I've just learned from a book review:

http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,1993741,00.html

that Young's modulus, the two-slit experiment to demonstrate interference of light waves, the three-colour theory of vision, a key insight that helped to decipher the hieroglyphs, a technique to tune pianos, and the concept of an Indo-European language family all came from the same person.

Now that's really scary. They don't make them like that any more. Besides, try applying for an academic job and telling the committee: "I'm going to work in physics, physiology, linguistics, music ... "