Is there a little Rain Man in all of us? Do we all have a salting of the genius savant with a peppering of madness lurking within us?
A savant used to live in our building. He was Deaf and his language skills were limited, but if you dropped a bunch of straws on the ground he could tell you how many straws there were in the bunch before they hit the ground.
If you threw a pile of poker chips at him, he could tell you how many chips you were throwing and the total value of all the chips before they landed on him.
If you handed him a gallon jar of pennies he could tell you exactly how many pennies were in the jar in the blink of an eye. Is there a fine line between madness and genius?
What is the difference between a savant and a smart person? Where does the savant lurk within you?