"How does any child learn to speak?"
"Mainly by hearing others. Maybe Timmy learned the same way. Maybe he listened, absorbing the meaning and sound of words, trying them out in the silence of his otherwise vacant little noggin. Maybe his mind awakened gradually to the realization that it was a prisoner in a paralyzed organ, strait-jacketed by blocks or short circuits. Maybe he spent his forty-two months of vegetating driving against those blocks until he partially broke them down and could speak. Maybe."
"And without ever having shaped his lips or tongue to intelligent sounds, he speaks fluently at the first try?"
"Why not? Any kid that will start out by addressing its parents chummily as 'Helen' and 'Jerry' and act naively surprised at the reaction, obviously has rules of its own."
They ruminated in silence for a moment.
"It's too easy to talk vaguely about blocks and short circuits, Clancey. How do you account for his completely erratic progress? Totally unpredictable, with alternating periods of complete idiocy and high intelligence?"
"Not totally unpredictable."
"Oh?"