“Jake” has an IQ of 170…which is higher than that of one Albert Einstein. In fact, he’s now begun an “expanded” version of Einstein’s famous theory of relativity.
His mother, Kristine Barnett, 36, wasn’t really sure if Jacob was really onto something or if he was just spitting out nonsense, so she sent a video of his new theory to the Institute for Advanced Study near Princeton.
Astrophysics professor Scott Tremaine was able to validate Jake’s theory.
Tremaine fired off an email to the family.
Given the family’s previous performance record in math, Kristin Barnett is a bit surprises.
“I flunked math,” she says. “I know this did not come from me.”
Jake was diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, a mild form of autism, after his parents became worried about the fact that he didn’t talk until the age of two.
At three years old, Jake could recite the alphabet, forward and then backward. He also used Q-tips to create complex geometrical shapes on the floor of the family living room. He could solved 5,000-piece jigsaw puzzles. He could recite the first 70 digits of the mathematical constant known as pi (he’s up over 200 now). He even studied a state road map and later was able to rattle off every highway and license plate prefix from memory.
By the time he was eight years old, he had moved on from high school and was attending Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis advanced astrophysics classes.
There is often so much going on in Jake’s brain, he can’t fall asleep.
His parents got so worried a while back, they took him in for some medical tests. Doctors couldn’t find anything wrong other than the fact that Jake just can’t fall asleep very easily.
“A lot keeps me awake,” Jake says. “I scare people.”
The next step, according to Jacob’s teachers, is for him to leave the classroom and start a paid research role.
Check him out in action below as he teaches us a little bit of Calculus 2…
