Please use this thread to discuss Chapters 4 through 6 or create and use your own threads.

Edited by: Chris OConnor  at: 4/10/06 4:53 pm

These three-chapter discussion topics correspond pretty well with the amount I tend to read in one sitting. I'm buying the story a bit more, as I'm exposed the world Card's creating.

There's an interesting philosophical and psychological question that the book brings up. Can geniuses be bred or trained? Or is genius something that arises at random in overall population?

When I consider the geniuses who have arisen in history, be they scientific, political, artistic, or military, random appearance seems to be the general trend. John Stuart Mill is one of the few exceptions: a philosophical genius who was shaped deliberately.

JulianTheApostate: Can geniuses be bred or trained? Or is genius something that arises at random in overall population?

In as much as intelligence is something that can be quantified, I'd say that it's possible to breed or produce by artificial means intelligence. That said, genius, as I understand it, is only intelligible in reference to the cultural context in which it arises -- Einstein is a genius for introducing the Theory of Relativity, but those who are capable of understanding it now that Einstein has introduced it are not necessarily geniuses. I'd say genius is a kind of work, and it has to be judged by the fruit it produces.

You can quantify genius by using an IQ test and setting a minimum level for the title of genius (I have no idea if MENSA or the IQ test officially use the term genius or not, but they could). IQ tests can have a cultural bias but there has been ongoing work to eliminate cultural issues from the test from what I understand. Ultimately, I think intelligence is, as with most things, a combination of the proverbial "Nature vs. Nurture" issue/debate.

But I think Mad has a good grasp on what a genius is...many people can have the same knowledge resources available to them, but only one will put them together in the correct order to make something new and world changing.

I think genius is reliant on intelligence, but not all there is to it. What is it that makes the difference do you think?

Mr. P.

The one thing of which I am positive is that there is much of which to be negative - Mr. P.

Once you perceive the irrevocable truth, you can no longer justify the irrational denial. - Mr. P.

The pain in hell has two sides. The kind you can touch with your hand; the kind you can feel in your heart...Scorsese's "Mean Streets"

I came to kick ass and chew Bubble Gum...and I am all out of Bubble Gum - They Live, Roddy Piper

this has been an interesting three chapters. However, I'm STILL having a hard time buying that a 6 year old can be this calculating, genius or not!

One thing that is not clear to me at this point is the beginning part of chapter where Graff is having the discussion with his boss:

Quote:

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The fleet is looking for a battle commander. There is nothing to take care of until you get me that.

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Huh?! Are we expected to believe that they are under attack and no one is doing anything about it? They think they can wait, possibly years, for a battle commander to appear and/or be groomed?! Something doesn't make sense here. Perhaps I'm missing what is going on

misterpessimistic: I think genius is reliant on intelligence, but not all there is to it. What is it that makes the difference do you think?

I'd say interest in a problem or set of problems is part of it. My best friend's little brother may have an IQ equivalent to that of Ludwig Wittgenstein, but if he has no interest in the sort of problems that challenged Wittgenstein, he's just as likely to spend his days playing Whack-A-Mole as he is to provide a problem of epistemology. It robs the word "genuis" of any meaning to say that a person who spends his whole life playing Whack-A-Mole is as much a genius as someone who has made real contributions to the direction that civilization has taken.

That's my short form argument against the quantification of genius.

Making genius equivalent to a score on a numerical score seems to me like reducing the term to nothing more than hyperbole. It's the same as saying that someone's very smart, multiplying the very as many times as you'd like. But to my mind, intelligence isn't genius until the claim is justified by some act of genius. And we can recognize those acts by the way in which they allow us to see the world differently, or by the way in which they change the way we live.

One interesting thing about that point of view is that it's wholly distinct from the numerical view of genius. A person can produce an act of genius regardless of how well he or she scores on an IQ test.

Quote:

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Huh?! Are we expected to believe that they are under attack and no one is doing anything about it? They think they can wait, possibly years, for a battle commander to appear and/or be groomed?! Something doesn't make sense here. Perhaps I'm missing what is going on

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The book definitely keep secrets from the reader intentionally. So you are not missing what is going on, but are not being told everything. The criptic introductions never reveal enough.

Yeah...I somehow felt like Ender may have for being duped so long and deep. Card handled the method of writing the story well. He kept us totally in the dark on many matters.

Mr. P.

The one thing of which I am positive is that there is much of which to be negative - Mr. P.

Once you perceive the irrevocable truth, you can no longer justify the irrational denial. - Mr. P.

The pain in hell has two sides. The kind you can touch with your hand; the kind you can feel in your heart...Scorsese's "Mean Streets"

I came to kick ass and chew Bubble Gum...and I am all out of Bubble Gum - They Live, Roddy Piper

very well put there, riverc0il. I've made it to the end, which I suspected to be the result (of the battle at least) and things are well hinden indeed in this book.

There is plenty of foreshadowing, just not of the specifics. Overall, I think Card has done a good job of giving us hints and keeping us guessing!