Drawing upon both reality and fiction, Daniel H. Wilson and Anna C. Long's book The Mad Scientist Hall of Fame: Muwahahahaha! offers an amusing and informative catalogue of famous individuals within whom genius and madness collided. Here we profile some of the more notable members of this club.
Nikola Tesla
Genius:
A child prodigy; superb mental imaging abilities and a photographic memory.
Madness:
Claimed communication via radio with extraterrestrial beings; may have suffered from OCD; obsessed with the number three; had a strange love of pigeons.
Legacy:
Revolutionary contributions to fields of electricity and magnetism; granted 212 patents; invented radio transmission.
Curious Quote:
"One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite insane."
Marie Curie
Genius:
Graduated high school at age 15, top of her class; graduated from the Sorbonne in only three years.
Madness:
Suffered from depression and anhedonia; her extreme devotion to science resulted in her death from leukemia and radiation poisoning.
Legacy:
Two NobelPrizes (Physics 1903, Chemistry 1911); discovered polonium and radium; invented a portable X-ray machine; coined the term radioactive.
Curious Quote:
"I am one of those who think, like Nobel, that humanity will draw more good than evil from new discoveries."
Stanley Milgram
Genius:
Reported IQ of 158; advanced understanding of experimental design and ability to conduct studies of complex social phenomena.
Madness:
May have had a narcissistic personality disorder; deceptive and manipulative; questionable ethical standards; enthusiasm for peyote and other hallucinogens.
Legacy:
A founding father of social psychology; exposed our willingness to harm others in the presence of authority figures; originated the concept of six degrees of separation.
Curious Quote:
"It is not nice to lure people into the laboratory and ensnare them in a situation that is stressful and unpleasant."
Victor Frankenstein
Genius:
Extremely high verbal intelligence; intensely curious about alchemy and the nature of life and death; incredibly disciplined.
Madness:
Wanted to play God; suffered from psychotic hallucinations and depression.
Legacy:
Discovered means of animating dead tissue; responsible for vengeful deaths exacted by his creation.
Curious Quote:
"How dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge."
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