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Is autism the legacy of humans evolving the ability to innovate?

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Re: Is autism the legacy of humans evolving the ability to innovate?

#51

Post by caddemon »

galgalesh wrote: post #35
chrisjharris wrote: post #24

I am now quite curious about this book. One thing which seemes puzzling and distinctive about autism is that it appears to manifest much more in males than females (I think somewhat over 4x) - I'd be interested to see how Baron-Cohen addresses that.

In case you didn't know this: autism diagnosis is heavily biased towards how autism typically expresses in males. Autism expresses differently in females, causing to a very high number of women on the spectrum being misdiagnosed as having disorders such as anorexia, OCD or anxiety.

The general consensus in the field is that 4x is an overestimate for the reasons you describe, but the "ground truth" would still be increased prevalence in men. Interestingly there are even some mouse models of Autism where the male behavior is what one might expect from an ASD model, but the females don't really behave differently from controls. There are of course also some models where you can get erratic female behavior. Ultimately I think there's just a lot we don't understand yet.

Re: Is autism the legacy of humans evolving the ability to innovate?

#52

Post by alphameese »

lookingforsome wrote: post #48
majjgepolja wrote: post #43

Interesting. There's a hypothesis about ADHD that it's a trait of evolution for Hunter-gatherer lifestyle, with even a few studies favoring the opinion. But that doesn't explain many symptoms of ADHD. Btw, with many 'gifted' children having ADHD, I am curious whether there is any reason / correlation for it.

Then why in the western world do so many adults and medical professionals try to suppress ADHD with amphetamines? edit: do you happen to have a source to this theory of linking ADHD to the evolution of hunter-gatherers?

I don’t think it’s correct to say ADHD is being suppressed. People with ADHD take amphetamines to make daily life easier, like actually being able to stick to a schedule, or maintain a clean house.

Re: Is autism the legacy of humans evolving the ability to innovate?

#53

Post by caddemon »

atleta wrote: post #45
morpheos137 wrote: post #41

A big problem with the label "autism" is that it does not seem to map to one, unified, underlying condition. Intense "special interests" may be useful for some kinds of problem solving but actually maladaptive for others.

Baron-Cohen indeed created a tool to measure it based on his theory which he hints at in this interview: he says autism means that you have a high 'systemizing quitient' AND a low EQ. And of course it's a spectrum. I don't know the validity of this, but it's his rather specific definition. (And it's not about specific interests in general.)

I think that characterization misses some key symptoms in certain profiles of ASD though. Sensory sensitivity can be hugely important. There was a really interesting study where they took a few common ASD mouse model mutations and instead of mutating all neurons, only targeted primary sensory neurons (so nothing in the brain was directly altered!). These mice developed to have very similar behavioral profile to the "normal" models - not just the core sensory symptoms, but more general anxiety, increased preference for objects over peers, etc.

Re: Is autism the legacy of humans evolving the ability to innovate?

#54

Post by kodah »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #49

I am so tired of these sorts of articles. Even in a piece proposing that "autism is based on genes that are 70,000 years old and we are basically pattern seekers" they fail to really make the point "Maybe it isn't, per se, a defect at all." I imagine the author is going for that, but the article doesn't really get there. The article comes across like "Autistic guy likes his defect and wants to prettify it by claiming…

I've pondered this a lot and I mostly agree, though your harsh criticism of the flowery articles is a bit... harsh. Personally, I think when people don't get understood in outright saying their point (eg: "I'm not defective, you being a little bit more understanding would go a long way") they end up having to paint imagery for people, and this is the kind of output you get.

It's also a good reminder that the functional degrees of autism only share characteristics, it is still possible (to my knowledge) that these are entirely unrelated and only related on the facade.

Re: Is autism the legacy of humans evolving the ability to innovate?

#55

Post by eMGm4D0zgUAVXc7 »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #49

I am so tired of these sorts of articles. Even in a piece proposing that "autism is based on genes that are 70,000 years old and we are basically pattern seekers" they fail to really make the point "Maybe it isn't, per se, a defect at all." I imagine the author is going for that, but the article doesn't really get there. The article comes across like "Autistic guy likes his defect and wants to prettify it by claiming…

I would go further than that:

It should be up for question whether the neurotypicals are actually the ones who are "retarded". Just because there's lots of a particular phenotype of a species doesn't mean they have to be the most apt at what they're doing.

- I don't know if I have autism, but I can observe lots of ways of thinking which are deemed as "autistic" by neurotypicals, and to me those are always the ways of thinking which just make the most sense. Or well, at least the high-functioning autism ones to be fair.

The neurotypical way of maneuvering through the world in contrast seems rather childish usually. Things don't have to make sense there. They just are declared as "that's the way it is done, we've always done it like that", and off you go. Sometimes I wonder if such people even think anything at all about what they're doing most of the time.

Re: Is autism the legacy of humans evolving the ability to innovate?

#56

Post by selimthegrim »

ArkanExplorer wrote: post #30
ruined wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

autism does correlate with birth month https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3296777/?report... and does seem to be more prevalent in particular latitudes, though that may be an effect of social/industrial/economic conditions.

Somali children in Sweden are 3-4x more likely to be Autistic than Swedish children: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/23221308_Prevalence... 73% of pregnant Somali women in Sweden are Vitamin D deficient vs 5% of pregnant Swedish women: https://www.alliedacademies.org/articles/vitamin-dbinding-pr...

I thought a complaint that Somalis in Minnesota had was that autism in their kids was disproportionately (not sure about exact meaning of this term) "low-functioning"

Re: Is autism the legacy of humans evolving the ability to innovate?

#57

Post by dnautics »

caddemon wrote: post #50
dogma1138 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that doesn’t explain the multiple genetic and chromosomal disorders that are associated with autism. It’s almost like autism is a side effect of disorders that are associated with cognitive impairment.

Personally I think it's more likely that we are grouping a bunch of distinct disorders under the "Autism" label right now, because psychiatric diagnosis is still quite crude. Origins, mechanisms, etc. could be widely different while still causing some overlap in symptom profile. Imagine if we had to distinguish between different infections using only fuzzy behavioral definitions for example.

Agreed. I have worked with autistic students in high school and lived with people with asperger's in college, and I am very unconvinced that there is a "spectrum". There is of course a research and funding incentive to cross-label marginally related disorders.

Re: Is autism the legacy of humans evolving the ability to innovate?

#58

Post by DoreenMichele »

kodah wrote: post #54
DoreenMichele wrote: post #49

I am so tired of these sorts of articles. Even in a piece proposing that "autism is based on genes that are 70,000 years old and we are basically pattern seekers" they fail to really make the point "Maybe it isn't, per se, a defect at all." I imagine the author is going for that, but the article doesn't really get there. The article comes across like "Autistic guy likes his defect and wants to prettify it by claiming…

I've pondered this a lot and I mostly agree, though your harsh criticism of the flowery articles is a bit... harsh. Personally, I think when people don't get understood in outright saying their point (eg: "I'm not defective, you being a little bit more understanding would go a long way") they end up having to paint imagery for people, and this is the kind of output you get. It's also a good reminder that the function…

I didn't consider it to be flowery.

My oldest son likely qualifies for a diagnosis somewhere on the autism spectrum. He was never formally diagnosed because I homeschooled him, so I didn't need a diagnosis to accommodate his needs. I was his teacher and his mom and I could be kind to my child because I felt like it without filling out forms and defending my right to help him make his life work.

He thinks in pictures and talking with him sometimes feels a little like talking to someone who speaks English as a second language because he makes odd language errors of the same sort as he translates my words into pictures in his mind and then translates pictures in his mind into words to engage in conversation.

Given that this is a labor intensive thing for him, it's hardly shocking he's not very social. Given that a picture is worth a thousand words, he can also be very verbose when you do get him talking.

He's in his thirties and still lives with me. Over the course of more than three decades I have gotten into the habit of using image-rich language because it's more effective communication for dealing with my child.

I adore him and think he's funny and wonderful and the apple of my eye. I've always found him delightful and I wondered why he did so many weird things as a kid rather than wondering how to break him and force him to "act normal."

I have speculated at times that my words seem to be powerful because of this habitual image-rich communication style. That's a two-edged sword and sometimes gets me in hot water when my words hit hard on sensitive subjects.

It's possible I didn't think it flowery because of this aspect of my life. And, so, I don't know what you are talking about or what relevance that has to my frustrations with a world that wants to say "These kids are defective" instead of wondering at what widespread changes have led to this seemingly sudden "epidemic" of supposedly defective kids who supposedly have sensory issues, lack social skills, etc.

Re: Is autism the legacy of humans evolving the ability to innovate?

#59

Post by jb775 »

For conversation's sake, my non-scientific guesses on this are that autism may be caused by one of the following:

1) A result of humans living longer and therefore having babies at a later age (i.e. older sperm and eggs)

2) A stage in human evolution where the human body is trying to figure out how to maximize efficient brain power in relation to amount of energy available (i.e. our caveman instincts aren't as important nowadays, so what brainpower-energy could be shifted elsewhere?")

3) Something unnatural that's recently been introduced to human life (which I feel like should be able to be figured out if the families of autistic people answered extensive questionnaires without lobbyists getting in the way).

Re: Is autism the legacy of humans evolving the ability to innovate?

#60

Post by caddemon »

dnautics wrote: post #57
caddemon wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I think it's more likely that we are grouping a bunch of distinct disorders under the "Autism" label right now, because psychiatric diagnosis is still quite crude. Origins, mechanisms, etc. could be widely different while still causing some overlap in symptom profile. Imagine if we had to distinguish between different infections using only fuzzy behavioral definitions for example.

Agreed. I have worked with autistic students in high school and lived with people with asperger's in college, and I am very unconvinced that there is a "spectrum". There is of course a research and funding incentive to cross-label marginally related disorders.

No kidding about the funding. I once asked a PI what they thought about the relation of both Schizophrenia and Autism to maternal immune activation models, like is there any way to distinguish what we are actually modeling. Their only answer was "depends who you are trying to get funding from".

I don't think that fully explains it though, even psychiatric diseases with less funding buzz word power suffer from a similar fate. Diagnosis is a hard problem, especially when all you can really go on is patient self report and a few hours of observed behavior. Although I do think that psychiatry as a field could be approaching the issue better too, a lot of people seem to get stuck in their old ways.

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