Scott Barry Kaufman

My mom tells me that they told her that your son wants to be an academic PhD psychologist.

He wrote that on his thing, but we think he has delusions of grandeur.

I remember taking a shower and just closing my eyes and giving a 50-minute speech on human potential.

The thing that excited me were ideas about how people are capable of so much more than they realize, how we don't really see the fullness of a human being.

And this is even before TED Talks, but I remember in my head, the recollection of it is that the kind of talk I was giving matches exactly what a modern-day TED Talk looks like, you know?

I became obsessed with IQ tests around that point.

I remember just taking one IQ test after another.

Some of them I didn't do too well on.

And then some of them I did really, really well on.

And I was like, okay, I'm going to throw away those ones that said they weren't so good.

I'm going to keep the others.

I remember one IQ test result I took on the internet, which said I was profoundly gifted.

And I took it and I printed it out and I put it on my bedroom wall.

I put this IQ test result on my bedroom wall.

I remember the specific...

corner of the wall that I put it on displaying my IQ test results I took from the internet.

Yeah.

I think I was desperate to prove to anyone, like just to show anyone like, look, there was, there's some intelligence over here.

Yeah, I remember the office.

It was a tiny room with file cabinets and a desk.