There was definitely insecurity-related bullying. More so in elementary school because the teacher encouraged and participated in it; moving from class to class in high school also helped to minimize bullying compared to being in a room with the same kids all day long.

A lot of the difficulty came down to a lack of shared concepts. To me, partial derivatives are very natural concepts and I would get a few sentences into describing something in terms of partials before I remembered that I was talking to people who didn't even know what those were. (Ditto for differential equations, vector spaces, orthogonality...). Over the years I've learned to a limited extent how to convey ideas without drawing on terminology which most people aren't familiar with, but that has taken decades of practice.

I absolutely benefited from going to university early -- and I also benefited from staying in school. I only finished high school a year early, but spent 4 years taking high school and university courses concurrently. While I gained very little socially from high school, I had a couple excellent teachers there and learned some useful material in other subjects. I've met people who dropped out of high school to attend university full time who struck me as shockingly ignorant of e.g. history.

> I've met people who dropped out of high school to attend university full time who struck me as shockingly ignorant of e.g. history.

This is an interesting complaint. I would argue that everyone whose knowledge of history consists of the entirety of their high school curriculum, with nothing forgotten, is shockingly ignorant of history.

After reading one relatively short book on the history of China, ( https://www.amazon.com/dp/0465015808/ ), I had a Chinese high school student remark to me on how unusual it was for her to find someone who could talk about Chinese history. But I was meeting only the lowest possible bar.

If someone is shockingly ignorant of history, that's not because they missed high school; it's a problem that high school doesn't try to address and isn't intended to.

I'm not saying that high school gives people a great education about history. But I would expect anyone graduating high school to be able to give general answers to questions like "which countries were we fighting against in world war 2" and "where was the Roman empire".

>But I was meeting only the lowest possible bar.

A low bar but certainly not the lowest possible bar.

If you can only speak in terms of partials/other-math-lingo - it speaks more to your own limits than the limits of others.

This is something you should - uh - think about.

I mean this honestly. Being able to convey ideas to many people of different backgrounds is a skill and an intellectual pursuit. If you’re incapable of talking to people except in nerd shit - you’re not really any smarter or whatnot than them. You’re just insular.

You're absolutely right -- as a 13 year old I was quite limited. I was mature enough to carry a conversation with 20 year olds, but not mature enough to carry a conversation with a 13 year old. (I like to think that I've grown up since; and while I don't talk to teenagers very often, when the situation arises I do manage better now than I did back then.)

This is exactly my point, and why University was a far better social experience for me than high school.

OP was nice enough to answer a pretty intimate question.

    You’re just insular

We don't know this person personally, so it would be wrong to make assumptions about their communication.

    you’re not really any smarter

You are using their innocuous comment, to project your insecurity onto OP. Well done on proving their point. Yeah, some people are better at tasks that are traditionally considered to signify intelligence. The kind who go to study difficult majors at university at 13, are very very likely to be smarter within that definition than the majority of the people they run into. It is fine to accept that. It is not like OP is going around taping 'stupid signs' on people's foreheads.

Gatekeeping math at its finest. Only the most intelligent can go and study math! Only the most bright of us can ever do it!

God damn. So cringe. I say this as someone who also studied math and got his degree in it. Incredibly cringe.

> it speaks more to your own limits than the limits of others.

Indeed, and that is totally okay for a 13 year old to have limits. You can't expect a kid to have any real maturity. People only really get good at communicating with age, and even then it is hard.

I agree to some extent. I have forgiveness for pre-teens and early-teens going through these phases. After all - it’s a phase. It is no different than when a kid is obsessed with Minecraft or some other shit. (Which is see as less intellectual than mathematics - eyeroll) It’s when that goes from “it was a phase” to “I was better than everyone else” is where I clearly draw the line.

>Over the years I've learned to a limited extent how to convey ideas without drawing on terminology which most people aren't familiar with, but that has taken decades of practice.

I think this is one of the most remarkable lifeskills to have. Personally, I feel stupid when I find myself between a jargon laced conversation. On the other hand, I respond very well to clearly communicated (not ELI5, but simple) ideas.

Putting things across as simply as possible is very difficult to master IMO.

Reading this thread made me realise I developed this as a defence mechanism and have honed it over many years, but as you say it's a great social skill as well.

It's amazing how many conversations you can have about interesting subjects (and thereby dodge smalltalk) by simply rewording them into something everybody at the table can understand.

I don't think the gap I experienced was self-imposed. I was genuinely interested in the nuances of chess openings and my classmates were struggling to figure out what to do when their Candyland card had two squares on it instead of one. (This isn't a criticism; the game is meant to pose just such a challenge to children the age we were.)

We just weren't thinking on the same planes. My mind made most connections so quickly and automatically that I didn't realize other people's didn't. I didn't know why I couldn't have a conversation with other children. I just knew it didn't work. They would just stare at me and then leave. I knew I could talk to adults fine, but I didn't have enough life experience to realize the other kids couldn't make mental connections like I could.

It was actually when my younger sister started school that it clicked. I knew she was a smart girl, but academic subjects were surprisingly hard for her. That was when I realized someone could be smart, but have to take time to learn certain things, or at least in certain contexts, and that the things they learned might have to be layered on top of each other slowly.

Prior to that, my only experience had been of someone's presenting an idea to me and my immediately understanding it. It's hard to relate to other people, especially children, when you don't have that conceptual framework.