwai Chang Caine was an iconic character and one strangely influential. After the first run of the series ended, I took up Kung Fu, myself, as a little boy. That youthful interest owed itself, to some degree, to David Carradine's portrayal of the mastery of movement that Kwai Chang Caine showed. From my browsing on the net, it is clear that David Carradine's character inspired many young boys, from around the world, to develop an interest in the martial arts.

It is funny to think of it, but not many tv characters made such a lasting impression on me, in my early years, as Kwai Chang Caine, did. Perhaps some of his success was his difference from what was then normal. He was an ODD character. His behaviour was out of the ordinary. His skills were magical. His self-assurance was attractive. He was the invincible outsider. There was something very alluring about that: a man who was not a part of what surrounded him, but was superior to it. He bested the typical Americans around him, at every encounter...and yet he was unarmed. To a young boy, that seemed very impressive.

There were also philosophical echoes to the character and the storyline. It had depths that were not immediately evident. This, too, had its allure: there was something to think about there.

The most shocking thing, for me, is to learn that the series was so long ago. When I watched it, I didn't think of myself as a little boy. I didn't feel undeveloped. I cannot, now, conceive that I was between four and seven years old, when I saw it - because it seems so recent, so present. The series made an impression on me that never really left, though, of course, I very rarely thought of it in the subsequent decades.

Oddly, however, I did a net search for David Carradine, a few days ago, on a whim. He had come to mind, for reasons I cannot explain, and I felt moved to go looking for what had happened to him and to see how popular he was, nowadays. It was the first time I had ever searched for him, on the net - and the first time, in perhaps three decades, that I had thought of him. That he should die a few days later is just the kind of coincidence that makes some people believe in psychic abilities.

David Carradine was an actor who was always working. However, most of his roles were sufficiently low key not to make a global impression. He was, therefore, one of those actors remembered largely for but one role: Kwai Chang Caine, despite having played over a hundred.

Thank you David Carradine, for inspiring so many young boys, to trying the martial arts. RIP.

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

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

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication prohibited. Use Only with Permission. Thank you.)

The happiest man in the world.

A couple of days after Patrick Rocca's suicide, seemingly over the loss of some considerable sum of money, it is supposed, I met one of the poorest men in Singapore.

I was on my way out in the morning, when I passed by a roadsweeper, cleaning up our estate.

He looked up at me from his work and threw the biggest of smiles. Reflexively, I smiled back, though I didn't recognize him.

"Good morning!" he said, to me and it was clear from the bounce in his words that it was, indeed, a good morning for him.

"Good morning!" I said, in reply, rather surprised at his evident happiness.

He had given me much to reflect on, as I went to work, that morning. You see, in Singapore, manual jobs such as the one he laboured over are exceptionally poorly paid...the equivalent of three digits per month, in US dollars and absolutely no more. That is for sure. He would barely make enough money to eat at a subsistence level for one person, never mind have a decent roof over his head. Yet, he was happy. He was unaccountably happy to be alive.

I thought, then, of Patrick Rocca who had blown his own brains out, over the loss of a huge sum of money (which I think it is likely would not have wiped him out down to this man's level). Patrick Rocca was a rich man, who had gotten somewhat poorer, though, by this man's scale he would still have been a rich man. Yet the roadsweeper was the happy, contented one.

There is a lesson in this, for us all. It is not our station in life that determines our happiness in life: it is how we feel about it. Rich Rocca was suicidal at his own circumstances - circumstances which are rich beyond imagination, for the happy roadsweeper.

Perhaps it is true, indeed, that money doesn't buy happiness. Perhaps all that is needed is a broomstick and a sunny morning.

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

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

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication prohibited. Use Only with Permission. Thank you.)

Suicides of the rich and famous.

We live in turbulent times, times so turbulent, in fact, that suicide is becoming almost fashionable among the rich and famous.

Patrick Rocca, Adolf Merckle and Rene-Thierry Magon de la Villehuchet are three men who may never have met, but whom each shared much in common with the others. All of them were very rich. All of them seem to have run into financial trouble with this global downturn - and all of them killed themselves.

Patrick Rocca built up a 500 million Euro real estate fortune, through investments in the UK and Ireland. He was a friend to Bill Clinton (to whom he used to lend his helicopter, to allow Bill to play golf when he was in town). His sister, Michelle, was a former Miss Ireland and is the partner of Van Morrisson. He seemed to have it all, until, one day, he put a gun to his head, and blew it all away. He was 42 - a husband and a father to three now fatherless children.

Patrick Rocca was recently joined by Adolf Merckle, a German billionaire who had lost a fortune on shorting Volkswagen shares. He lost one billion pounds and, not wishing to fall from 94th richest man in the world to virtually nothing, jumped in front of a train. He had once been the world's 44th richest man in the world (in 2006). He left a wife and four children.

Rene-Thierry Magon de la Villehuchet was a French investor from an ennobled shipping family. He had invested all of his personal fortune with Bernard Madoff - and a billion pounds of other people's money, too. On understanding that he had lost it all, he slashed his wrist and biceps. He left a wife but no children.

I understand that people can become depressed and dejected by great financial or other loss, but I still found myself shocked by the underlying philosophy of each of these three very rich men. For them, the attachment to things was greater than their attachment to life. They would rather lose their lives than face the loss of their things. This is the ultimate materialist philosophy…that their life is defined by material goods and without their material goods, they cannot live.

No doubt they must all have been intelligent men, in some way, to have become so rich in the first place - but nevertheless, their final acts, reflected a kind of resolute stupidity and lack of perspective. Most people in this world live modest lives in economic terms. Most people struggle by with various levels of discomfort, there being always something that cannot be readily afforded, something just out of reach. This limit will differ from person to person, but for most people on Earth it is true that there are limits of consumption and expenditure within which they must live. People become accustomed to this. People learn how not to wish so hard for the unattainable and live somewhere within (or perhaps just beyond) their means. This perennial minor discomfort common even to the world's middle classes, to a degree, does not lead people to suicide, it leads them to patience: patience to wait a little longer to be able to afford that which is just beyond reach, patience to plan how to acquire it, patience to grow the finances a little more.

Had Patrick Rocca, Rene-Thierry Magon de la Villehuchet and Adolf Merckle a little more patience with life, they could have accepted their loss and done what most ordinary people would do in the circumstances: start again and rebuild. Yes, it would have taken years, maybe decades to recoup the family fortunes - but they would have been rebuilt eventually for one thing is sure: each of these three men had acquired the financial skills and understanding to build such fortunes in the first place. They had done it once, they could do it again. All they needed was something many people have a lot more of: resilience. If they had been poorer men, but stronger (in the sense of resilient) they would have survived this downturn to reemerge in another time, as good or better than before.

Their actions defy rationality. For they threw away the entirety of their lives, when faced with a loss that would have meant a few years' to a few decades' work to rebuild. It was not the downturn that cost them everything they had, but the actions of their own hands. The global crisis cost them nothing but money. Their deeds cost them their lives.

Their tales provide a lesson to us all. We should not place so high a value on material things that they seem more important than life itself. Two of these three men had children they should have loved enough to stay alive for. All of them had a wife who should have provided the same motivation.

There are more important things in life than money. In fact, all the important elements in life: family, love, companionship are more important than money. These men had everything, but misunderstood which of the things they had was truly important.

Now, of course, those who are left behind suffer a double loss: the loss of the wealth that supported them and the husband and father whose love they will never again know.

It never seemed to occur to Patrick Rocca Rene-Thierry Magon de la Villehuchet and Adolf Merckle that they were only making matters worse for their family, by dying in this way. Surely it would have been better to start again...perhaps from the equivalent of a middle class lifestyle and rebuild...than to throw their lives away?

My condolences to the families of Rocca, Villehuchet and Merckle - and all the other millionaires and ordinary investors who have and will decide that life without money is not worth living, before this crisis is over.

Perhaps, before it is too late, someone might let them know that there is such a thing as a happy life without great wealth. It is the life most of us know - and I don't see the typical person being that much less happy than the world's billionaires.

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

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

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication prohibited. Use Only with Permission. Thank you.)