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Tragically, as many as 9625 out of every 10k individuals may be neurotypical

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Re: Tragically, as many as 9625 out of every 10k individuals may be neurotypical

#121

Post by pojzon »

As an autistic person that has issues with understanding other ppls “feelings” - Yes, you are labeled as deficient.

But… I can always make better decisions, coldly calculate pros and cons, dont let feelings take better of me.

Im much better at anything I do than your average person.

Example I started carpenting work, became better at it in few weeks than my teacher that does it for 20 years (his words).

Can start doing something new and become really good at it very fast.

In a logical sense - Im much much better than any average normal person at anything.

But Im deficient, because I have issues socializing or understanding ppl behaviour.

Ps. I talk straight from heart, coz I see no value in lying.

Ps2. I also strongly believe, ppl like me are the next evolution step for humans. Overdependance on feelings and first guesses is very detrimental for us as a spieces.

Re: Tragically, as many as 9625 out of every 10k individuals may be neurotypical

#122

Post by benj111 »

rglullis wrote: post #119
benj111 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You are conflating fitness of the individual with population robustness against systemic shocks Yes and as per my first example, the ones who don't drink the contaminated water survive. The population robustness is people doing things differently and not dying. Fitness of the individual is population robustness where that individual does something different. >(1) not everyone understands the basics of evolution, (2)…

> the population robustness is people doing things differently and not dying. No, you created a completely contrived example in an absurdly complex and dynamic system and assumed your outcome is the likely one. You are fantasizing a completely stereotypical behavior (neurotypical people act like sheep) to say "they would all drink poisoned water and die", when the story could just as well be that after a first wave o…

You do realise that modern germ theory was discovered in the 19th century due to cholera in a well. The 19th century! So no it isn't obvious. London's sewers were originally built to get rid of the smell, ie 'miasma'.

The outcome doesn't have to be likely. Just likely enough.

Yes perhaps I was over egging the pudding with the sheep comment. The point that we both agree on is that neurodivergents think differently.

Re: Tragically, as many as 9625 out of every 10k individuals may be neurotypical

#123

Post by dofm »

danaris wrote: post #78
ozlikethewizard wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a health problem though. Neurodivergency (christ I hate that word) is far more prevalent than you'd expect, particularly ASD and ADHD, some 20% of the population. These traits have self selected for a reason, and any issues encountered are a fault of modern society not the individual imo.

This is absolutely untrue. Sure, there are autistic and ADHD traits that are primarily a problem because of the structure of our modern society. But just you try being severely ADHD, and ending up with your yogurt going bad on the counter and growing mold because your clutter blindness made you not notice it was there for 3 weeks. Or you start reading a good book, and 10 hours later you realize that you haven't had a…

+1 to all of this.

I used to think that the hyperfocus and the many small talents I have acquired were a net up-side to my disorder. But now I see they don't even fully compensate, and neurotypical people are just as good at all those things as I am if they dedicate similar time, and they don't struggle to pay their bills or do paperwork.

I am still undiagnosed — because even getting that done involves a level of organisation — and it has taken me fully burning out and trying to learn how to do things without relying on hyperfocus and deadline adrenaline, two mechanisms that fully broke, to realise that I was always impaired. I was just skating by because I went to a good school and had attentive parents.

The superpower narrative makes me mad. The Alex Partridge "ADHD people are experts at " bullshit makes me mad.

Re: Tragically, as many as 9625 out of every 10k individuals may be neurotypical

#124

Post by rglullis »

benj111 wrote: post #122
rglullis wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the population robustness is people doing things differently and not dying. No, you created a completely contrived example in an absurdly complex and dynamic system and assumed your outcome is the likely one. You are fantasizing a completely stereotypical behavior (neurotypical people act like sheep) to say "they would all drink poisoned water and die", when the story could just as well be that after a first wave o…

You do realise that modern germ theory was discovered in the 19th century due to cholera in a well. The 19th century! So no it isn't obvious. London's sewers were originally built to get rid of the smell, ie 'miasma'. The outcome doesn't have to be likely. Just likely enough. Yes perhaps I was over egging the pudding with the sheep comment. The point that we both agree on is that neurodivergents think differently.

> modern germ theory was discovered in the 19th century due to cholera in a well.

So what? If you see people getting sick after drinking from a well, you don't need to know the science to know that water is not safe. Birds do not need to know the laws of physics in order to fly around, etc.

If anything, you should look at your contrived example to understand that most people will not wait for a scientific explanation to establish social norms. A lot of Organized Religion "doctrines" are just learned behaviors that gained some metaphysical explanation in order to be passed down the generations. To this day we have people who do not eat pork out of the belief that they are not "clean", and while this is would be a perfectly valid assumption millennia ago, no amount of "Science" and laboratory analysis will convince an observant Muslim, Jew or Seventh-Day Adventist to go eat some bacon.

> The point that we both agree on is that neurodivergents think differently.

This is tautological and never has been the point of disagreement. If you don't mind, I'd rather just let this go now...

Re: Tragically, as many as 9625 out of every 10k individuals may be neurotypical

#126

Post by optionalsquid »

pojzon wrote: post #121

As an autistic person that has issues with understanding other ppls “feelings” - Yes, you are labeled as deficient. But… I can always make better decisions, coldly calculate pros and cons, dont let feelings take better of me. Im much better at anything I do than your average person. Example I started carpenting work, became better at it in few weeks than my teacher that does it for 20 years (his words). Can start doi…

There is no "next step" in evolution, nor any concern for what is or is not "detrimental for us as a spieces".

Evolution is much simpler, at its core: Is autism heritable and do autistic people leave behind more viable offspring than the non-autistic? Then the proportion of autistic people can be expected to grow, otherwise it most likely won't

Re: Tragically, as many as 9625 out of every 10k individuals may be neurotypical

#127

Post by dwaltrip »

pojzon wrote: post #121

As an autistic person that has issues with understanding other ppls “feelings” - Yes, you are labeled as deficient. But… I can always make better decisions, coldly calculate pros and cons, dont let feelings take better of me. Im much better at anything I do than your average person. Example I started carpenting work, became better at it in few weeks than my teacher that does it for 20 years (his words). Can start doi…

Is your ability to acquire new skills easily related to autism? At the end of the day, does it matter?

I have ADHD and I've found peace in trying not to assign precise moral value to different characteristics that I have. Easier said than done, of course…

Re: Tragically, as many as 9625 out of every 10k individuals may be neurotypical

#128

Post by satisfice »

austin-cheney wrote: post #47
satisfice wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Productivity is not the most important thing to me— because it’s too easy to get the wrong things done.

It’s not really about productivity. Consider productivity an unintended benefit of the medication. Extreme ADHD is a constantly shifting quest for volatile stimulation. This results in poor diet (extreme sugar cravings all the time), short term memory loss, failure to achieve basic tasks, obsessive behaviors, poor social framing, and more. For these extreme cases medication provides clarity that allows for more ratio…

My son is on such medication and he swears by it.

I suffer from ADHD, probably-- enough that I wrote a book about how I couldn't abide school and can't force my brain to think about arbitrary things. I developed ways of dealing with it. I don't want to take any drugs for it, because I like being me and it is part of me.

Re: Tragically, as many as 9625 out of every 10k individuals may be neurotypical

#129

Post by gitaarik »

mzhaase wrote: post #33
lukeify wrote: post #9

Is there value to people constantly self-diagnosing themselves or seeking clinical diagnoses for neurodivergency? I don't mean this in a disparaging way; but surely constantly seeking to remind both yourself and society of your neurodivergency and any shortcomings you have with that seems almost like a crab bucket mentality that you are enveloping yourself with. I don't have a problem with people looking inwards, but…

I got more things done in one week on ADHD meds than in the three months before that. And the only reason I went out to get a diagnosis was an ADHD meme community that constantly made me go "haha, that is so me". If I got diagnosed 10 or 20 years earlier, I wouldn't have dropped out of university and my life would have been profoundly different and better.

Maybe you would have developed much different but still interesting and useful skills if you didn't take the meds. The meds were good for the work you needed to do, but maybe without the meds you would develop into other kinds of work?

Re: Tragically, as many as 9625 out of every 10k individuals may be neurotypical

#130

Post by gitaarik »

jongjong wrote: post #40

So true. NT people are so frustrating! The scenario which drives me insane is; someone tells me some popular mainstream narrative about why we should do something in a particular way. Essentially just parroting expert consensus on a similar topic. I tell them exactly why this approach wouldn't work in that particular case and they concede to all my points. They fully agree and don't push back on anything. But then a…

It might also be that they just agree with you to not get into conflict with you because they know you won't want to see their perspective, and once you're done with your monologue they happily move on to the next person and you don't even realize they didn't care anything about what you told them
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