Aspergers, a path to species differentiation?

Post Reply New Topic

Neurotypicals want us to believe that we are a bunch of Forest Gump. ret*ds. If we do not believe we are ret*ds neurotypicals call us racist. So do we really believe that everyone who posts on this forum is a ret*d?

If it doesn't lead to greater reproductive success, then it is not selected via evolution. Traits that do not lead to greater reproductive success are not advantageous as far as evolution is concerned.

Autistics can have greater reproductive success if we can change societies rules regarding reproduction.

"If it doesn't lead to greater reproductive success, then it is not selected via evolution. Traits that do not lead to greater reproductive success are not advantageous as far as evolution is concerned."

Early days.

How come there appears to be an increase in aspergers?

If that increase continues, will that not increase breeding opportunities?

You don't think there are any advantages to the way we think and our perceptive bandwidth?

Some highly successful people are suggested as being on the spectrum, is this not due to the advantages given them by their "disorder"?

Are NTs doing a great job of running things?

Will not the current patterns extrapolated lead to a possible extiction event bought about by climate catastrophy?

I give the OP credit for putting slightly better wine into the old "aspergers-is-the-next-step-in-evolution" wine.

Most folks who post that sorta thing give absolutely know reason for why they think would be so. Indeed they rarely give evidence of understanding what evolution is at all.

Atleast the OP is giving an interesting analogy from nature that has some logic to it.

But still-

I get that a species of songbird might split into two species (without even needing a geographic barrier) in the same location. A strain may (a) start seeking a new food source (seeds instead of bugs) in the same area as the parent species, and at the same time also evolve a new song. The change in the mating song might reinforce the deviant strain evolving towards seeking its new niche. And in time you might have two distinct but similiar species side by side in the same location.

But that analogy doesnt quite work. Aspies maybe analogous to birds that sing a different song- but the song doesnt help us mate with other aspies anymore than it does with mating with nts. Our lack of reading social skills interferes with mating with our own kinds as much or more than with nts.

So I dont see evidence that we are breeding with each other and forming this new strain.

Also- is aspergers really becoming more common? Or is that just an artifact of the mental health community getting better at diagnosing it in the population?

Do you have actual evidence of a trend like that?
Your notion seems to be heavily based on the assumption that aspergers is trending towards becoming more common.

Well, for one, we're not sure what the exact cause is. Other than that, increased understanding and better diagnostic techniques.



If you look at it as pure statistics, yes. However, our social limitations limit the effectiveness of population increase. HFAs might be able to live normal lives, and reproduce normally. But the vast majority of autistics are not high functioning, and their chances of reproducing are slim to none, depending on their severity.



Sure there are. But oftentimes the limitations outweigh the benefits. What we see is a point of diminishing returns.



Correlation does not equal causation. I would suggest that their genius would've existed independent of their disorder. Also, high functioning Asperger's is often times indistinguishable from gifted extreme introversion. We can't prove that Einstein or Jefferson were on the spectrum.



That doesn't mean we're the panacea.



Sure. That doesn't mean that autism is the cure for it. That means we're doing things wrong. And NTs and Autistics are finding out about it at the same rate.

Basically, nothing you've said has anything to do with evolution except some dubious prediction of increased population ultimately leading to specieshood. NT handling of things, autistic "superiority", and the climate do not mean that we are more advanced. Just different.

You seem to have taken several things I've said as implications that we are "inferior." We are not. Autistics span the entire IQ spectrum from supergeniuses to mentally deficient. Ours is most ly a social disorder, and frankly, when it comes to socialization we are inferior. You can not, repeat NOT demand that the world change to conform to you. You must live in the world you're in. You're where you are. Where we are, in this world, we have difficulties. You can work on those difficulties to lessen them, or you can say that we're perfect and special and the world just has to get used to us. Which path is more successful, do you think?

You make a gigantic assumption that everyone gets those traits: ever visited a forum called "Wrong planet" before? Its filled of Aspies who have intelligence ranging from dumb as a rock to mensa material. Some have zero creativity and some are very emotional.

Whatever you may think, the way you are, is not representative to everyone with aspergers. Do some research.

The world does get used to us but as soon as our ideas become mainstream we demand even more change.

And what ideas are those that a brilliant NT couldn't come up with? What makes us so special that the monolith of civilization must bend to accommodate us? Facts, please, my friend, not rhetoric.

Antipathy.

I spent most of my life trying to be "normal" It didn't work or make me happy. So I stopped and decided to be who I am. That worked, I'm now very happy in my world.

I refuse to be typecast as something by others, but that just me.

Like I said earlier, being a spectrum condition, theres is probably a sweet spot. I'm not suggesting we are all the stuff of Homo Superior, I'm putting out question to stimulate thought, hopefully along a line that we can feel good about with our differences.

Of course all this conjecture is purely that.

I'm having fun with it, you guys must be too cause you keep at it. Thats great.

Been reading much Nietzsche? I hate the term "Homo superior". Nothing is superior to anything else. There are hierarchies, that's natural, but mutations aside, almost everything is perfectly adapted to fit its own evolutionary niche. It also suggests that we are in some way superior or "more evolved" than anyone else. Evolution, in its early years as a theory, was shockingly used to argue in favor of racism. Many argued that whites were more evolved than all, and blacks were the bottom rung of the evolutionary latter. Even Darwin himself believe that while we were one race, there was a hierarchy of "savage" races. The idea that we are more evolved or less evolved or whatnot is nonsense. That's not how evolution works. Deeming even the best of us as "superior" is wrong at best and narcissistic at worse. We are the production of a mutation. We are slightly different. There's no correlation between pure ability and autism. All there is is social disability. That is all.

I do not mean to suggest anything other than feeling good about ourselves. We are just as worthy of respect, and just as capable of holding up our achievements and demanding it, as any NT. We are just as human. No more so. No less so.

I would love if everyone on this site, if everyone in the world could feel better about themselves. I will not, however, allow evolution to be misused, as it once was, to promote some wrongheaded idea of superiority.



Nothing I enjoy more than a hearty debate

Maybe a look back at history when man evolved in the cave man era would help. Did the ones who were inventive and developed great hunting tools evolve more than the ones who did not? Or was it luck of the draw, as in certain cavemen did not freeze to death so they helped steer the human race?

Has there always been humans with ASD?

Am I overthinking this and I do like to sit around and think about things sometimes.

Maybe people with ASD evolved so that human beings interested in science or music exclusively could help invent new and better ways to do things, etc. etc.

There's no such thing as evolving more...

Those that survived long enough to reproduce and lacked any genetic traits that might prevent reproduction, and also conformed to what was considered sexually desirable (sexual selection plays a HUGE role) passed on their genes. Genes that prevent reproduction in any way die out. That is all.

We have no idea or way of proving when or how ASD happened.



Evolution's a fundamentally simple concept. A lot of people overthink it.

And there's nothing wrong with sitting around thinking about things.



Evolution does not have a purpose. It doesn't look for ways to guide us to a brighter tomorrow. It helps us adapt to the world as it is right now.

ASD is a genetic accident. It's a copying error in DNA. There's no purpose behind it, no grandiose design leading us to a brighter day. That doesn't mean it's wrong. It just means there's no purpose to it. No one's pulling the strings.

Ok Ok we won't use Homo Superior if you're squemish about it. I didn't actually claim that we were of course, if you care to read the sentence, but I digress.

Of course time and the course of events will dictate what the "move?" will be along the evolutionary arc. Actually Life has not evolved to suit the condition, but to take advantage of unexploited possibilities. Prior to life taking hold the encvironment was hostile to all but the primative and hardy organisms. It was life that created the conditions (with the available materials) that are now current and able to sustain complexity of the degreeneeded to bring about consciousness.

Homo Superior/ Nuovo Whatever will be the next identifyable species of humanoid whether it has a line through aspergers or not.

I am suggesting that HF aspergers display some characteristics that would / could be advantageous in the next hominid

Aspie traits could be advantageous, or they could not be. Or they could be irrelevant. We have no idea what challenges our species will face. We have no idea what the course of sexual selection will be. For all we know, the next distinct descendant species could very well be adapting to life on Mars, or Titan, or Alpha Centauri Beta. Whatever happens, it will be interesting. I just don't know what the course will be. ASD is a fairly new on the scene. Until we develop an understanding of exactly what causes it, how the allele is transmitted, what all of the strengths and weaknesses of it are, we have no idea where it'll be generations from now. As with hominid evolution, it will be interesting.

My only problem is that the idea of transcendental evolution, goal-oriented evolution is a fallacy. No one trait is the beginning of any new species. Species differentiation is a result of the unpredictable winds of sexual selection, changes to habitat, changes to food sources. We have no idea where we're going.

And with that, I'm off to bed.

To get a new species an already existing species must be separated into two or more distinct portions which cannot exchange genetic material with other portions. This could be accomplished by a the breeding population being separated by a geographical or geological barrier that cannot be easily crossed.


ruveyn