The Rationally-Minded Eight Year Old

I love the way that kids reason through things.  Here is a great example from Emma, the oldest of the four.

We have cows in our pasture.  Cows poop a lot.  A few days ago, when the kids and and I were returning from a walk, Emma noticed something straw colored and dried out on the cow's gate.

Emma: What's that on the gate?

Me: Probably poop.

Emma: That doesn't look like poop.  It looks like hay.

Me: Well, that's all they eat.  They probably got poop on the gate and it dried out in the sun, and that's what is left.

Emma: That doesn't make any sense.  Are you trying to tell me that if you ate a hamburger and pooped, and let it dry in the sun, it would look like a hamburger again?

Of course, at this point, I was in awe of her humorous logic and couldn't stop laughing.  It's probably better that way because, to be honest, I couldn't come up with a good response to that.  It is pretty logical, after all.

Oh, come on.  You know you were wondering what it looked like.