alex doesn't have Asperger's

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One can disagree with anything; this doesn't mean it's correct.

In your words, you describe disabling symptoms, see: "way behind".

People with AS can adapt via intelligence, and it even says so, but it still needs to be severe and disabling [in the correct context], no matter how well one adapts to be classed as having the disorder.

Kinda like the person missing an arm, he or she will always be impaired, no matter how well one can adapt via intellect. Someone with mental retardation won't adapt as well as a person of average intelligence; adapting equates to working around said impairment.

This site probably wouldn't be doing as well if alex indeed didn't have AS.
There's a few things he seems to know that only a person with AS probably knows.


Or i dunno....thats just my opinion.*shrug shrug*


Getting mighty tired of the "i have as and YOU/HE DOESN'T!" threads.

Daniel, there's no evidence I can see that autistic people lie any more than professionals do. The idea that you should never take an autistic person's word for their own experiences, because an autistic person could be lying, but you should take a professional's word for it, because they couldn't be lying, is illogical.

The idea that you should never take your own experiences seriously because you yourself could be lying, completely boggles the mind. If you were lying, wouldn't you know it?

As to professionals, one of the most respected professionals in the autism field for a long time, Bruno Bettelheim, turned out to be wholly or partially fabricating his case studies. Case studies that are still in some cases used to train other professionals about autism, and certainly were used to train almost all other professionals back when most of the current famous professionals were studying autism.

People, even the learned professionals that you seem to place on an undeserved pedestal, cannot just simply retroactively excise everything Bettelheim taught them from their memories. It doesn't work like that. Part of the foundation of the impressions that they have of autism, will always have come from someone who was lying, even if every single one of them is totally honest.

And then outside of the realm of lying, you can look at the possibility of just being mistaken. Everyone has the capacity to be mistaken. But one person is more likely to be mistaken about what another person's internal experiences are, than the other person is to be mistaken about what their own internal experiences are.

Given that any two people probably have the same likelihood of lying or not lying, and given that a professional is less likely to know what is going on inside an autistic person's mind than the autistic person is, I'd think in that case you'd want to pay attention to what autistic people have to say about themselves. Especially when a ton of different autistic people keep saying the same thing about themselves that contradicts your interpretation of the professionals.

If all autistic people saw things the way you did, then the professionals would be far less able to make some of the advances they have made in understanding autistic people, and you would be sitting around espousing a quite different view of autism than the one you are now, because the professionals would say so and that would be the only reality to you.

Objectively, I don't use my own experiences as the basis of an argument, just as I don't use someone else's (an anecdote). The logic follows that if Tantam is [possibly] lying (the guy who put forth how Asperger's is outlined in the DSM), there's no point in recognizing the disorder, but I know he's most likely not for his work must be peer reviewed [in person]. Whereas, a person on the 'net who may or may not have the disorder has a greater chance of lying, just as I might be lying or embellishing. I'm detaching myself from this personally, as I'm just a single blip, like any other individual out there.

I'm all for autistic people letting their thoughts known, i.e., explaining why they do this, and I never said otherwise, but in the realm of where there's hardly any validity to people's claims other than quotes from professionals, I'll take the quotes.

I let my thoughts known to professionals, why I do this and that; I corrected a professional a little while back when she thought I was rolling my eyes at her when I was actually looking at the light above her head. She never knew adults did this, and I explained why I did such (distraction from the environment), she just thought I was avoiding eye-contact when I first told her.

If the said "ton of different autistic" people outlined how their interactions actually proceed, rather than saying it works like this without explaining it in-depth, I'd start reading into it more. Just how the OP's point is illogical, people need to add evidence if they're to argue their point, even if it's a basic explanation and outline of how their two-way interactions go.

The peer review process when it comes to autism research is not that good at weeding out inaccuracies (or conclusions drawn that have nothing to do with the evidence), so I doubt it would be that good at weeding out lies. See this page and scroll down to the paragraph starting with "In autism research" for several examples. The peer review process will not weed out bias if the bias is shared by the professional in general, nor will it weed out inaccuracy if the standards for accuracy in the field are below a certain point to begin with, and if it is accepted and standard in said field to draw conclusions that aren't supported by the evidence.

As far as going into detail goes, I thought I at least went into a fair bit of it regarding the mechanics of what is going on, and I have seen others do the same. However, they have been met with replies like "But that's not real interaction," as well as a completely unsupported claim that "real" interaction is and ought to be defined as "typical" interaction (with no explanation other than "but it's not typical so it's not real" essentially).

I wonder what Alex thinks about this?

OMG 10 pages for this?!?

I didn't read all of them, but I can tell you I have AS, diagnosed, and I can socialize with people and talk with them, sometimes I have to "fake NTs" and all, but I can do it.
I live a "normal" life, go outside, shopping, talk with people, etc.

"We" can adapt.

Daniel may have more difficulties in it than Alex, that's all.

VERSUS



HUH?

Methinks thou doth protest too much.

Z

I think a lot of the diagnostic criteria may have been designed for the diagnosis of very young children...kids too young to have "learned" the interaction skill.

I know that the longer I talk with someone, the less structured it will become, and the more random I'll get...usually making the person I'm talking with increasingly uncomfortable.

I take issue with anyone saying those of us who are more high-functioning don't "really" have the disorder. Sometimes I think that the person making the accusations is simply jealous.

It can be several things that cause people to say that "high functioning" autistic people aren't really autistic.

I'm going to use hypothetical names of people in the example, they aren't meant to correspond with anyone particular.

Let's say that Janet is autistic, and has a lot of trouble interacting socially in a typical way, to the point where it is very noticeable to anyone who meets her. Let's further say that Janet is told by professionals, over and over again, that she is extremely high-functioning, that they have never or rarely seen another autistic person as capable of her, that she is a total exception to the rule for even doing as well as she does, and other things of that nature.

Let's say that Janet takes them at their word, doesn't question this, etc.

Janet then encounters Bob. All the things that Janet is supposedly exceptional for an autistic person at, Bob does even better than Janet does. But Bob is claiming to be autistic too.

Janet may conclude that if she's the highest-functioning autistic person in the known universe, then Bob can't possibly be autistic.

Janet may even conclude this more firmly if she hears from professionals, not to trust other autistic people on the Internet. I have heard this from professionals and so have some of my friends. We have disregarded this (as well as the other things we've been told that Janet has been told), but not everyone does, and to some people that might add to the idea that the people they're talking to are not really autistic.

Then there's another way of looking at things that can do this.

Let's take Maria, another autistic person. Maria hates being autistic with a passion. Maria believes that the reason that she hates being autistic is solely due to her autistic traits anyone who had these traits would hate having these traits, in her mind.

So Maria sees Bob too, and Bob doesn't seem to mind being autistic, therefore he must not really be autistic as far as Maria is concerned. He might have the same traits as Maria, but feel differently about them. This isn't in Maria's worldview, a person could not be neutral or positive about the same traits she is negative about, the traits lead to hating being autistic, period, therefore Bob must not really have them. Then this colors how she sees Bob interact, she's on the lookout for "NT traits" in Bob and sees them all over, even if she has the same traits.

The same effect Maria experiences can happen in a different way for parents of autistic people.

And then there are actual malicious attempts to say that some people are not autistic because one does not like their views and wants to make people not have to listen to those views. At that point "He's not autistic" really means "You don't have to listen to him or take his points into account, because he's not relevant."

And jealousy might be a factor for some people, but a lot of the time I think it's more like the situations I describe above.

And, by the way, this doesn't just happen to people normally deemed "high functioning". I've seen people claim that Sue Rubin must have "Asperger's" because she can communicate. Seriously.

I looked at the start of this thread a few days ago, and I've now read the last couple of pages. I think what Danielismyname has written in that context is very clear and perfectly rational. It's an opinion with which I agree, and I'm surprised so many don't. There's not much point me adding to that, as he's explained things much better than I could.

The logic that Danielismyname uses is perfectly rational in what it takes into consideration, but there are factors that aren't recognized that appear to be inconsistent with the reality of abilities of people who are on the Autistic Spectrum.

1. A strict and unqualified interpretation of the DSM in effect un-diagnoses some of those who are "higher functioning" but have been professionally diagnosed.

2. The interpretation fails to recognize that it is possible, over time, for some on the Autistic Spectrum to learn social interaction that is virtually identical to NTs and thus might not exhibit "severe social impairment" but are still part of the Spectrum.

3. The logic mandates that anyone with adequate or good social interaction, at any time in their lives, gets kicked off of the Spectrum.

4. The interpretation that the social interactions / communication of those with ASD are not "genuine" or "real" can be viewed as illogical, dismissive, and demeaning for all levels of ASD abilities. To be philosophical about it, "I think (but have trouble holding a conversation) therefore I am not."

Z

The way I see it,learning social interaction
is much the same as learning a foreign language. In most cases the native 'speaker'
of social interaction (the NT) will tend to have the edge when it comes to understanding
all the nuances,however in some cases the
foreign (AS) speaker can become so fluent
in communication that they will easily pass for a native.

Good comparison. I still think that someone who learns to speak French is still speaking French, even if it's not their native language and they don't do it as well as natives. I know some people who have dreams in their second or third language, though, so I think it can become quite ingrained. But by now I see that it's largely a semantic argument. I don't think NTs have exclusive ownership over the term "interaction."

WELL PUT!

It is a shame that some people with ASD(whether it is 8% or 88%, it makes no difference) have to feel so inferior, have so much more trouble living, etc.... Still, such disparities exist EVERYWHERE, and don't discount the fact that others LACK such problems, or have them to a lesser degree.

HEY, I ENVY some things OTHERS here say they have. Some even have more problems elsewhere than I do, and I STILL envy them. Still, I wish them no ill will or discount their ability.

That's in addition, and it's not a basis for anything other than showing that I'm not hypocritical in that don't see my socialisation as genuine compared to those who don't have said disorder. Even in my "high-functioning" days, my social interaction wasn't real/genuine; it's plainly obvious to me as I know what reciprocal interaction entails.

Again, there are clear points, cut-offs for any mental disorder (neurological in this case), and there's no point in arguing against such until they change the criteria for such.

In response to your other words:

1. That's assuming too much for one would have to observe the so called "higher-functioning" individuals in reciprocal interaction to see if they are impaired or not; it's impossible to do such through this medium, and I've only seen one person describe how she interacts in-depth, and of note, she said it wasn't "two-way" how others interact. One must take a scrict interpretation of the criteria as they're explicitly stated and outlined; if they included, '...may appear to socialize normally, but still has a genuine impairment,' I wouldn't bother arguing.

2. It says that people can learn, but they'll still be impaired. That's the whole point of the disorder; just say that instead of missing your entire arm, you're only missing your hand (you're "higher-functioning" innately, to use eye-sight as the analogy) and you have an IQ of 160+ on standarized IQ tests; you'll be able to adapt, and create a tool to affix to your arm that allows you to pick things up. The problem is, it'll never look like a "real" hand (because it's not), and you'll never be able to pick things up as if you had a complete arm. Not to mention that you'll still need to have an obsessive interest that's possibly disabling, but one can utilize such if it's a needed area of interest to the population at large.

3. That's the whole point of the disorder. The social impairment is gross, sustained and lifelong since birth. See: missing an arm, or part of such from birth ("low-functioning" to high-functioning").

4. It's not illogical when one sees it as what it is, a genuine impairment that removes one's ability to interact "normally", and said normality is what defines genuine. Again, you're assuming too much; just because one lacks an arm doesn't mean they're any less of a human, it's just that they'll have areas of weakness/impairment in a severity that may or may not be more severe than the next person.