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Autism research on single neurons suggests signaling problems in brain circuits

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Re: Autism research on single neurons suggests signaling problems in brain circuits

#61

Post by thg »

dymk wrote: post #30
nicoburns wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's different because, at least in some forms, it comes with advantages as well as disadvantages. For some people it's debilitating, but for others it's not.

What possible advantage is there to having any form of autism?

Speaking only for myself:

Logical thinking is really easy for me. Also abstracting, pattern matching, "out-of-the-box" thinking.. Loyalty, honesty and helpfulness are also positive traits common among autistic people.

Having a unique worldview certainly is helpful in some situations. However it also makes other situations, especially pertaining to social interactions with strangers, rather challenging at times..

Re: Autism research on single neurons suggests signaling problems in brain circuits

#62

Post by mftrhu »

thelasthuman wrote: post #56
pasiaj wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The DSM-III, published in 1980, established autism as its own separate diagnosis and described it as a “pervasive developmental disorder” distinct from schizophrenia.

Wasn't homosexuality still considered a disease in the DSM-III?

Almost. It was declassified as a disease by the American Psychiatric Association in 1973 [1] (and by the American Psychological Association in 1975 [2]), and the DSM-III has been the first edition to not include homosexuality.

It still contained ego-dystonic homosexuality (TL;DR: "I don't want to be gay") - which was opposed by the APA in 1987 [3] - until 1988, with the publication of the DSM-III-R.

[1]: https://www.nytimes.com/1973/12/16/archives/psychiatrists-in...

[2]: https://www.apa.org/about/policy/discrimination

[3]: https://www.apa.org/about/policy/diagnoses-homosexuality-arc...

Re: Autism research on single neurons suggests signaling problems in brain circuits

#63

Post by throwaway848483 »

Unrelated : In this article double f, like in "affected" are rendered with the second f bigger than the first (both on firefox and chromium). I looked inside the css editor and the font seems to be ("Libre Baskerville", Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif).

I guess this is probably to improve readability but it doesn't do this for other pairs of repeated letters.

It kind of sent me into a rabbit hole as I thought font were defined for a single letter only. I did a quick search and I couldn't find the rules which defined fonts. Is there some pattern matching for sequence of characters ? More importantly, when trying a new font how do we know that there aren't special cases like this ugly "ff" ?

Re: Autism research on single neurons suggests signaling problems in brain circuits

#64

Post by Arnavion »

throwaway848483 wrote: post #63

Unrelated : In this article double f, like in "affected" are rendered with the second f bigger than the first (both on firefox and chromium). I looked inside the css editor and the font seems to be ("Libre Baskerville", Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif). I guess this is probably to improve readability but it doesn't do this for other pairs of repeated letters. It kind of sent me into a rabbit hole as I though…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typographic_ligature

Searching for "fonts ligatures" will give you more reading material.

>I guess this is probably to improve readability but it doesn't do this for other pairs of repeated letters.

Ligatures are mostly a style thing from the days of handwriting that got brought forward into print.

>Is there some pattern matching for sequence of characters ?

Yes, combinations are pre-defined in the font and picked up the renderer. In this particular case, LibreBaskerville defines a combination of two f's to render the first f in a slightly smaller size.

Re: Autism research on single neurons suggests signaling problems in brain circuits

#65

Post by throwaway848483 »

Arnavion wrote: post #64
throwaway848483 wrote: post #63

Unrelated : In this article double f, like in "affected" are rendered with the second f bigger than the first (both on firefox and chromium). I looked inside the css editor and the font seems to be ("Libre Baskerville", Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif). I guess this is probably to improve readability but it doesn't do this for other pairs of repeated letters. It kind of sent me into a rabbit hole as I though…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typographic_ligature Searching for "fonts ligatures" will give you more reading material. >I guess this is probably to improve readability but it doesn't do this for other pairs of repeated letters. Ligatures are mostly a style thing from the days of handwriting that got brought forward into print. >Is there some pattern matching for sequence of characters ? Yes, combinations are pre-def…

thanks

Re: Autism research on single neurons suggests signaling problems in brain circuits

#66

Post by anoncake »

miguelrochefort wrote: post #39
dymk wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What possible advantage is there to having any form of autism?

Isn't there a correlation between Asperger's and high IQ?

AFAIK that's just because an Aspergers diagnosis requires an IQ>70.

Re: Autism research on single neurons suggests signaling problems in brain circuits

#67

Post by jdefelice »

Arnavion wrote: post #64
throwaway848483 wrote: post #63

Unrelated : In this article double f, like in "affected" are rendered with the second f bigger than the first (both on firefox and chromium). I looked inside the css editor and the font seems to be ("Libre Baskerville", Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif). I guess this is probably to improve readability but it doesn't do this for other pairs of repeated letters. It kind of sent me into a rabbit hole as I though…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typographic_ligature Searching for "fonts ligatures" will give you more reading material. >I guess this is probably to improve readability but it doesn't do this for other pairs of repeated letters. Ligatures are mostly a style thing from the days of handwriting that got brought forward into print. >Is there some pattern matching for sequence of characters ? Yes, combinations are pre-def…

You can also control this with CSS using font-variant-ligatures.

Re: Autism research on single neurons suggests signaling problems in brain circuits

#68

Post by anoncake »

dogma1138 wrote: post #34
astine wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" Most people on the spectrum will require help to go to the bathroom or complete other basic tasks so them making medical decisions is unlikely. " What's your source for this claim? Is this the majority of all people diagnosed with ASD, or just the majority of people diagnosed with ASD that you believe should have been diagnosed?

1/3rd of people diagnosed with ASD are non-verbal. 56% would have an IQ below 85, 83% would have a other developmental, neurologic, chromosomal, and genetic conditions, with down syndrome, fragile X syndrome and tuberous sclerosis accounting for about 10% of these. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20431403 https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/67/ss/ss6706a1.htm https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19268036 Overall this…

> 56% would have an IQ below 85

14% of the population have an IQ below 85. It's low, but not to the point of being a disability.

> 83% would have a other developmental, neurologic, chromosomal, and genetic conditions

What qualifies as a "condition" for the purpose of that statistic? What's the percentage for the general population? Frankly, if you actually include all genetic conditions, I'd be surprised if much less than 100% of the general population have one.

Re: Autism research on single neurons suggests signaling problems in brain circuits

#69

Post by wswkb »

dazfuller wrote: post #55
dogma1138 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since always? It’s a developmental disorder, and a disease is “a disorder of structure or function in a human, animal, or plant, especially one that produces specific symptoms or that affects a specific location and is not simply a direct result of physical injury.” Pretty much every medical body would list it under its classification of illnesses. e.g. NHS: https://www.nhsinform.scot/illnesses-and-conditions/brain-n…

With 2 kids and a partner diagnosed as being autistic, it's a massive trigger for me. Seen so many health professionals because of my family, not one has ever referred to it as a disease. Just to elaborate further. Child 1 - ASD/ADHD Child 2 - ASD/SPD possibly PDA Partner - ASD/SPD They're all different and display different characteristics,have differing needs and have different mental health issues. Child 1 is abou…

The fact that it's a massive trigger for someone doesn't mean it's less of a disease. Maybe the problem is the negativity the word "disease" brings, but someone who suffers autism is a diseased person.

Re: Autism research on single neurons suggests signaling problems in brain circuits

#70

Post by anoncake »

ThrustVectoring wrote: post #40
bufferoverflow wrote: post #35

Autism (or maybe some forms of it) are now linked to gut problems / inflammation and can be treated with fecal transplants: University of Arizona experimental study on 18 children: https://microbiomejournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186... A very successful treatment of one child: https://youtu.be/KRXl_N0OtX4?t=1477

One complicating factor with a lot of these studies is how "autism symptoms" and the like are measured. Specifically, they measure something like "how much distress is the autistic individual under compared to how much they can handle". High level of distress leads to meltdowns, inability to handle outside behavioral demands, etc, and shows up as higher autism symptom load. So this study is, IMO, much less about "gut…

That depends on what Autism is/how we define it.

I think there may be people whose brain works like an autistic brain in that the things that specifically distress autists also distress them. But they are good enough at tolerating distress that they don't actually show the symptoms of autism.

If people like that exist and we don't consider them autistic, then improving someone's ability to deal with distress can indeed reduce or even cure autism.

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