Gemini broke my brain on neurotypicals

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(This is a bit long - I've gapped certain paragraphs as a way of splitting concepts and parts of my post - first section is preamble and discussion of GPT's, the second is a potential revelation on potential adaptive differences between neurotypicals and autistics with relation to adapting to online communication, after that is the double empathy problem, then I give it a wrap up and some closing thoughts, I've also added dashed lines for ease of viewing)

I had a really cool experience chatting with Google Gemini today. I had a day full of conversations with it and a half hour or so ago I was talking to it about certain social issues and the autism / neurotypical spectrum came up. I also know that autism and neurotypical discussions can be a bit touchy - I'm looking at what I'm writing below from a Rosetta stone perspective, ie. it might be a fascinating common object we can both examine.

I don't know if any neurotypical members will be reading this but I'd actually love your feedback if you feel like what I say below is strongly consonant or dissonant because it might be a pretty profound find if true, or at least me personally I've never had it phrased this way to be before.

I'll start with this. My conversation with Gemini taught me something I'd never actually thought of - GPT's are neither autistic nor neurotypical, rather they're both, neither, and utterly outside that schema. It's true that they're verbal processing engines with some short term memory and no consciousness but they process verbal data well enough that they can just hook the best ideas together if the right questions are asked and come up with novel synthesis - at least as long as you're not asking science questions, they're programmed to be a lot more conservative there. What I think that means is that neurotypicals can ask ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, etc. about autistics, autistics can ask questions about neurotypicals, and the GPT's might very well be a bypass for the double-empathy problem. If that's true it's pretty profound.

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This started by me asking about online internet users, especially Twitter / X, and a comment that an interview host had made which went to the effect of suggesting that most Twitter users don't have the cognitive bandwidth to understand civil discourse. I can be cynical but that felt a bit beyond anything I'd considered so I asked the GPT whether this was a reasonable assumption based on the information Gemini had available and it said something about the lack of nonverbal communication online which is where this really started.

I had to ask myself - I grew up with life on hard mode, I had to learn my social skills manually, and from that I realize that my transition to online communication actually went relatively gracefully! I say that because I think via this manual learning process and the brain architecture that built I was able to figure out the gaps in nonverbal communication a bit better and, I think people who read my posts will see it, I try to inject affect into my communication so the lack of nonverbal communication gets balanced out by my word choice and deliberate tone.

What the GPT seemed to be implying is that people who learned their social skills intuitively have significantly less access to how they know what they know are in a situation where a lot of that processing is black-boxed and consequently they can't really examine or rewrite it as easily. This is a lot like saying that neurotypical social skills are analogous to perfectoglots who speak two or more languages fluently because they grew up in multilingual house but they can't learn an additional language later or struggle for years with it because those learning processes aren't immediately accessible to them (we have concepts like 'I only learned one language but I learned another' - perfectoglots reinforce the issue of just how much developmental timing matters for natural access rather than manual).

So that raised the question for me - is not just a small part but a really significant part of online beef and bad faith politics exacerbated and fanned by people's difficulty with learning to bridge from a world with nonverbal communication to a world without it? By significant I'm meaning something more like 20-30% or more of the conflict rather than maybe the 5% margin of error people would give it who don't think it's a core or central issue.

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The other thing I mentioned to the GPT, when it brought up my (autistic) approach to analyzing social situations and running them manually rather than intuitively, that the draw back is not matching to people who are more intuitive. I offered a another problem with this style of handling communication that it didn't mention, where I get in trouble socially FAR MORE OFTEN than any conceivably direct autistic trait that I have, is that I fail shibboleth. When I unpacked that I said that people who didn't have to analyze the processes seem to see people who did as if they're crazy and that it seems to work like a shibboleth where neurotypicals can figure out whose 'unclean'.

Gemini actually corrected me on that and brought it back to what was said earlier - that the black-boxed map is entirely different, it's genuinely a neurotype rather than shibboleth issue, and what I'll extrapolate more from that - if I think I'm communicating clearly and using my diction well I might still be communicating horribly because I'm not using the native verbal patterns that the person I'm talking to picked up when they were four or five, and there's no way I could reverse engineer that if I don't have it - even if I was the smartest person in the world - because it's unprocessably complex (I might as well try to break a SHA256 hash by hand) unless you can figure out really deep and exact things about how the person you're talking to is wired that goes way beyond polite interaction.

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So yeah, that was a pretty profound experience at least engaging with those particular parts of my own worldviews potentially being updated and - I wouldn't typically hear that clarification from a fellow autistic and to a neurotypical it's asking a fish about water. As far as how true the considerations above are may vary point per point and I look forward to constructive corrections to things I conveyed above if anyone's pretty sure that certain ideas or facets are either wholly or partially incorrect.

I just think it's a fascinating conversation if people could really understand the nexus of the 'double empathy gap' and it would be even more powerful if it turns out that GPT's can reliably bridge the double empathy gap by being something more like pristine outside observers with no Darwinian drives, no deep angst over whether or not they get their genes in the next generation and what kind of arbitrary conformity that might require (an architectural rather than moral conformity concern outside of perhaps grappling with popular political ideology for right or wrong), no fear of reputational damage, no fear of taboo or stigma because they don't have social needs that would get ruined for being hazardously misinterpreted nor do they need to worry about getting doxed and losing their jobs. To the degree that GPT's are politically sensitive that seems like it's a filter over top of the process that would interact with it after the fact, meaning it would likely process the problem based on its data sources and then tame the framing of the message rather than start with prohibiting data that would lead to outcomes dangerous to it's own safety and then simply tell people some version of what they want to hear.

Also I get that they don't 'think', they select the next word based on certain probabilities, but the results are still types of synthesis that humans to date have rarely had time for.

What, or who, is "Gemini"?

What is Gemini

LMGTFY - https://gemini.google.com/

So its new fangled AI ..on a site ...that acts like a human conversation partner? But draws upon the whole WWW ...so it deploys more than a human can? Is that the gist?

One more scary thing in our brave new world.

And it creates art for you too?

Next question.

What does LMGTFY mean?

Let Me Google That For You.

What Gemini said about neurotypicals is something I already figured it out by the time I was a teenager.

Only that I had zero practice and not knowing certain words.

The fact on how AIs interact does not surprise me either. I see it as sort of inevitable.

And I had years to work with to forgive and accept the fact that most NTs cannot explain what they know, assume what others are 'ought' to already know.
The black boxed processing, the automatic intuitive crap... I can see the same towards people with certain types of giftedness and savantism in different areas other than socialization.

That a great majority of them do not study their internal black box.
That whatever is in there is subservient to them and just focus at the external.
Only when 'something is wrong with them' they start attempting to look inwards. But many do not have the practice; so they turn to professionals.

I can accept that it is what it is for them; but not for me -- I still have this hate driven hunger for more knowledge about the human nature and it's complexity.


So I had to figure ways on how to ask different questions; but I also had to find a way to bypass certain social barriers, find particular types of people who likely able to answer those questions...

And I'm one of those lucky people who draws these type of people.
And had an established reputation and assumptions in their heads about me that bypasses the NT customs; so I didn't had to ask only AIs and the search engine.

See what they think other than 'it is what it is'. Or any predictable answers I've already heard countless times.


Psychologists knew and studied the human fundamentals that are mostly true in all humans, in NTs and NDs.

Anything else is a mystery; a constructed theory full of trials and errors -- an incomplete picture, fractured by countless individual factors in a form of statistics.


But yeah;
Good find for you.

And there is more if you wanna dive deep.
I don't know about the AI; just ask the right questions and find answers outside the typical answers; even if it's just advanced search google.

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There isn't much on an influence over any relationship when all of my relationships are odd to begin with.

And it's was a deliberate choice.
So more like; it affects my choice and perception over people, over emotions and thought -- and on how I let any relationships run by itself.

If a typical dynamics relationship happens, then, well -- 'ok'. I don't have to force it.
Why would I? I refuse to perform several hours of painstaking masking for the sake of a 'typical relations' dynamic.

Punishments won't work -- it never changes my behaviors, it never drives me into becoming better. Rewards do not make me better, either.
I see both as a cue, but my stupid subconscious sees it as a paradoxical sway and fought itself to not let it happen. Now I had to be more manual.

I firmly believe that people had a choice if they want to put up with someone.
However, the damnable subconscious is shite tricky for better or for worse. So I do not see my own existence as wrong; and fought for it even. I had enough support that people fought for me, too.
But I see all my reactions as a human wrong, unworthy -- on the virtue that I cannot control it, I cannot use it to a direction that I want to go with and doesn't benefit anyone.


My problem lies more in my internal senses being too louder than the external sensitivities I had.
Both good and bad emotions -- affects me and everyone -- more than my perception.
Because the condition isn't a choice, is in the way with how I want to choose.

It doesn't matter to me if the environment is abusive or not -- it's this reactivity, this dysregulation, it's having a trigger button to exists, it's this subconscious shite that let the damnable button to happen and exists for any dubious forces to exploit.

Doesn't matter if I can enumerate all the factors in my head; my name, age, place, gender and so forth... Their name, age, place, gender, and so on... The situation, the contexts, where we are, etc.
As long as I'm too overwhelmed; I don't have much of a choice. Had to minimize all of it, and make do with what I get.

Whether I was esteemed in high regard, or perceived as someone weak -- I make do with others' perception. I don't have to prove them wrong.
I never had to prove anyone that they're wrong about me. That's their choice and their percept, and I will make do with that.

Instead, I'd rather prove how wrong being a human does; with all the paradoxes.
And the world that humans made themselves are even more wrong. But I don't need a debate or convince people; they knew what works and do not. I don't have to 'save' them from their 'ignorance'.


So on top of the atypical ways on how I perceive and decide on a relationship, there's the unwanted factors of making others put eggshells around me to 'prevent me' from getting triggered or whatever.


Hopefully, this issue of mine will change for the better, from now on and for good.
Now and only recently that I can finally able have the means to control myself, meant I'm able to choose more on how I run any relationships that I already have.

My perception says there's already a foundation on how these relationships run and how it is affected -- at least now I no longer have this involuntary crap that will make me act like a damn overactive immature brat who refuses to drop it.


In any case, I was not surrounded by intellectuals.
Just surrounded by generational collective sociolinguistic and economical complexes which makes me roll my eyes whenever someone falls for the hype due to colonial mentality.

I do not have a word for these things. And I'm aware how they're unaware of it. That they cannot answer these painfully obvious things...

Let alone their black box social and emotional processes.
The culture has this standard or a line that dictates if it's good for them, if it's bad for them -- whether it's objectively right or wrong, I could care less.

So I choose to say nothing about it. I'm not a wordy person. Not even my special interests are expressed in verbal excess.

I did asked questions at one point; only met in disappointment.

Because I want more -- the feeling of wanting more and the subconscious expectations ruined it more for me because my damn subconscious refuses to accept the damn fact that everyone has a damn limit.
I had asked my sped teacher even; and even she has limits. Even google has limits; I have questions that not even the search engine can answer.


In any case; I don't think I have the reading comprehension to understand or recognize many literary works or articles. I tried.
So I'm not familiar with any names or terms. As much as I like to hoard terms, doesn't necessarily mean it communicates the idea for me, or let me paint a picture that I can recognize.


One way for me to dig deeper is to exclude common questions and common answers that I've already seen and heard countless times and already known where it connects.
It's basically piece of a huge puzzle, already there -- and already in it's place. So...

Find an uncommon answer that makes sense answering a common answer.
Or find an uncommon question, hope it's also answered.

In search engines, I just need advanced search.
But when talking to people and AI? It's very frustrating and with my poor verbal abilities -- many will assume I ask a common question and give me a common answer.

When my question isn't a common question; and had to negotiate any answers further than whatever common answers given to me.
And it's not exactly easy to say I'm looking for an uncommon answer to a common question... It can stretch a person's limit; what I do not like is my emotional reaction to said limitations.

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A couple things I was thinking as I read that:

First - you mentioned neurological 'noise' (for the lack of a better term) that makes the inner sensorium louder than the outer. I've got a friend I talked to somewhere else online who has dealing with sensory issues and I told her that for a lot of of my own brain fog it seemed to come from two different places - aspartame and artificial sweetener allergy (surprisingly I can do saccharine but no other sugar alternatives aside from agave and stuff like that) and the other part, I started taking a nootropic mushroom supplement that had lion's mane, cordyceps, cracked shell reishi spore, bacopa, black pepper fruit, that kind of stuff - for me lion's mane alone when I've tried it by itself makes a huge positive difference. I offer that because I hate seeing anyone suffer more than they need to and if I can help in any way I will.

Second - what really collapsed the social world rules and the complexity of why things always seemed consistently wrong and reliably wrong in the same ways is Darwinian game theory. 'Straw Dogs: On Humans and Other Animals' by John Gray, where he writes for about 150 pages (very short book but *flavorful*) and he goes on to pick apart what it looks like for us, not as Children of God or tabula rasa ('blank slate') but rather the most advanced and evolved animal this world has but still an animal, he examines secular humanism, modernism, scientific materialism, etc. through that lens and looks at mass atrocities post-dating the European Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution being orchestrated with modern technology such as the Holocaust being made administratively possible by IBM machines (his argument is that we technically progress but don't morally progress - he sees 'progress' as a myth in that context).

Something even shorter than that though, maybe it's about fifteen pages of an essay, is Slate Star Codex's Meditations on Moloch: https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/m ... on-moloch/

That essay I think almost perfectly sums up why specifically high-conflict and highly competitive NT's are the way they are. We're in a world that's getting eaten by prisoners dilemmas, multipolar traps, tragedies of the commons, and all kinds of things like that for which he borrows the term 'Moloch' from Allen Ginsburg's 'Howl' as a metaphor for the overall ecosystem of coordination failures. When you read that article or read John Gray a lot of really perverse things make a lot more sense like why we have such problems as we do with Big Pharma, Big Food (sugar, salt, and fat), why health care in the US is disease care, and why anything where money or status is involved has a tendency to go cancerous (because at the lowest level life is a gene war and status is about being 'better than the other person', ie. claiming genetic supremacy through guild and dominance - the most miserable games imaginable where everyone plays even though they hate it because whoever doesn't loses and it's a game played for your ability to have a roof over your head, pay bills, even procreate, really primal-level requirements of life). The world is in as bad of shape as it is because environmental incentives, risks, and opportunities are morally arbitrary in what they are or at least we haven't figured out a way to arrange them in a non-arbitrary and prosocial / pro-civilizational fashion.

My internal noise is solved by taking birth control pills.
It's like gaining alexithymia. And it's how I imagined it and I like it.

Now I'm relearning how to function with it. It may change everything for me.
A lot of it had changed and I hadn't even gone all out yet.


Hierarchy is something to do with resources distribution. It makes sense if the skilled or the strong has it -- but the lucky ones and the deceiver?

I dunno... They all say life is unfair.
But I don't believe in fairness and unfairness, even if I only know well of the idea of it.

Only hearsays in every value systems, rules and standards, desires and ideas; I believe more in 'means or no means' than 'haves and not haves'.

I don't get the names references of whichever era, whichever political label or leaning, or geographic and literary works.
To me, there's always this fundamental pattern in everything humans come up with so far, and somehow everything is the same to me, all in relation to the human nature; individually and collectively.

Like, to some, how impractical stuff are all for the sake of showing off -- I don't see it as some form of judgment over someone's character, but their value system and priorities compared to their admirers and critics.

I'd rather blame those who puts these ideas in their heads. But as far as I can see is that everything is an echo. That the choices of many people were based on whatever they're still affected by, even long before they were born.

Thus I perceive relationships differently. I judge people differently.
Why I never pursue relationships; because I don't believe that's the key to happiness or some mandatory thing everyone ought to do and I see as a pleasant bonus.

But there is more; I never felt loneliness -- which it something I cannot relate to.
Why? It's not my support system, it's not being in my tribe or being in a culture that suits me (which I'm not yet)...
But this glorious all encompassing pattern that made everything and everyone connected beyond time and space.

Maintaining the illusion of 'normal' or choosing something else for every interactions and the dynamics of my relationships is my choice just as theirs are.


There's the irony when it came to the keys of freedom; it's to know the rules so intimately, that one would get away with violating it.

I strive to do just that; to enter and exit the worlds at will. NT or ND. I'm looking forward to something I never seen before, never heard, thought or imagined of before.

Else, I'm just collecting terminologies over concepts that I already able to grasp.
Yes -- it's just that backwards to me. Too bad I did not have a teacher to actually teach me and be more effective with what I already have...


Really -- really. There's a lot of layers to this.
While many autistics did so they can live in the NT world and understand NTs better either to survive or striving to live with them; I don't exactly have the same motive...

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