2018-10-01_Reader_s_Digest_AUNZ

30 | October• 2018

THE AMAZING SCIENCE OF INSTANT SAVANTS

temporal lobe, making the neurons

that were more active in the demen-

tia patients – the ones associated with

creativity – more likely toire.

This time, more than 40 per cent

of the participants in Snyder’s ex-

periment solved the problem. The

experiment, Snyder argues, supports

the theory that acquired savants blos-

som once brain areas normally held

in check have become unfettered,

meaning that savants can access raw

sensory information normallyof-lim-

its to the conscious mind. When a

vision,asifatransparentilterhad

synthesised before his eyes. He was

plagued with headaches, as many as

iveaday.heymadehisheadpound,

and light and noise caused excruci-

ating pain. One day, he collapsed in

his brother’s bathroom. Another, he

almostpassedoutinasupermarket.

Still, Amato’s feelings were unam-

biguous.Hewascertainhehadbeen

givenagift.heevidencelaynotjust

intheeasehefeltwhenheputhis

ingersonthekeyboard,butalsoin

the drive he felt – the burning com-

pulsion to play. He felt it in his heart:

his was what he was meant to do.

F

EW PEOPLEhave followed the

emergence of acquired savants

with more interest than Allan

Snyder, a neuroscientist at the Univer-

sity of Sydney. In 2012, as part of his

research, Snyder and his colleagues

gave 28 volunteers a geometric puzzle

that has stumped laboratory subjects

for more than 50 years. The chal-

lenge: connect nine dots, arrayed in

three rows of three, using four straight

lines without retracing a line or lifting

the pen. None of the subjects could

solve the problem. hen Snyder and

his colleagues attached electrodes to

the heads of subjects and used pain-

less direct electrical currents to tem-

porarily immobilize the left anterior

temporal lobe – the area of the brain

destroyed by dementia in Miller’s ac-

quired savants. At the same time, they

stimulated areas in theright anterior PHOTO: COURTESY JASON PADGETT

Name:ALONZO CLEMONS

Discovered Talent:

SCULPTURE

SavantssuchasClemonscan

storevastamountsof

informationintheirmemory

banks. Clemons can sculpt

perfect3Danimalsafterjust

glimpsing them on TV