Christopher Langan

Christopher Langan
Chris and his wife, Gina Langan in March 2006.
Born	(1952-03-25) March 25, 1952 (age 65) San Francisco, California, U.S.
Residence	Princeton, Missouri, U.S.
Nationality	American
Alma mater	Reed College, Montana State University
Occupation	Intellectual, independent researcher, scholar
Known for	Man with one of the highest known IQs
Home town	Bozeman, Montana, U.S.
Spouse(s)	Dr. Gina Langan (m. ?)

Christopher Michael Langan (born March 25, 1952) is an American whose IQ was reportedly believed to be "between 190 and 210". In Morris 2001, Langan relates that he took what was billed as "the world's most difficult IQ test" in Omni magazine, and he gives his IQ as "somewhere between 190 and 210". He has been described as "the smartest man in America" as well as "the smartest man in the world" by some journalists. Langan has developed a "theory of the relationship between mind and reality" which he calls the "Cognitive-Theoretic Model of the Universe" (CTMU).

Langan was born in San Francisco, California, in 1952. He spent most of his early life in Montana, with his mother and three brothers. His mother was the daughter of a wealthy shipping executive but was cut off from her family's fortune. Christopher did not grow up with his biological father, as the man died or disappeared before Christopher was born. Because Christopher's father was absent, the family struggled to escape poverty.

During elementary school, Langan was repeatedly skipped ahead and was tormented by his peers. Langan claims he was brutally beaten by his stepfather, Jack Langan. Jack Langan denies this claim. Chris Langan recalled that his "stepfather constantly asked [Chris] difficult questions, and when I'd give him correct answers to those questions, he'd bat me in the mouth or something of that nature to let me know he didn't appreciate a guy trying to be smarter than he was." At the age of twelve years, Langan began weight training, and forcibly ended the abuse by throwing his stepfather out of the house when he was fourteen, and telling him never to return.

Langan says he spent the last years of high school mostly in independent study, teaching himself "advanced math, physics, philosophy, Latin, and Greek". He earned a perfect score on the SAT (pre-1995 scale) despite taking a nap during the test. Langan attended Reed College and later Montana State University, but faced with financial and transportation problems, and believing that he could teach his professors more than they could teach him, he dropped out.