James William Sidis was able to speak twenty-five different languages, possessed a superhuman memory, and had an intelligence level that was higher than that of Albert Einstein.
Boris Sidis, a psychologist, and Sarah Sidis, a physician, both found themselves in New York, and they anticipated having a child that was exceptionally bright. When they had their son William in 1898, however, they were completely unaware of how remarkable their child would turn out to be.
William turned out to be an extraordinarily clever young boy who was able to take in a lot of information. As a result of the parents' generosity, their kid was given a large number of books, which William devoured with excessive zeal. In addition to having a photographic memory, the young kid began reading newspapers when he was only 18 months old. By the time he was 4 years old, he had completely absorbed himself in the works of William Shakespeare.
When William was just 11 years old, he was accepted to Harvard University, where he studied mathematics, physics, and philosophy. This was in contrast to the majority of his classmates, who had difficulty with spelling and mathematics.
While this was going on, William was learning approximately 25 other languages and developing his own language with the intention of making it a worldwide language that people from all different cultures could speak.
As a result, the entire world was at William's feet when he left Harvard at the age of sixteen, carrying a rucksack full of academic accomplishments. In his first position, he was a maths teacher at the prestigious Rice Institute in Texas. However, the fact that he was younger than many of the pupils led to a great deal of conflict between them.
As time went on, William became increasingly accustomed to the attention and yearned for a life of tranquilly. He stated this in an interview that took place in 1914. "The only way to live the perfect life is to live in seclusion," he added.
Over the course of the subsequent decades, he worked a number of different menial occupations, one of which was that of a bookkeeper, while also isolating himself more and more. After suffering a brain haemorrhage at the young age of 46, he passed away in a state of poverty.
The intelligence quotient (IQ) of William James Sidis was never measured, but it is estimated by specialists to be somewhere between 250 and 300. This makes him a strong contender for the title of the smartest person in the history of the world.
To put this into perspective, the average intellect is 100, whereas Albert Einstein had a score of 160.