Autism can't be cured if you don't want to be
I'm asking for autistic traits to be listed. The actual ones, not those used by the psychiatrists.
If you want to remain an Aspie, then you can conciously decide to maintain that aspect of yourself. Difficult, but not impossbile. If an Aspie can imitate an NT, then they can stay as an Aspie even with the full force of a 'cure' bearing down on them.
The Aspie/NT contrast you make is interesting. What does 'imitating a neurotypical', or rather, a non-autistic, even mean? So many non-autistic people are very unsociable or even anti-social by their own personal nature. The (relative) challenge I see before me is not so much geared at trying to imitate non-autistics, as much as it is attempting to fashion myself a relative adept-ness at social interaction with regard to everyone whether they aren't or are autistic or neurotypical or otherwise.
It's also not clear to me what you mean by "interested in NT stuff" in your first post. NT interests seem as diverse and all-encompassing as interests of autists, from where I'm standing.
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clarity of thought before rashness of action
I've wondered about this, too, but I'm a complete layman when it comes to neurology, so I'm oblivious to the neurological details of ASD. My assumption is that if they'd come up with any medicine, it would only serve to suppress certain traits, and may well have long-term negative effects on the brain. I prefer a self-styled psychological 'crutch' to a cure.
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clarity of thought before rashness of action
fiddlerpianist
Veteran
Joined: 30 Apr 2009
Age: 46
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,821
Location: The Autistic Hinterlands
Autism is a developmental disorder, not a disease. Can you cure a disorder? Even hypothetically?
The only thing you might be able to do would be to prevent whatever neurological conditions "set up" autism, from an early enough age. For instance, there is some research out there that suggests that autism may be caused by a brain which grows unusually rapidly. (I'm not commenting on the validity of the study, just using it to highlight my point.) Let's say that this is demonstrably true, or at least true in many cases. If you could come up with some sort of treatment that prevents said rapid growth, you could maybe prevent autism.
Once your brain has developed that way, though, you're pretty much stuck with that for life.
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"That leap of logic should have broken his legs." - Janissy
It all comes down to what the difference between NT and Autism is. A question which has still not been satisfactorily answered.
A 'cure' for people who already have it would have to suppress certain traits of the person. But what if the person decides consciously to still exhibit those traits?
I don't claim to know much about how the NT mind works, but I know when i get excited about seeing Mars or Jupiter NTs don't care.. eg the other day I spotted Mars pointed it out to some other people who were camping, they didn't even bother to look up(wtf). On saturday morning I got up early to see a meteor shower, me and my mate were the only 2 people on the beach. I found a super cool rock in my garden, it has strips and some dots that are fossils (it's a rare rock call zebra rock) , showed it to my landlord totally unimpressed!
I can spend hours working out mathematical problems or creating the perfect computer algorithm, I don't need other people around me to make me happy.
Of course not all scientists, mathematicians, musicians, authors etc are aspies but I suspect the really brilliant ones are. Being an aspie gives me a super power called persistence - I don't care how many hours it takes to understand vector equations I will get there then move on to the next topic. Who is going to keep all the knowledge if the world gets rid of the aspies? We are the ones who will spend our whole lives learning it, we are the ones who understand it's importance
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I reckon they got it wrong, and it's the NTs who don't appreciate what life's all about
I don't think a cure would be effective, since autism varies so much from one person to another. It would be a bit like curing brain damage. What's done is done. Maybe the brain can be rewired, but it would never be "normal." I know, I have both.
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If I were a knight, my name would be Sir Stimsalot.
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