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Autism and Invention Are Connected

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Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#81

Post by hinkley »

skissane wrote: post #42
PlugTunin wrote: post #21

Interesting read. Minor point of clarification: It's noted that many autistic folks struggle with empathy. There are two dimensions to empathy, cognitive and affective . Cognitive is more about perspective taking, or reading the feelings / intentions of others, while affective is the ability to share/understand the emotions of others, and respond appropriately. Putting aside that the two may overlap, it's often the c…

> as well as the related concept of Theory of Mind. On the topic of theory of mind and ASD, I think this is quite an interesting read: "Empirical Failures of the Claim That Autistic People Lack a Theory of Mind" – https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6959478/ "We conclude that the claim that autistic people lack a theory of mind is empirically questionable and societally harmful"

Temple Grandin's inventions mostly revolved around applying a theory of mind to farm animals, did they not?

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#82

Post by solarmist »

Kharvok wrote: post #76

How much of autism diagnosis is just people misunderstanding people with high IQ? Obviously autism != intelligence, but I'd wager a fair amount of people are thought to be "on the spectrum" when really they just have an incredibly high IQ compared to their peers. Obviously not coming at this from a medical background.

Why not both?

For the longest time people viewed high IQ (as much as it is an actual distinct thing) as a pure blessing. But more and more is coming out saying like everything else high IQ is a trade off and by increasing IQ you decrease other factors so it would not be at all surprising if major issues are strongly correlated with high IQ.

That said I believe autism specifically occurs up and down the range of IQs and there are generally more people with autism on the low end of the spectrum (it could be equally likely that this is because of the diagnosis bias from the above).

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#83

Post by DoofusOfDeath »

getlawgdon wrote: post #79
DoofusOfDeath wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I too received a probable-diagnosis later in life. (It was part of neuro-psych testing to look for ADD, so they didn't run the specific test battery used for Asperger.) In many ways my life has been just fine: steady well-paying employment, wonderful wife and kids, etc. So as with you, being (probably) somewhere on the spectrum isn't correlated with a crappy life. But... I've also had some unusual personality traits…

would love to hear more if you'd be willing.

Not sure what more to say. Was there something specific?

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#84

Post by 0b01 »

primroot wrote: post #18
programmerslave wrote: post #12

Mental disabilities are mostly adaptations that have huge upside. Technology is exacerbating that upside. You can’t have a majority autistic society, but you want some of them around

That's an interesting take. I have seen the disability-as-adaptation idea in the past but nothing regarding Technology exacerbated upside. For instance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter_vs._farmer_hypothesis and https://slate.com/technology/2016/06/the-monkeys-of-south-am... .

There's an entire field (although a small one) dedicated to this called Evolutionary Psychopathology. The idea is that mental illnesses are failure modes of adaptive phenotypes. For example high functioning autistic couple could produce a severely autistic child.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#85

Post by aussieguy1234 »

PlugTunin wrote: post #21

Interesting read. Minor point of clarification: It's noted that many autistic folks struggle with empathy. There are two dimensions to empathy, cognitive and affective . Cognitive is more about perspective taking, or reading the feelings / intentions of others, while affective is the ability to share/understand the emotions of others, and respond appropriately. Putting aside that the two may overlap, it's often the c…

I'm curious if the supposed Theory of Mind impairments only apply when Autistic people theorize about Neurotypical minds, which are different from their own.

My guess is that when theorizing about another Autistic person mind, which is similar to their own, they might actually do quite well because they have their own mind to use as a base to work from, just like Neurotypical people have their own mind to use as a base when theorizing about another Neurotypical persons mind.

Similarly, I'd say your average neurotypical person would have difficulties theorizing about whats going on inside an Autistic persons mind.

If I'm right, then the difference in Theory of Mind in my view would be more of a difference than an fundamental impairment.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#86

Post by PlugTunin »

PlugTunin wrote: post #25
DoofusOfDeath wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of my sons has Asperger syndrome. He's brilliant, happy, and has one of the sharpest senses of humor I've encountered. I'm not sure if his Asperger syndrome is a net positive or negative in his life, but it's certainly not a straight-up disability. Perhaps the author was thinking about a strong form of Autism that pretty unequivocally makes life difficult?

Good point. The author of that article, Baron-Cohen, has previously written (debated?) about whether HFA/AS is a disability OR a difference. Speaking for myself, and many who identify as having Asperger's -- and your son, from what it sounds like (who sounds really cool!) -- it is indeed a difference , and by no means a disability.

I should be clear in stating that my life hasn't been a bowl of cherries. Asperger's is at the core of a looooong list of problems I've had with interpersonal relationships, whether it's family, friends, co-workers, roommates, etc. I'm sort of intolerant of being treated unjustly or being taken advantage of, and I react rather nastily to those who cross me. (And before you judge me, know that people with Asperger's have a knack for finding these situations. Exploited by coworkers? It really happens. Undesirable roommates who've physically threatened me? Been there more than once. Physical altercations as a kid, refusing to back down from bullies? Too many times to count. Screwed up relatives? I have many.)

But I don't care to use the word disabled in describing myself. Being unable to keep my mouth shut in the face of something I don't agree with doesn't qualify as a disability. My sensory issues aren't anything I ask for accommodations for. That I prefer to spend more time away from people than the average bear is not a disability. And in the context of autism, it's hard to use the word disabled and not have people place limitations on what one can/can't do. So, I don't use the word. And just consider myself different.

I recognize that there are people deeply offended by people like me, who are at the higher-functioning end of the spectrum and refuse to consider themselves disabled. (They see us as impostors.) There are also many people who take offense to the term lower/lesser functioning, and resent the use of terms like "severe autism". They consider this language to be demeaning. Autistic twitter is quite the landmine for semantic wars of this sort.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#87

Post by c22 »

dnissley wrote: post #63
BlueTemplar wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst issue with this is that titles are generally picked by different people than those writing the article, and are sometimes only tangentially related to its content.

On the other hand: Most articles are pretty fluffy and don't bring much to the table, and so are just an invitation to discuss the topic at hand in the comments at what is usually a far greater depth than the original story.

Yeah, I often don't feel the need to click the link after reading the comments, but sometimes I do and I am frequently disappointed to find only a few paragraphs of content or a superficial introduction to the subject.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#89

Post by BurningFrog »

aussieguy1234 wrote: post #85
PlugTunin wrote: post #21

Interesting read. Minor point of clarification: It's noted that many autistic folks struggle with empathy. There are two dimensions to empathy, cognitive and affective . Cognitive is more about perspective taking, or reading the feelings / intentions of others, while affective is the ability to share/understand the emotions of others, and respond appropriately. Putting aside that the two may overlap, it's often the c…

I'm curious if the supposed Theory of Mind impairments only apply when Autistic people theorize about Neurotypical minds, which are different from their own. My guess is that when theorizing about another Autistic person mind, which is similar to their own, they might actually do quite well because they have their own mind to use as a base to work from, just like Neurotypical people have their own mind to use as a ba…

A lot of the programmers I think are "on the spectrum" seem to have a real blind spot for the possibility that other people lack the knowledge they have.

If they know something, they just assume I do too.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#90

Post by solveit »

Godel_unicode wrote: post #45
lumberjack wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most (like 90% or more) autistic people are low functioning. But they are completely invisible to people like you. When you hear the word you think of the border line cases that fall under the label "high functioning autism". But the author is not limiting himself to just these borderline cases.

Do you have any data for this distribution? This is the first time I've heard someone suggest any particular shape to this distribution, much less that it's shaped as you suggest.

I don't know about these precise numbers, but ~57% of autistic people have an edit: my source is the CDC(https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/data.html) for IQ and this paper https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3727194/ for proportion of nonverbal autism.
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