What is an idiot savant?

Answer 1

An autistic savant (historically described as idiot savant) is an autistic person with Savant Syndrome[1]. Savant Syndrome describes people with both a severe developmental or mental handicap and extraordinary mental abilities not found in most people. The Savant Syndrome skills involve striking feats of memory and often include arithmetic calculation and sometimes art or music.

Answer 2

A mentally handicapped person (very often autistic) who has an amazing talent amounting to genius. There was a young autistic boy, for example, who was taken to the Victoria and Albert Museum and who astounded everyone by drawing the building precisely to scale when he returned home. I have met an autistic boy whose talent was to tell you on precisely which day of the week any date fell and a Down's syndrome boy who could tell you exactly what programmes were on every TV channel available at each hour of the day.

Answer 3

Have you ever heard of that movie "Nell" with Jodie Foster ? She plays an "idiot savant", I would say.

Answer 4

A person with gross mental retardation who nonetheless is capable of performing certain remarkable feats in sharply circumscribed intellectual areas, such as calendar calculation or puzzle solving.