Spectrum ??? Part of natural evolution???

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The only way that autism spectrum traits are going to be the next step in evolution is if having those traits helps a person to survive and reproduce, significantly better than those who don't have them. So I'm dubious. Even the mildest of autistic traits is going to make it harder to find a partner and have kids. Obviously some people on the spectrum do have kids, but they're not finding it easier than NTs.

There are ways in which autistic traits are good for a person, and good for society. Useful to society, however, isn't the same as useful to survival and reproduction, which is the only thing which will be responsible for a change in the structure of the human genome. There's a temptation to think that evolution is heading inexorably towards some kind of preordained goal of higher consciousness, but that just isn't true. Evolution will head in the direction of the characteristics of whoever is having the most surviving offspring. That's not going to be aspies. It's not necessarily going to be the most intelligent humans, even. Natural selection has favoured increasing levels of intelligence in our ancestors for millions of years, but that doesn't mean it will continue to do so.

On average, I'd say that aspies are probably more likely to be single, more likely to die childless and, in fact, less focused on sex and having children than their NT counterparts. That doesn't mean that all aspies are like that, of course, but even a slight pendulum swing in this direction will mean than natural selection doesn't favour these genes.

Ah but what if nature didn't want us to reproduce with the NTS and wanted us to reproduce with the people who have autism. It would explain why we don't fit well with the "normal" people but we might be able to get on with the AS people. So i think this could be natural selection in play, because humans would evolve into calculating creatures to be better at thinking.

That was very well said, Liopleurodon.

Mutations cause evolution to happen fast. I like the Indigo/Crystal theory too. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQAd3FxKVUY[/youtube]

Half of us are social cripples. I doubt that's an advancement.

What's more, half of us are painfully unsuccessful with the opposite sex. We're not exactly populating quickly, are we.

Nature and evolution don't 'want' anything, nor do they take steps. Autism is, I suppose, like a mutation, but it's not really a beneficial one. Plus, we wouldn't work well as a species, as I gather from these forums that we even have trouble socialising with other Aspies. In nature, the species that breeds the most survives, because there are more of it. There are no directions, and evolution doesn't think or plan. People with an ASD tend not to breed as much as NTs, so they will always be 'different' from the rest of the population.

Probably not. I know of one married couple, both very intelligent, who finally succeeded in having a child after seven years of trying. In the process, they found themselves surrounded by less sophisticated and less educated couples—those who might more likely spend most of their free time in front of a television set than actually doing anything creative—who had no trouble having seeming tribes of children. They would semisarcastically remark that maybe the reason they had trouble having children was that the two of them were too intelligent and too sophisticated.

Yeah but why would we want to evolve into dumb beings. Isn't evolution supposed to improve ourselves, not go back?

Misunderstanding the point… I think:


As individuals with any given AS trait may or may not procreate. This is part of a mutation, a genetic evolution. Each human is a mutation on the last generation. A combination of 2 sets of DNA that combine to give a uniquely mutation interpretation of the previous generation.

Unfortunately, for the AS individual it can be painfully obvious that their mutation is undesirable. However, even if only .001% of the AS community procreates over time the traits will be selected for either extinction or enhancement. Some of our traits are somewhat apparent and contain in greater or lesser degrees in all of us. Some of my AS traits are completely undesirable… Others are greatly appreciated

For instance IF, compassion was and is a common trait in AS individuals. (yes there are AS individuals that are not compassionate) Just taking that one thing and being able to carry forth with that is enough… as it seems to me there IS NOT enough compassion in the world. Desirable trait??? Naturally selected ??? Slated for extinction??? Who knows… But lets just say it is there, it is real & it is present… where it goes from there is unpredictable.

The individual AS experience is painful at best… and can not be made any less painful. But I myself would rather believe that I am equal to and NOT less than any NT I have met or that I will meet. I am NOT defective, I am not handicapped. Instead I am unique.

One would think so, yes. I was simply noting a funny, if tenuous, correlation that was the couple's way of laughing at the situation. It had nothing to do with whether natural selection actually favored intelligence or the lack of it. I would hope that it would favor intelligence.

It can be painful, but I don't think it has to be so.



Bravo! You've obviously taken a giant step to functioning despite your pain. I think that's a large part of what living with nonstandard mental wiring is all about. I'm an Aspie, too, and I don't consider myself defective despite some real difficulties that I struggle with.

All species fit on a standard Bell Curve. They go from minor numbers, humans had bottlenecks of 5,000 to 10,000 within the last few hundred thousand years, which might have been a large population compared to the predacessor species, for 5,000,000 years.

Then they find conditions, food supply, that allows population increase. With us it was eating grass seed rather than hunting. That has been within the last 40,000 years. We are not alone in filling the space possible, then overfilling it. All species do.

For us it is two factors, food production, and transporting it to market. This has supported a growing population. Now we hit the wall.

Fuel for producing crops, fertilizer, and transporting them is costing a lot more. Drought conditions are getting worse, and grain production is falling.

The Bible speaks of storing food for seven years, through most of history one or two, we had enough for one, till a few years ago, now one bad year, we have several months of food.

Meanwhile the population doubling time is getting short, What took tens of thousands of years, was then thousands, then a thousand, then hundreds, then a hundred, and now it will double again in thirteen years.

Six billion with food riots, soon to be twelve billion, with less food than the six.

This is the population crash part of the curve, the tipping point is deaths exceed births, then become a growth industry. The Bell Curve is mathematical, in Biology it is more like Lemmings jumping over a cliff, a sudden population reduction, 90+% in one year.

We are doing just what every other species in the Rodent line has done, overrunning the food supply, then dying off.

Who will survive?

Will it be the NT who will gather in social groups, have elections and prayer meetings, pass laws against the lack of food, and demand Washington does something?

They think social network, and during famine, large groups are the worst place to be, hunger leads to sickness, and spreads through weakened people.

When the bubble breaks, "Every man's hand will be turned against every other man". War, Famine, Pestilence. Then comes a pale horse.

In Aspie Land, every day is a disaster. With no desire to join groups, be social, they can wander off into the hills, forests, the far places, the wastelands.

They do not bathe, change their socks, will eat the same thing every day, have no need for social status, so can live in a burrow and eat seeds, buds, roots, insects, and within a year, be the only survivors.

"The meek shall inheret the earth."

The history of famine is well documented. It has happened recently, millions died. The Chinese write about one village not having enough, who then move to other villages, and there is not enough, and it spreads over the land. One response is send food, if you have it, but when there is famine, people horde, and suddenly there is less food.

Another response is to send the army, call them rebelious, and slaughter them.

When Stalin was faced with a grain shortfall, of millions starving, he took all of the grain crop from large areas, then closed the roads and rail going in. Millions died, but famine over all of Russia was stopped.

By the next spring, all of the land was ready to seed in collective farms. The few who survived the winter without food, were shot as cannibals.

Famine strikes suddenly, the price of rice goes up, so people buy more, all they can afford, and the price rises, speculators by rice as an investment, and then there is none. A month later people are starving. People with food show up dead, the food missing, and in the second month, people are found stripped of meat.

First the old people are killed, less mouthes, but still no food, then they are trading children for food, babies are smothered, but it is not more or less food, there is none, when they all die there is still none.

A mild Flu becomes a killer, no one hauls away the dead, many diseases spread, and from Fall to Spring, the people are no more.

By Summer there is food everywhere, and hardly anyone to eat it.

So remember, stay with your group, work within the system, and gather with those of your Faith for support in these times. Stay in the cities and towns where Government Aid can reach you. Together, for God, Flag, and Nation, we can face this problem. The economic downturn will end in the next two quarters, then there will be plenty.

The Aspie knows not hunger or thirst, the Aspie knows not hot or cold, the Aspie does not feel pain, the Aspie does not seek the company of men.

This is how evolution works, the survival of the fittest.

To be the next step in evolution then we would have some sort of attribute that increased our survival and reproduction odds in relation to "normal" people.

Well I'm an Aspie and i have no clue how to grow my own food and I am kind of picky about what i eat.

But i agree with you about the bell curve, but i think your being a bit too religious in your explanation of the human downturn... no offence...

It is estimated that geniuses comprise 10% of the autistic population and only 1-2% of the NT's.

The question does not make sense because it presumes the truth of an erroneous premise. Specifically that evolution occurs in steps or entails steps toward some specific outcome or kind of outcome (presumably a more 'advanced' state).

Yes, it's one of the more widely accepted theories regarding the origins of autistic diversity.


This seems to assume that evolution is a ladder. Evolution is simply changes (from one generation to the next) in the frequency at which alleles occur in a population's gene pool.


If genetic difference results in greater reproductive success in a particular environmental niche (occupied by the organism concerned) there is a good chance the allele involved will occur in greater frequencies each succeeding generation. It's not possible to determine on the basis of evidence available, exactly what 'net' effect autistic diversity has on the reproductive success of any extant alleles that code for or contribute to evolution.


Mutating forward is not a valid concept. Evolution is not a process of 'moving toward ultimate perfection', nor even a process of improvement. It is simply a process whereby the frequency at which alleles (within a population's gene pool) occur, changes from one generation to the next. Evolution has no goal, no plan, no pre-determined 'ultimate destination'.

Whether or not something is wrong is no doubt highly subjective but being 'forward' in regards to evolution is a nonsense concept.

This seems more a social issue than a 'directly' evolutionary issue.


Evolution does not have rungs.

Humans are animals and we experience evolution; so far as I know all available data supports the view that the human population continues to experience changes in the frequencies at which various alleles occur, in our gene pool, from one generation to the next.
Natural selection is perhaps not helpfully named. Differentiated reproductive success is probably a better way of giving name to the process being referred to. There is no selector or chooser, there is no 'state of perfection' or even improvement as an end goal; there is not in fact a goal at all.



I doubt nature as a corporate entity is endowed with the capacity to form volition.


No, evolution is not supposed to improve us (or itself). It's just a process, there is no evidence that it is supposed to do any particular thing, since there is no evidence anyone or anything designed it to have any goal or purpose. It's just what happens.