I've been thinking just now for like 20 seconds.
I was thinking about Aaron, one of Bri's charges.
He's nine I think.
Nine should be the age of adulthood.
He still has to round some developmental curves, but if we culturally instituted nine as the age of adulthood, I think most kids would meet the challenge. He has all the intelligence necessary to get a job, handle adults. He's apparently emotionally volatile, but if there were social expectations that he would be trafficking with the adults and keeping his shit together, he would whip that a little more into shape.
Brianna probably will disagree with me totally about this.
But it just seems to me that much of his good behavior could be harnessed, and it seems that much of his bad behavior is in large part the result of folks allowing him (expecting of him? requiring of him?) that he be childish. I just see a very interesting man in him (and in other kids his age: my cousins whom I saw over christmas--they're _young men_).
Child prodigies have just been given room to be human earlier.