Comments on: Feral Children

By: JarvisLoop

JarvisLoop — Fri, 03 Jan 2025 04:26:19 +0000

Just two days ago, I found information about rumored feral families in the primitive sections of the Great Smoky Mountains. A number of persons are convinced that they exist.

By: Dekkit

Dekkit — Thu, 20 Oct 2022 06:05:51 +0000

Wonder if Genie is still alive all these years later. I hope she was at least physically able to become healthy.

By: seannachie

seannachie — Fri, 08 Apr 2016 17:17:48 +0000

Seannachie, April 8th, 2016
Feral children help to demonstrate the importance of nurture in human development. To survive environments that would tax adults to do the same, these children, by their very survival, show evidence of the ability to problem solve, plan ahead, anticipate, etc., in other words demonstrate qualities we relate to intelligence. The lack of language acquisition after being returned to society later in life, should not be considered proof of cognitive impairment by nature. Although within normal human development, nature offers us the neural framework to acquire whatever language that surrounds us, but there is a “best before” expiration date. The average human has 100 trillion neurons formed by age 2. By the time puberty arrives, this number is down by half. Experiences, or their lack, strengthen neural networks, makes them more robust, or conversely, if there is a lack of experience, neurons, and their networks are lost, pruned as it were, a “use it or lose it” scenario. Childhood experiences, therefore, positive, or negative, or even absent, shape the adult to be. This should have implications on how we attempt to help those individuals who were subjected to abuses: of neglect, physical, emotional, or sexual. It should bring into question the practice of offering psychopharmacological solutions to these traumatized individuals,as a primary means of assistance. How can absent pathways be helped by offering medications? Would chemical stimulation of the Broca’s Area, the Arcuate Fasciculus, Wernicke’s Area and the Central Motor Cortex (parts of the brain related to language) help these unfortunates who were excluded from human society to acquire language? We may not be able to turn the clock back, but perhaps, we can learn from the experiences of these unfortunate children.

By: TJ

TJ — Wed, 05 Nov 2014 07:43:35 +0000

During a course for a Foster Parenting program we were introduced to a child that was discovered abused by her highly drug addicted parents ( dealers also). She was almost 4 yrs @ the time. Couldn’t walk ,talk, was filthy dirty with her hair so matted to her head she had sores. She scooted around on her bum. She was terrified when discovered by police locked in a bedroom during a raid. When we met her 2 yrs later to the credit to all who worked with her and to her Foster Family she was a polite,outgoing,beautiful,,intelligent darling little girl. She spoke well, played hide and seek and sat nicely and colored while her foster family talked about her, their experiences ( some extremly hard and trying) and answered our questions. It is truly amazing what a little patience and a lot of love can do.

By: mattesx69

mattesx69 — Sat, 30 Jun 2012 08:48:16 +0000

[quote]Hayley said: “This is an incredible article. I’ve read about many feral children before, but it makes one wonder why they’re all children. Obviously, adults would not adapt so well, but I wonder if the average feral child simply doesn’t make it to adulthood or if they’re simply not found, or all found before then. It would be very interesting to see how an adult feral person would have adapted even more so, though I don’t suppose there are too many of them around.”[/quote]

ummm, when there found as children they never really change due to the fact that almost all human social growth and intelligence happens at a very young age, once at the age these kids are “discovered” they really cant be taught anything, some habits can be changed and a few surface cracks but no more, these kids grow into adults the exact same way as a feral child, these people never improve due to how humans learn at this young age, so these kids are the adults, they never have any kind of improvements sadly :/

By: siphons

siphons — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 06:10:58 +0000

I’m frankly shocked not more than one person recognized all of the symptoms of these ‘feral’ children are inherent in autism.

By: WildMountainBoy

WildMountainBoy — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 00:11:01 +0000

[quote]Tynan said: “A baby could never fend for itself in the wild – an abandoned 2-year old with a mental speech handicap and some luck could theoretically do much better.”[/quote]

I agree, with both Tyana and also that infants can be reared by wild animals and accepted into animal social groups such as packs and herds.

I was recently told about a boy abandoned at the age of 2 in a shopping center near Deli India.
The boy survived mostly on his own, with little help from shop keepers or shoppers. Until he was about 16 he lived in the shopping center when he was then “adopted” by a low-middle class family from the Local church, but was unable to deal with the luxury of 4 walls . So he retreated back to the familiar shopping center. Several attempts were made to “bring the boy home”, but he never stayed more than a month . After this he was taken in by one of the shop keepers who lives in the slums, this being a much more comfortable environment for the boy has been his home for the past 2 years.
He is Called Kite. Because his greatest joy is… well you guessed it “flying kites”. He is very Intelligent (though extremely shy), and speaks well. He has a job as a parking lot guard at the same shopping center where he was abandoned.

I know this isn’t exactly a wilderness scenario. But I still find it amazing that a child abandoned at the age of 2, could grow into a reasonably healthy adult and member of society with little rearing other than the occasional kindness of strangers.

also here are some links to relating (feral children) story’s.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7803699
http://argentinareporter.wordpress.com/2008/08/22/heroic-dog-adopts-baby/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gpfvkeo0KBc

By: Jospec5Star

Jospec5Star — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 21:58:34 +0000

http://i.abcnews.com/Health/story?id=4758945&page=1

Another more recent but equally horrific and saddening example.

By: Jospec5Star

Jospec5Star — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 21:52:22 +0000

Wow. This is one damn interesting article. I believe this is my favorite so far.

By: Tink

Tink — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 17:19:39 +0000

Hayley said: "This is an incredible article. I've read about many feral children before, but it makes one wonder why they're all children. Obviously, adults would not adapt so well, but I wonder if the average feral child simply doesn't make it to adulthood or if they're simply not found, or all found before then. It would be very interesting to see how an adult feral person would have adapted even more so, though I don't suppose there are too many of them around."

Ya know, after re-visiting this one, your comment made me think of Big Foot, Yeti, Sasquach etc. Now wouldn't it be funny if those creatures were the remains of those kids,never found. I say this half in jest as I have no idea that crypto creatures actualy exist, but like all things here it is fun to speculate upon.