Everbody is a little bit autistic genetically

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Autism genes are in all of us, new research reveals

It's almost like they're saying they've identified the countless genes that correlate with being autistic, except for the little detail of actually knowing what those genes are because there are so many of them...which indicates they are common to everyone & it's only a matter of degree that determines if someone crosses the threshold for diagnosis?

Isn't that why it's called the autistic spectrum in the first place?

Explains why autism has always been present with the human species from the beginning, and how it might appear unexpectedly in one's children.

Doesn't it also make a bit of difference if the genes are dominant or recessive, autosomal or allosomal, etc.? Everybody has genes for albinism too but that doesn't make everybody a little bit albino genetically.

I think this is correct, though the actual mechanisms are even more complicated because the phenotype emerges from the interaction of many systems when the variations in those systems alone may be part of a normal range.

Saying "everybody is a little bit autistic" because the genetic variations that contribute to autism are widespread is like saying we are a little bit of a thermonuclear bombs because we all contain hydrogen. The details make a difference.

What defines autism is behavior. People who don't exhibit the behavioral criteria are not "a little bit autistic."

Saying most people have one or a few autistic traits is more accurate then saying everybody is a little bit autistic.

And everyone is a little bit "albino", since we all carry the genes for it. Point being?

Carrying genes for something != having a genetic condition.

I think it's true to say that autistic traits are common in the general population. People who have enough traits to the degree specified in the criteria are autistic. People who have many of the traits but too a lesser degree can be considered in the broader autistic phenotype.

There are plenty of people who don't have autistic traits at all. Saying "everyone is a little bit autistic" makes the term autism meaningless. Understanding of genetics is not sufficiently developed in the general population that ""everyone is a little bit autistic genetically" doesn't communicate much.

Everyone might be a little bit autistic, or have a few autistic traits, but it doesn't cause them any problems. Some of us with autism are totally excluded from society...and that is a major problem for us.