Comparing subjective experiences over a forum is useless

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Comparing my subjective experience to anyone else's here is really limited, especially over an internet forum. That's because language can only semi-adequately scrape the surface of ones total perception/understanding (And there can be a lot of subconscious things going on that never really gets vocalized), so trying to surmise my level of autism by comparing our subjective experiences is futile. Why do I even bother? Furthermore, perception may affect a person's comparisons by cherry-picking experiences that supports ones suspicions/leanings, and this is the dreaded confirmation bias.

However, maybe it does has a useful amount of accuracy. How accurate do you think it is?

swbluto Wrote:

I don't understand this part of your post.

I was describing the "confirmation bias", which is a bias that can affect investigations. Let's say a person is investigating whether or not they have autism and they have a stereotype in mind of what someone with "autism" looks like or how they act based on reading the posts here. The person then recalls their experiences and finds similar experiences, but those experiences are actually quite insignificant and infrequent compared to someone who truly has autism, and they discount other experiences that suggest the opposite. In doing so, they focus too much on the "supporting evidence" and don't consider the "disproving" evidence.

Wikipedia has more info:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias

swbluto Wrote:

If your objective is to surmise your "level of Autism" on this site or others, then everything you have mentioned is a problem. Your idea of Autism is different from my idea of Autism, and both our ideas are different from the doctor's who diagnosed me when I was 15. It is nothing but a vague word that denotes a set of subjectively-observed behavioral traits, and it is not defined apart from them, and it isn't defined apart from it's co-morbids either.

It is just a label that helps people who run into problems in life, by enabling them to access services. Autism isn't something that exists in and by itself within an individual. It should be this but it isn't.

When I was diagnosed, I didn't think to myself "oh I'm so relieved, I now know why I'm different." Instead I thought "I know who I am, and this label changes nothing." I say be who and what you are, labels serve expedient purposes (and if you have a purpose in mind, don't hesitate to try and get one), but they are of no importance beyond that.

You finally realise. What took you so long swbluto?

The girls cluck together more than males. Esp rogue males like

Very inaccurate.