Expressing Doubts: First Scientific Refutal Of Asperger's

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You have to care about how the person feels in order to feel empathetic. But you don't have to care about how someone feels in order to understand what emotion they are feeling. You can also be apathetic and not empathetic at the same time. Maybe you have been empathetic in other situations but in this case with your therapist, the way you responded is not empathy because you didn't care how she felt.

Hi IdleHands, I agree that my Quargs analogy was perhaps not the most logically sound argument. I think I tried to introduce too many ideas and so the main point got lost a bit along the way. I have written a more rational argument for what I was trying to say

1. A develepmental disorder is not just a collection of identifiable symptoms, a developmental disorder assumes a mechanism.

Suppose you define a disorder with symptoms A, B and C. If A B and C have independent causes, then it would be following an incorrect scientific method to study the causes of (ABC) as a whole, as obviously, to study the causes of ABC you simply have to study the causes of A, B and C separately. Furthermore, if you introduce a 4th independent symptom D, you could introduce new developmental disorders ABD, and DBC which would have equally valid staus as disorders, and so calling the set of independent symptoms ABC a disorder, and not DBC would be an arbitrary decision. In conclusion, designating ABC a disorder, if its symptoms were not linked would be scientifically invalid.

If, on the other hand, A, B and C are not independent symptoms, then there must be an underlying scientific reason that A B and C tend to be linked.

Therefore, for (ABC) to exist as a developmental disorder, it is assumed that ABC must have one or more mechanisms that cause symtoms A, B and C to be linked. If A B and C are found to be not linked in any way, then it will become inppropriate to continue classifying it as a developmental disorder.

2. There is no currently agreed mechanism(s) for why the symptoms of Aspergers syndrome appear together. This means that the status of Asperger syndrome as a developmental disorder is in doubt.

3. The arguments put forward in this thread are mostly in the vein of "The symptoms of Asperger syndrome are observed to occur together in a statistically significant proportion of people, thus this is sufficient evidence that the symptoms of Asperger Syndrome are linked".

Since observing Asperger syndrome in patients is a highly subjective and controversial matter (evidence: 1.Most people with Aspergers do not display all of the symptoms 2. Aspergers is considered to be highly difficult to diagnose due to its symptoms being extreme variations of normal behaviour, and there is suggestion of widespread misdiagnosis/overdiagnois 3.Diagnosis of Aspergers is fluid, with at one point 1 in 10 people referred for diagnosis being women, now that number is more like 1 in 4) whatever scientific evidence there is for the prevelence and linking of Asperger syndrome symptoms is heavily thrown into doubt. There is certainly no definitive scientific proof that Aspergers symptoms are linked.

In summary, we cannot solidly prove that the symptoms of Asperger syndrome are linked, as such we cannot definatively prove that Aspergers exists as a developmental diasability.

I'm glad you found it useful. As I said, I do find what you are saying to be interesting and thought provoking, and as you can tell I am sympathetic to your arguments.

I just hope you aren't too depressed about posting in a thread full of frankly quite vicious and immature criticism.

Foxfield-

But, Aspergers is a syndrome! Not a disorder! I'm totally joking

I think what your saying is that we are still in the discovery phase with the cause of Aspergers; if so I agree.

I think he deserves a bit of smack-down. His first post was so presumptuous and full of illogical arguments. Though he himself thinks he was a master of logic, and that logic alone proves a concept to be true.

First scientific refutal of Asperger’s was the title.

Epic fail for 10 years of research and study of the subject. I'm guessing it was his first attempt at a rebuttal, not the scientific community’s first attempt to refute.

As for arguing his points, they are so laughable I couldn't be bothered.

I'm personally not a fan of having the stuff I live with every day being trivialized, denied, or written off as "personality traits." MoonCanvas' description of AS and autism both do not match anything I experience, so I wonder how he can hope to speak regarding a condition I have been diagnosed with. As far as I can tell, he's not even talking about that condition.

A discussion about how autism's etiology is not fully understood, and that there may be several different conditions that are being labeled as "autism" would certainly be constructive, and not involve making unverified and unverifiable claims.

ditto

I didn't want to say this until I found my source, but what the heck...
Recent advances in brain imaging seem to show a difference about how two parts of the brain communicate with each other in autistic people as compared to non-autistic people. (pretty sure it was front to back) I don't remember whether it's a difference in speed or a complete failure, and it is early days in the research, and I don't remember whether it is from a TED talk or part of the psyc classes I just took at Uni.
When I find it, I'll post it, if I can. Some information is privileged, and you can't just spread it around without permission, so you may not be aware, MoonCanvas, but a lot of research is not available to the open public, at least not without a price. (I mean real research, not youtube)

The point is that just because an exact cause or mechanism has not yet been identified, does not mean that there is not one. The brain is complex, interconnected, plastic, and controls the rest of the body, as well as vague things like emotions, ideas etc. So the fact that a specific problem in the brain could manifest itself in multiple ways in different people should not be a surprise.

If we knew everything about everything, then we wouldn't need scientists, now, would we?

And maybe the people who diagnosed you were wrong. Most of us know that 'professionals' differ. Maybe you're not autistic, just something else.
You lumped an entire community with yourself based on your own experiences and dismissed the reason why they even are a community in the first place. You also dismissed the problems they suffer through every day, and you have not even met them.
People don't like that.

They have been kind because we have all been young and full of it once. I am confidant you will change your mind multiple times in your life and look back and see your mistakes. If you don't, then you will be stagnating and it will be a sign of lack of intelligence, which according to you, you don't have.

Having severe reactions to certain noises/smells/lighting isn't what I would call a "personality trait."
Not understanding the social climate around me isn't something I'd call a "personality trait."
A consistent and unintentional deficit in appropriate reaction to social cues isn't something I'd call a "personality trait."

Things that I would consider examples of "Personality Traits:"
-Being rather sensitive about sad topics or movies
-Being easily or not-so-easily offended by off-handed insults
-Being a flirt

I'm another one who is somewhat disgruntled at my particular difficulties being categorized as mere "personality traits." You won't be convincing me any time soon that what is happening isn't really happening. As for the cause? Sure, if we don't know the cause, then we don't know the cause. But the reality of the condition? Well....

Your last sentence makes me think you're writing this off as a "autistics are just acting" stance that most radical-conservatives make. That is not my stance and I don't know if you've been reading the posts.


In all fairness, I myself was diagnosed with autism, I had just as much of a right to reject its existence as everyone else does to accept it. If posters realized this then they may have not found me so offensive. To your defense, I probably shouldn't mentioned as much in the opening post.


Empathy is defined as the capacity to recognize emotions that are being experienced by another sentient or fictional being. I was certainly empathetic, just immoral. And if I could continue further, my immorality was a response to my therapist's insensitivity. Though it doesn't matter, I did care about my therapist's feelings; she felt like she had a higher worth(grandiosity), and this was established by her refusal to acknowledge she was wrong about my failure to understand empathy. Besides; normal people are allowed to use any tools whatsoever in identifying someone's emotions, but somehow I couldn't? That was an obvious double standard. For anyone still interested who hasn't watched yet, there's a fun little video that explains the difference between lack of empathy and apathy.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5jrUg_kXjY[/youtube]


My opening post was just an attempt to spark conversation, which has already been beaten to a dead horse quite enough. You then criticize my reasoning and go on to say that you won't be taking part in any of the conversation. Are you just putting your head in the sand because I said something you don't agree with? There's plenty of good points made on page 5 but almost nobody(aside from one poster) has tried debating them, maybe because they can't.


I took your disclaimer to heart and won't hold it to you for not currently having the research data. However, many theories as to autism's cause are speculated and none of them ever survive critique. As for the idea that information about autism is being withheld from non-scientists, I think that notion is crock; (Not insulting your intelligence here, just an analogy)when Glenn Beck was questioned about where Noah's Ark was, he said that only the chosen ones were allowed to know where. In any case, both are conspiracy theories. Almost anything you need to know about health related topics can be found online.

It was clear people would greet my assertion with hostility, and that's fine by me since it was expected. However, as I was diagnosed with autism multiple times, it'd be self serving to suggest I've suffered through no problems.

If you think I'm just full of it, then you're mistaken. We have waited decades upon decades for a cause and cure to be revealed, yet we still know virtually nothing about how autism works. It makes complete sense some of us would eventually begin to question what is going on, which is what you're seeing here in this thread. The scientists of the 1950's were able to cure the deadly polio virus into extinction and yet I'm supposed to believe modern scientists are finally after centuries of research going to uncover the secrets behind autism?


First off, it'd take multiple personality traits, not just a personality trait like you think I suggested.

Yes, the reality of the condition, or rather your condition, is that there is a cause that causes you to be so moderate/severe. However, saying autism did it does nothing to further our understanding of why you and others are the way you are. Check below:
Current consensus: Many cause(s)---->causes autism---->autism traits
My consensus: Step 2 serves no scientific purpose
Step 2 does not really exist, nor is there a reason for it to. What's causing your symptoms could be a number of things, and autism doesn't fit into the picture. You could have Congenital Rubella Syndrome, or a brain lesion impairing your empathy, or any one of the many brain abnormalities that can cause you the problems you have.

Your confusion here is that you think that diagnoses have something to do with serving a scientific purpose. Diagnoses serve a purpose of identifying a person's needs and treatments. These diagnostic categories are also used in research to better understand the traits that are identified as connected in some way to the diagnosis. But...telling someone their diagnosis serves no scientific purpose serves no purpose at all. It's utterly meaningless because that's not the point of a diagnosis. What you're trying to do here is just as meaningless because you are not helping anyone here come to a better understanding of their difficulties, symptoms, or traits that are associated with autism.

I strongly suggest checking out NIMH's recent announcement about not mandating that research be required to fall into DSM categories. This is the kind of research that will identify the kinds of things you're trying to talk about, but are doing in a completely nonconstructive way.

Now, if you actually have some kind of suggestion that will assist in any particular person's treatment or in developing coping mechanisms or is helpful in some particular way that is not possible if people accept that they've been diagnosed with autism instead of focusing on details no one currently actually has, then I'd love to hear it. What beneficial purpose does saying "autism doesn't exist" on a message board serve? What humanitarian aims are met? What further understanding do you bring beyond the assertion that there is no such thing as autism?

Also, while autism and ADHD are not (contrary to your claims) a matter of identifying personality traits, there are disorders that are based in dysfunctional personality traits. They're called personality disorders. So, I wouldn't try to argue that something being a personality trait means it can't be a disorder.

It's not that information is being withheld from non-scientists, it's just that science is stringent about how they do things. There are a lot of peer-reviewed journals that cost money which universities and various other institutions buy but the general public won't. Some of them are very expensive. The general public buy 'popular' science which is accessible to them because it has been 'dumbed down' and made entertaining so that they can understand the message without having to learn much of the language of the discipline. I noted during my time at Uni that one of the most important things you learn in any scientific discipline is the language, necessary for concise and unambiguous communication within the relevant scientific community. The problem is that the general public aren't trained to question and critically evaluate published research, even if they understood the terminology. At my Uni, all science students do basic statistics to enable them to not only understand the numbers they are seeing, but more importantly, to understand the uncertainty in those numbers, and how seriously to take the findings in the published work.
This is the domain of professional scientists. They say things like 'the evidence shows....' and 'there is a correlation between...' , which you'll note are not statements of fact because they take very little as fact. They are careful to discriminate between terms like hypothesis, theory and speculation. This is why the source of any information is important to scientists- it matters. It is not about some sort of elite club, it is about knowing how seriously to take the information. Any dickhead can buy a book, read what it says, take it to be fact (even though it could now be outdated and disproved), make a video, and put it on you tube, and convince an army of novices that they are clever and correct about what they are saying. A trained scientist wouldn't dare to use it as a credible source without tracking down the original research and confirming that it held water.
Scientists argue about things all the time. You can find various points of view on almost any topic. It is the untrained public that think in terms of facts and absolutes. So yes, you can find a lot about health online - which bits are correct? Which are outdated? Which are illegal in some countries? Which are misrepresenting information in order to sell something? Which are leaving out important information or otherwise one-sided?
I have found that the more I learn about health, the less I find online that seems useful.

It is a really ignorant thing to think that 'they should have found a cause by now'. People these days can't just take patients and perform random experiments on them to see what happens. There are a lot of rules and ethics concerns that need to be addressed. Once upon a time, psyc patients could be electrocuted or cut open for the benefit of science, now they can't. So how do you propose they investigate the brain of someone who is not showing 'normal' behaviour? They are not supposed to harm subjects or do anything at all without appropriate permission. So this means they need to use the technology as it becomes available. MRI's, EEG's, etc all have their uses but they also have their limitations. So does cutting up a dead brain. They have recently invented some new stuff - like giving virtual lesions to a conscious person, as well as a new magnetic imaging technique, and computer programs which are supposed to work like real neuron networks, but the brain is still millions of times more complicated then that.
Hey, I have an idea... why don't YOU become a brain scientist? Then you could PROVE that autism doesn't exist!

I can't beieve this is up to 7 pages......

I'm going to presume you're talking about smallpox, which was eradicated in the 70s. Polio is still epidemic in three countries. We know a lot more about immunology than we do about the brain. One major reason behind this is that the immune system largely acts in the bloodstream, which is easily and safely accessible, but properly examining someone's brain is fatal. We cannot determine levels of neurotransmitters in different parts of the brain, just approximate them. We can extra samples of blood from a person infected with an infectious disease and create a vaccine by attenuating the pathogen or isolating surface proteins called antigens (which stimulate antibody production). We can't do the same thing with neurological disorders.

Autism is distinguished from personality traits because it is a lack of ability. An introverted person can socialise, but prefers not to. An autistic person can be introverted or extroverted, but does not possess fluent social skills.

If "Asperger's" is really a disorder then how come people with this disability have an intelligence superior to that of the normal person? As normal(non-smart) people vastly outnumber us, it comes as no surprise that we don't mix socially with them. The reason we're so ostracized from society is due to the Assumed Agreement Fallacy(AAF) which happens to come as a result of intelligent people being vastly outnumbered by non-intelligent people(under AFF, normal people routinely view us as stupid, which is why bullying is common), and isn't the result of our inability to understand social cues. I believe there's actually a thread up that indicates our users think NTs have a tougher time understanding us than we do them, and that we understand social cues among eachother just as well as normal people understand social cues among themselves.

Here's the fallacy below if anyone is interested.
Assumed Agreement Fallacy (Wikipedia)
Assumed Agreement Fallacy (Other)

Ok so where exactly is the science here? The title says first scientific refutal of Aspergers, but where is the evidence to support your claims, where is the scientific research?

Science is not anecdotal, it is not based on personal beliefs, it is the result of painstaking evidence gathering and analysis with extensive peer review. Real research is based on direct and proactive information gathering such as (in this case) interviews and monitored observation backed up by technical evidence - not on watching second hand youtube videos. Science is investigation of a subject with an open mind as to what the evidence will support, not bending data to support personal prejudice (or at least that's what science should be)

I'm quite sure that the definition and understanding of what we call the 'Autism Spectrum' will change and evolve as science delves more and more into the area. It may even be discovered that Autism is not what we currently believe it to be, and yes it may even turn out to be a red herring (I personally doubt it but you never know) But this evolution has to be directed by serious scientific evaluation, not by amateur peer review from someone who has no direct experience of actual research into the problem.

All I see here is a personal denial of belief in the condition, based on bad experiences of therapy, and a reluctance to accept the fact that you have a condition - its called denial.

Also, your assertion that "We have waited decades upon decades for a cause and cure to be revealed" is completely pointless as an argument. Firstly, you are ignoring the fact that even today, the technology to accurately study the human brain in fine detail simply does not exist. Yes we have MRI scans, but these are nowhere near as detailed and accurate as you would like to believe when it comes to brain function. Secondly what makes you think that we are even close to having the technology to 'repair' the human human brain even if we did have a likely cause. Research into brain function and treatment of brain related problems is heavily hampered by the limits of current technology, and will be for some time yet.

To put this into perspective, people have strokes every day. We know exactly why, and yet there is virtually nothing we can do to prevent them from happening. And we are completely incapable of repairing the after effects of a stroke (assuming they actually survive) This is because the technology to repair brain damage from a stroke is not even within sight of current research. So if there is no way to cure the after effects of a stroke, even after decades of research, does that make strokes non-existent? And more to the point how can we repair something as complex as Autism when we can't repair something more simple in nature such as stroke damage? as an argument for the non-existence of Autism this simply does not hold water!

P.S.
Empathy means understanding that its wrong to purposely hurt someones feelings and acting upon that understanding, not simply knowing that it's wrong. The very act of saying that you don't care about another persons feelings is in itself proof of your lack of empathy. Sociopaths know that its wrong to hurt people, but will do so anyway because they don't care - that is what makes them sociopaths and defines their lack of empathy. People with Aspergers will usually hurt someones feelings through ignorance (i.e. they simply don't realise that what they say is hurtful) then will get extremely upset when they realise that what they did was hurtful. That is delayed empathy, but empathy none the less. What you did to your therapist was unconscionable and quite nasty, and definitely lacking in empathy.

Being of higher intelligence is not a scientific argument either. Not all people with Aspergers have higher than average intelligence anyway, just a high percentage. And you might as well say that because intelligent people are more prone to senile dementia that senile dementia is a myth too!