Suppressed Genius

Last night I was watching a program about the human brain, and was stunned to discover that 'super-mind' conditions are not caused by abnormal growth of the brain, but rather the suppression of certain areas. Let me explain. A man is born with a condition that doctors say will cause him to be socially dysfunctional and mentally retarded for life. In his childhood he seems to live up to these expectations, failing miserably both academically and relationally. But then his parents started to notice things. At seven he memorised a whole encyclopedia and all the state highway routes in the U.S. He remembered every word of every book he read. And could make any calculation concerning prime numbers you cared to throw at him - dead accurately every time. He is now famous because of the movie based on his life: Rain Man. So okay, he was super-intelligent on one level - but talks and walks funny and has difficulty interacting with people. A trade off; not unusual in human physiology. There are other cases though. Another man had a head injury in the late seventies and can now remember, without thinking, what the weather was like every day since and (here's the scary part) is beginning to remember the weather from before his accident - without trying to. He has never been caught out or proved wrong when asked about the weather details of any day after his brain was 'damaged'. And he isn't socially retarded or weird or . . . anything. He seems like a perfectly normal guy until he tells you what colour shoes the seventeenth lady he saw at Savemart on the 26th of August 1982 was wearing. Here's the thing: his brain is not larger or working harder than ours; it's the same size and working less. Some mechanism that causes us to forget minor incidences is not functioning properly in this guy, and he's coping. He's not burdened by the weight of a billion memories - he (quite literally) remembers what meals he ate 753 days ago like you and I remember how to ride a bike. The motions of leaning and twisting and pushing and pedaling don't load or clutter our minds. They are just there for us, subconsciously, when we need them. Were we originally designed to live like that? What would our society be like if we recalled everything in that fashion? Worse, better, or just . . . different?