Jacob Barnett

Not to be confused with Jacob Barnet.
Jacob L. Barnett
Born (1998-05-26) May 26, 1998
Indianapolis, Indiana, United States
Education Certificate of Completion, Perimeter Scholars International, 2014

Jacob L. "Jake" Barnett (born May 26, 1998) is an American physics student[1] who was identified in the media because of YouTube videos of him at the age of twelve where he offered his ideas about general relativity[2] and the Big Bang.[3][4][5]

In 2011, following a series of (now deleted[6]) YouTube videos published by Barnett's mother, several articles appeared in the mainstream media, with headlines such as "Autistic boy, 12, with higher IQ than Einstein develops his own theory of relativity"[6] "12-Year-Old Genius Expands Einstein’s Theory of Relativity, Thinks He Can Prove It Wrong",[2] and "Autistic teenager tipped for Nobel Prize".[7] A CTV News story asserted without evidence that Barnett "built a series of mathematical models that expanded Einstein's field of relativity, which was described by a Princeton University professor as ground-breaking."[8] Barnett had not disproved Einstein, was not in consideration for a Nobel Prize, and other sensationalist media claims made in these stories were identified by astronomer Phil Plait and others as being demonstrably false.[4][5]

His mother, Kristine Barnett, wrote a book about her son called The Spark: A Mother's Story of Nurturing Genius. She said that he was diagnosed with "moderate to severe autism" at the age of 2, and that he was subsequently home-schooled, displaying an unusual talent for mathematics and physics.[9] She wrote that Barnett had, at the age of 12, developed a novel theory of relativity that was validated by physicist Scott Tremaine, and that it would put him in line for a Nobel Prize,[9] repeating these claims on talk news programs during the promotion of The Spark.[10][11] These claims were not true.[5] While Tremaine and Plait, among others, did commend Barnett for his precocious interest in aspects of astrophysics, there was not at the time any professional vetting done of Barnett's novel ideas.[5] As of 2016, Barnett's ideas about general relativity are not published, and the YouTube videos have been taken down.

Joanne Ruthsatz, a psychologist specializing in child prodigies, called him a prodigy[12] on the basis of a working memory test, and wrote a pop psychology book[13] about the link between autism and prodigious abilities that prominently featured Barnett.[14] On the CBS program 60 Minutes, Barnett was shown reciting a few dozen digits of the decimal expansion of the mathematical constant pi, a hobby known as piphilology. He was also shown in the program repeating about two dozen US States from memory that were presented to him in a random order.[12] In a 2011 Glenn Beck Program segment, Beck asked Barnett to solve a calculus problem, but did not check the results. Barnett was asked to establish convergence of the divergent series to which he incorrectly applied the integral test, and the error went unrecognized in the program.[3]

Barnett was admitted to the Perimeter Scholars International in 2013, a one-year non-degree master's level program at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Ontario.[1] He completed the program in 2014[15] and continues there as a doctoral student.

References

  1. 1 2 Paul Wells, "Jacob Barnett, Boy Genius," Maclean's, Sept. 2013.
  2. 1 2 "12-Year-Old Genius Expands Einstein's Theory of Relativity, Thinks He Can Prove It Wrong". Time Magazine. March 26, 2011.
  3. 1 2 "12 Year Old Genius Jacob Barnett on Glenn Beck". Glenn Beck Program. 2011.
  4. 1 2 Plait, Phil (April 8, 2011). "A (very) smart kid and a solid theory". Discover Magazine.
  5. 1 2 3 4 Edwards, Chris (September 25, 2013). "The Spark and the Hype". Skeptic.
  6. 1 2 "Autistic boy,12, with higher IQ than Einstein develops his own theory of relativity". Daily Mail. 24 March 2011.
  7. ↑ "Autistic teenager tipped for Nobel Prize". BBC News. 10 May 2013.
  8. ↑ Commisso, Christina (2013-10-01). "15-year-old Jacob Barnett: One of the world's most promising physicists". CTV News. Archived from the original on 2014-06-28. Retrieved 2014-06-28.
  9. 1 2 Barnett, Kristine (2013). The spark : a mother's story of nurturing genius (1st ed.). New York: Random House. ISBN 978-0812993370.
  10. ↑ Katie Couric (June 2013). "The 14-Year-Old Living with Autism Who Could Win a Nobel Prize". Katie (talk show).
  11. ↑ Tapping the Potential, The Agenda, 2013: "...now [Jacob] is on track to become a Nobel Prize winner for his work in theoretical physics" (Steve Paikin)
  12. 1 2 "Jake: Hanging out with a teenage Einstein". 60 Minutes Overtime. CBS News. 15 January 2012.
  13. ↑ Noble, Barnes &. "The Prodigy's Cousin: The Family Link Between Autism and Extraordinary Talent". Barnes & Noble. Retrieved 2016-12-03.
  14. ↑ Ruthsatz, Joanne & Kimberly Stephens (2016). The Prodigy's Cousin. The Family Link Between Autism and Extraordinary Talent (1st ed.). New York: Current. p. 30, 99–114, 169, 171, 181, 203 & 212–213. ISBN 978-1-61723-018-9.
  15. ↑ "PSI Ceremony 2014". Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics.

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 12/3/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.