Extraordinary

Superhumans: 10 gifted people with impressive abilities

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We are often unaware of the unlimited potential of human beings. Certain individuals possess unique and powerful abilities that are truly extraordinary. From a woman who can see inside the human body to a man who experiences colors and textures in numbers, these people are living proof of the incredible diversity of human talent and resilience. Read on to learn the stories of 10 individuals who have such amazing skills that they are almost superhuman.

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On Jeju Island, South Korea, a group of women—some as old as 80—dive into freezing water without tanks or thermal suits. The haenyeo are not afraid of the cold; they descend up to 30 feet deep hunting for shellfish and can hold their breath for as long as two minutes.

But how is this possible? It's not magic—it’s adaptation. Since they have been diving for centuries, their bodies have adapted to extreme conditions. Recently, scientists discovered that these legendary divers have unique genetic traits that regulate their blood pressure, increasing their tolerance to cold and protecting them even during pregnancy. Researchers compared the DNA of haenyeo with that of other non-diving Korean women and found significant differences.

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Chris Robinson, or Dream Detective, as he calls himself, claims to be able to see the future in his dreams. Since 1989, he says he has dreamt of crimes, natural disasters, and even collaborated with law enforcement on several cases.

His uncanny ability has been studied multiple times, and on one occasion, he was able to accurately predict a series of events that would happen the next day. While Robinson doesn’t always get it right, his record of claimed premonitions is intriguing and has earned him considerable attention.

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In 1973, Thai Ngoc developed a severe fever from a rare illness. He recovered after a few weeks, but was affected by a strange medical condition that scientists cannot explain: Thai Ngoc claims he can’t sleep, not even for a moment.

The Vietnamese farmer is now 83 years old and says he hasn't slept in more than 60 years. Even prescription medications have failed to help him rest. So what does he do during those endless nights? He spends his time farming and making his own rice wine!

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Natalya Demkina, a young woman from Russia, can see inside people's bodies. At least that's what she claims and has been trying to prove over the years. The first time she declared to have this ability, she was 10 years old, and everyone thought it was childish nonsense. However, as time went by, Natalya proved she could actually diagnose a person just by looking at them for a few minutes.

Scientists have carried out various tests to investigate her claims, often with mixed or skeptical results. Still, many continue to believe in her powers. What do you think? Is it true?

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Elisabeth Sulser suffers from a strange condition called synesthesia. A synaesthete can hear colors and see sounds, as well as experience taste when she touches a particular texture. It is a rare neurological condition, and Elisabeth Sulser presents one of the most complex cases of synesthesia in the world.

As a child, she believed her unusual perceptions were completely normal. It wasn’t until her teenage years, while beginning her musical career, that she learned she had this rare neurological condition. Today, she is a successful performer and composer. How do you think she feels about her own music?

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Stephen Wiltshire is an English artist famous for his extraordinary ability to draw detailed landscapes entirely from memory after seeing them just once. Diagnosed with autism at the age of three—the same year his father was killed in a motorcycle accident—Wiltshire found comfort in drawing. Encouraged by his teachers, he used art not only to express himself but also as a bridge to learning speech.

His ability is so impressive that in 2006, Prince Charles of England made him a Member of the Order of the British Empire in recognition of his artistic work.

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When he was 10 years old, American Orlando Serrell was struck in the head by a baseball and briefly knocked unconscious. After recovering, he discovered he could solve complex math problems in record time. Serrell suffers from brain damage, and although his mathematical ability was latent before the accident, his trauma turned him into a genius.

Acquired savant syndrome is a rare condition in which a person develops exceptional skills after a brain injury or trauma. In addition to his mathematical abilities, Serrell has other rare skills, such as being able to remember what the weather was like every day since his accident, or identify the day of the week for almost any date mentioned to him.

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The American ultramarathon runner Dean Karnazes is no ordinary athlete; his body works in an extraordinary way. He has a rare physiological adaptation that allows him to efficiently clear lactic acid from his muscles, preventing the painful buildup that normally forces people to stop.

Lactic acid is responsible for the hot, burning sensation we feel when we do physical activity. Because Karnazes' muscles always receive the necessary oxygen, he never gets tired and can keep running for miles without even taking a break. This uncanny ability has allowed him to set an incredible record in the United States: he ran 50 marathons in 50 states in 50 consecutive days.

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Daniel Tammet is a British writer and scholar celebrated for his extraordinary skills in mathematics and languages. Diagnosed with high-functioning autism and having experienced epilepsy as a child, he can perform complex calculations, memorize vast sequences of numbers, and learn new languages with remarkable speed.

In addition, Tammet experiences synesthesia, which enables him to assign totally unique physical properties to each number. He can even identify numbers according to the way their surface feels to the touch, awakening in him a totally different set of emotions each time.

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Joy Milne is a Scottish nurse known for her remarkable sense of smell, which allows her to detect Parkinson’s disease. She first noticed this unusual ability when she detected a distinctive musky odor on her husband, twelve years before he was officially diagnosed.

Researchers have since confirmed her talent, finding that she can identify a specific odor in the sebum of people with Parkinson’s. Thanks to Joy’s extraordinary sense of smell, progress has been made in early diagnosis and research, offering hope to those affected by the disease.

Some names stick around

From Table Tap Joe to Ziggy Stardust: Who are the best song characters?

Sometimes, a character is the perfect alter-ego to write a song about oneself without self-referencing so much. Other times, a character is just a character. Over the years, musicians have come up with lonely dreamers, fearless heroes, mysterious strangers, and even supernatural villains who have become just as famous as the songs themselves. Some were inspired by real people, others sprang entirely from imagination, but all of them left a lasting mark on music history. Which of these 12 do you remember?

Tom Waits has always had a soft spot for society's oddballs, and few are even stranger than Table Top Joe. Introduced on the 2002 album Alice, Joe is born with only a head and hands, yet grows into a brilliant piano player whose extraordinary talent earns him fame despite the odds stacked against him.

The song unfolds like a forgotten American folk tale, complete with references to Coney Island's legendary Dreamland amusement park and composer Igor Stravinsky. Although many listeners assume the story is based on an old carnival legend, Table Top Joe is entirely Tom Waits' own creation.

Few fictional musicians have ever become as famous as Ziggy Stardust. Introduced in 1972, Ziggy is an alien rock star sent to Earth shortly before humanity's end, only to be consumed by the very fame that makes him a savior to millions.

David Bowie blurred the line between fiction and reality by performing as Ziggy onstage for more than a year. When he unexpectedly announced Ziggy's retirement during a concert at London's Hammersmith Odeon in 1973, many fans believed the character, and perhaps Bowie himself, had truly reached the end of the story.

Tommy Walker isn't just the hero of a song, he's the central figure of one of rock music's first great operas. After witnessing a traumatic event as a child, Tommy becomes deaf, mute, and blind, yet somehow develops astonishing pinball skills that transform him into an unlikely celebrity.

Pete Townshend built an entire musical world around Tommy, exploring themes of trauma, faith, and redemption. First released in 1969, Tommy later became a hit film, a Broadway production, and one of the most influential concept albums ever recorded.

Johnny B. Goode is every aspiring musician's dream. Growing up in rural Louisiana with little more than a guitar and natural talent, he plays so brilliantly that listeners predict "his name will be in lights."

Chuck Berry based the character partly on himself and partly on pianist Johnnie Johnson. Originally described as a "colored boy," Johnny became a "country boy" in the final lyrics, making the song more likely to receive airplay during the segregation era. Nearly two decades later, Johnny's anthem would even travel into space aboard NASA's Voyager Golden Record.

Few fictional characters have captured loneliness as powerfully as Eleanor Rigby. She quietly moves through life unnoticed, while Father McKenzie delivers sermons that no one hears, creating one of popular music's saddest portraits of isolation.

Paul McCartney later explained that Eleanor's name came from actress Eleanor Bron and the Liverpool shop Rigby & Evens. The discovery of an actual Eleanor Rigby gravestone in Liverpool only deepened the song's mystique, though McCartney maintained the coincidence was unintentional.

Billie Jean may be one of pop music's most famous women, yet Michael Jackson insisted she wasn't a real person. Instead, she represented several women who falsely claimed that he had fathered their children during the height of the Jackson 5's fame.

Released in 1983 as part of Thriller, the song became a global phenomenon. It also provided the stage for Jackson's legendary moonwalk during Motown 25.

Unlike many legendary song characters, Stagger Lee actually existed. His real name was Lee Shelton, a St. Louis criminal who murdered Billy Lyons during an argument over a hat on Christmas Eve in 1895.

The shocking crime quickly entered American folklore through countless folk songs before Lloyd Price transformed it into a chart-topping hit in 1958. More than a century later, Stagger Lee remains one of the most enduring antiheroes in American music.

Tom Dooley was inspired by Thomas Dula, a Confederate veteran executed in North Carolina in 1868 after being convicted of murdering Laura Foster. His surname was locally pronounced "Dooley," giving the ballad its familiar title.

The Kingston Trio revived the old Appalachian folk song in 1958, turning it into an international hit and helping launch America's folk music revival.

When the narrator of "Lola" meets an intriguing stranger in a Soho nightclub, expectations quickly give way to surprise. Ray Davies crafted one of rock's earliest mainstream stories exploring gender ambiguity, decades before the topic entered popular conversation.

The recording rarely reached British radio. Because BBC rules prohibited commercial product names, Davies had to interrupt a U.S. tour and fly back to London simply to replace the lyric "Coca-Cola" with the now-famous "cherry cola."

Unlike most famous song characters, the Piano Man is really Billy Joel himself. Before becoming a superstar, Joel spent six months in 1972 and 1973 performing under the pseudonym Bill Martin at the Executive Room, a piano bar in Los Angeles, after becoming trapped in a bad recording contract. The song transforms those experiences into a bittersweet portrait of ordinary people searching for escape at the end of another week.

Joel has said that virtually every character in the song was based on a real person, from bartender John to "Paul, the real estate novelist" and Davy, who really was in the Navy. Yet the Piano Man himself became the story's most enduring character: a quiet observer who offers music as a brief refuge for dreamers, lonely souls, and regulars alike. More than fifty years after its 1973 release, "Piano Man" remains Billy Joel's signature song, and its title has effectively become his lifelong nickname.

Standing nearly seven feet tall and missing an arm, Amos Moses roams the Louisiana swamps hunting alligators. Jerry Reed filled the song with colorful Southern expressions and exaggerated storytelling that make Amos feel like an authentic folk legend.

Although fictional, Amos embodies the larger-than-life heroes found throughout American tall tales. His adventures turned the song into one of Reed's biggest crossover hits and secured Amos a permanent place among country music's greatest characters.

Big Bad John hardly says a word, but he doesn't have to. The towering coal miner earns everyone's respect through quiet strength before sacrificing his own life to save fellow workers when a mine collapses.

Jimmy Dean's 1961 ballad became a smash hit, winning a Grammy and inspiring several sequel songs. More than sixty years later, Big Bad John still stands as one of country music's defining working-class heroes.