Is Aspergers the next evolutionary step for humans?

  • Here is a thought:

”What if we are not odd, but Aspergers is the next step in evolution for humans?”

We are no less loving or empathetic than other humans.  As someone once said, we perhaps feel too much. 

So perhaps we evolutionary firsts!

  • NT’s aren’t thinking at all, they are simply following what they have been taught to think, they are simply blindly following the dictates of somebody else. This has been a necessary requirement for building sustainable communities, societies and empires. Autistic people have less tolerance of this behaviour. We find it almost impossible to simply go along with and think what somebody else wants us to think and so, we have found ourselves at the forefront of any real advancements in the world. If a person cannot think for himself or if he chooses to give that responsibility over to somebody else, he can never come up with something new. That job is ours my friend and we are leading the way in so many wonderful ways, mostly unseen to the human eye. 

    What the world needs now more than ever, is not more buildings, more rules, more laws, more restrictions, more punishments, more rewards. It needs more love, more unconditional love, more honesty and kindness, more understanding and acceptance, more of what really matters, each other, not our outer roles and appeareances, we’re moving beyond that and autistic people are coming out in force now to quietly and gently but definitely lead the way back to the heart. 

    To work with somebody who is so called ‘severely’ autistic, a person needs patience, understanding, unconditional love, unconditional positive regard, they must have a non judgemental and person centred approach. These are all qualities that are non negotiable and they are valued over high school education or university degrees. 

    If a person has been caring for such a person (missnamed ‘severely’ autistic), over time, the qualities they have to assume when at work, will spill over into their day to day life. They will find they are much more understanding, patient, kind and supportive to those around them who then in turn begin to take on these qualities to those around them. 

    I used to hate having a voice and one which is articulate. I used to want to be mute. But last year when I realised I was autistic, my friend who is married to an autistic guy and has two autistic children, made me realise that my voice isn’t a curse. She said it’s a gift, be proud of it and use it for what it was intended. To help, support and speak up for those who are unable to do so for themselves. That’s what we’re here for isn’t it? To help each other, to live together in joy and harmony, peace and understanding. Each having our own unique ways, each bringing our own gift of joy to the world. 

    Autistic people, by our very natures, are brining into the world more of what it needs right now. We do that, just by being alive. We don’t have to make any special efforts, we need simply be ourselves and by being ourselves, we are bringing into the world, more of what we need right now. 

    There are no accidents in the universe. Our brother, Mr Einstein (an autistic), proved that. People may say, oh, there’s more autistic people in the world right now because the diagnostic criteria has changed. There are more autistic people in the world right now whether or not we are ever diagnosed. The diagnosis doesn’t make us autistic. Many of us on here grew up without a diagnosis, yet we were still most definitely autistic. Our appearance in the world is no mistake and it is certainly no accident. Accidents don’t happen and neither do mistakes. That’s something (mistakes), that some man invented so he could train other people to do his bidding ~ create a thing called a mistake and get people to not only believe in it but to be sorry and remorseful and even more willing to do his bidding, every time a person makes one of these things. Mistakes our a gift from the universe. An opportunity to start again with more knowledge and more awareness. Not something we should fear and be sorry for. 

    Ask yourself honestly. What does the world need more of? Who is most qualified to bring these qualities into the world? 

  • So to push on the debate.  Would it be fair to say that NT are still primarily stuck in a reactive, primitive way of thinking?  Would it be fair to say that the advancements in human kind came from those who appear to be on the ASD?

    For example:

    physicists Einstein, Feynman etc

    Computer genius Jobs, Gates etc

    Just a thought.

  • Haha I love reading your comments as well Lonewarrior. 

  • Hi BlueRay, quick question for you.?

    Did you happen to climb into my head at some point when I wasn’t looking?

    You would be amazed at how much you think is shared by me,

    However I still have responsibilities which have to be maintained, Yes as the responsibilities are towards others that are deserving of my continued support.

    Doesn’t mean my thoughts are any different though.

    keep talking I enjoy reading a lot of what I myself seem unable to share right now.

    x()x

  • OK, thanks for the extra information.

  • I can’t find what I’m talking about but basically the world needs more of the traits that autistic people have. So yeah, we’re here to change the world. 

  • Yes, autism is the next evolutionary step for humans, without a doubt. I’ll try and find a YouTube clip I listened to that says this better than I can and I’ll come back here and post it, but yes, we are most definitely the next evolutionary step for humankind. 

  • I like that ~ a world that’s already overpopulated with largely identical humans! I don’t think the world is overpopulated. Overpopulated for what?

    Overpopulated for the other lifeforms we share the planet with and overpopulated for sustainable quality of human life.The vast majority of vertebrate biomass is now either human beings or their domesticated animals, and we're pushing both hunter-gatherer humans and our great ape cousins to the brink of extinction. The more humans, the more pollution and the less space, food and clean water and air for each. Check our Earth Overshoot Day, planetary boundaries and Population Matters. Why do you think the world might not have a chance?

    And I say 'largely identical' on the basis that there have been bottlenecks in humans' recent evolutionary past and all Europeans are descended from a few thousand settlers during the glacials. By having children, we shouldn't get the idea that we're preserving any rare genetic heritage, autistic or not, and of all the reasons for human extinction, not having children is one of the least likely. But yes, cultural homogenisation, mass media and globalised Macdonalds also contribute to human uniformity at expense of biodiversity. So I have reasons to prefer being childless and to wish it were more common.

    In return I was tickled by your 'hard work' sounds too much like hard work. In an ideal world work should be pleasurable, or not exist at all. On how Universal Basic Income (or Citizens' Income) might provide freedom and reduce discrimination for autistic people, see this essay by Dinah Murray.

  • I don’t want anything universal, apart from the universal laws that operate in society whether we like them or not. 

    I’m certainly not a fan of hard work, that sounds too much like hard work to me  but it seems to work well for some people, so it’s good for those who it works for. I’m more a fan of doing only what you love, doing only what brings joy, peace and harmony into your life.  I don’t understand why some people think we were given a life, just to work hard for all of the life, for what? Doing what you love isn’t hard work so why not just do that? Unless you love hard work of course, and then the idea of hard work would certainly work for you. 

    I don’t recognise societal man made laws in society, they don’t mean anything to me, I see them as simply guidelines for people who can’t think for themselves. I say just do what you love and be happy in life, there’s no hard work required and it doesn’t matter how much or how little money you have or how many other humans you have in your life or how you to look to the rest of society because you’re happy, so you don’t care about those things. You don’t care about capitalism or income tax, you’re too busy being happy to think about things like that. Unless of course, those are the very things that bring you joy and if so, then knock yourself out, go for it, become an ardent leader of capitalism, whatever that means. I don’t understand those terms and have no desire to, I see me understanding them as having no benefit to me but if I do ever need to understand them, then that is when I will educate myself on their meaning. 

  • I discussed the issue of capitalism and Calvinism with MattBucks a few months ago. He is a strong advocate of hard work and earning your way in life even if it's a wage slave.

    http://community.autism.org.uk/f/adults-on-the-autistic-spectrum/11438/government-treatment-of-asperges/60155#60155

    Some of the stuff he has said about income tax is questionable and he clearly underestimates the effects of automation on the job market and the tax base in the future.

    I'm very strongly in favour of a Universal Basic Income myself.

  • I like that ~ a world that’s already overpopulated with largely identical humans! I don’t think the world is overpopulated. Overpopulated for what? But yes, each country or society etc has its own identity, let’s say, and because most people don’t think for themselves, they go along with what socity tells them to do, so yeah, you get a world full of identical people. I have never thought of it like that before and it proper tickled me, thanks for that and  thank god for autistics, the world might have a chance after all! 

  • Just because ‘society’ values financial wealth in life, above all else, it doesn’t mean that’s it’s right. And I would question what ‘society’ actually is. Who is it exactly who is saying that your value in life is based on how much money you earn? If somebody said that to me I would probably just look at them as if they had said the most ridiculous thing in the world and I would probably change the subject abruptly into something a little more fun because how can you have a sensible conversation with somebody who thinks that mans worth in life is to simply work like a slave all your life, to make somebody or yourself rich in money. That’s insane and I don’t think I’d bother discussing such matters with an insane person.

  • Although i do think some of the genes associated with AS must have been selected for, I agree that AS itself isn't likely to have been. It doesn't appear to confer an advantage overall. I wouldn't want to be any different as I would then not be 'me', but I certainly think my life would have been easier and more economically successful without AS.  

    Your post may raise some unpalatable ideas regarding what makes a person valuable to / in society as a whole but I can't disagree with it. Lower income does affect health outcomes whether we like it or not and the global society we live in now certainly doesn't make allowances for anyone who can't keep up. 

  • As I say elsewhere on this thread, in so far as there are autistic genes, they may be advantageous (particularly if heterozygous), but not necessarily to the autistic person. Most autistic people are labelled as such because the disadvantages outweigh the advantages at that point.

    Good to hear you've not had problems with finding adult relationships. Of the autistic people I've met who are parents, most seem to have come to call themselves autistic or get a diagnosis because one or more of their children have been diagnosed and they recognise the same traits in themselves - I also see more women in that group than men. But well over half of autistic people (inc Aspies) I know have been single for a very long time and maybe never dated, or some have married without offspring. Not being able to tolerate living with someone, being hypersensitive to touch, not having the social skills or confidence to meet someone (that mostly refers to under-confident straight men), being terrified of sex or just being asexual or trans or non-binary, being too obsessed in special interests to care about either relationships or practical matters... these would all seem to diminish the possibility of reproducing. It's seems to be generally recognised that Aspies tend to start having relationships later, maybe by about 10 years, so that also reduces average number of offspring. I'm probably too old now, and despite liking and getting on with kids, I don't think it's responsible to bring my own into a world that's already overpopulated with largely identical humans.

  • I'd agree. If you think about the skills and dedication needed for the first flint-knapping, I think those of our ancestors were probably autistic.

    Can I be pedantic about 'according to Google'? Google is not a source. It's a way of finding a source that happens to be online. Although the word 'autistic' may have been used in 1908, that was a very early conception partly related to schizophrenia. Then in the 1940s and 1950s it became more associated with learning disabilities. It's only really in the last 20 years that it's been used in the way it is now to mean lifelong problems with social connection.

  • My theory is based on economics. In Britain, and even more so the US, society measures a person's true value by their economic value. Although it's a bit unpleasant to say so, the ultimate skill to have is the skill how to make money using any legitimate means. They may be a businessman, a professional, an investor, or a gambler who almost always wins.

    If AS was an advancement in evolution then people with the condition would overwhelmingly be making millions regardless of the family or area that they were born in. They aren't and they are statistically more likely to be unemployed or underemployed than NT with a similar level of education and qualifications. I think it's probably safe to say that people with AS who mastered basic education and had some commercial skills could easily have entered the middle class in terms of income or occupation during the 1950s and 60s with its Keynesian economics and controlled capitalism, but since 1980ish the economy has changed in a way that disfavours people with AS and favours people with a mindset of Richard Branson or Arthur Daley out of minder.

    Considering the rise in hate towards the unemployed, benefits claimants, and the poor in general over the past 10 or so years, then society is patently moving in a direction where those who lack the skills and the ability to make money are deemed to be failures regardless of what other skills and abilities they possess. A person with a PhD in maths or physics who can't get a job or make self employment work for them is no more valuable than a person in their 50s who is functionally illiterate and innumerate who dropped out of school and lived off benefits all their life.

  • I don't know. Not in my experience but I don't know what everyone else's experience is.

    I did't want serial partners during most of the years my contemporaries were pairing off repeatedly / hooking-up / whatever it's called now, but my un-diagnosed AS didn't seem to stop there being just as many opportunities as other people around me. 

    I've had three long-term (4 - 18 years) relationships as an adult, which is quite enough for me, so I'd have to say that finding a partner hasn't been difficult despite AS.    

  • Yes, it's a nice idea. Nobody knows though, really. We don't know what might happen in the future - humans might be replaced by robots or wipe themselves out in some other way. (Personally I hope not. Some of my best friends are human.)

    I have felt that joining an autism group that we're really diverse and most do seem to have a unique talent, so it's a bit like another autistic mutant joining the X-Men.

    There has of course been a lot of medical research on autism - and sadly much less social research into how to improve quality of life, because in many ways the cause doesn't matter. You hear figures of between 20-50% of autism being genetic, which raises questions. How far back do these genes go? (Maybe 5% are de novo mutations, that is when it's not inherited from parents.) And do these genes have advantages, or in other words are they 'adaptive'?

    So how do we interpret any autism gene variants? Are they 'defects' that cause a variety of symptoms such as digestive or auto-immune problems as well as changes in the structure of the brain? Or have they been around for hundreds of thousands of years? It seems H sapiens sapiens carries about 1% Neanderthal DNA, and there's a theory that Neanderthals didn't have language (although they did have slightly larger brains). At rdos.net you'll find talk of the idea that rather than the next evolutionary step, we're the previous one.

    But my favourite theory is that autism is a 'spandrel' for human intelligence - it's not advantageous itself, but autistic/AS people help the community by their ingenuity. Think of the amount of back pain humans suffer because we've only evolved to walk upright relatively recently, and evolution hasn't ironed out all the bugs. We've only evolved eg writing much more recently, so there are even more 'bugs' in that, including autism, that mean that although the individual talents can be impressive, the various brain functions don't work well together 'globally'. That might be a bit like the same genes for malaria resistance - another recent adaptation - also producing sickle-cell anaemia. There is quite a lot of recent evidence that autism genes are correlated with intelligence or years in education, but they're not correlated either way with psychosis, depression, diabetes, obesity or Alzheimer's (Bulik-Sullivan et al, 2015) (Clarke et al, 2016). They don't seem to be intrinsically maladaptive.

    So most autism gene variants (assuming they exist and the geneticists are right) at least aren't unambiguously deleterious. If there were pre-natal screening against autism genes, humanity would very probably be shooting itself in the foot and stopping evolution of intelligence, so to that extent you might be right. As I say, nobody knows.

  • It makes it harder to find a partner though, doesn't it?!

  • It's not looking likely that AS is an evolutionary dead end. First of all, because it seems to be pretty intrinsic genetically. Second, because it has no bearing on survival to sexual maturity. Last, it doesn't hinder the ability to find / consume food or other resources necessary for life.