It's amazing how a lot of NTs are actively trying to think in a more autistic manner while trying to cure autism at the same time. Really amazing.
It was this cousin I talked to the other day that thought autism = savantism.
From the few people I've spoken to about autism this seems to be a really common perception. I blame the media and its tendency to publicise only the more sensational aspects of autism.
Another *really* odd one was a friend who recently met someone who works in residential childcare. This guy told my friend that autistic children are often obsessed with Thomas the Tank Engine, and my friend's response was, "That's awful - why isn't Thomas banned!" 
couldbecousin--Have you considered ADHD? If you're "unfocused" that could be the problem. There are a lot of books out there that teach you how to train your mind to overcome attention-deficits; and of course there are also drugs to assist (though I really think they ought only to be taken if it would be much harder to learn those anti-distraction skills if you didn't take them). After all, ADHD shares so much with mild AS... I really think it's an offshoot from the Spectrum... So it's pretty common for those sorts of things to occur along with AS.
I have ADHD or at least a severe focusing problem. However, I don't have the discipline or the focus needed to learn the anti-distraction skills in the first place!!
Don't call me lazy--you are not me. My attention problem is much worse than even some people I know with ADHD!
A book I am currently reading,
Last Child in the Woods, discusses many studies that all indicate the same thing regarding attentional issues -- time spent in nature lessens the symptoms. The greener, the better. Get thee to a forest!
I have ADHD, my psych thinks it's a symptom of AS, and I take Strattera so I can drive (important in the US since public transit is almost nonexistent). I take so many different medications that taking this stuff is out of the question. I simply don't know how it will interact.
I have ADHD, my psych thinks it's a symptom of AS, and I take Strattera so I can drive (important in the US since public transit is almost nonexistent). I take so many different medications that taking this stuff is out of the question. I simply don't know how it will interact.
Why don't you try working hard on yourself to decrease your symptoms or read self help books to fix your problems, rather than take the meds?
Or how about you spend more time in nature?
(possible sarcasm...)
It's amazing how a lot of NTs are actively trying to think in a more autistic manner while trying to cure autism at the same time. Really amazing.
What's so amazing about it? NT's want to cure autism because of the associated disadvatages that autism brings. If they could have the advantages with few, if any , disadvantages then I believe their would be a de facto movement to cure neurotypicalism. Or, in other words, a regime change of what is considered neurotypical.
This is why some people think that autism represents nature's attempt to evolve a better human-if NTs could have all of the benefits of HFA without the nasty disadvantages, AND pass it on to their kids, I think that you would see the definition of "neurotypicalism" undergo a dramatic shift, and you would see "old-style NTs" die out fairly quickly, within a few generations.
Of course, since every action has an equal and opposite reaction, and since evolution has many "dead ends" or attempts to get it right that go nowhere, autistics get excellent memories or superhuman senses (I read a story about a young aspie woman who could hear electricity running through the walls and hear flourescent light fixtures) but with really awful downsides, such as being unable to tolerate being around other people or being unable to speak. If nature could produce a human with super-senses and super-memory without the problems, I'm fairly confident that the new and improved human would wipe out the NT human within five generations or so.
I once saw a book in the bookstore that described how scientists were just a few steps away from producing a superhuman with many of the superpowers described in comic books, including super-senses, superior brainpower, and even superior physical ability. If they could produce such a superman (and superwoman) who could pass on their super-abilities to their kids, ordinary humans would quickly go extinct.
This is why some people think that autism represents nature's attempt to evolve a better human-if NTs could have all of the benefits of HFA without the nasty disadvantages, AND pass it on to their kids, I think that you would see the definition of "neurotypicalism" undergo a dramatic shift, and you would see "old-style NTs" die out fairly quickly, within a few generations.
Evolution doesn't attempt to do anything. It's a directionless process. Also, it would take quite a while for a new kind of human to predominate as there are currently 6.5 billion people on this planet. Unless this new kind of human is planning to kill the rest, it would take quite a bit longer assuming normal breeding.
(I read a story about a young aspie woman who could hear electricity running through the walls and hear flourescent light fixtures)
People cannot hear electricity. There is no way to hear electricity. Electricity is not sound. Electricity is electrons flowing through a conductor through the conduction band. Fluorescent lights, however, rely on electricity flowing through a vacuum tube exciting the atoms of the gas. That can be heard and is often heard by lots of people. They are quite loud.
If nature could produce a human with super-senses and super-memory without the problems, I'm fairly confident that the new and improved human would wipe out the NT human within five generations or so.
Are you saying that these new super humans would launch a genocide?
I once saw a book in the bookstore that described how scientists were just a few steps away from producing a superhuman with many of the superpowers described in comic books, including super-senses, superior brainpower, and even superior physical ability.
In all likelihood, the "superhuman" characteristics are mild at best and we're still quite far away from being able to directly edit the genome.
You can often hear a humming noise from high tension lines can you not? not hearing electricity per se, but you can still here the effects.
you can certainly smell electricity...
That's not exactly true. Species can and do evolve due to a change in environment. They adapt. Humans are very complex, so our adaptations would be much more fraught with problems than those of a mouse.
Yes, adaptation does occur, but evolution is still a directionless process. There is no goal to evolution. There are only those who survive and those who don't.
Also, we're no more complex than a mouse. We're just larger. You could argue that our higher brain function is more complex, but our body isn't. We have much the same organs.
The story was posted on AFF. Shall I go dig it up for you? She said she could hear electricity, or sense it in some way I guess.
Sure. I suppose she could sense it, but I don't see how. Electricity for the post part stays in the wire and generates little outside interference.
Why not? Some archeologists believe that the sudden disappearance of Neanderthal man was due to Cro-Magnon man wiping them out deliberately. There have been at least three attempts to eliminate Jews that came frighteningly close to success (the Roman response to the Bar Kohkba Rebellion in AD 140, during which 9 out of 10 Jews died; the Chmelnitzky massacres in the 16th century; and the Holocaust). Hitler almost wiped out Gypsies (Rom) in Europe via the death camps. I once read a theory that said that if the existence of superpeople such as proposed in X Men really happened, that either the superpeople would wipe out the regular people or vice versa. Two forms of human seem incapable of coexisting. Heck, white people have a hard enough time coexisting with black people, even though the true genetic differences between the two groups are negligible. Why do you think NTs are so hot on aborting all fetuses testing positive for ASD? NTs don't want to coexist with us, they'd rather resort to eugenics and genocide to get rid of us.
Genocides typically only work when you outnumber the people you're killing or you have a large technological advantage. The superhumans would lose and badly.
Its ozone you smell, triatomic oxygen, toxic in all but tiny doses but easily sniffed out if its about, formed by electrical discharges through oxygen containing gases.
Yes, ozone is detectable when generated, but why would there be ozone generated with electricity flowing through a wire in a wall? That's just bad wiring.
I still don't see how currently available nootropics and other "cognitive enhancement drugs" could give NTs the advantages of the autistic-type brain.
If it is true, or could become true, it almost seems like cheating... quite simply, unfair to autistics. Here we are, having to live with this "different mental configuration" every day of our lives, and now options are available to the NT conglomerate to use our special abilities without sacrificing their default NT skills??
So then, what singular benefits does the autistic mind bring, if people can steal our gifts for temporary periods of time? What use is there to having autistics anymore??
I don't like the ramifications.
Its ozone you smell, triatomic oxygen, toxic in all but tiny doses but easily sniffed out if its about, formed by electrical discharges through oxygen containing gases.
I love that smell/sense in the air after a good storm, it feels like it washes all the shite out of the atmosphere, I rather like breathing clean air, its amazing how different it is when you are used to inner city filth (no I'm not talking about curebies here), and how much one gets de-sensitised to breathing in such garbage.
actually, I wasnt talking about coming through the walls; if you go into a server room, or a transformer room, then you can smell it.
I've been wanting to give piracetam (or another nootropic) a try lately, to see if it can help me understand statistics or other complex math-type subjects. I am worried, however, that it might aggrevate my anxiety by making my brain exceedingly alert and active.
If you try it, please let me know how it works out for you.
The sensory overload is not a universal side effect. Piracetam is something that's fairly cheap with no longterm negative side effects (except in RARE cases) so my advice would be to just try it and see what happens. Always ask a doctor's opinion on this kind of thing first though.
As to sensory overload, there's nothing at all wrong with curing sensory overload in itself. That's the same as you can cure testicular cancer without giving a sex change operation.
I am currently residing in the UK. Where can one find Piracetam here?
I don't think you need it. The gifted already have everything they need. It's people like me who need this stuff the most...
In other words, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
What do you call what Americans call "herbs" in Australia, then? Stuff like oregano, parsley, rosemary, etc.