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Metabolism of autism reveals developmental origins

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Re: Metabolism of autism reveals developmental origins

#121

Post by Tijdreiziger »

somenameforme wrote: post #90
shipman05 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand the sentiment, but there's a reason it's called the autism spectrum. I work with several software engineers with autism who are as capable as their peers. Sure they may have behavioral quirks, but not significantly more so than the normal variation in human behavior. Their brains don't seem to work in an inferior or problematic way, just different. On the other hand, I have a close relative with more sev…

Then people should stop conflating the two. This whole "spectrum" nonsense is nonsense. Your coworkers are not autistic - they are weird or whatever other more PC term you might want to use, and that's great - many, if not most, great engineers are!. There is no need to pathologize differences in people. Your relative, by contrast, is. If you have a habit of feeling sleepy at work, it's not like we say you're on the…

I got my autism diagnosis in my early 20s (from a licensed psychologist, before you ask).

It was a life-changing experience for me. Suddenly I was able to understand and validate my experiences and shortcomings, and to improve myself based on that understanding, instead of resigning myself to the fact that I’ll always just be a ‘weird’ human with ‘weird’ opinions, feelings and experiences.

I suppose though that since a random guy on HN said so, this is actually impossible, and I should just go back to having the entirety of my lived experience dismissed as ‘weird’.

Gee, I’m sure glad we cleared that up.

Re: Metabolism of autism reveals developmental origins

#122

Post by toasterlovin »

Waterluvian wrote: post #91
RobotToaster wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Or does it just mean “are found together when discussing this disease?” this. "morbid" is from the Latin root "morbus", meaning sickness.

Ahhh okay. My mind had catalogued it to mean death.

In common use ("don't be morbid", "that's morbid") I agree that 'morbid' has a connotation of death, so I don't think your understanding is wrong. In this case, a 'co-morbidity' is a term of art in the medical literature with the specific meaning of "occurring with".

Re: Metabolism of autism reveals developmental origins

#123

Post by filleduchaos »

throwaway2562 wrote: post #62
m00x wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's completely incorrect. Autism has clear physiological differences in the brain. It's not just a personality difference. People like to call themselves autistic when it's just social awkwardness, and some doctors might even improperly diagnose them, but these are separate from the condition. https://www.healthcentral.com/condition/autism/autism-brain-... This could help us prevent autism completely.

Here’s hoping. Autism is pure hell for some families. Unless of course self-declared leaders of the ‘neurodivergent community’ declare such efforts to be genocidal, modern eugenics, and so on. Relatedly, I was struck to see the recent breakthrough in curing congenital deafness condemned by members of the ‘deaf community’ on Twitter. So we unfortunately have good reason to expect the same kinds of folly here.

Mmm, that sounds rather uncharitable. While obviously Deaf people aren't a hivemind, I think people who are not Deaf (and fully-abled people in particular) should listen when they each speak for themselves instead of coming to broad conclusions of "folly".

For me it began to click due to somewhat similar discussions I've had about my sight (I'm moderately myopic in both eyes and significantly astigmatic in one), where I've explained that:

- yes I actually like wearing glasses, and am not interested in contact lenses at all

- yes I also like my uncorrected vision: I like the softness and the smoothing over of details, and the way that lights scatter, and the fact that I can focus on things that are right in front of my nose

- no it isn't anxiety that's stopping me from getting the likes of LASIK; I actually like having both corrected and uncorrected vision

And it is astonishing how much people who are caught up in their own complexes about vision deficiencies try to convince me that I'm stupid or even lying because I don't share their aversion. It was rather off-putting, to be honest.

So yeah, that was how I began to see how people whose condition (for lack of a better term) is much more strongly linked to their identity[0] would end up with their hackles permanently raised against the idea of a cure for a life experience that they find neutral and/or positive coupled with the prevailing sentiment that they must be so grateful and excited about its existence (and if they aren't then they must be stupid or crazy). Theoretically it's good that the capability exists because it gives the choice to those who do want it, but when a person is part of a group without much societal power to begin with, I don't think it's irrational to fear that it would eventually end up as an imposition rather than a choice (especially when we get obstetric treatment).

0. For example, sign languages are distinct linguistic phenomena and not simply a cipher for spoken language. And wherever there is distinct language, a distinct culture soon follows. This is why "Deaf community" and "Deaf culture" are real things in real life not just something that someone on Twitter made up, contrary to many abled people's assumptions.

Re: Metabolism of autism reveals developmental origins

#124

Post by Tijdreiziger »

dukeyukey wrote: post #89
mewpmewp2 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Autism is not a disease. It's a diverging feature.

How do you square that with the severe cases of autism? The people who will never be able to live independently?

There are also non-autistic people who aren’t able to live independently.

Re: Metabolism of autism reveals developmental origins

#126

Post by filleduchaos »

jeroenhd wrote: post #112
throwaway2562 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here’s hoping. Autism is pure hell for some families. Unless of course self-declared leaders of the ‘neurodivergent community’ declare such efforts to be genocidal, modern eugenics, and so on. Relatedly, I was struck to see the recent breakthrough in curing congenital deafness condemned by members of the ‘deaf community’ on Twitter. So we unfortunately have good reason to expect the same kinds of folly here.

I've seen the same protests among certain deaf communities and it baffles me that someone would oppose a cure to what is obviously a medical condition. In the same vein, I wouldn't oppose a cure for autism, despite my own diagnosis. Why go through the pain and suffering that comes with autism in a world of non-autists? I've seen more than enough of the lives of people with non-high functioning autism to realise the a…

> it baffles me that someone would oppose a cure to what is obviously a medical condition

Ultimately, not everybody seeks to be "normal", and there is plenty of reason to fear the imposition of normalness when simply being functional would have done just fine.

Re: Metabolism of autism reveals developmental origins

#128

Post by [deleted] »

somenameforme wrote: post #110
rjmunro wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a continuous range of people in between. Where do you draw the line?

This is like asking where to draw the line when somebody is bald. Are you bald if you have 1 hair? Yes. 2? 3? 137? There's of course reasonable room for discretion in saying what is or isn't bald. But it isn't reasonable to say somebody with a full-on afro is on the spectrum of being bald. Literally some of the most high functioning and successful individuals are being diagnosed as "on the spectrum" of what is, in it…

[deleted]

Re: Metabolism of autism reveals developmental origins

#129

Post by aitchnyu »

r3trohack3r wrote: post #81
Der_Einzige wrote: post #11

I know of at least one book written by and for autistic people who advocates for a gluten free diet. They claim in the book that this significantly reduces their symptoms. I don’t know if I believe it or not, but the notion of gut-brain axis seems to imply that a good diet should help a bit, right?

Anecdotal, but we grow a heritage strain of wheat here in PHX (Sonoran White). Its appearance gives me pause. Common commercial wheat is very short in comparison. I have a friend who can’t eat “common” wheat products from the grocery store, having been diagnosed with severe gluten intolerance, but can eat Sonoran White without symptoms. You can follow the same exact recipe but substitute Sonoran White flour for stand…

What is referred to cuisine today is partly preserving food in bacteria killing chemicals. Do you mean to hypothesize people ingesting more (traditonal) bactericide are sicker?

Re: Metabolism of autism reveals developmental origins

#130

Post by throwaway092323 »

ffjffsfr wrote: post #104
ldjkfkdsjnv wrote: post #33

Used to have a mix of what could be considered ADHD/light asperbergers. I dont eat carbs and mostly stick to a keto diet, it resolved many symptoms. Our food is poison

> what could be considered ADHD/light asperbergers could be considered, or did you get a diagnosis from a specialist? Self diagnosis is not reliable. If you don't have an official diagnosis you can't be certain you really have ADHD. There may be several differe tfactors relevant for YOU that make keto diet work for you. Same diet can be harmful for similar people who have ADHD.

> Self diagnosis is not reliable

Professional diagnosis is not reliable either. ADHD and autism are often misdiagnosed as one-another, especially in girls.

> If you don't have an official diagnosis you can't be certain you really have ADHD

A lot of the time, the mental health professional making the determination doesn't have specialty in ADHD/Autism. All they're doing is looking at symptoms and making their best guess. Which is exactly what people are doing when they make a self-determination. In many cases, people with high-functioning autism know more about autism than the people who are supposed to know. And it's not like the diagnoses can be validated when we're still figuring out what autism even is.

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