Loss of Innocence and sciences

So, the solution (or at least what I think is a solution now) came to me - and opened a number of new possibilities. My problem was how to express an essentially scientific mindset while simultaneously expressing the draw of mysticism, and the way I think I can pull it off is by making a major element of the story the observation of and interactions with a child, and thoughts upon how that child thinks - the way he has insights without realizing they are insights, and how he sometimes says plain foolish things.

This opened the possibilities of a whole short story collection - which I think I may embark upon - which deals hugely with children, but with children almost as metaphors for ourselves, our politics, our loves, and our deaths, are all reflected in them. The struggle will be to not simply rely upon the natural hypnotism of children (I'm sick of authors who just use kids to arouse automatic sympathies) but to explore the place of children in our world, to show them in their horror and their unexpected kindnesses, and, more than this, to show that they are not always right, and that they do not always know it when they are.