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Originally Posted by Lacedaemonian How are the kids so clever? Is any indication ever given? |
I don't think there is ever any explanation, except that they test all the kids and pick the most likely ones.
Actually, I think we talked about this a bit before, around the time I joined the forum. So, if I repeat myself here, sorry.
It's just that there are kids out there, a few, who are frighteningly bright. I've known a few, not when they were that age, but older, in college, and I can absolutely imagine that something like what goes on in "Ender's Game" could happen if the testing methods were developed to the level they seem to be in the book. I mean, I know a guy, if warp drive ever gets invented for real, he's the one who will do it. I know one or two other people who are just so smart that they almost don't relate to the rest of the world at all.
Now, me, I'm not nearly that smart, but I was in an MGM (mentally gifted minors) program my last two years of elementary school, when I was in fifth and sixth grades (10 - 11 years old). I got enough experience in that class of being treated as "different" (by teachers, by the other kids), that I could relate to what the kids go through in "Ender's Game", even though what is in the book is on a whole different level than the class I was in.