Autism = "Crazy"?

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Haha, no, I meant what I wrote. I wasn't trying to be sarcastic. I also wanted to be clear that I'm not representing some kind of wrong planet group consensus.'

When people mention not knowing trivia, I tend to find the information and share it.

I didn't notice you'd posted the fun quiz until after I wrote the response. I thought you were talking about the quiz Borat's cousin wrote.

A sense of humor is always helpful (assuming one gets the jokes).

I haven't read Jaynes' book yet, but I've read discussion about it over the years. The idea itself is really fascinating even if it's not true or not entirely true. I have had brief a psychotic episode, after going without sleep for too many days straight, and the sensation of hearing a voice is, er, interesting and definitely different from conscious thought. Not something I want to do again, however.

I find the things burnbridge said interesting. I've heard of some of that before but I haven't read any of those things.

Google "Medjugorje". It's a town in Bosnia where several people who were young teenagers in the eighties have been seeing and writing down messages from Mary. Not God, just His Mother and messenger. Some of them are still getting messages on the 25th of every month, that you can read on the main website, some of them stopped getting them as they got older. One girl gets an extra vision and message on her birthday. They aren't called either "insane" or "crazy", just "Visionaries", because they see visions. I don't think anybody labels them "crazy", though they aren't considered "Saints", either. Sometimes whole crowds of people see miracles there, like the sun dancing. Sometimes the hardware of rosary beads changes color. There are healings.

Maybe some people privately think the Visionaries are crazy, or lying, but they're generally too polite to say so.

While not logged into any google account (as it saves search history in some and modifies results based on that), you either needed to read the titles of the top two results (not even the rest of the summary not to mention the page), or go to the first wikipedia page mentioned (knowing that wikipedia tends to be good at that sort of information).

It really wasn't "read every word of every page in top 10 results" it was "glance at what the top ten results were".

Probably IQ and intoversion create the gap. From what you posted up here at WP, and in my opinion, there is something much more here than these two. Your mind doc. seems competent and can offer the solution to the problem, soon.

Last edited by Mdyar on 18 Oct 2011, 4:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.

The colloquial definition of crazy is "doesn't share consensus reality" which is not quite the same as "doesn't share the most common type of neurology". You can have a neurology different from many people but still share consensus reality, as apparently happens here on WP. It is very rare that a poster says something that indicates they do not share consensus reality. On the few ocassions it happens, other posters will gently suggest a psychiatrist. This is my way of saying that "shares consensus reality" does not mean "thinks like everybody else".

As Verdandi noted, you can share consensus reality while having a very different neurological experience from others. People who had religious visions and talked to spirits long ago still shared consensus reality because it was understood by the general public that such things were possible, even if most people didn't experience it. Thus they weren't "crazy". Back then there did seem to be a label for people who diverged wildly from consensus reality and it was "possessed by demons". Those people no longer shared consensus reality to the extent that it was thought a demon had taken over, shoving aside the human.

As Burnbridge noted, the label "crazy" can get stuck on when a particular experience doesn't change over time (like hearing voices) but the consensus does. When hearing voices stops being common, those who still do no longer share the consensus reality and get the label "crazy" which they wouldn't have had millenia ago when it was a shared experience.

In this way, autism =/= crazy because a consensus reality is shared...at least here on WP. Do autistic people who can't/don't post share consensus reality? I have no way of knowing.

Still, regardless of the correct definition of "crazy," I feel that many people consider Aspies as crazy, especially if the Aspie has not explained their brain to the the observer. The term tends to get used more as "someone I don't understand" - aka, someone who is weird or different. I've been called crazy and a maniac by so many people over the years....

Oh and, Verandi: My understanding that the main arguments against Jayne's theory are that he chose to publish his book in the popular market instead of in a scientific journal, thus making it non-scientific. Also, those studies from wwII were done on prisoners, which supposedly invalidates their data... Just because someone doesn't play by the accepted rules of the scientific community does not automatically mean that they are incorrect.

anecdote closed.

Last edited by Mdyar on 18 Oct 2011, 4:52 pm, edited 1 time in total.

double

Last edited by Mdyar on 18 Oct 2011, 1:24 am, edited 2 times in total.

Doesnt crazyness refer to "trying the same thing over and over without learning that it doesnt work... vs. that it works"?

Like not being able to understand logic?

Then I'll put it this way: when the licensed mental-health professional evaluated me, she told me to my face that while I may have some issues with trust, I am not insane, and that I'm surprisingly well-adjusted for someone who has had to deal with AS/HFA for over 50 years without support or even knowing what I was dealing with.

She further explained to me that, in my case, having AS is like color-blindness, in that I simply can not perceive certain subliminal forms of communication, and also that multiple forms of communication occurring at the same time tend to come across to me as noise.

This means that I communicate best in one-on-one situations, where the person I'm communicating with says what they mean and means what they say.

NO. Autistic people are talent, cute, navie, and we are not crazy!

Sorry for quoting myself

But after thinking about this a little, Ive changed my mind. I think what I first suggested is related to stupidity instead.

And regarding craziness, maybe its the fantasy we use to fill the slots. Like what we assume instead of knowing it. If this is true, being a person who tend to think too much, I would say... hell YEAH Im pretty crazy.

I wouldnt change it for anything though

Ah, I was called "strange" in elementary school for what others noticed of my disorders, then "insane" and a "danger". It must have been quite a sight to watch a class of secondary school students follow me down the yard and shouting and calling me a "psycho, psycho".

So yeah, kids and adults were dead sure that what they saw of autism (and other disorders) = crazy.

These days people who know me fairly well regularly semi-jokingly remind me of that I'm a complete lunatic - not meaning my ADHD or ASD but my "personality". I'd say lunacy is quite close.

Looks like there are people who think that autism and such = unfamiliar/different but normal.

I would say it's actually a form of perseveration and doesn't relate directly to intelligence.

"The definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again" is a popular quotation of Einstein's, but not the actual definition of insanity.