Autistic people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality • Hacker News Board

Re: Autistic people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality

#221

Post by bitwize » Fri, Jan 07, 2022, 5:40 PM UTC

Dracophoenix wrote: post #205

bitwize wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Empathy has a performative component to neurotypicals. If you are not acting as though you are empathizing, you have "no empathy" and are thus a strange form of psychopath. Actual psychopaths can pass the performative part of neurotypical empathy with flying colors because they are excellent maskers and mirrorers -- that is, of course, when they can be bothered to try at all. Neurotypical psychology is deep, complex,…

Any examples in your Japanese case? I would have thought the main performance bottle neck to social calibration would be the unspoken mind-reading requirement that seems to be prevalent in American society. Perhaps I'm wrong, but from what I know of Japanese society is that it's pretty blunt in its expectations. So there isn't this "mental searching tax" to make the "right" social choice that seems to be de riguer in…

Well, for one thing, we Americans claim to value honest communication to each other in our personal relationships. Whether we actually live up to those values is a different matter, but my point here is the Japanese do NOT. Honne/tatemae is pretty ingrained into Japanese society, and you must avoid embarrassing yourself and, more importantly, your ingroup (family, company, club, etc.) by being too honest around outgroupers. The Japanese are so pressured to not lose face that they are actively encouraged to hide their feelings and intentions, even when showing them would be mutually beneficial. You see it in business -- the old saw about circumlocutions like "We will give your proposal the consideration it deserves" meaning "no freaking way"[0] -- but you also see it in modern Japanese drama. Taro loves Hanako and Hanako loves Taro, but they are from different social strata and their parents would be shocked to find out they're in love, so neither of them says anything and neither of them knows the feelings of the other. Plus Taro is going to America to play baseball and Hanako is going to medical school. Will one of them work up the courage to go against the social grain and the wishes of their family, and confess their feelings before it's too late? Or will they just say shouganai and go about their lives without ever knowing what could have been? That sort of thing.

So as a Japanese person you are tasked with not only following the rituals, but also sussing out from the vaguest of cues what your friends, family, potential mate, etc. are thinking because they're following the rituals too instead of engaging in explicit communication.

Regrettably, I had to learn a lot of this by reading; I don't have a lot of personal experience with this because I'm a Westerner. The Japanese are generally more willing to be open with foreigners because of the relative lack of social repercussions for honesty with foreigners than with Japanese. They don't have to be "on", they don't have to actively be Japanese in front of us and that makes for some interesting and refreshing barside conversation, lol.

[0] Earlier negative stereotypes of Japanese as being "sneaky" and untrustworthy are partially rooted in this sort of thing. They mask their true intentions to avoid embarrassment, but to Americans it looks like they're trying to trick or defraud us. And they see us as loud, pushy bulls in china shops who are unable to handle delicate affairs with any nuance, even if we're well-meaning.

Re: Autistic people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality

#222

Post by bitwize » Fri, Jan 07, 2022, 5:41 PM UTC

m_fayer wrote: post #206

Dracophoenix wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any examples in your Japanese case? I would have thought the main performance bottle neck to social calibration would be the unspoken mind-reading requirement that seems to be prevalent in American society. Perhaps I'm wrong, but from what I know of Japanese society is that it's pretty blunt in its expectations. So there isn't this "mental searching tax" to make the "right" social choice that seems to be de riguer in…

That's interesting. A German friend of mine who's on the spectrum and had established a second life in Japan told me that Japan's explicitly defined social mores, and slightly more chilly and formal relations between people suit him much better than the Western default. His German buddies who also have one foot in Japan all seem like they're on the spectrum too, because of this I thought Japanese culture is a safe ha…

I've commonly said that the Japanese are Germans to strangers and Italians to family and close friends. Sometimes as a quip I add that they're Irish in the bar, lol.

Japanese society is not really safe harbor for Japanese on the spectrum. It is, however, quite gracious to foreigners. As a foreigner no one will say anything to you, for instance, if you use the wrong honorific or something; most will be impressed that you can speak the language at all.

Once you've been living and working in Japan for some time and have started to assimilate, though, you are on and you've got to perform the appropriate rituals or people will start to think you're being aggressively rude.

Re: Autistic people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality

#223

Post by solarmist » Fri, Jan 07, 2022, 5:56 PM UTC

serverholic wrote: post #149

solarmist wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never really had the "meltdowns" that I hear about autistic people, unless particularly bad temper tantrums when I was 2-5 years old count, but I also agonized about how little sense "social rules" made. I would spend a lot of time pondering and thinking about these things. So I completely get this and empathize.

I don't have meltdowns either but I do get unreasonably upset about stuff that seems illogical to me.

Sure. I remember feeling this way when playing video games until I was 13-14. Getting so frustrated I wanted to throw the controller and punch stuff.

The fact I don't get this anymore is probably from the trauma(?) of parentification I went through growing up.

Re: Autistic people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality

#224

Post by gmfawcett » Fri, Jan 07, 2022, 6:21 PM UTC

lostcolony wrote: post #5

gmfawcett wrote: post #2

Doesn't everybody challenge these, pretty much? Any artificial "person-in-the-street" construct is unlikely to represent a living, breathing person.

We know that people aren't perfectly rational. The point of the article is that autistic people tend to be more rational on average than neurotypicals. The emotional weight that affects neurotypicals and causes them to fall into biases more often (on average) doesn't apply as often (on average); an autistic person will be less likely to behave differently when confronted with "80% fat free" vs "20% fat", to borrow an…

Supposing autistic people are more rational than the neurotypical: then couldn't we generalize the thesis to, "highly rational people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality"? I don't think the research claimed that people with autism have rationality-enhancing properties that are unavailable to people who don't. For example, "reduced use of stereotypes" applies to some otherwise-neurotypical people -- we would probably call these people "highly rational".

Put another way, I suppose I'm saying that there may be a second group -- "highly rational people" -- that intersects and overlaps significantly with "people with autism", and we could be making statements about one group that should be attributed to the other.

(I'm not trying to touch any nerves here. I'm putting aside the fact that the article is a positive piece about people with autism and makes some enlightening points. I'm just claiming that the "challenging preconceived ideas" may be mostly true, but also too narrow and possibly misleading.)

Re: Autistic people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality

#225

Post by NaturalPhallacy » Fri, Jan 07, 2022, 6:32 PM UTC

nicoburns wrote: post #138

NaturalPhallacy wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure it does. We're a sexually dimorphic species that can only reproduce with one XY and one XX. Differentiating between them is vital to the continued existence of the species. Talking with your buddies of the same gender about how you were hanging out alone with one of the opposite was a tribally significant thing in the early days of speech. It still today implies you might be mating! And babies might be forthcomi…

Maybe for some people? Most of my buddies are of the opposite gender, and me hanging out with one of them doesn’t imply anything different to me hanging out with someone of my own gender.

I mean hanging out 1 on 1 with someone of the opposite sex is how like 99.999% of new humans get created.

Re: Autistic people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality

#226

Post by lamontcg » Fri, Jan 07, 2022, 6:47 PM UTC

solarmist wrote: post #94

akvadrako wrote: post #3

It takes a while to get to the point, but this is what the page is about: As we explained in a recent review paper, researchers have repeatedly found evidence that Autistic individuals are, on average, more consistent, less biased, and more rational than non-autistic individuals in a variety of contexts. Specifically, many Autistic people seem to be less susceptible to cognitive biases, and therefore better able to m…

I have what you would deem mild Autism and it CAN be a beneficial adaptation, but it's is highly context-dependent. I think it's only in the last couple of decades when that's become true, specifically information, knowledge work, or science. Think of the cartoons where the "nerds" are trying to fight/play sports and are trying to calculate optimal trajectories, etc. The additional rationality slows down coming to co…

Society is getting so complicated that spending the time to find the actual right answer is supplanting various "going with your gut" heuristics since its about 50-50 as to if picking the simple answer is right or the counterintuitive answer is right. The whole "blink" thing of knowing the right answer is deeply busted.

We still value people who strongly assert what they think is the correct answer quickly though and view that as a sign of intelligence (and to be fair it is, but its more about the intelligence of knowing how to convince rather than the intelligence of knowing what is correct).

Re: Autistic people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality

#227

Post by jjk166 » Fri, Jan 07, 2022, 6:53 PM UTC

seba_dos1 wrote: post #219

jjk166 wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The two options are the cheap and the expensive one. If we're making the determination of which one to drop based on price, and are given no information about the options besides price, presumably price is the determining factor. All else being equal, cheaper means easier.

From the article: > In this case, many people will cancel the cheaper trip regardless of which one they would prefer to go on "All else" is explicitly not equal, there's a difference in preference for some reason other than price. This is not a puzzle with a correct answer, this is an example of specific behavior in specific cases observed in specific people who have all needed information available to them.

That's in reference to the desirability, not the availability. When I say "all else being equal" that is in reference to the future version of the same comparison. If one option is cheaper now, it will most likely be cheaper in the future too, and if it is cheaper then that means it is less demanding in terms of resources to acquire, and if it is less demanding in resources it is "easier". You might have a special case where the less expensive option will suddenly become much more difficult than the expensive option to acquire, but there is no reason to assume in any particular instance that's true.

For a more concrete example - if you have bought a $10 and a $100 ticket, buying a second $10 ticket is, all else being equal, preferable to buying a second $100 ticket, regardless of how desirable either option is.

Re: Autistic people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality

#228

Post by seba_dos1 » Fri, Jan 07, 2022, 7:22 PM UTC

jjk166 wrote: post #227

seba_dos1 wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the article: > In this case, many people will cancel the cheaper trip regardless of which one they would prefer to go on "All else" is explicitly not equal, there's a difference in preference for some reason other than price. This is not a puzzle with a correct answer, this is an example of specific behavior in specific cases observed in specific people who have all needed information available to them.

That's in reference to the desirability, not the availability. When I say "all else being equal" that is in reference to the future version of the same comparison. If one option is cheaper now, it will most likely be cheaper in the future too, and if it is cheaper then that means it is less demanding in terms of resources to acquire, and if it is less demanding in resources it is "easier". You might have a special ca…

> if you have bought a $10 and a $100 ticket, buying a second $10 ticket is, all else being equal, preferable to buying a second $100 ticket, regardless of how desirable either option is

Not if you won't desire it anymore (or desire less) at later date. Or if you won't be able to take it at a later date at all (which influences desirability at present). Or when the price doesn't really matter, you'll be able to afford it anyway. Or in multitude of other circumstances that may be relevant to the given example that you may think about once you decide to not miss the point of that example anymore, since it's very far from implying that "all else is being equal" ;)

Re: Autistic people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality

#229

Post by zepto » Fri, Jan 07, 2022, 7:55 PM UTC

jjk166 wrote: post #212

zepto wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. The fact that you have to qualify that the ‘neutral’ trait isn’t ‘necessarily’ bad implies that you think people might think it was bad. You wouldn’t need to qualify it otherwise.

People might think anything is bad.

Yes, which is why we only qualify it when we are implying it is a possibility.

Your comment doesn’t make you look stupid or casually dismissive.

Re: Autistic people challenge preconceived ideas about rationality

#230

Post by zepto » Fri, Jan 07, 2022, 7:57 PM UTC

Jensson wrote: post #150

zepto wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I suspect the fact that Autism reduces a person's ability to relate emotionally and socially to themselves and others This is not a fact. It’s a now discredited stereotype.

Or maybe it is still a fact, but the definition of autism/Asperger changed so it is no longer true with the new definition? There seems to be a great bundling going on, where people with a wide range of various problems gets bundled under large umbrella terms like "ADHD" or "Autism". Before Autism and Asperger was different, now they are the same etc. and some even argue that ADHD and Autism are the same thing. Edit:…

> What they were said to lack was the ability to read people…

That’s not a fact. It’s a now discredited stereotype.