Underground Knowledge — A discussion group discussion

It has long been speculated that secret societies, mystery schools, intelligence agencies and other clandestine organizations have advanced learning methods superior to anything taught in even the most prestigious universities. Methods which are only ever taught to the chosen few – initiates who have all sworn an oath to keep the group’s syllabus in house and never reveal any of the teachings to outsiders.

On the rare occasions the public get wind of advanced learning techniques – usually via information leaked to the Internet, sometimes via published books – those techniques are seldom tested or given the attention they deserve and so largely remain in obscurity. One reason for this could be they’re often not comprehensible because whoever is behind them has withheld the overall curriculum.

There’s many a tale of mysterious figures from secretive groups mastering skills, languages and even complex career paths so quickly that most would say it’s impossible. But that opinion assumes we know of, or have access to, all the learning methods known to man.


"The purpose of having the orphans study all these diverse fields was not for them to just become geniuses, but to become polymaths – meaning they would be geniuses in a wide variety of fields. Whether they were studying the sciences, languages, international finance, politics, the arts or martial arts, they would not stop until they’d achieved complete mastery of that subject. Kentbridge himself had encyclopedic knowledge about almost everything, and expected nothing less from his orphans." –The Ninth Orphan


If we are to assume there are superior learning methods not taught in our mainstream education system then this naturally leads to other questions. What if your child’s top-notch education is actually a second-rate education? Or, if you are a student, what if that professor you look up to is no genius, but just a tool of an inferior learning institution?

None of this is to disrespect formal education. It plays a vital role in society and the betterment of Mankind, and only a fool would doubt the importance of getting a good education.

Nor are we suggesting there isn’t the odd learning institution that teaches at least some accelerated learning techniques, although such establishments would probably exist on the fringes of mainstream education.

The Montessori education system is possibly one such example as it allows children to have greater freedom of expression and to learn in playful and organic ways. Successful alumni of the Montessori system include Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, as well as Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales and the co-founders of Google, Sergey Brin and Larry Page.

In general however, accelerated learning methods are more likely to be found outside the modern education system. Let’s face it, wherever in the world you go, real prodigies are the exception not the norm in the present system. Those rare individuals society labels geniuses are almost always freaks of nature and are naturally gifted rather than being diligent students who became geniuses because of their education.

In The Ninth Orphan, Nine is a pure genius and exhibits a level of intelligence rarely if ever seen in any character in literature. He has a photographic memory, can read entire books in five minutes flat and speaks dozens of languages. Plus he learns new skills extremely fast and is highly adaptable – so much so that he’s nicknamed the human chameleon.

How Nine reached that level of intelligence, though, is merely implied or hinted at in this first book in the series.

In its prequel, The Orphan Factory, we had to design an education system that would reveal exactly how Nine grew up to become that smart. This was quite a challenge as our setting was no Ivy League college. Rather, it was the Pedemont Orphanage, a rundown institution in Riverdale, one of Chicago’s poorest neighborhoods.

We had to do a lot of research into radical types of learning.

Having both gone through the traditional education system and finding it laborious and uninspiring, we found it fun to write about an alternative and more accelerated form of learning in our trilogy. Even so, it took several years of study before we felt confident enough to write about what it would take to create youngsters with intellects as advanced as those of our Pedemont orphans.

We predict, or sincerely hope, that formal education will one day be reflective of what occurs within the fictional Pedemont Orphanage – minus the assassination training of course!


“I’ll be a genius and the world will admire me. Perhaps I’ll be despised and misunderstood, but I’ll be a genius, a great genius.” –Salvador Dalí. Written in his diary at the age of 16. Diary of a Genius

Minor update:

While researching for my soon-to-be published book GENIUS INTELLIGENCE: Secret Techniques and Technologies to Increase IQ, I recently discovered Nobel Prize-winning author Gabriel García Marquez and world tennis champion Roger Federer are also both graduates of the Montessori education system.

Yes, three of my grandchildren went to pre-school in a Montessoti pre-school and my daughter-in-law has the utmost respect for their teaching methods. The children are not disruptive because they are do involved in this learning experience because it is exciting and full of discovery. Even Autistic children do extremely well. I understand that they can move around to different learning experiences as they choose but get so absorbed in the way "exercises" are presented that they remain focused and rarely change course except when they want to try a new learning experience.

She also told me that the children, although only 3-4 years old, are given tools to help them understand how Math works. These are exciting and interesting programs for young children who are hungry yo learn when it tests their comprehensive skills through play like learning.

My daughter-in-law went to our local education minister to plead for some inclusion into primary school of this method of teaching and a very helpful minister said he was willing to give anything a go so we had a trial class within the public education system in one of our local schools. It was very successful and many of the mainstream kids joined that class but obviously not all could.

My grandchildren went through the rest of a Primary school in this class. My granddaughter (the oldest one) is now in high school and appears to have a great sense of personal responsibility and maturity for her age. I have also been impressed.

Look, for instance at my analysis of language (8 book series, plus junior version).

http://logiclistsenglish.simplesite.com

The stupid complicate things to 'appear clever' - the intelligent simplify things, to 'be' clever (This is my observation on what amounts to the difference of ego and ignorance (fear of being found out to be a fake) when compared to humility and discovery (the courage to go beyond the limits of the self)).