I just read an interesting book, The Big Short, by Michael Lewis. It’s about the recent, sub-prime, Wall-Street collapse. In the book, Michael Burry is a neurologist who decides he lacks people skills and concludes that he doesn’t want to be a doctor any more. So he heads for Wall Street, where he is astonished that no one seems to recognize the housing bubble that is about to burst. In the midst of it all, his son is diagnosed Asperger’s, and Michael Burry decides he is also Asperger’s, which explains his lack of people skills and his aversion to being a doctor. His lack of intuitive thinking-ability (non conformity) would also seem to explain his ability to recognize things other people don’t see, such as the housing bubble. He bets heavily against Wall Street and becomes a multi millionaire.
I would never consider myself Asperger’s, but I do emphasize with many Asperger’s traits, and I have an autistic son. I am not a biologist, never took a single biology course, but I am astonished that anyone can accept Neo Darwinism - the notion that premature death or lack of fecundity might (somehow?) turn a long series of highly unlikely genetic accidents, all of which would have to occur in some precise order, into highly complex, purposefully interacting biological systems. It doesn’t even require much intelligence to recognize the absurdity; just an ability to reject accepted dogma.
Some of you seem to regard your lack of ability to intuitively absorb the thoughts and attitudes of other people a handicap, and label it Asperger’s. Apparently some of you also have other neurological difficulties, but I wonder that anyone would regret having a personality generally described as Asperger’s. I recognize the obvious value of intuitive abilities. Society would be in chaos without them. Still, I would not willingly exchange my ability to think independently for more people skills.
A Few Impertinent Questions about Autism, Freudianism and Materialism
http://30145.myauthorsite.com/
10 Nov 2010, 9:56 am
