ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
All right. It's time for a bit of mental math.
JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
OK, Ari, what is 567 times 123? And you have exactly three seconds to answer, so you better move fast.
SHAPIRO: You can't be serious right now, Juana.
SUMMERS: (Laughter).
SHAPIRO: There's no way anyone can solve a problem that fast.
SUMMERS: But Aaryan Shukla is not like most people.
AARYAN SHUKLA: I loved playing with numbers, so I started learning mental math since the age of 6.
SUMMERS: The 14-year-old from India has set the Guinness World Record for mental calculation.
SHAPIRO: He's been dubbed the human calculator and can solve complex math problems in his head in seconds.
SUMMERS: For some context of just how good he is, this month, he broke six world records in a single day. And get this - one of those was for adding 100 four-digit numbers in 30.9 seconds.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
AARYAN: Can I start?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: And you go.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: For this Guinness World Records title attempt, Aaryan's time...
SHAPIRO: In this official video from Guinness, you can see him standing in front of a screen that's flashing random four-digit numbers one at a time. The clock starts once the first number appears and does not stop until the last number flashes and he gives his answer.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
AARYAN: What's the time?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: OK.
AARYAN: What's the time?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: I'll tell you.
AARYAN: OK.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: So the minimum requirement for this attempt is 50 seconds. And Aaryan Shukla was able to get 30 seconds, 0.900 milliseconds. Congratulations.
(APPLAUSE)
SUMMERS: He also broke records in division and multiplication. So what does it take to be a human calculator?
AARYAN: Generally, I practice for two to three hours. But whenever a competition or some event come nearby, like Guinness World Record, so I generally do practice about five hours.
SHAPIRO: That is a lot of practice. When it comes to what that practice routine actually looks like, he says he uses a few techniques. One includes working with an abacus.
SUMMERS: He also studies a technique called Vedic math.
AARYAN: Vedic maths are basically the rules written by Indian mathematicians. So it's not a device. It's rules or, we could say, techniques of different calculations by Indian mathematicians.
SHAPIRO: When º£½ÇÉçÇø caught up with him, we wanted to test his mettle for ourselves. So producer Jeff Pierre asked him a question on the spot.
JEFF PIERRE, BYLINE: So what is 46,578 minus 8,098?
AARYAN: The answer is 38,480.
SUMMERS: Aaryan Shukla, congratulations on your record.
SHAPIRO: And for making math students across the world extremely jealous.
(SOUNDBITE OF MOONSTARR'S "DETROIT") Transcript provided by º£½ÇÉçÇø, Copyright º£½ÇÉçÇø.
º£½ÇÉçÇø transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an º£½ÇÉçÇø contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of º£½ÇÉçÇø’s programming is the audio record.
