Fragments of Genius: The Strange Feats of Idiots Savants

Fragments of Genius: The Strange Feats of Idiots Savants by Howe, Michael J. A.. paperback edition. ISBN: 9780415071697.

This text provides an account of "idiots savants" - those remarkable individuals who are simultaneously retarded yet capable of quite extraordinary achievements. Their talents include outstanding artistic and musical achievement, mental arithmetic at incredible speed, and calendar calculating, involving extremely difficult questions about calendar dates. Michael Howes findings encourage the reader to reconsider existing views about the manner in which human skills are organized and contradicts the widely accepted belief that a persons different abilities are interdependent and centrally controlled.