AS and other type of humans.

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Genes simply are not deterministic, they operate in an open system whereby genes interact with other genes, any given gene can produce many different proteins given how many different DNA they can interact with. Not only that, chromosomes interact highly randomly with cells, with cells being influenced general biological happenings. Similar genetics do not produce anything like similar results, if autism genes actually exist then many people with them will not become autistic (and some people without those genes can be autistic (I think, my biology is admittedly rusty)). Of course, genes certainly influence, but genetic determinism is largely discredited in research and it always takes time for fields where science has been applied (i.e. mental health) to catch up.

Nadesan, Constructing Autism, 2005

Autism is certainly biological but it exist at a higher level than genes. I'm not totally sure where, this is a key question for autistic research, one perhaps even philosophical so may never be properly answered.

Last edited by oppositedirection on 27 Apr 2009, 9:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Let 'im...what makes you think he's better than you? As I always tell people "if I were running in a national election against John McCain, and we had a televised debate, he'd destroy me in a historical landslide that would make Reagan look second rate. Of course, if I typed my opinions out, I could take out him and Obama combined in one fell swoop".

No, I'm not trying to be political here; just trying to really give you guys an idea of the scope.

Because you can communicate better on text yeah, me too. When you remove NTs with all their body language they are quite weak.

Well, I do like the thought involved in generating the idea.

I do not think we are going to be ruling over anyone though.
I have never met a violent AS who would impose ideas by force.
And this is what it would take to deal with NT's.

Those with AS are generally not interested in ruling; but in rather peaceful coexistence.

Got to go to the lowest common denominator to rule.

Unfortunately.

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Last edited by Jamin on 27 Apr 2009, 10:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Now THIS is very interesting.

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Newton and Einstein are old news...

But I've always wondered whether Otto Lilienthal and perhaps the Wright Brothers were AS.....

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The autism=neanderthal theory is ignored because it has been soundly discredited. There was very little real evidence to support the rampant speculation involved in the theory. It may be resurrected if additional evidence can be found; but so far it's little more than wishful thinking. Allegations of superiority are pure nonsense unsupported by any evidence at all.

And claiming that autism is purely genetic is also a gross overstatement. The most recent verified research, particularly twin studies, indicates that AS has a complex eitiology involving a number of different genetic components, and very likely some sort of pre-natal epigenetic trigger as well.

Well the neanderthal theory may have been soundly discredited in the minds of many, but for those who can make connections and have put time and energy into figuring out the truth behind this theory and not just trying to find proofs to discredit it will find that it is most certainly true, even if no proof that PHD's will recognize exists. There exists enough "proof" and logic in my own mind to believe the theory is true nearly 100 %. Although no solid evidence may have been found to support it, no solid evidence can rise up against it and the reason that no solid evidence is rising up against it is because people want to think that modern humans won out over the neanderthals and we did not breed with them so they cover up the truth/don't look for it. I could list all my proofs but I'd rather not since people who would understand how my proofs are proof of the neanderthal theory are rare even on this forum. Plus I'm sure you don't even want to hear my proofs since you have already made your mind up about the theory and I must obviously be wrong. Basically if you cannot look at the neanderthal theory and understand how it must be true by connecting your experiences in your life to the theory and science then no proof I can offer you would change your beliefs.
Also the pre-natal trigger could be genetic as well....................everything could be genetic. I don't care about studies most people who study are stupid anyways.
I guess people like me are not the people who will get most people to believe in the theory because I am too out there but oh well at least I am right.

Bram Cohen isn't

He invented bittorrent

I don't know about you , but I am afraid of the other"types" of homonids ! !
I really know what you mean, yet we need to try to communicate with "them" . We really need to have some sort of understanding. Only "through" communication and understanding can we get along .

Where as those who can make connections and put the time and energy into evaluating the just-so tale's relevance and likelihood will find both very low indeed.
There is no proof at all, the evidential body is less than compelling.

The reason is actually because it is not something that can be proved using the information we have or can currently access, nor is it something that is indicated by the evidence we do have. There is no current practical means of investigating this notion robustly, nor there is currently a compelling case for bothering to do so.

That's big talk for someone who seems ignorant of the distinction between evidence and proof. There is no proof for the Neanderthal theory; just speculation and some circumstantial evidence. There is better evidence for the earth being only approximately 6000 years old.

So this is a faith principal rather than a scientific theory even in your own view?


Sure, you got that way by refusing to educate yourself through mundane stuff like studying or concerning yourself with scientific evidence, but by belief through connection to your experiences. I guess we all make up our minds our own way.

Pandd, I am aware that I am a huge hypocrite and that I seem to be a hugely illogical, and a very wrong person, who is clearly an idiot for having a seemingly irrational belief in something that must be false. I apologize for being unable to make a logical argument for the truth in the neanderthal theory of autism. I am a horrible debater and it takes a lot of energy out of me to write long things due to executive dysfunction especially only to have a low chance of gaining the validation of people who I will probably never meet but here goes.

BUT WHAT ELSE COULD ASPERGER'S POSSIBLY BE OTHER THAN THIS?!

You claim the neanderthal theory has no relevance? What else is more relevant in the history of mankind? I say that this is one of the most important historical discoveries in all of man's history.
You claim there is no proof at all, but considering the fact that a skeleton has been found exhibiting partly neanderthal and partly cro-magnon skeletal structure, wouldn't this be proof enough for something very strange indeed in the genetic make up of some humans, considering that neanderthals and cro-magnons were kept apart for nearly one million years? Is it at all possible that in addition to having different shape bodies, neanderthals also had different brains, and even if there was only a few cross-breedings, evidence of which may never be found, wouldn't some modern humans at least have some neanderthal brain in them considering they were not eliminated from the gene pool? Aren't pretty much the only humans alive today who would be considered as having brains that are almost like those of a different species are those people on the autistic spectrum?

Also if you look into rdos's website you will find that a neanderthal flute has been found that was probably made thousands of years before similar flutes made by cro-magnons were ever found. Archeological evidence has found that neanderthals had tools of the same or even greater quality than cro-magnons at the time, and cro-magnons never possessed better tools than those of the neanderthals until after they had encountered each other in the same regions. Neanderthals also had spirituality and religion, and clearly were not less intelligent than cro-magnons, in fact they were most likely more intelligent, and this is from archeological evidence that you can find pretty legit proof of on the internet if you were to look for it. But you're probably not interested and I'm not interested in looking up the links.

What is not to believe? That neanderthals were more intelligent than the cro-magnons, that they interbred with each other, that the cross-breeds could have children, or that neanderthals possessed brains that were autistic in nature??!?!?!?! All of these points seem very likely to be true in my perception, except for the cross-breeds having children, which I admit is a bit of a leap of faith but considering the many other physical traits that are common among present day aspies I see it as being very likely.

I ask you have you even read the neanderthal theory in its entirety? I find it hard to believe that an intelligent person could read the entire thing and be autistic and still not believe it, especially after searching diligently for evidence that could prove or disprove it, and not just discredit it after reading it once, but perhaps this is a personal error in judgement.

You're right, I don't know the difference between evidence and proof, but I fail to see how it is relevant. I would like some of your evidence that the earth is 6000 years old that trumps my evidence of the neanderthal theory.

Here are some interesting things that I have noticed that are part of my "evidence".

1. We all feel like we are part of a similar tribe, we relate to each other's styles of communication much better than we relate to that of NT's and than NT's can relate to ours. Wouldn't this seem strange considering that we are apparently missing some "mirror cells" or what ever that dumb theory is? Wouldn't a person who is socially impaired have an even harder time understanding the social communication of a person who is also socially impaired? Why is it that we so often just "get" each other and frequently marry and befriend one another? Is it only because we are so desperate for love that we would accept the love of anyone, even a similarly neurologically "defective" human? Or is it something deeper, something of a physical, mental, emotional and spiritual nature?
We look in the photo section of this site and find that we have found our people. Clearly there must be some genetic link that we are of a tribe that existed long ago. If this is believed is it so hard to think that maybe our tribe interbred with NT's and are not just a biological mistake of NT genes or are the experimental "evolution" of NT genes. No, aspie traits must have been useful and were selected for naturally a long time ago, probably in Northern Europe, which is coincidentally also where the Neanderthals used to inhabit. Another apparent coincidence is that most people on the autistic spectrum have ancestors who were from northern Eurasia. The occurence of autism, bipolar, add, schizophrenia, etc among pure African blacks and other peoples who did not breed with the neanderthals very much is probably nil, although probably no evidence will be found of this because it is so politically incorrect.

2. Why is it that technology so rapidly increased only in Europe in the last few thousand years, and a bit in Asia? Perhaps the perfect neanderthal-cro-magnon hybrid finally walked the earth - the aspie. Or more likely perhaps the right percentage of neanderthal and cro-magnon genetics were in the population of Europe and lead to the ultimate domination of humans via technology. The cross-breeding of neanderthals and cro-magnons are what indirectly lead to the superpower of America.
Why is it that Africans did not create technology? Oh yeah they didn't need to it was so hot and full of life in Africa it was not necessary. Why is it that the native american peoples of North America did not create the technology that the Europeans did, considering that they were in a similarly cold environment. Must've been luck right?

3. This point concerns Rdos. Why would a man, an aspie, an INTP on the myers-briggs typology system, who is clearly not an idiot, do so much work as to create this theory, and even created aspie-quiz, a tool which so many people use and have no idea that it actually pertains to neanderthals and cro-magnons, and are always confounded by the hunting aspect of it, not knowing that it pertains to actual hunting? Clearly there must at least be some truth to it even if the concrete evidence that so many people rely on to make their judgements of reality are somewhat lacking? I mean, does the damn thing have to be taught in school for people to believe it, or at least admit that it is a possibility? For more intuitive people who can make the connections there is not much else that needs to be proven, the proof is in the enigma of the present day aspie.

The neanderthal theory is interesting, I've not read about it on the internet but I'd like to provide some criticism on what you've written.

Firstly, in relation to my above point about genetics, there has been a number of posts yesterday about the new study comes out, bbc autism news story, it sort of proves my point that there has to be more than genes. However, it is certainly possible that if neanderthals had significantly different brains then different genetic interactions will have happened and so those autistic genes could have theoretically produce autism very regularly. My points stand for modern autism in humans, not neanderthals.

Okay, I accept that humans may have got religion from neanderthals, I've not heard about the tools and flutes but I believe you. I'd caution though that this implies higher intelligence. Social structure and even sophisticated social relations is something that usually arises due to material conditions, that being to keep things together and working those groups people that adopt social relations are far more likely to survive if they have sophisticated social relations. They might have been more intelligence but equally they might have had similar or lesser intelligence, there is no way of knowing, I just point out that sophisticated social relations does not automatically imply higher intelligence. The flutes interest me, I've no idea if artistic expression implies higher intelligence according to anthropology, I might look into that... But I accept there's certainly a fair chance they were more intelligence and interbreeding may have happened.

However, does more intelligent mean more autistic (or mentally ill)? I can't talk about other mental illness but I've always suspected autistic people's vaunted intelligence is actually the effort and focus they put into whatever they do, not some innate intelligence. Perhaps I'm a stupid one, but comparing myself to many postgraduate students I knew, I got the impression they got there because of intelligence, me because of obsessive work. I could be mistaken and I suppose postgraduates are more likely to be intelligent than your average person. However, I will say that obsession is usually something fairly personal, and so works against sophisticated social relations. I'm not religious myself but I remember not really liking going to church as a child because, I realise now, I did not get the subtle social interactions and roles taking place. Would autistic neaderthals really have created religion and spirituality, even if they were more intelligent?

No mental illness in Black Africans? You want to see some programs about the affects of recent civil wars on their mental health (I think its on the internet, I'll search for it later). You could say that's not biological but it's generally accepted that mental illness often needs environmental factors to activate it. Perhaps autism is an exception, I am unsure.

I'll accept that most your arguments until this point have been pretty good, don't prove anything but neither do the counter arguments. However, this point here is completely wrong. History of science is somewhat of a speciality for me. It's a big question, why did science (and subsequently excessive development of technology) occur in late 1500s europe? Why did this not happen in China when it was at its peak of power while European population lived in tribes and huts in pre BC times. Or why not during the middle east in medieval times, where Islamic scholars kept learning going while europe went through the so called dark ages? Hell, if talking about strict genetic similarities then why not the Romans, they ruled for long enough and the scientific revolution did eventually start in Italy? There are so many different answers to these questions but all are social and have nothing to do with intelligence (the theory I follow focuses on a philosophy that was popular in late 1500s, neo platonism, which suggests that reality was ultimately mathematical and so mathematics was the best way to understand reality, hence physics followed, specifically due to trying to account for some of errors the telescope showed in Aristotelian cosmology. Copernicus, Kepler and Galilieo were all followers of neo platonism). However, my point is all these explanations point to social factors, after all, neaderthals were long gone and whatever genetic impact they left had been there for thousands of years before the scientific revolution. So there had to have been other causes.

Your arguments are interesting, I don't have a problem with the influence of neaderthals on humans (I hate humans to be honest, but am yet to be convinced autistics are any better). It's good for research into autism to take many approaches, but its only research and theories, there's no proof either way. However, I will say your points about science are completely wrong.

Just about anything.
In fact there is no reason to believe there is a single common cause. Maybe there is, maybe there is not. From this maybe, whether one or many actual causes are entailed, potential causes are numerous.

If the history or mankind were relevant to the lives of many people, many more people would be more familiar with more of the history of mankind. What difference does it make to the average life of the average person autistic or not, other than for its interest value?

More to the point, I can see no particular productive insight that would emerge. We know little about autism and little about Neanderthals and saying they are the same, does not lead to any further insight or useful line of investigation into anything. If it were true, so what? We cannot prove it, and even if we could, how is meaningful besides being a "curiosity"?

Indeed there is no proof. Proof is a very high standard and the evidential and speculative case for this theory does not come close to meeting that standard.

Interpreting old bones is a far from exact science. In fact there can be much controversy over the taxonomic classification system, much less where the actual bones of early hominids fit into that classification system. We have limited examples on which to extrapolate "stereotypes" of the less than clear sub-types considered to be represented in the record, and not every member of a sub-type will be stereotypical (by a long stretch). For decades the view of Neanderthals was mis-shaped by the interpretation of atypical remains as being typically representative.

I do not know quite what you mean about being separated by nearly a million years, but it's less than clear what you believe the relevance of such a skeleton would be in proving anything whatsoever about AS anyway.

Not necessarily. Even if cross-breeding occurred there is no reason why the genes would be retained in the gene pool, even if the off-spring of such cross-breedings were reproductively viable.

Even if the genes were retained in the gene pool what you are suggesting is not plausible. We all have the descendant genes of earlier ape-like forms, so why if what you suggest is viable, then we would at least occasionally see instances of anatomically modern humans giving birth to atavistic ape-like primates.

The intelligence or musical aptitude or interests of Neanderthals is completely irrelevant to the truth value of the theory.


All of it. Why stop at the mid-lower Paleolithic, why not suggest AS is the result of a modern human giving birth to someone with a H. erectus brain? Every human living has descendant genes of H. erectus, so why are not giving birth to atavistic H. erectus or H. erectus-brained people as an explanation for Autism?

The latter is a major stumbling point.
That even if all the above were true, that this would result in autism today is an even bigger stumbling block.


Right, like dandruff, which we know Neanderthals had as a result of finding fossilized remains of medicated anti-dandruff shampoo in conjunction with Neanderthal remains?
When someone suggests to you Neanderthals had dandruff, is there some reason why this alone would not make you skeptical of everything else they are saying? How on this earth would they know that?

It might make some difference that I have a vague familiarity with archeology and evolutionary science, and am seemingly more skeptical than yourself of claims about knowledge that is currently unknowable (such as claims that Neanderthals had dandruff).

You can find equally speculative cherry picking of science and equally colourful interpretations on most "young earth" web sites. Even "scientific evidence" such as "evidence of world wide flood" and "evidence against the validity of current dating techniques".

We do not all feel part of a similar tribe. My autistic nephew relates better to his non-autistic mother than to me. People relate best most usually to the familiar. People with autism can have similar experiences, and may be more likely to share cognitive or communicative traits with other autistic people, making them more familiar seeming and therefore easier to relate to. The same can be true of many other traits, as evidenced by things as diverse as "Deaf culture", racism, and the banding together of fans of particular music genres, replete with particular fashions and language trends.
Would it seem strange if some theory you describe as dumb did happen to be correct? It's not relevant unless the theory you are describing as dumb is also correct.
Would not a person who cannot hear and is therefore impaired in communication, not be more impaired communicating with someone else with the same exact impairment? Having gone to a school with a class of deaf people in attendance and routinely sharing activities with my class, I can state from direct observation that the answer to that is an unequivocal "no".

Well it's not uncommon for other minorities to do this, why should we be any different?

Nothing in the photo section gives me cause to believe I have found "my people". They look like photos of people pure and simple to me.

Why must have they been useful and selected for as "Aspie traits"?

Not so far as I know from any research that could demonstrate as much one way or the other. It's certainly true that socio-economic status influences likelihood of diagnosis and there is an association between ethnicity and socio-economic status in the very places where autism is most pervasively diagnosed.


More speculation does not help the case, and further I very much doubt this speculation would hold up to scrutiny.
Perhaps technology has a tendency to facilitate technology. In fact it clearly does. The development of technology over the last few thousand years does not bolster the theory that autism is caused by Neanderthal ancestors.

I do not consider it was luck or biological superiority/inferiority, and find the multi-factorial explanations of the likes of Jared Diamond, far more compelling than "biological superiority of Eurasians as compared to Africans, Americans and Pacificans, due to Neanderthal ancestry in the earlier but not latter groups".

Why would an intelligent person come up with the notion of phlogiston? Why would so many intelligent people believe it? People make mistakes, intelligent people make mistakes. Why would all those other intelligent people not believe the theory? Intelligent people do not always agree, so being intelligent cannot be proof of being correct.

No, the fact that someone deemed an authority states something, does not make the something so....and this is why this kind of reasoning is commonly known as "fallacy of authority" or "fallacious call to authority". It is very well known that "who" is stating something does not constitute a proof as to the truth of their statement.


"Enigma of the present day aspie"?
The same could be argued if the theory was "aliens came to earth, bred with early humans and AS is just throw-backs to our alien ancestor's brain traits".

Translation - "It is true because I fell that it is true, even without any real evidence"

Things without no proof that have been stated in this thread:

- Autism comes from Neaderthal genes

- Autists are more inteligent than neurotypicals (if we don't count with the "diagnosis"of Michael Fitzgerald, what real evidence there is for that?)

And how the high IQ of Jews fit in these theories? They are any evidence of a neaderthal population in midlle east?