Why autism exists
Once I found a very unremarkable book at the local library. It was called Smartest People in the World (in Swedish) and it was a book about the IQ concept. I read it carefully for one reason only: Already in the introduction, the writer revealed that she had a very high IQ. That way, Smartest People in the World was kind of a window into a high-IQ person's mind. Through reading that book, I could peer into the reasoning of a person with a much higher IQ than mine. So I read the book in order to understand its author. Was she a genius? Was her reasoning outstanding? Did she come up with something new? Overall, the answer was no. The book was well written and sometimes entertaining. The writer was obviously intelligent. Still, the book lacked sharpness. The writer processed the thoughts that already exist very well, but didn't even pretend to come up with something new.
Why couldn't the writer, who was indisputably an intelligent person, come up with something creative of her own? I thought about it and came up with a theory: Because she was not the least autistic. The book looked like a product of high social ability. The writer traveled all over the world to speak with people who were extremely skilled at IQ tests. Controversial issues like race and IQ were glossed over as if they genuinely didn't matter. The writer also seemed very trend-conscious: Her only other book is called Faghag (2007) and is about women who befriend homosexual men. That was indeed a highly socially suitable subject in 2007.
A theory
An unremarkable book by an unremarkable writer led me to a hypothesis: What if social abilities block people from thinking? We have all heard that aspie people can be geniuses: Albert Einstein, Nicola Tesla, Immanuel Kant… But I wonder if that theory can't be taken a step further: What if geniusness requires a certain lack of social abilities?
As Lewis Terman's studies revealed already in the mid-20th century, having a high IQ doesn't equal being a genius. A genius is not a person with a high IQ, but a person with a fairly high IQ combined with an unknown something else that leads to intellectual independence and creativity.
I strongly suspect that this unknown something else is some kind of impaired social ability. When we think, we sooner or later come to points where we need to choose between what facts and logic tell us to think and what is socially appropriate to think. Very intelligent people often choose the socially appropriate way of reasoning over the factually appropriate way of reasoning. That usually makes them socially and professionally successful, but it also prevents them from ever coming up with anything original.
The concept of geniousness requires some sort of newness. Geniuses think what no one else thought before. Thinking what no one else thinks requires a certain disrespect for the thinking of others. Or, in other words, a certain disrespect for social conventions. I strongly suspect such a lack of respect for social conventions has a link to lack of social ability: The easiest way to stay away from social pressures is not feeling them very well in the first place. The stronger people feel social pressures, the stronger their incentives to follow them. That way, I think that being a little autistic is really good for thinking.
I have no way to quantify this, because there are no tests of social abilities that can be compared to tests of intellectual abilities. If people cared enough about it, I'm sure imperfect but relevant tests of social abilities could be created, just like imperfect but relevant tests of cognitive abilities have been created. But as far as I know, psychology researchers don't care enough to create such tests.
A costly way to be curious
Overall, I think high social abilities carry one important cost: Social compulsivity. The social world of humans seems to be a bit like the song of Sirens: Everyone who hears the song gets drawn into the full depth of social life. With no mast to tie oneself to, there is only one way to avoid being drawn into the deepest corners of social life: to be a little short of hearing.
Since I'm a semi-aspie myself, I can only guess that Sirens sing more beautifully to fully neurotypical people than to me. I can't really know what I'm missing, because I'm missing it. But I know there is something I'm missing, and this something is very important to normal people. For example, females very often spend a lot of time and a lot of money on dressing fashionably. I assume that is because they feel dressing in synchrony is lustful. But since I don't feel it myself I can't be sure. I only know that not feeling any urge to dress fashionably saves me time that I can spend on, for example, reading sociological theories about why people want to dress fashionably.
If autism light is the only way to keep people away from compulsive socializing, that is indeed a clumsy solution. For every carrier of aspie genes who develops an unusual interest in the objective world and thereby unusual skills, there seems to be several others who only suffer from their blunt social skills. Aspie genes also need to appear in the right dosage: Too many in the same individual creates great suffering.
If nature had a more elegant way to create curiosity for the objective world and some healthy skepticism of social conventions, those genes would probably outcompete the aspie genes. Maybe they will, in the future. But for the moment, aspie genes exist all over the planet. I think they are here for a reason.
Hello, Tove. You know, the difficulty with talking about "autism" is that a whole mess of different conditions get labeled "autism." Nevertheless, you and I both know ourselves as "kind of aspie" women, and you and I both have autistic kids, so within that range, there's *something" worth talking about.
One of the things I have found very striking in my conversations with autistic people on forums like Wrong Planet is very, very anxious they are. Many of them are even socially anxious. They are acutely aware of the fact that they are different from other people and they are very worried about other people judging them. It's like talking to a middle schooler who's afraid of being bullied, except these are grown adults.
My own kids are very anxious, too. It leads to a lot of phobias and OCD. It's... frustrating.
Anyway, autists might be bad at observing social norms, but boy do they wish they could.
I have a couple of different/related theories: autists have abnormalities in brain growth/connectivity. Smart people also have differences in brain structures. Stick two smart people together, and maybe you get a brain that is just trying to get too big/connected.
Relatedly, autists seem to be very emotionally/socially immature. My kid is like a 20 yr old in intelligence and a 6 yr old in emotions. Not just in bad ways, like tantrums. He is very sweet in the ways of little children, too. He does not like any sorts of "mean words" and is always kind to animals.
But all humans mature slowly compared to, well, practically all other animals (elephants and some dolphins/whales seem to be the exceptions). Extended childhoods are necessary for developing higher IQs. So perhaps "develop more slowly" is yet another way to get a smarter person, but combine two such people, and you get a very slowly developing child.
I don't favor the "extreme male brain" hypothesis. Autism is more common in males, but so are dyslexia and retardation and schizophrenia... none of which are very masculine. Yes, autists are bad at social stuff and can be fascinated by objects, but a lot of that is repetitive "stimming" related to OCD and difficulties they have with anxiety. It's like they get stuck.
"If nature had a more elegant way to create curiosity for the objective world and some healthy skepticism of social conventions, those genes would probably outcompete the aspie genes. Maybe they will, in the future. But for the moment, aspie genes exist all over the planet. I think they are here for a reason."
No, aspie genes ARE the future. We're already cognitively equipped to interface with ever-advancing technologies and develop them even further.