Way back in December of 2003, Wired Magazine published an article by Steve Silberman called The Key to Genius, in which he discussed the extraordinary gifts of austistic savants. Born with “miswired neurons,” these special individuals with Autism can do amazing things completely outside the range of the ability of ordinary individuals. For instance, a savant might memorize a book he/she has read only one time, then recite it backwards.
In 1988 the popular film Rain Man popularized the subject of profound and incomprehensible genius demonstrated by these individuals, not one of whom is exactly like another. The film was based on a real person, but attributed to him several types of known savant abilities that do not generally occur in the same individual. Many of us became aware of savant genius for the first time from that film, and maybe you have even known a savant. Maybe you ARE one! Check it out.
Fascinating stuff - I’m off to see if I can find some of Matt’s recordings - listening to Chet Baker now - who had his own problems. Creativity is not only the mark of genius it is the soul of the universe.
It’s amazing what some people are capable of.
Parents want all of their children to learn a little bit about everything, in order to do well in school and in life, in general. They want their children to grow up and be productive members of society, and to be happy individuals. But they also struggle with the notion that they want all of their children to be genii - in the sense that they hope each kid will excel in something.
When a parent discovers autism in a child, it is a devastating experience because the child will grow as a dysfunctional member of society, depending on the degree of autism. The parent realizes that the autistic child is not capable of doing “a little bit of everything.”
Parents’ adjustment is severe, when therapy proves to them that their child can only do certain things, albeit doing them in extraordinary ways or extraordinarily well. Now the parents cannot nurture them in doing a little bit of everything, as their original goal was intended. Their lives are changed forever because they have to discover now how the “little things” that the child can do, can help them with the things they do in extraordinary ways, to gain relative happiness as adults.
The way that autistic children excel sometimes makes them society’s rejects.
Parents should go through “therapy” themselves, to learn new ways (or anew) how to nurture the autistic child, so that they can be as productive as anyone else.
A good example is Bill Gates.
The real person who helped Dustin Hoffman prepare for his role as The Rain Man was Kim Peak. Kim Peak is classified as a “Mega-Savant” which means that like the Rain Man he has more than one ability. You can read his amazing story in a book called “THE REAL RAIN MAN: KIM PEAK”. Another book to look at is one called “BORN ON A BLUE DAY”. It was written by Daniel Tammet a mega-savant who has a nearly normal IQ but in addition has some amazing abilities. For example he can recite pi to 22,514 places from memory, and he learned the Icelandic language in a week. “Bright Splinters of the Mind: A Personal Story of Research With Autistic Savant” by Beate Hermelin is another book that will give help you understand some of the recent theories about the nature of autistic savants.