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Autism and Invention Are Connected

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Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#121

Post by raducu »

novok wrote: post #112
the_cat_kittles wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

can you go into a little more detail about what results allowed them to conclude you were probably aspergers, and what the personality traits that you previously felt guilty for were?

ADHD and mild ASD can sometimes look like one or the other. TBH a good neuropsych will do both if they have any suspicion of ASD if they are also doing ADHD testing.

There can be overlap and comorbidity too.

As part of my BPD the psychiatrist gave me an ADHD test, 25% of people with BPD also have ADHD.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#122

Post by raducu »

thedevil wrote: post #109
worker767424 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My unresearched pet theory is that, at least in mammals, males are risk-takers, do stupid things, and are where the genome gets to try new things, because they're more "disposable" when propagating a species.

It's not just mammals and I wouldn't frame it as them being disposable when propagating the species. There's a bigger payout at the right tail of the distribution for male genes. Male genes can sometimes have 1000 offspring. Female genes generally can't. Male genes are generally more likely to have 0 offspring. So male genes have less to lose and more to gain by taking risks, behavioral and biological risks. See also…

>I warn you though, this is a controversial subject because of some of its possible implications.

This is a really sad state of science we are living through.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#123

Post by globular-toast »

PlugTunin wrote: post #40
amelius wrote: post #27

Please don't take this the wrong way, but there is a 3-to-1 male-to-female ratio in autism prevalence. Does this mean that males invent more things than females? Or is the percentage of people with autism too small to have an effect here? https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28545751/

There was a time when society relegated women to pursuits that frequently deprived them of many opportunities to invent. Fortunately, society has changed.

Yeah, "fortunately" it's changed so now they can't have children and still don't invent things.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#124

Post by ZephyrBlu »

thedevil wrote: post #109
worker767424 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My unresearched pet theory is that, at least in mammals, males are risk-takers, do stupid things, and are where the genome gets to try new things, because they're more "disposable" when propagating a species.

It's not just mammals and I wouldn't frame it as them being disposable when propagating the species. There's a bigger payout at the right tail of the distribution for male genes. Male genes can sometimes have 1000 offspring. Female genes generally can't. Male genes are generally more likely to have 0 offspring. So male genes have less to lose and more to gain by taking risks, behavioral and biological risks. See also…

> I warn you though, this is a controversial subject because of some of its possible implications

I can imagine some of the implications people could come up with, but I'm curious which ones come to mind for you.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#125

Post by Traubenfuchs »

amelius wrote: post #27

Please don't take this the wrong way, but there is a 3-to-1 male-to-female ratio in autism prevalence. Does this mean that males invent more things than females? Or is the percentage of people with autism too small to have an effect here? https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28545751/

It's true, but it can not be discussed and researched further because it is very upsetting to a lot of people. Also explains why men are better in chess. (I don't mean this from a misogynistic viewpoint: The majority of men will never invent anything or become good at chess, just like the majority of women)

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

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#126

Post by tasogare »

BlueTemplar wrote: post #60
hnracer wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is definitely a large part of the picture but it's also possibly partly genetic when it comes to the science and tech fields. I'm talking about interest and not competence. Women tend to self select out of science and tech in richer societies where they have the freedom to do so, and self select into disciplines that serve the empathic personality better. There are persuasive studies on that topic.

A significant factor seems to be that the way (not only STEM) academia is currently organized means that women have to pick between a career or having any children (at ages favorable to childbearing): https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=4522 And I kind of have the impression that the situation here actually got worse during the last decades?

This theory doesn’t any hold scrutiny: some academic or academic-like fields are dominated by women despite having the same formal organization as the STEM ones.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#127

Post by seanhandley »

BurningFrog wrote: post #89
aussieguy1234 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I really struggle with this.

I think it feeds strongly into imposter syndrome too. It's easy to devalue your own contributions when you suspect anyone else could make them.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#128

Post by redis_mlc »

konjin wrote: post #119
ksm1717 wrote: post #14

The first sentence rubs me the wrong way. The claim that you wouldn’t expect autism to be coupled with invention because it is a disability only makes sense because of the semantics of labeling autism necessarily a disability. Not to mention the slight to disabilities as a whole

The idea that it's a disability is as stupid as the idea that being 7 foot tall is a disability.

Not to nit-pick, but exceptionally tall people often have spine issues, and in sports, career-ending foot injuries are common in basketball.

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

Also disable sound and search for "Kevin Durant injury: A look at the NBA's history with foot injuries"

As well, some of the "tall genes" are associated with connective tissue and other health problems:

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

I'm average height for the West, but when I'm in Asia, I often hit my head on gates, taxi doorways, etc. I imagine that would also happen for 7 footers in the West.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#129

Post by cbsmith »

BurningFrog wrote: post #89
aussieguy1234 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

In my experience, non-programmers struggle with this just as much. The main difference is that as a specialized discipline, it is more likely a lot of their knowledge is not shared with other people.

Re: Autism and Invention Are Connected

#130

Post by steve_adams_86 »

cookiengineer wrote: post #104
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 was reading this comment dozens of times while trying to understand its implications. When reflecting on myself, I think I have problems with both cognitive and affective empathy. From my perspective it's hard to differ between those because I think a lot of what makes the "reactibility of a person" is intertwined and feels like a really complicated maze that needs exploration to find a potential solution. The prob…

I’m very similar. I easily become a door mat because I tend to assume people are sincere. It makes me seem nice, but I’m not trying to be particularly nice at all, just decent I guess. I don’t realize when I’ve been taken advantage of until months or even years later. I’m quite bad at reading these things in other people.
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