haha! history has been made today :D
190 karma · joined November 26, 2015
Reminded me of the time Russell tried to reduce all language to logic, only to be thwarted by a rebellious twenty-something Austrian who claimed that all logic was tautology.
So I think if those teens were really that rebellious then they might try something similar with my social-calculus.
But still, it sounds like a fun exercise. "What are the primitive elements of a social interaction?" Hmmm :)
In a broad sense, what sort of changes did you make to the way you present your body language, and what sort of cues do you look for in other people?
Yes, you are correct that it is different for children. As adults we can learn to cope and compensate for our weaknesses, but for a child whose mind is very different from the norm it could be nearly impossible to do so without outside intervention. So it's good that you persisted and found him the help that he needed!
I am very critical of the DSM, but that criticism is more due to my tendency towards mathematical purity, and I do agree that there are people helped immensely by it that wouldn't have been otherwise.
However, I also think that if we had better models of the mind, then perhaps we could even help more people. In your case your son was showing some clear signals that allowed several independent specialists to reach the same conclusion. I wonder how many children with less visible signs of autism that nevertheless would have benefited from some form of intervention and assistance in their youth. Perhaps, even, most people have some form of blind spots, be it in social interaction or mathematical aptitude, and a more individualised approach to education would allow all children to grow up maximizing their potential in every area. But I understand that that kind of thinking is utopic.
I suspect that the recurring phenomenon where adults self-identify with autistic traits is due to such a problem - they perhaps struggled with social interaction as children, but were not given the adequate tools to understand that at the time, and have only come to realize it as they grew older.
Certainly I understand that it used to be much worse, but if it's not satisfying me now, well, I'm keeping an eye out for what will.
It's interesting you note lists as I agree that there's a really good underlying idea there that has never blossomed. Any ideas by how they could be improved?
Most tweets that I see in English are pushing towards the boundary of the 140 character limit, which suggests to me that it's at best barely-sufficient to express ourselves. If it turns out that, say, most Chinese tweets are in the region of 100-120 characters then that would mean that using Hanzi they can express everything they want to say and still have space left over.
I would be quite keen to collaborate with someone on this.
With Kanji/Hanzi 140 character limit turns into a 140 word limit.
That's like a friggin essay.
On the one hand, some of the most insightful things that I've seen on Twitter have been written in such way.
On the other, it's just so effin ugly. You can't reply/share/like the whole thing at once, so you end up with splintered conversation trees with different people replying to different parts of the mega-tweet.
I think it's a poor design choice, really.
I love the long form messages that being in a place like HN allows you to have.
I also think that there's something unique to Twitter that being on HN does not provide. I can't quite articulate that yet, though. Would anyone using Twitter care to try?
I've met a lot of people who describe themselves in such a way.
I think the problem is that the DSM relies on very arbitrary and subjective behavioural signs to diagnose a lot of what it considers a mental illness. That is something that really annoys me about the psychiatric profession. I would be quite keen to see a more mathematical and objectively grounded theory of mental disorder than the vague, hand waved criteria that we have now.
In your case though, I'll quote a character from the Rosie Effect (an amazing book by the way which you might enjoy reading) who said that the main criteria is... pathology. If you are able to maintain an adequate lifestyle (job, education, family, friends) then you're fine. It's only when those "autistic" traits interfere with your life and preclude you from reaching your potential that they're considered abnormal and a diagnosis is apt.
That's my observation, too. When I was a teen I would completely rebel against any kind of conformity, especially against the idea of "socially expected" behaviour.
However by my 20's I ended up learning that sometimes what is socially expected is expected exactly because it's the smartest thing to do in that situation.
Funny how these things work out.
Wow, that's... Wow.
Reminds me of the early 1900's eugenicists posters about "facial features shared by criminals".
"This kid is not good at following orders and is unwilling to engage in long hours of monotonous and repetitive tasks? Clearly we need to fix that".
If you think about it, what would ADHD mean in the animal kingdom? Most animals just run around and do whatever they feel like in the moment. Humans are the only species where that's not the norm. I wonder why.
1 - I asked you not to tell random people that they're autistic because it's bad form (fact) and questioned your knowledge of the matter (my opinion). No personal attack on you has been made.
2 - You retaliated by contradicting yourself and sending two ad hominem attacks at me. No attempt to disprove my claim of your lack of knowledge besides another deflection .
3 - I point out that you've contradicted yourself.
4 - You reply with another two ad hominem attacks on me.
Yeah, I rest my case. You enjoy your day.
"I didn't diagnose anyone"
Wow, do you even LISTEN to yourself when you say things?
"nor do you know anything about me or my understanding of anything"
Yes I do. I can infer sufficient from what you've just wrote.
That said, coursera did an amazing course on emotions recently by an Italian AI researcher, Jordi Vallverdú. I think it's been taken offline now, unfortunately.
That goes for anyone who isn't a trained professional. But it goes triple for you, given your rudimentary understanding of aspergers, intellect, or how people learn to recognize emotions.