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Elenore Victoria Garcia <garcie@rpi.edu>
Wed, 04 Sep 1996 13:40 -0400
I was thinking about the fact that I think kids do think the way Ender did. Albeit yes I think he was a product of genetic selection and not all children think that way, however I think some do rationalize things on a much more complex level then adults give them credit for. I remember thinking about childhood bullies the same way Ender did... yea, and who didn't, I know. I'm referring more than anything to the conversations of Valentine and Peter. I know those who write and think slower now than they did when they were children, including myself ( so this may be a bit defensive). Maybe people are just forgetting that they were like this once too. I also think that unless you have company like Ender did, as in Val and Peter, then you won't develope the same way. I think Ender would have been an intelligent yet utterly boring and non ingenuitive if he hadn't had the influences he had in his early life. It's because he was encouraged in intelligent thought that he continued, or so is my belief. I think it's also possible that the situation that Ender was put in didn't allow for childish thoughts. If you ever compare children in the country who work on the farm from the age of three to children in cities with moms who pamper them, the difference in the actions is staggering. Remember the thoughts of Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird? Sure she didn't know lots of technobabble, but she was pretty intelligent for a kid her age. Maybe it's that children can THINK this way, but don't necessarily act or speak in the same manner. Their communication skills aren't always quite up there.
Any takers...
El
--
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{~._.~} Sometimes you feel like a nut,
( o ) Sometimes you don't!
()~*~()
(_)-(_)
Elenore Garcia..................garcie@rpi.edu
http://rpinfo.its.rpi.edu:80/~garcie/
Jesse Booth <boothj>
Wed, 04 Sep 1996 12:38 -0400
> I also think that as we grow older we do lose some abilities.
>
> After thinking about it my only conclusion was that as we gain learned =
> abilities, we lose some unlearned.
yeah, i would agree with this. as we get older, the ease of learning
certain material becomes harder (e.g., foreign languages). there
are particular age ranges in which one learns more readily - something
about the sensitive period for learning new material...
Jesse
Dennis Payne <dulsi@identical.stu.rpi.edu>
Wed, 04 Sep 1996 13:44 -0400
> I remember thinking about childhood bullies the same way Ender did...
Yeah but if you were confronted with them and beat one whould
you continue to hit him. I don't know about you but that didn't
occur to me. Ender was thinking futher into the future than most
kids (and possibly adults). Peter did also although his thoughts
were on domination.
> Maybe people are just forgetting that they were like this once too.
Maybe your right but I don't remember thinking too far ahead about
the consequences of my actions.
> I think Ender would have been an intelligent yet utterly boring and non
> ingenuitive if he hadn't had the influences he had in his early life.
So to increase ingenuity we give every a bully of a brother, a
nice sister, and lock 'em away in loneliness :)
> It's because he was encouraged in intelligent thought that he continued,
> or so is my belief.
[I left this in as explaination for the line above I took out
of context.>
Dennis Payne
dulsi@identical.stu.rpi.edu
payned@rpi.edu
Anthony Mrazik <mrazia@rpi.edu>
Wed, 04 Sep 1996 15:07 -0400
I definitely did not want to imply that I didn't think that kids
aren't intelligent or don't have the ability to rationalize in
a way that is not familiar to us. I am amazed at some of the stuff
that my 2-year old does and says, and my response to my wife is
always "where did he learn that?" I also think that
as we grow older we do lose some abilities. I have found that
when I'm home and get really angry the cats can sense it (this
is before any action by me). When Peter was much smaller the same
thing would happen: if either of us were angry he would get very
upset. After thinking about it my only conclusion was that as
we gain learned abilities, we lose some unlearned.
After thinking about it I do think that there was probably some
kind of genetic processes occurring at the time. In ch. 2 (p.
24) Graff is talking to Ender and he talks about Ender's parents
choosing a girl after Peter and then another boy later.
Tony
BushBebi <takats2@rpi.edu>
Wed, 4 Sep 1996 23:57:43 -0400
In response to Dennis Payne's comments to Elenore Garcia's comments:
>> Maybe people are just forgetting that they were like this once too.
>Maybe your right but I don't remember thinking too far ahead about the
>consequences of my actions.
I think think that if a child is put into such circumstances,
s/he would think as far ahead as needed. From the time I was four
years old to seven years old, I attended a school in which I was
the only minority. When I think back, I find that my situation
closely mirrored Ender's situation--to a lesser extent.
When people bullied me, I made sure that my retaliation "took
care of" that person--meaning, s/he would never think about
hurting me again. In Ender's game, Graff believed that isolation
would keep Ender from becoming tainted by the others and push
him to excel. Well, my isolation certainly kept me from thinking
like the other children around me... it kept me from learning
what a real friend was until I was in college. However, it also
forced me to excel so that I at least had a place of isolation
as the best... Ender and I were best friends in our isolation.
--Sarah
PS I hope this isn't completely out of context of the thread.
I'm just trying to keep up with what's going on...
PSS Sorry for any duplicates of this message...
--
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"The soul would have no rainbows if the eyes had no tears."
~Anon.
Sarah TC Takatani
E-mail: takats2@rpi.edu
Professional Work: http://www.lrc.rpi.edu
Homepage: Temporarily off-line for reconstruction
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kenneth W. Flynn <flynnk@rpi.edu>
Thu, 05 Sep 1996 23:53 -0400
At 06:44 PM 9/4/96 -0400, Dennis Payne wrote:
>> I remember thinking about childhood bullies the same way Ender did...
>Yeah but if you were confronted with them and beat one whould you continue
>to hit him. I don't know about you but that didn't occur to me. Ender was
>thinking futher into the future than most kids (and possibly adults).
>Peter did also although his thoughts were on domination.
I was hit by bullies a lot. I struck back occassionally. Unfortunately,
I was rather punny (still am, actually.)
When I struck, I was by no means as coldly rational as Ender,
but I did want to hurt them, hurt them badly enough so they would
fear me, and wouldn't pick on me again. I wanted to be left alone.
If I hurt one bad enough, they would just go away.
Fortunately, I never hurt anyone, and I learned better. To be above violence (killing is not the answer), or to try to be. Ignore them.
>> Maybe people are just forgetting that they were like this once too.
>Maybe your right but I don't remember thinking too far ahead about the
>consequences of my actions.
I don't think this is a function of intelligence, but personality.
People as adults still don't think ahead, except for some. I think
Ender just had forethought, which will probably stick with him
throughout life.
>> I think Ender would have been an intelligent yet utterly boring and non
>> ingenuitive if he hadn't had the influences he had in his early life.
>So to increase ingenuity we give every a bully of a brother, a nice sister,
>and lock 'em away in loneliness :)
Suffering does build character. It is an unfortunate truth, but
suffering teaches one the misery of pain. Empathy is important.
However, we should not torture our kids! Ingenuity is not something
we need everyone to have anyone. Some people are, some aren't.
We shouldn't force everyone to be.
>> It's because he was encouraged in intelligent thought that he continued,
>> or so is my belief.
>[I left this in as explaination for the line above I took
out of context.>
This is clearly true. There must be a place to share ideas.
Anyone see Clueless? My impression was that of an intelligent person stuffed fool of pathetic valley girl notions, and convinced that traditional intelligent thought had no point.
>Dennis Payne
>dulsi@identical.stu.rpi.edu
>payned@rpi.edu
Kenn
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Kenn Flynn
flynnk@rpi.edu
http://www.rpi.edu/~flynnk
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Welcome to the human race. Nobody controls his own life,... The best you
can do is choose to fill the roles given you by good people, by people who
love you.
--_Ender's Game_ by Orson Scott Card
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Re: kids
Mon, 9 Sep 1996 13:40:24 -0400
On Sep 6, 12:53am, Kenneth W. Flynn wrote:
>
> Anyone see Clueless? My impression was that of an intelligent person
> stuffed fool of pathetic valley girl notions, and convinced that traditional
> intelligent thought had no point.
Clueless rules.
Mick Doherty <doherm>
Wed, 11 Sep 1996 10:00 -0400
SFVR3,
My colleague Greg Ritter at Vorginia Commonwealth recently wrote
an artilce in which the first paragraph reminded me of _EG_ ...
just thought you might be interested.
Here 'tis:
-----
A friend on the Internet told me this story: as part of the test
of a computerized flight simulator, a group of fourteen- year-olds
were evaluated against a group of experienced fighter pilots in
a simulated combat situation. The fourteen-year-olds outperformed
the fighter pilots in almost every respect. Their superior performance
was attributed to an ability to interact with the simulation as
a game instead of as a representation of an actual combat situation--whereas
the fighter pilots showed a professional reluctance to engage
the simulated enemies, the kids, raised on Sega and Nintendo video
games, were more likely to take risks and, because of this, were
more successful.
