What would existence be like for a child born with no senses?

During my time as a teacher-candidate at Brock University, I was expected to take a half-year course on Special Education.

For the first few weeks of the course we were introduced to the laws and regulations regarding special education in Ontario, as well as some of the more common exceptionalities that we would most likely encounter in our teaching careers, such as autism and several behaviour disorders. All of it was engaging, informative, and our instructor was a true riot. The course was only weeks away when we were informed we'd have a special guest coming in, on short notice.

It was then we learned about Scott.

We didn't actually meet Scott. His mother was the one that introduced him to us. See, Scott can't. See that is. Nor can he hear very well (the doctors think he may have partial hearing in his left ear). He has cerebral palsy, was born without eyes (didn't develop at all in the womb) and had a horrible reaction to vaccination when he was one and a half years of age, leaving him almost completely deaf and also brain damaged. They also believe that the medication that he requires to stay alive has both damaged his sense of smell and his sense of taste.

Scott therefore only lives in the world of tactile, and they're not even sure if he understands everything he takes in from that sense either, because of possible nerve damage due to the vaccination.

His mother is an amazing woman, don't get me wrong. She and her husband run a very successful driving instruction school across Canada, so they have the resources to keep Scott both in school and with nurse almost 24 hours of the day (she estimated the cost at $85,000 a year). She tours schools in the area (sometimes with Scott in tow, other times with her husband) to educate people about Scott and his life.

And what a life he's had! Travel to Europe, Africa, and Australia. He has his "own van" (which is actually driven by his "peers" from his high school, as long as they hang out with him) as well as a hot tub and personal trainer. He has met the Prime Minister personally (twice), and also had dinner with then Vice President Al Gore. He's been to Disneyland, Canada's Wonderland, and a few Six Flags theme parks. He been to numerous ski lodges, engaged in water skiing and horseback riding, he rode in a tank with the military and travelled in Europe by hot air balloon.

Problem is, I believe he has no idea this is what he has done.

His mother gleams with pride, saying that Scott is always happy. But how do we know? He can't speak at all, and the six hand signals he uses to communicate with the world are for such words as bathroom, hungry, and thirsty (and even his mother admitted that these signals are used very seldom and are often mixed up).

But the kicker came when one of my fellow students asked Scott's mother what she expected him to do after high school (he was "graduating" later that year, at age 18). She said that it was all settled: Scott wanted to be a public speaker.

My jaw dropped. She continued that Scott likes to educate people about his multiple conditions, and how he lives through them, so they were going to go on a circuit to educate people.

It ocurred to me, after hearing this and watching a short video on Scott (where they showed him being tied to a toboggan and shoved down a hill, and also showed him "swimming", which is actually Scott floating around in a small pool with a half-dozen floatation devices strapped to his body) that in fact his mother was using Scott as a puppet. Nothing more than a doll for her to walk around and talk through. All of Scott's adventures, in a way, are for his parents.

But what I still can not even begin to imagine is what goes through Scott's head on a given day. He doesn't cry, he doesn't laugh, he doesn't speak, he doesn't really communicate at all with the world around him. All the while he is dragged across the globe and set up in front of people and admired and brought on adventures and experiences life to the fullest that any human being can imagine to.

But how much of it does Scott really know is happening?

A child born without senses would really have no cognitive functions whatsoever. I say this because the brain would have absolutely no input on which to calibrate thought.

I possess all five classical senses. I can reproduce any of them as a thought, if I try hard enough, but like most people, I tend to think in sounds or images. But what of a child without senses? If one has lacked vision since birth, can one produce an image in one's head? If one cannot hear, can one think in spoken word? I would imagine not, because the brain has never had input of this type. If you can't hear, then obviously you can't think to yourself in any vocal tongue.

Being only blind and deaf would be a damning burden, but you might still be able to function. Surely there are people in the world who could cope with this and find a way to communicate and share knowledge through the senses of taste, touch, and smell. But what if you then remove these? Now you have a person who cannot see, cannot hear, cannot feel, taste, or smell. What you have here is not a person; he or she is, in essence, a life-sized, anatomically correct and functional doll. The brain is not functioning at all, except to keep the inner workings of the body working.

To answer the question of "What would existence be like for a child born with no senses?", I can only say that it wouldn't be "like" anything. There would be no experiences, no thoughts, no self-awareness. Much as a corpse is no longer the person that once dwelled in it, there would be no "child," just a shell.

I was having a look at CNSNews.com and i was appalled and disgusted by the article that I am talking about now.

Two Lesbians have decided to bring a child into the world... Ok I personally I don’t have a problem with this, bringing children up in a homosexual environment is up to the parents, as long as they can understand what they are letting their child in for.

The most notable thing to point out about these two lesbians is that they are deaf. I am sorry to hear this, it is something that I cant even begin to imagine what its like and I have a lot of sympathy for those people, also I give up most respect to these people that can learn a new way of living by hand communication, for someone to learn something like that is incredible and deserves a happy life.

What bothers me about these two ladies is that one of them is try/trying to get pregnant. Ok as said before up the top I don’t have a problem with it, But what I do have a problem with is that these 2 ladies are purposely trying to make their baby deaf.

This is not right, I will say this over and over again, what right is do these people have stomp, crush and destroy a babies future a PERSON, A LIVING ENTITY WITH A SOUL!

Now I would like to point out some reasons why the 2 ladies want their son (which they have named Gauvin) to be deaf:

"He'd be the only Hearing member of the family. Other than the cats,"

Well Gee Golly Fucking whiz, I think there should be a new Nobel Prize Award for: "Being the most ignorant, stupid, arrogant Lesbians in the world"

Many people who are deaf have lived very happily and also have become successful in their chosen profession and have a rich life in more ways then one, but to even discuss the notion of putting a child at a disadvantage right from the start is utter madness.

At the end of the day they are messing the way we are meant to be, if god or whoever made us meant us to be deaf from the start then it would be so, but no we are not, It begs the question of why society permits such people to have children and, once they have them, to keep them.

And, this pair's *selfish* need for a kid to be just like them is SO narcissistic, that it truely boggles the mind. Were I to have the say to approve their parental rights, I would absolutely dis-approve of their doing this abomination, that *will cause harm to the child*.

To finish this off, I cant imangine what it would be like for someone in the situation, even though this particular example is only a minor case, and yet I cant stop thinking how the parents will react when their child finally asks "why am I like this?" It will eventually happen, and the child will find out, and sadly the child would end up forever hating his parents for purposly causing his disability.