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My original post was perhaps a bit unclear on suggesting that AS, intelligence, and xenophobia are all independent variables. It was inspired by a train of thought that began in my early youth. I thought I was on the wrong planet then because we had barely evolved since developing agriculture, and were poorly adapted to life in large groups.

The Hurons had less xenophobia about the Jesuits than the Iroquois, and now there are no Huron Indians at all. A few towns escaped the Spanish Flu by putting up total roadblocks. Without prejudice, etc, we would wind up putting all our eggs in one basket, so that no outlier communities would survive a general disaster. The Amish are not worried about gas or fertilizer prices. Encountering prejudice is grating, but it can also maintain a cozier community if you find yours. I only oppose it when it is used as an excuse for economic advantage.

I think that the numbers of people with AS or any other genetic oddity has been nearly constant. A tribe with our natural "troop size" of 150 people according to our brain capacity only needed one or two nerds to slowly improve the technology or find new opportunities. However, our understanding of the human variety has improved, and with it our ability to identify and describe various traits.
Here's a list of mental disorders from 200 years ago, and I am particularly intrigued by the last entry. Sorry about the formatting - all my tabs and spaces vanish. The numbers should be in columns under M and F.
"19th century reasons for admission into insane asylums:
M F
Ill health of various kinds 22 24
Intemperance 29 0
Loss of property 17 0
Dread of Poverty 2 0
Dsappointed affections 2 4
Intense Study 5 0
Domestic Difficulties 1 5
Fright at fires, etc. 2 3
Grief - loss of friends 4 16
Intense application to business 2 9
Religious excitement 8 7
Want of employment 9 0
Use of opium 0 2
Use of tobacco 2 0
Mental anxiety 4 1
Unascertained 0 0

So do you think the Amish community are more equipped to survive a disaster such as a pandemic because they are more selective about who they allow in?

I'm wondering if living in smaller tribes might be the way forwards.

Also I had a thought a while ago about how long mankind has been on the planet yet it seems to have taken quite a long time to develop technology as we have it today. I know that our brains are the same as they were all those thousands of years ago so I couldn't understand what has taken so long. I asked someone and they told me it's because we just didn't have the materials.

I think ASD people have existed throughout time. The only thing that is new is how it has been defined, categorized and diagnosed.

I was pointing out that the Amish were less dependent upon complex technology and trade. I don't know that they have any particular safeguards against contagion, but they could isolate easily.
Living in small tribes is safer for humanity, but worse for technology. When I got serious about bicycling, parts from the various European companies were not compatible.
We are able to develop advanced technology now because we cooperate so widely. When Thomas Edison started on electricity, he had to wrap thread around his copper wires to insulate them. Now, I can buy a ball bearing for $5 that would have taken me a lifetime to build half as well in 1700. I can buy a precision, hardened shaft to put it on with known properties for strength and corrosion resistance, and cheap oil seals as well. Our best materials are not far superior to silk, bamboo, and Damascus steel, but they are far cheaper to use, and complex, pre-manufactured components abound. There are also great tools and instructions available. The dumb stuff has been tried, warning off the next generation.

It takes large groups to produce enough nerdly specialists to have all our modern materials available. When Tasmania and Tierra Del Fuego became islands at the end of the last ice age, the isolated populations were too small to even keep the technology for fire going. Ancient Greece produced a very large steel beam, a superb mechanical calculator, and a steam engine, but they were not a commercial success with a small market.

Our modern world was begun when there were enough rich people to finance large, well-armed ships that plundered enough money to build bigger, better-armed ships. Leonardo spent a lot of his time on fancy weapons, besides sketching helicopters and bicycles. For millennia we had been able to dominate nature only in a few areas most suitable for farming, but now, we could cut down a forest and ship it half way around the world.

The rich were very erratic, but enough spent money on hiring nerds for research that it all got better and cheaper. Machine-made rope made the voyage around Cape Horn routine, which had been impossible for Captain Bligh. Then we started burning coal, and then oil and gas, which made it easy to turn almost any wilderness into human habitat, and to establish world-wide trade in bulk goods. The use of electricity has accelerated progress tremendously. Chemistry is turning out to be more of a two-edged sword.

So, I would say that technology came from a critical mass of talent and capital, which improved materials along with the rest. Even the materials are products of technology. As J.E. Gordon said about steel - "Anyone from the Bronze Age could have told you that." We do finally understand our materials, and that makes them easier to improve.

Now that we have crowd funding, the last social utility of the rich has vanished, but they seem likely to blindly pursue their greed until agriculture fails and we are back to isolated tribes, unless mankind has an epiphany soon.

Do you think that restrictions on the freedom of movement could have an impact on social utility?

Last edited by babybird on 07 Aug 2022, 8:39 am, edited 1 time in total.

Yes, now I think about it it wouldn't have been a thing until someone named it.

I often wonder if it was just easier to have ASD (even though it wasn't known about) in some periods of history because there were very clear social rules. People had rules to refer to for social events e.g. if you wanted to be friends with someone, you visited them and left your calling card. If you wanted to court someone, there were specific rules that you followed.

Now days anything goes, so we are all confused. I'd have loved some dating rules when I was young. e.g. If a man fancied me, he'd do XYZ so I'd clearly know. On our first date, we'd do A. On our second date, we'd do B. etc.

Also I think small communities were possibly more accepting. 'Oh that's just George. He's always been a bit eccentric. But he's my brother's son, my parents' grandson, my children's uncle, so we know and accept him.'

If you're a stranger in a vast community with no relatives or friends, people are more likely to feel threatened or whatever, and bully/mock you.

I never used to talk when I was younger. I could talk but for some reason about 80% of the time the words wouldn't leave my mouth.

People never even used to care about it. I wasn't treated any different because of it. I had friends and was involved in things.

Other kids parents used to think I was some kind of dream child they wished they had but apart from that nothing. I once had a friend who used to ask me to just say anything I wanted and it didn't matter but apart from that I felt no pressure to be any other way than how I was.

I think that people do tend to be more social these days and there is a massive pressure on this as well. Not only have you got to have a real life social life but you also have to prove it on social media.

I think people with asd just don't feel that pressure (or maybe some do) and therefore it can spell out that there is more of a difference but in the olden days that difference wouldn't have been there or it would have been easier to bridge.

It was very hard living in the “be seen, and not heard” era.

I’m glad my childhood was at almost the end of that era.

Yes, I was probably a weird child but no one treated me like one. I had friends, a social life and was involved in things like you were. However my daughter and I are mostly seen as weird and therefore we are excluded. Maybe because we're introverts? My mum was a big extrovert and very sociable so we had lots of social events (and no internet).

I think people are more social online than in real life these days and as you say, it's all about image and proving the life you live. In the past everyone lived in their little communities, the whole world didn't know about everyone else, so we just all got on with each other in our communities.

I wonder if internet socialising will just be a fashion that will eventually go. Humans have obviously spent the vast majority of history without the internet. I hope we'll go back to little communities/tribes like you said above.

They say the maximum number of people the human brain can recognise and know, is 150. So maybe we'll go back to that. I dunno

I’m “lucky” I was weird from a very young age.

I didn’t talk till age 5 1/2. I said my first phrase (my first “word” was a phrase) when I was the subject of an autism study.

Not many kids played with me. Sometimes, I feel it was because kids “knew” that I “had problems.” My best friend’s mother, over like 5 or so years, only had me over to lunch once or twice. And I was sometimes banned from this friend’s house. I went to a special school, then briefly to a public school before I went “special” again. My supposed best friend, who went to the public school, didn’t want to be seen with me when I started going to his school. He was 2 years younger than me.

That is pretty sad about the kids keeping away from you and not wanting to be seen with you. People are so judgemental.

I seem to be different to many people on Wrong Planet: I'm sure I was weird from birth but my life was pretty normal for most of it. I had friends and family, a job, colleagues etc. I got on pretty well in some jobs and was a valued employee and friend.

My life was normal until I moved to my current village and had a baby (I was 37 years old by then). My life basically stopped the day I found out I was pregnant. I became too ill to go out so I couldn't find or make friends, even after I'd had the baby. I had no support and my social life just ended completely. I can't remember the last time people came round to our house socially. I don't go anywhere socially. It's like 17 years ago, time just stopped for me and I've been treading water since then. Or going round and round in a hamster wheel.

I actually wonder if I died in childbirth 17 years ago and I'm stuck in purgatory now, unable to get out. It's very pleasant here but nothing ever happens and I never make connections with anyone.

Maybe I'm stuck in a ghost village or something?

Yes.

A PS to that history rant - there are lots of unexpected consequences of progress. For centuries, the scribes necessary to commerce were a by-product of the churches. Then, the English Empire got so big that they made school compulsory to supply overseers for the ongoing plunder. Part of this literate population then started thinking for themselves, and organizing together.
Also, machines proliferate. Someone made a machine to cut the price of a bicycle chain 1,000 X or more, and suddenly it was much easier to make lots of new kinds of machines.

It's one of the reasons why I don't want to get pregnant; getting pregnant can sometimes permanently damage you, mentally or physically. It's the equivalent to "long covid" except it's "long pregnancy" or something. My aunt had one child 30 years ago and her once strong bladder has never been the same since, and ever since she's always had to wear pads because of her bladder leaking.

I think I'd like to keep my body the way it is. Your body changing gradually due to age is different, but your body changing abruptly from pregnancy is scary.

And the increasing costs of raw materials will be passed onto the consumer?

Do you think it will come to the point of a kind of survival of the fittest in manufacturing?