The future of Autisim!

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There is evidence that Autism may be influenced by hormones in the womb along with genetics, and other possible factors. A hormonal influence could produce a generational effect for Autism.

If this is the case, one might work to prevent the occurrence of Autism; but it would be close to impossible to eliminate it, considering geographical diversity of humans and the size of the world population.

If humans are stupid enough to do this they deserve what will inevitably happen because of it. Perhaps this is a natural barrier of the intelligence of our species in place, we get smart enough to destroy our own species or at least send it back down through evolution.

Quick note to everyone

Keep it civil.

Personal attacks are against the rules.

Calling people trolls is against the rules. It is fair to disagree with a post, or an opinion.

Hm, interesting discussion. I'm more used to people usually waiting at least 20m to an hour for a reply before starting to tell other people they're impatient and want a reply now now now so seeing a complete disregard for that is interesting as it's so uncommon to find in adults. Certainly most wait more than 1 whole minute before reiterating their need. Absolutely fascinating to observe.

To address the original post. I don't think that's likely to happen. That we haven't died out yet does sort of indicate we're not flawed enough that we are at a very high (survival, not societal) disadvantage, but that there aren't more of us would seem to indicate we're not as versatile or adaptable.

It's things like this that push the conversation into the ridiculous. You can predict the future? The entire "aspie is a superior variant" concept is on flimsy scientific ground to begin with. The injection of these types of statements do nothing to clarify and reveal a personal bias that diminishes credibility.

Autism is a variant, one that is often so debilitating that in a less altruistic world, many with autism would be discarded.

This very forum is populated by autistics that display a range of abilities, some that can't get through the day without direct assistance and some that are very successful by current social standards. The EVIDENCE suggests that autism is not a positive variant. MOST autistics are beset with difficulties that diminish their opportunities for self actualization. There are some autistics that go against this trend, but all that does in reveal the spectral nature of the variant.

I would love to see some hard numbers. If 1 in 100 are on the spectrum, how many of those actually excel? How many are held back from realizing their full potential? lets be generous and say 20% are successful by this culture's standards, not some conflated "everyone is special" feel good politically correct mumbo jumbo. That means this so called superior variant of humanity generates 4 failures for each success. This means that 1 in 500 autistics are participating fully in society and contributing to this world at full capacity.

What of the remaining 499? Should society carry these as dead weight in exchange for the contributions of the rare autistic that excels? (I am not this draconian, I am only playing devil's advocate). Then those 1 in 500 had better contribute enough to make up for their less capable brethren.

My personal feeling is that autistics are poorly served by entertaining the notion that autism is anything more than an aberrant combination of genetics and environment. It is what it is. Trying to pin some positive spin onto it serves no one and only feeds the same propensity for egoism that is prevalent in the remaining 99% of the population. Imagine that. We are human.

You're autistic. Deal with it. Get over yourself.

Hmmmm... this whole conversation is kind of skirting the specifics.

Gideon seems to think autism is a positive when, what he is really supporting is Asperger's and the occassional ultra positive side effects in some people.

Everyone else seems to be arguing that autism - all varieties - are not 'positive' as a whole. Surely those who suffer with Kanner's and are nonvocal with uncontrolled stimming don't see the positive's that Gideon does and would want a cure/treatment to alleviate their difficulties.

I do find it curious that autism rates are solidly studied but with the detection and dx standards still evolving we are working with guidelines, not solid facts. And with this group and that manufacturing stats to serves their own purposes, it is only clouding the issue. But, there are families where all 3-4 kids are born autistic these days. What are the odds of that? And it's not just isolated cases - it's more and more common, if all the testimonials and personal stories, blogs and articles can be believed. If autism is indeed statistically uncommon - 1 in - whatever the number is now - 155? - how are certain families crapping out so often? Is it simply genetic or are we dealing with some environmental factor too?

I do believe that autism is genetic but maybe not in all cases... the prenatal research is pointing to high levels of maternal testosterone as a possible factor. Sure some women have naturally higher levels than others - maybe that and the genetic predisposition account for historical autism occurrances. But what happens when the general population is exposed to radically higher levels of testosterone on a daily basis and encouraged to consume higher levels in pregnancy? Hormones in beef and milk have been attributed to increases in height, muscle mass and breast enlargement in Japanese kids as they westernized their diet. In our own country, only estrogen and estrogen like hormones are regulated by the FDA because of cancer concerns. Naturally occurring sex hormones, like testosterone and progesterone are not regulated or even tested for in our food. If the autism research is focusing on testosterone and pregnant women - with those HORRIBLE dairy cravings in early pregnancy - are encouraged to drink milk maybe additional testosterone in the diet is that environmental cause some factions keep looking for.

I do think some forms of autism are evolutionary. When Aspies take over the world, Gideon will be there to tell us all - "I told you so'. I personally believe Asperger's is a genetic family trait in my and my daughter's case. I was not exposed to higher levels of testosterone BTW. I only ate/drank organic dairy in pregnancy and I'm an extremely rarer than rare meat eater. Maybe my family's females just have naturally higher levels of testosterone in pregnancy - but I doubt it. I was tested over and over for hormone levels throughout my pregnancy because I was high risk. (well, not really but we didn't know that until after the fact.) I pretty sure me and my kidling would have been Aspies no matter what.

But all these 'new' cases - no family history, entire families with all autistic children - something may be going on there and I highly doubt its evolution. I firmly believe that evolution isn't always a slow progression - it happens in fits and starts, sometimes amazingly rapid changes happen in the course of a few generations. I'm not sure I believe autism is one of those though. Species evolve to suit their needs. While I think it would be advantagous to us as a society to have highly technical, science minded Aspies in this day and age - where exactly would we be right now without Einstein? - I think such an evolutionary shift might be impossible to measure with current scientific methods. In general, the debilitating forms of autism we are witnessing are not necessarily advantagous to us as a species at this time.

Interesting theory, gideon - something to ponder but, as yet, unprovable. But, science doesn't happen without theory... The world needs more big, out of the box thinkers.

?? I honestly thought (still think) that this person trolling. Read the responses. Why can you not call it out if you think someone is trolling? (I did not call anyone a troll btw but I assume you are talking to me since I don't see anyone else saying that word) The protocol is to call out that someone is trolling and then respectfully decline further comment from my experience.

Probably meant me. I was a little aggressive in a few of my responses.

It's an aspie thing - just calling it as I see it.

My argument is that to be diagnosed with an autistic spectrum disorder, you have to experience impairment in some areas of your life. This means, by definition, to be diagnosable you have a disability. That's just about the extent of it - I don't care if people view it as a positive or a negative, but I do not care to have anyone try to sell me on the idea that it is not a disability.

I hesitate to decide whether or not anyone else is suffering or not. I am not personally comfortable with the way people introduce "those who suffer with Kanner's and are nonvocal with uncontrolled stimming" as a kind of rhetorical device to describe how "horrible" autism can be. While perhaps many of them would describe it that way, I suspect not all of them would.

I was just generalizing attitudes I've experienced - those I've dialogued with who are non vocal and have stimming and other challenges have expressed a desire for a treatment /cure. I make no assertions that everyone's experience is like this. 'Suffering' is determined by an individual in response to their situation... I have witnessed the word being used by some - I did not intend to apply that to all. Apologies for the lack of clarity.

Fair enough, thank you.

I've just seen a lot of generalizations here, and I sort of get a bit at how casually people will discuss these people in a particular way.

I've noticed that many people just type as they would speak... stream of consciousness, raw thoughts uneditted. Personally, I enjoy this. I seem to be able to read intent in the words - the sometimes amorphous train of thought that is still being explored and still coelescing into a firm OPINION.

Simple back and forth can clarify intent - like we just did. Sometimes we just gotta diffuse the immediate emotional reaction and try to see the point someone is trying to reach. And sometimes, people just don't agree. Personally, I'm ok with that. The world is big enough for two opposing positions - or more.

I wasn't particularly talking to anyone, just a reminder. It's a controversial thread and the T word was invoked!

First of all I don't really like the tone you are using to speak to me but I'll try and address some of your points

Yes I'm pretty certain that homogenising the gene pool will have negative effects, for example people who would zap away "negative" genes would probably have zapped away people like Einstein. If you have 9 people who are all pretty similar working on a project and you can choose 1 more member who either thinks in the same way or thinks differently what choice makes more sense? Is it the differences in genes making a person incompatible or is it intolerance from the conformists?



And yet we are still here so how did we survive through evolution then? The very fact that we are here proves natural selection wants us here or at least that we are worthy as we have stood the test of time exactly the same as you have.



"Evidence"?!? I don't need any evidence I know myself tyvm, you can collect all the data you like but your understanding of my mind will still be 1 dimensional at best. Most of the problems autistics have are caused by other people, not by their own minds imo. It's difficult when you don't relate to people, when they are very noisy, when they make unfair demands of you.



That depends on your meaning of "excel" how many NTs "excel"? Is someone elses mind worthy only if it can "excel" in your eyes? Society does not cater to autistics or allow them to reach their potential so easily imho. What do you think would be best, one society of NTs and one of people on the autistic spectrum both combining their labours/discoveries/arts etc or just two NT societies?



People should be nurtured in whatever environment is best for them and helped to achieve their potential in whatever they feel their life goals are. People today are expected to do certain things such as work in a meaningless job in order to collect pieces of metal and paper to pay for a pile of bricks.



But you don't know my mind so your opinion is not valid. I don't have aspergers, I live it every day and I know it intimately so my opinion is worth infinitely more than yours.




I like my mind, I don't really get what you mean by this?


Some of your points I find so ridiculous, how about when we can choose to modify genes to make everyone smarter? How about when we can implant lots of hardware into people? Then why should people like you be carried? Is this really the kind of future you want? Because really why stop at getting rid of autistics? When you can make people so much better than normal people you would have to get rid of NTs as well anyway wouldn't you?

Natural selection does not "want" anything. It is not an invisible force subtly guiding evolution to a goal. Evolution has no goal. We're not here because "evolution" or "natural selection" want us to be, we're here because natural selection doesn't select autistic genes out of the pool.

Quit personalizing a conversation on an open forum. This isn't about you.




If you're sure of it it must be true. This is utter bollocks. Idle speculation. How can you even make the leap to zapping away Einstein? This is nothing but a blatant appeal to emotion. So much for the vaunted hyper logical-ness of the aspie mind



A completely contrived scenario. And an erroneous conclusion, to boot. If the nine people all think similarly, the tenth will immediately be marginalized.



Come back in 100,000 years before you claim autism survived. The presence of something like autism does not automatically grace it as a good evolutionary adaptation. It just is here, now, at this point in evolution. It may or may not be selected against. I doubt we will be alive to witness the end result.



It PROVES nothing of the sort. Your time scale is completely wrong. The presence of a trait for a few generations or even a few thousand years means nothing. Autism has appeared in the gene pool. You can't even say with certainty anything about its prevalence or even existence for more than a few hundred years. Speculating such things a "Da Vinci was on the spectrum" fun, but it has no basis in science.



And you mean nothing to demographics, same as me. You might actually be one of the 1 in 500. So what? You conflate your sense of self and apply it to others. A theory of mind problem?



So the world is supposed to change it's behavior for you? Isn't that an unfair demand on your part? Another very human trait shared among autistics and NTs is hypocrisy.




I don't get to choose or even alter what this society values or considers "excelling". The measures of success are out there. I can integrate with those measures and values or live a marginalized existence.



Again, this isn't about you. Of course I don't know your mind. The lack of that specific knowledge has no bearing one way or the other on the veracity of my opinion



I like my mind too. So what? The world is supposed to bend to my will because I hate the noise? Why? What is so special about ME that the world should adapt to my needs?



Right. Like things always turn out like we expect. Look at the power structure in this world. Are these the people you want deciding which genes to modify and which hardware you can afford? And if you can't pay for that cybernetic implant and they turn it off from their remote server, then what?



People like me? You've already stated I don't know your mind, but you know mine?



You've already suggested that we should go ahead and modify our genetics for the 'betterment' of humanity. We autistics are on the wrong end of the power equation. What will be "gotten rid of" will not be anything that upsets the power structure of the society that pays for the science. That society is DOMINATED by NTs. What world do you think they will choose? We won't have any real say on what is removed from the gene pool. Autism will be eliminated unless someone can PROVE that doing so will have a detrimental effect. Good luck with that.

The fact of the matter is simple. Autistics comprise a small minority of humanity. And a small minority of those are hyper-competent. We have a very small seat at the table. Idle speculation about historical aspies changing the course of human progress is not even remotely useful. Cold hard facts are what is needed. You know? That apsie penchant for truth thing?