after reading the parallel four (Ender's Game, Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and Children of the Mind) and it just keeps getting better and better.
But I do have a really specific question about Bean. According to the way I understood the reason for Bean's superior (off the scale, really) intelligence is that through genetic manipulation, Bean was made super intelligent by flipping a couple of switches and one of them is going to cause giantism, that is, he won't stop growing. Okay, on one level I accept that this is a convenience that Card is using (for a purpose that will probably come clear in Shadow of the Hegemon). *But* I'm not biting, just nibbling because I don't understand why giantism is necessary for the added intelligence, especially in light of the fact that there are people who don't stop growing (Andre the Giant, for example). While this does shorten these folks life span, it does not appear to have any effect on their intelligence, plus or minus.
Posted by Eruve Nandiriel (Member # 5677) on :
I'm short. And I'm smart. Posted by Nick (Member # 4311) on :
Just about everybody here is smart. OSC is smart. The people I consider smart generally like OSC. People who like OSC come here, so, most people here are smart. By the way, that wasn't meant to make too much sense, because all I wanted to say is, I'm relatively short, but somewhat intelligent. Posted by Anna (Member # 2582) on :
Just because if you want the brain to keep growing, then the rest of the body has to keep growing, too. Well, that's what I understood. So if it keeps growing, you become a giant and die from that.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
I think that Card linked the freakish intelligence and the gigantism not because it makes good scientific sense, but because it makes good literary sense. Bean gets cheato intelligence, but at a terrible price. It wouldn't be fair if he could just be super smart without some sort of balance.
It would be like Rand in Robert Jordan's Unending Series of Doom -- he gets to be the most powerful sorcerer in the world *AND* the best swordsman in the world *AND* lots of hot chicks fall all over him for no reason? Yeah, he hears voices in his head, but that mostly is just used as an excuse for him to act like the jerk he is.
Posted by Julie (Member # 5580) on :
I thought what Anna thought. In order for him to always be able to take in new information his brain must keep growing. This means that the rest of him must keep growing as well. I think there was some theological connection too. Anton mentioned something about that. (Shadow Puppets, I believe)
Posted by Eruve Nandiriel (Member # 5677) on :
I agree with potato head.
Posted by unohoo (Member # 5490) on :
quote: I think that Card linked the freakish intelligence and the gigantism not because it makes good scientific sense, but because it makes good literary sense. Bean gets cheato intelligence, but at a terrible price. It wouldn't be fair if he could just be super smart without some sort of balance.
I agree about using gigantism as a plot device. Too bad Card couldn't find something less clumsy because otherwise the book is superb.
Anyway, why do things have to be fair? For one, Bean did not possess the leadership ability that Ender has, and most likely, never will. Hmmm, the books are called shadow for a reason, Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote: Anyway, why do things have to be fair?
They don't have to be fair as long as things are *unfair* to the protagonist. We love watching someone we love suffer. But when everything is stacked in his favor, it gets boring.
That's why so many people prefer Batman or Wolverine to Superman. Yes, Superman, has his kryptonite, but it's too little, too late. He's just too powerful to be interesting.
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