At an age when normal children sit in the sandbox, the most gifted manage to create symphonies, perform complex surgeries, and even receive a nomination for Nobel Prize!

8 Akrit Jaswal

This Indian boy became the youngest doctor in the world. At the age of five, he was already well versed in anatomy and read Shakespeare, and at the age of seven he had his first surgical operation! It was like this: the doctors at the local hospital noticed that the child was actively interested in medicine, and allowed him to observe the operations. Akrit read everything he could about the subject and convinced the professionals with his comments that he really understood surgery. When he was seven poor family asked him to operate on their daughter because they couldn't pay a real doctor. Everything went well.

He has the highest IQ among compatriots (146 points). Currently teenager Akrit is the youngest student at the medical university, is looking for a cure for cancer.

7 Pablo Picasso

Pablo began to draw before he learned to speak. According to the legend, he himself asked his father with gestures to put a brush in his hand and teach him the basics of drawing.

Although other school subjects were given to him with difficulty, he did not seem to have mastered the counting system until the end of his long life. By the age of 12, he so skillfully and realistically reproduced nature on canvas that he was already considered a mature artist with his own unique handwriting, at the same time reading in syllables and allowing numerous spelling mistakes when writing. But the teenager passed the exams at the School of Arts brilliantly in one day, although it usually took a whole month for novice artists. At the age of 16 he had his first exhibition, and at 20 he was world famous.

6. Howard Phillips Lovecraft

The forefather of all mystical literature, the creator of the story of Cthulhu, Lovecraft mastered reading at the age of two, and at six he was already writing complex, serious poetic works. A gloomy and sickly boy from childhood was carried away by creating his own frightening universe with terrible creatures inhabiting it.

He transferred the horrors to paper from his childhood dreams: yes, these are the boy's nightmares. In many ways, this was facilitated by the home environment.

His father was locked up in an insane asylum with a diagnosis of "irreversible mental changes caused by syphilis" when Howard was three years old. Mother, eternally depressed, frail and white as death woman, also ended her days in a mental hospital. Young Lovecraft was ill with all possible diseases and stayed in bed for a long time, listening to scary tales from the lips of his eccentric grandfather Whipple, the owner of the largest library in town. Howard from childhood was an amazingly enthusiastic person, interested not only in literature, but also in astronomy, history, and chemistry.

5. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Wolfgang Theophilus Mozart)

Mozart is not only one of the greatest composers of all time, but also perhaps the most famous child prodigy in all of world history.

At the age of four he already played the piano virtuoso, and at five he wrote his first small pieces of music. At the age of eight, when ordinary children do not distinguish double bass from cello - if they even understand what these words mean - Mozart finished writing his first symphony.

4. Okita Soji

This Japanese prodigy is from a slightly different field than the above. He lived in the middle of the 19th century and did not have outstanding intellectual abilities. But no one could defeat him.

At the age of nine, when many children are not yet allowed to use table knives so as not to be cut, he perfectly mastered combat sabers and swords (boken, katana, shinai). At the age of 12, he easily defeated the famous swordsman. He officially became a recognized martial artist at the age of 18. Okita was one of the organizers of the famous military police Shinsengumi, the legends of which are popular in Japan to this day, embodied in comics, films and video games.

3. Kim Ung-yong

According to the Guinness Book of Records, Korean Kim Ung Yong is still considered the smartest living person and has the highest IQ - 210 points! Kim entered the physics department of the university when he was only three years old and graduated brilliantly at six. Later, being already a "mature" seven-year-old, he was invited to the USA to work at NASA. (Maybe NASA suspected that he was an alien and wanted to investigate him?) However, at 15, he already had a Ph.D. and incredible prospects.

True, having matured, Kim decided to return to his homeland in Korea and teach at the usual higher education. educational institution provincial town.

2. Gregory Smyth

Gregory Smith was born in 1990 in the USA and at the age of 2 he already knew how to read, and at 10 he began his first year at the university. It is clear that against the background of such phenomena as the Korean Kim Ung Yong, the achievements of the teenager Gregory look pale and can hardly surprise anyone.

So what is so special about the boy Gregory Smith that gives him the right to take pride of place in the list of outstanding geeks?

The fact is that, as studies show, most gifted kids are, to put it mildly, weird. They are either nerds or sociopaths or both. And Greg Smith is not like that! The boy realized that the niche of young politicians is still free, and founded a children's social movement"to achieve understanding among the children of the whole world." As the head of this worthy movement, the gifted fellow managed to have an audience with Mikhail Gorbachev and Bill Clinton, and then made an incendiary speech from the UN rostrum. On the crest of popularity, he was nominated four times for the Nobel Peace Prize.

1. William James Sidis

Some consider William Sidis to be the smartest man to ever live on Earth. His IQ level, according to the most conservative estimates, fluctuated between 250-300 points. For comparison: if your IQ is 136 points, you can safely classify yourself as a genius. Intelligence ordinary person with average abilities ranges from 85 to 115 points.

Born in the USA in 1898, the son of emigrants from Russia, Sidis learned to read at the age of one and a half, and by eight he had already written four books and owned a family foreign languages: Latin, Greek, Russian, Hebrew, French, German. And the seventh - Vendergood - the boy came up with himself on the basis of Greek, Latin and modern languages Romano-Germanic group. Passed the Harvard exam at the age of seven medical school in anatomy, and he was not accepted to the university only because of his age. At age 11, his father secured admission to Harvard. William became a professor before he was 20 years old. Despite his amazing work in mathematics and cosmology, even his parents began to doubt his adequacy after he declared at the age of puberty that he consciously accepted celibacy, that is, he refused relationships with the opposite sex. William Sidis never died a virgin.

He led a reclusive life, moving from city to city and changing jobs to hide his genius from others.

Some people are born with incredible abilities, far beyond the standard. Already from childhood, they can do what others are not available at all. And many people are attracted to it. We so often fall into the illusion that we need to desperately develop our children from the very cradle.

Movies are made about child prodigies, books are written, they are invited to television. We have collected the most interesting characters to find out how their lives turned out in the future. Alas, not everyone has become happy in this life.

1. Sasha Putrya

She has been drawing since the age of three. And she drew beautifully and amazingly. The little artist took stories from her head. She painted relatives, animals, but most of the stories were about distant India, which she had never seen.

From the age of five, the baby had to fight the disease - she was diagnosed with acute leukemia. She seemed not to notice severe pain and worked 8 hours a day. last picture depicts hands reaching for the star Sirius. She asked her parents to let her go quietly. She was only 11 years old when she left. After that, exhibitions were held around the world amazing works little artist.

2. Harp Karim

A five-year-old girl from Pakistan became a certified Windows application developer at the age of 9. Bill Gates himself invited her to the company's headquarters, after which the girl began to represent her country at international IT forums.

However, at the age of 16, an epileptic seizure interrupted her brilliant career. The brain was damaged, and Bill Gates paid for the costs of treatment, but it did not help. The girl left this world.

3. Pasha Konoplev

Young star of the USSR. He rocked in the 80s. At 3 years old, the boy read and produced complex calculations in the mind. At the age of five, he easily began to play the piano, although no one taught him.

At the age of 15, he already entered the university, at 18 he already graduated from it. But phenomenal abilities burdened him, the brain could not cope with the load, and at the age of 29 Pasha died in a psychiatric hospital.

4. Nika Turbina

A brilliant poetess who declared herself at the age of 4. At the age of 9, she released a collection of poems, which was sold in huge circulation and was translated into 12 languages ​​of the world.

Yevgeny Yevtushenko himself became her patron, and at the age of 12 she received the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival. Before her, only Anna Akhmatova was awarded such an award, and then when she was already over 60 years old.

But something went wrong. The girl began to have nervous breakdowns, she went to Italy and married her psychologist there, who was 60 years older than her. Six months later she returned to Moscow, began to drink and use drugs. At the age of 27, she fell out the window.

5. Akrit Yaswal

A little Indian at the age of 7 performed his first surgical operation - he restored the mobility of the fingers of an 8-year-old girlfriend. Two years later he entered medical University. Now he is about 20 years old, and he still lives only in medicine, dreaming of finding a cure for cancer.

6. Michael Kearney

From the age of four months, the boy began to speak, at 10 months he read confidently, and at the age of 10 he graduated from the university. He entered the Guinness Book of Records as the youngest graduate in the world. At the age of 17 he became a lecturer at the university.

Michael is a rare example of how you can live with genius and not go crazy. The guy is engaged in science, plays in Mind games. The last hobby once brought him a prize of $ 1 million!

7. Alyosha Sultanov

He has been composing his own works since the age of five. And I've been playing for a year. He was a brilliant pianist, and for some reason his parents decided that they needed to sharpen the boy at the instrument so that he would not lose his divine gift.

Already at the age of eight, he impressed professionals with his impeccable game, but already at 9 he began to have mental problems. Appeared a little later panic fear death from a stroke, which later completely came true. At the age of 19, Alyosha was recognized as one of the 40 most talented pianists in the world, but his condition worsened.

At 32, he suffered 5 strokes, became blind in one eye and was partially paralyzed. He lived only four years after that.

8. Savely Kosenko

A rare story where a Russian child prodigy managed to become truly successful in this life. Savely entered the Moscow Technical University at the age of 11 and at the same young age wrote a textbook on physics and got into the Guinness Book of Records. At the age of 16, he graduated from the institute, and then immigrated to Canada.

Now he is the owner successful business, but he does not like to remember his childhood. Saveliy said that gifted children often become lonely, are harassed and miss carefree time, because they are forced to constantly study. Is the game worth the candle?

9. Evgeny Kissin

At 11 months old, he sang Bach's fugue, which he learned elder sister at the piano. Those around were more than surprised, but that was only the beginning. At the age of 2, he could independently play any melody on the piano.

At the age of 6 he was taken under the wing of Anna Kantor. At the age of 12, the first public speaking at the Moscow Conservatory, which was a resounding success. He played in such a way that venerable professionals considered that he was a mature musician. But when they saw that the boy was only 12, they were amazed.

The greatest pianist, he is still successfully continuing his path, however, he considers himself a modest Jewish minister of music.

The boy was born in New York at the end of the 19th century. Already at the beginning of the 20th century, he became the youngest student at Harvard. At the age of 8, he easily read eight languages. At 30, he already knew 40 languages.

He was interested in, it seemed, many very different areas that were not at all connected with each other. His works devoted to anatomy, mathematics, history, and logistics were published. All his life he worked as a simple accountant, he was terribly afraid of women and died at only 46 years old in complete oblivion.

So genius does not mean at all that life will be happy and long. What do you think?

child prodigy translated from German means - a wonderful child. Geeks are called children whose level intellectual development significantly ahead of the level of development of their peers. Geeks already in early childhood exhibit unusual abilities.

In this post, you can learn about seven children with extraordinary abilities:

  • about a boy who, at 6 months old, diagnosed himself correctly.
  • about a two-year-old artist
  • about the three-year-old singer
  • about the seven-year-old surgeon
  • about the 12-year-old Nobel Prize nominee
  • about a student who taught at Harvard
  • about the smartest person in the world

Six Monthly Prodigy - Michael Kevin Kearney

American Michael Kevin Kearney developed surprisingly quickly in childhood. He was born in 1984, and four months later he began to talk.

At six months at the appointment with the pediatrician, young genius declared: "I have an infection in my left ear!"

At 10 months, Michael was already reading fluently, at 6 he graduated from high school brilliantly, and at 10 he graduated from college with a degree in geology and archeology. In addition, in 2008, Michael won a million dollars in the game "Who wants to be a millionaire?"

Two-year-old artist - child prodigy Aelita Andre

Aelita was born in Australia on January 9, 2007. This girl started painting when she was only 9 months old. Aelita's style is abstractionism.

When Aelita was in her second year, her father captured the work of his beloved daughter in photographs and showed it to his friend, the director of the Brunswick Street Gallery in Melbourne, Mark Jemison. The gallery was to host an annual exhibition for which Jamison collected work. Jamison liked the paintings and decided to take them to the exhibition. When Jamison found out that these were the works of a two-year-old girl, he was shocked to the core. But the exhibition took place and Aelita's paintings saw the light.

When Aelita was only 4 years old, her personal exhibition was organized. IN given time, Aelita is considered the youngest artist on Earth. Already sold 32 paintings for 800 thousand dollars.

Aelita's father, mother and grandfather are also artists.

Three-year-old singer - child prodigy Cleopatra Stratan

One of the youngest singers on our planet is Cleopatra Stratan. Cleopatra was born on October 6, 2002 in Chisinau. Her father is the singer Pavel Stratan. When Cleopatra was three years old, her father took her with him to the recording studio, where he recorded the song "Mama". Suddenly, Cleopatra said to her father, “I also know this song. Can I sing it?" The baby was given a microphone and she sang, so well that they soon recorded a song in which Cleopatra sang the leading part.

After that, Cleopatra's father took seriously the musical development of his daughter.

In 2006, Cleopatra's album "At the age of three years". The girl received the award for the youngest singer, as well as 1000 euros for her performance. And in 2008, Cleopatra released another album - "At the age of five."

And here you can listen to how the youngest singer of the planet sings:


Seven-year-old surgeon - child prodigy Akrit Yaswal

Seven-year-old surgeon Akrit Yaswal was born in India. In 2000, he attracted the attention of the people of the country with an amazing operation. Akrit learned that a girl from a neighboring house could not open her fist because of a burn and decided to help her. Without any medical skills, he was able to restore mobility to the fingers of his little patient. After this amazing incident, Akrita was sent to college to study medicine. He became the youngest student in Indian universities.

12-year-old Nobel Prize nominee Gregory Smith

The youngest nominee for the Nobel Prize is American Gregory Smith. Gregory was born in 1990. At the age of two he read, at 10 he entered the university, and at 16 he successfully completed it. He began to be nominated for the Nobel Prize at the age of twelve, was nominated four times, but, unfortunately, he never received it.

In addition to classes exact sciences, Gregory is known as a children's rights activist.

A student who taught at Harvard - child prodigy Saul Aaron Kripke

Saul Aaron Kripke was born in New York in 1940, the son of a rabbi.

IN primary school Saul managed to study a full course of algebra, geometry and philosophy. As a teenager, Saul created many works that changed the teaching of formal logic. A gifted teenager was invited to work at Harvard. But Kripke refused, explaining that he must first finish high school and college.

And yet, after graduation, Saul went to work at Harvard. Saul Aaron Kripke is considered the most prominent philosopher in the modern world.

The smartest person in the world - child prodigy Kim Ung-Yong

Kim Ung-Yong was born in Korea on March 7, 1963. At the age of 4 he was already solving complex differential equations.

At the age of 5, Kim Ung-Yong knew four languages ​​(Korean, English, Japanese and German). At the age of 8, Kim was invited to study in Colorado State University, at the age of 15 he became a doctor of physical sciences.

Kim Ung-Yong is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the most clever man in the world, his IQ=210

  • Geeks are more likely to give birth to first-born children.
  • At the age of 4, a child manifests 50% of his intellectual abilities, at 8 years - 90%. It is at this age that you can identify giftedness in children and help it develop.
  • About 90% of child prodigies become unremarkable, ordinary people when they grow up.

Nature - this inventor is constantly experimenting in her desire to make the species of Homo Sapiens more perfect, and all conceivable and unthinkable tricks are used. The victims of these experiments, endowed with a non-standard view of the world, are called geniuses. Giftedness is nothing but a deviation, an irregularity in mental development and structure of the brain. That is why geniuses pay an incredibly high price for their gift. These loners make progress, thinking in an original way, formulating truths that are inaccessible to the ordinary mind, but they also pay for their genius. They pay with loneliness, disorder, illness and early deaths. Very often, genius manifests itself in childhood. The great Mozart wrote music and gave concerts from the age of three. At the age of 11, A. S. Griboyedov entered the Moscow University, and at the age of 13, the outstanding physicist L. D. Landau became a student. But these are examples of people who have taken place, more often the fate of geeks turns out to be sad and tragic.

Children geeks in Russia - examples

In February 2011, 18-year-old Sergei Reznichenko committed suicide by jumping out of a window. This young phenomenon learned to read at the age of three, to count - even earlier - at two.

By the age of seven, he knew the periodic table, read the four-volume epic of L. N. Tolstoy "War and Peace". Studying at school was an easy walk for him. Sergey spoke several languages, was the winner of many olympiads in a variety of subjects.

The teachers were afraid to call the intellectual superman to the blackboard, because his knowledge of the subject was more complete and deeper than the teachers'. At the age of 15, a talented teenager became a university student and moved to a hostel.

Possessing a phenomenal memory, here, too, he began to master new subjects with amazing ease. But it all ended suddenly and instantly.

Reznichenko dramatically changed his lifestyle. Starting from the third year, the guy gave up on studying, began to drink, smoke, quarrel with teachers, be interested in girls. And then troubles piled up all at once.

He lost a large amount on the Internet stock exchange, his relationship with his mother worsened, because of a missed session he was threatened with expulsion from the institute, and, finally, his beloved girl left him.

Actually, the problems are quite everyday, many faced similar ones, and everything, in the end, ended happily, but remember that we wrote a few paragraphs up about. (They pay with loneliness, disorder, illness and early death).

The corpse of a boy who got confused in life, even without knowing it properly, was found at dawn under the window of the hostel by the janitors.

Everyone in the Soviet Union knew the name of this girl. She was as popular as the astronauts, Alla Pugacheva or Sofia Rotaru.

The collection of poems "Draft", which she published at the age of 9, was translated into 12 languages ​​and sold thirty thousand copies. For comparison, today a circulation of three thousand is considered a huge success.

By the way, she started writing at the age of four. The collection was followed by an award at the Venice Poetry Festival, and a little later, at the age of 16, a nervous breakdown.


Nika was treated in Switzerland, treated and lived in civil marriage with a professor who was 60 years her senior. But the treatment did not help, the young poetess returned to Moscow.

For the next ten years, Nika became more and more inward and drank and drank.

During the next booze, the favorite of the Soviet people either accidentally fell off the windowsill, or deliberately stepped out of the window and flew, but not up, but down.

Another hero of newspaper stories, favorite and pride Soviet people. At the age of eight, the young genius solved a complex astronomical problem, the solution of which was highly appreciated by Academician A.N. Kolmogorov.


The future looked great. Pavlik published articles in the most popular in the USSR scientific journal"Science and Life", at the age of 15 he entered Moscow University, studied in graduate school.

But the cruel experiment of nature on a young guy and this time ended in failure. A talented young man ended up in a psychiatric hospital with a nervous breakdown.

A year before his thirtieth birthday, Paul died.

Geeks of the world

William was born at the end of the 19th century in New York. At eight years old, this indigo boy easily read books in eight languages. In the early 20th century, Sidis became the youngest student at Harvard.

His interests were surprisingly varied. It seemed that there was no area in which he would not be a specialist.


One after another, his books and articles on mathematics, history, anatomy, logistics and other unrelated fields of knowledge are published.

At thirty, William James knows forty languages. So, what is next? But nothing!

At 46, the genius dies forgotten by everyone. All his life this unique person worked as a simple accountant, he was terribly afraid of women and journalists.

So guess who it is - a real genius or another failed experiment of nature?

And finally, a biography for a young genius is atypical. Life is good! The very middle of the twentieth century. 1951 USA.

Kim is born with a whole bunch of congenital diseases, including merged into a single piece of the hemisphere of the brain and damage to the cerebellum.

This predetermined the genius of the experimental patient. At two and a half years, this unique learns to read, after which he cannot stop.

"Swallowed" home library, newspapers, magazines, brochures that came to hand. He perceived the text on the page immediately, and not line by line. But the most amazing thing is that he remembered everything he read forever.


He remembered hundreds of fiction and documentary books, could play thousands of pieces of music from memory.

Fame came to the nugget when a portrait was copied from him for the film "Rain Man", where the brilliant Dustin Hoffman played the prototype of Kim.

After the incredible success of the film, Kim, who, unlike Hoffman's character, did not suffer from autism, became an extremely popular person all over the world.

He traveled across different countries with lectures, demonstrated his extraordinary talents. Unlike many geeks, his abilities did not disappear over time, but only intensified. The “rain man” died of a heart attack at the age of 59.

VIDEO: What happened to geeks former USSR? Drama and tragedy

A child prodigy is a concept familiar to everyone. A precocious, highly intelligent child who is significantly ahead of his peers in some or all areas of life. But what are geeks like? How do they become? Is it possible to independently bring up the qualities of a child prodigy in a child, and is it necessary? And how do you know if your child is a child prodigy? Not every adult knows the answers to these questions, but the IQ Club knows for sure.

Everything you wanted to know about geeks, and even more, you will find in this article.

Who are geeks?

The word child prodigy is of German origin. "Wunderkind" - where "Wunder" is translated as "miracle" and "Kind" as a child. Wonderful child! Of course, each parent own child- wonderful, but this word has a slightly different meaning.

A child prodigy is usually called gifted, exceptional children. They stand out significantly from their peers in one or more areas of activity. Their level of intellectual development is noticeably higher than that of other children of their age.

For example, while peers are just learning to add "2 + 2", the child prodigy decides math problems which are beyond the power of graduates of the school. Or, while peers barely know how to draw squares on a piece of paper, the child prodigy is already drawing full-fledged pictures that carry artistic value. Giftedness can manifest itself in a variety of areas of activity, whether it is reading, memorizing information, composing music, chess, and the like.

Who are savants?

When it comes to geeks, the concept of "savants" invariably pops up. This is a kind of geeks, not quite ordinary children. They are often said to have savant syndrome. This means that they have exceptional talent in one narrow area, for example, they are good at drawing or composing music, but at the same time they are significantly behind their peers in other areas. Often these are children living with Asperger's or autism.

Do you become a child prodigy or are you born?

Psychologists still have not been able to figure out the exact cause of such a phenomenon as a child prodigy. On this moment, there are 2 versions:

  1. Every child is gifted in their own way, and everyone can become a child prodigy. It is only necessary to find the giftedness of the child and choose the right “key” for its development. A version that many psychologists deny due to its low logic. In addition, many child prodigies do not retain their amazing abilities when they grow up, which makes the version even more illogical.
  2. Giftedness is a gift “from above”, which a child is endowed with by chance, for no apparent reason. You need to be born a child prodigy, educate him, no matter how hard you try, it will not work.

Thus, right now it is difficult to talk about the nature of the emergence of geeks. They just exist, they are incredibly gifted, and only time and further study will determine exactly where this giftedness comes from.

Famous geeks and their merits

  • Marilyn vos Savant. At the age of 10, she took an IQ test, the result was 228. Today, tests using different measurement scales give a result from 167 to 230.
  • William James Sidis. At a year and a half he could read newspapers, at 6 he consciously decided on religion, at 8 he already had 4 books written. Has the highest ever recorded IQ of 250-300.
  • Arran Fernandez. He received a certificate of secondary education, which ordinary children receive at the age of 16, at the age of 5. At 14, he was accepted into the ranks of the students of Cambridge.
  • Kim Un Young. Already at the age of 4 he could speak 4 different languages and decide challenging tasks in mathematical analysis.
  • Michael Kevin Kearney. At 6 months he could speak coherently, at 10 he learned to read. At 4 years old, without pre-training, got the highest score in the math test. At the age of 6 he graduated from high school, at 10 he received a bachelor's degree.

Is it good to be a child prodigy?

Unfortunately, genius has its price. Few are ready to accept and understand extremely gifted children, they are considered strange, they are envied. The child prodigy casts a shadow on all the children who are around. Children feel this, and often little geniuses find themselves isolated from their peers: they simply do not want to communicate with them. Little geniuses can also be isolated because they often do not have common interests with their peers.

Another factor that can poison the life of a child prodigy is high self-esteem. They are not ready to be in second place, they want to be the best in everything and always be the best. They do not always manage to cope with reality, and bitter disappointments in some cases cause suicide.

Often people geeks are exposed to stress, frustration, depression. It harms the health of geniuses, and the harsh statistics is this: geeks live an average of 15 years less than ordinary people.

How to understand that your child is a child prodigy?

It is quite difficult not to notice the extraordinary giftedness of the child. If your child is truly a child prodigy, this will manifest itself with early age These children are very different from their peers. Watch the child and his habits, the makings of genius are often accompanied by perfectionism, increased curiosity, and extreme independence. Such children are interested in many things, independently trying to learn a skill in which their genius is manifested. In addition, brilliant children from an early age are able to build cause-and-effect relationships, and more people communicate with adults than with children, because with children they have almost no common interests.

If your child is not a child prodigy, this is not a reason to be upset. After all, their birth rate is negligible: only 1-5%. And without the makings of genius, you can raise a smart, developed, versatile child. To do this, encourage the child's craving for knowledge, work with him more often. Effective method develop horizons, memory, attention and thinking - play games at the IQ Club. The child is having fun, and you do not get tired of rejoicing at the success of your son or daughter in studies and creativity.