Jason Padgett, a 41-year-old college dropout who worked at a futon store, sustained a brain injury during a mugging at a karaoke club in Tacoma – the muggers were after his $99 leather jacket. Little did he know that this brain injury would change his life completely. A day or two after the injury, Jason began seeing “bits and pieces of the Pythagorean theorem everywhere.” He’s currently working with MIT researchers on developing a fractal energy source. Continue reading for a video, more pictures of his fractals, and additional information.
Video
At the time, doctors said he had a concussion, but within a day or two, Padgett began to notice something remarkable. This college dropout who couldn’t draw became obsessed with drawing intricate diagrams, but didn’t know what they were. “I see bits and pieces of the Pythagorean theorem everywhere,” he said. “Every single little curve, every single spiral, every tree is part of that equation.”
The diagrams he draws are called fractals and Padgett can draw a visual representation of the formula Pi, that infinite number that begins with 3.14. Jason Padgett’s drawing of Pi. “A fractal is a shape that when you take the shape a part into pieces, the pieces are the same or similar to the whole. So say I had 1,000 pictures of you, that were little and I put all those little pictures of you in the right spot to make the exact same picture of you, but bigger,” he explained.
Fractal Pictures
Padgett doesn’t have a PhD, a college degree or even a background in math. His talent was born out of a true medical mystery that scientists around the world are still trying to unravel. A scan of Padgett’s brain showed damage that was forcing his brain to overcompensate in certain areas that most people don�t have access to, Brogaard explained. The result was Padgett was now an acquired savant, meaning brilliant in a specific area.
