Savantic Latency: Mind the Current

Are you a latent savant, with hidden mental powers waiting only for the proper trigger, to reveal themselves? Perhaps. A recent posting by commenter Mike led to this provocative NYT article from 2003 about the work of esteemed neuroscientist Allan W. Snyder:

If Snyder's suspicions are correct, in fact, and savants have not more brainpower than the rest of us, but less, then it's even possible that everybody starts out life as a savant. Look, for example, at the ease with which children master complex languages -- a mysterious skill that seems to shut off automatically around the age of 12. ''What we're doing is counterintuitive,'' Snyder tells me. ''We're saying that all these genius skills are easy, they're natural. Our brain does them naturally. Like walking. Do you know how difficult walking is? It's much more difficult than drawing!''

...Snyder's theories are bolstered by the documented cases in which sudden brain damage has produced savant abilities almost overnight. He cites the case of Orlando Serrell, a 10-year-old street kid who was hit on the head and immediately began doing calendrical calculations of baffling complexity. Snyder argues that we all have Serrell's powers. ''We remember virtually everything, but we recall very little,'' Snyder explains. ''Now isn't that strange? Everything is in there'' -- he taps the side of his head. ''Buried deep in all our brains are phenomenal abilities, which we lose for some reason as we develop into 'normal' conceptual creatures. But what if we could reawaken them?''____Source

Snyder, who has been publishing in the scientific literature for several decades, currently experiments with transcranial electromagnetic stimulation to bring out latent abilities mental.

The researchers think that by temporarily inhibiting activity in the left anterior temporal cortex, the TMS allowed the brain’s number estimator to act on raw sensory data, without it having already been automatically grouped together into patterns or shapes. In other words, they believe it caused the 'normal' brain to function more like an autistic 'savant' brain.___Source

Some forms of electromagnetic stimulation enhance the function of the stimulated portion of brain, and other forms of EMS suppress the function of the stimulated brain. Such a tool can function in an analogous way to a reversible "knock-out gene" in genetics research. By removing particular "instruments from the brain's symphony", we can glimpse the workings of a differently arranged brain.

It is not really a matter of whether savants have more or less brainpower than the rest of us. It is a matter of how the brain is being used. As people gain experience in life, they use forms of "mental shorthand" to speed repetitive mental functions. We do not actually read every word, but rather clump words and paragraphs into "essential meanings" to save time as we read. It seems that by taking shortcuts, we gain some time, and possibly lose something else.

"Modern" education is geared to shortcut thinking. The savants are "weeded out" by our educational system, because they make the teacher's work harder. Teachers have forgotten how to see the world in "raw" terms, without the learned shortcuts. The savants do not fit, so we toss them in with the refuse, or drug the savant out of them.

Yet, never have we needed the savants more than today, when modern societies find themselves in traps of their own making, but without any understanding of what is needed to open the cage door. Political systems are tightening the trap, and every proposed and attempted solution promises to make the situation worse. Political "change" is merely shorthand for a re-dressing of more-of-the-same. Savants have the ability to see elements of a problem that are hiding in plain sight.

An autistic savant is different from a genius savant, or prodigy. A normal person with savant-latency is a different creature still. Presumably, after the brain stimulation is turned off, the normal-cum-savant reverts back to normalcy. Autistic savants and prodigies typically retain their gifts for much longer periods of time, although not always permanently. Most of us probably wish to be polymaths, which may be possible eventually, with more advanced brain stimulation, or brain machine interfaces.

Here is more about the polymath.

More on Snyder's work here.

BTW, check out the new blog Brain Stimulant, if you are interested in brain electromagnetic stimulation.

Prodigies vs. Psychological Neoteny

The definition that we offered for the prodigy was a child (typically younger than 10 years old) who is performing at the level of a highly trained adult in a very demanding field of endeavor.Genius Denied
Child prodigies generally have IQs between 120 and 180, depending on the area of high performance. A child prodigy is different from a generally gifted child in focusing on one area of performance with a high level of motivation--far beyond its years.

This kid is special. He was practically born on a tennis court - his mother, tennis instructor Mari, was in the middle of a lesson when her waters broke. Jan started hitting balls at the age of one and now, a veteran of five, is beating kids twice his age, courtesy of his incredible all-round game.

If you thought the footage of Woods hitting golf balls as a tiny tot was impressive, wait till you see Silva's forehand volley on YouTube.

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Child prodigies are rarely understood, but they shine a light on a possible human future where high achievement in an adult area of expertise will not be unusual for children under the age of 14. One reason it is so rare today is the general attitude of "babying" children into lifelong psychological neoteny--often in the name of protecting them from the "harsh world."

Parents of gifted children typically have high expectations, and also model hard work and high achievement themselves (Bloom, 1985; Csikszentmihalyi et al., 1993;Gardner, 1993a). But it is logically possible that gifted children have simply inherited their gift from their parents, who also happen to be hard working achievers. Parents of children in performance domains like music and athletics are the most directive; parents of children in visual arts are the least directive; and parents of children gifted in an academic domain fall somewhere in between (Bloom, 1985). To achieve in a performance domain, one must submit to rigorous and early training; even the most gifted children might not stick to such a rigorous schedule without a directive parent, one who insists that time be spent on practice.

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Generally gifted children may lack the level of achievement of child prodigies, despite having the same IQ levels and enriched home environment. The prodigy displays a "single-minded" devotion to his area of high performance that acts in concert with intelligence to achieve expert level performance.

Motivation and single-mindedness incorporate the mysterious "executive functions" of the human brain/mind. Executive function may be as much as 99% heritable as opposed to the 50% to 80% heritability of IQ. Given the need to possess both at high levels for "optimal achievement", it is extremely likely that heritability plays a strong role in life success.

What if the prodigy or gifted child is not recognised as such. What if the parents are largely absent, and the school system serves as more of a prison or torture chamber than a place to learn basics and to learn to live one's dreams? Much human capital is wasted in this way. Gifted children and prodigies could make huge contributions to a better future, if they are recognised, nurtured, and gently guided.

Humans are riding a centuries-long wave of achievement--begun in Europe, but now incorporating contributions from East and South Asia, the middle east, the Americas, and the South Pacific. Given the immense challenges and dangers humans face, they cannot afford to waste human capital. It is time to say goodbye to child raising that creates lifelong "cute puppies" or psychological neotenates. It is time to treat children and teens to as much expertise and competence as they care to take up.