Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!spool.mu.edu!uwm.edu!bionet!agate!eris.berkeley.edu!doug
From: doug@eris.berkeley.edu (Doug Merritt)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: I need references for cases of math ability in mentally deficient
Message-ID: <1991Apr29.023746.13929@agate.berkeley.edu>
Date: 29 Apr 91 02:37:46 GMT
References: <80305@bu.edu.bu.edu>
Sender: root@agate.berkeley.edu (Charlie Root)
Distribution: usa
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
Lines: 34

In article <80305@bu.edu.bu.edu> jdubb@bucsf.bu.edu (jay dubb) writes:
>
>   I am looking for pointers to (references, or stories about) cases
>of mentally deficient people (or, people who have had no mathematical
>training whatsoever) performing various mathematical feats.

Probably the best book on the subject of arithmetical savants is
"The Great Mental Calculators -- The Psychology, Methods and Lives
of Calculating Prodigies Past and Present" (Steve B. Smith, copyright
1983 Columbia Press).

Although the "idiot savants" are in some ways the most interesting,
the author debunks as myth several famous cases that are generally
reported to be idiots, such as Dase. He, and some other lightning
calculators, were uneducated and had rural mannerisms and dialect,
leading people to the unwarranted conclusion that they were idiots.

There are apparently some retarded (oops, "intelligence-challenged")
lightning calculators. Smith opines that there may be both greater genius
(Gauss was one such) and retardation represented in these prodigies than
in the general populace, and that this may be due to "a tolerance for what
ordinary folk find intolerably dull."

I find that easy to believe, but in any case this book has more factual
information on the general subject than anything else I've ever seen,
including correction of widespread myths reported elsewhere, and also
quite a bit of detailing of the methods used by varies of these prodigies,
where the author was able to uncover them. Quite unusual, quite interesting.
	Doug
P.S. I'm forwarding a copy of this posting to the requested email address.
-- 
--
Doug Merritt		doug@eris.berkeley.edu (ucbvax!eris!doug)
		or	uunet.uu.net!crossck!dougm