Aspergers link (was Re: PEP 312 - Making lambdas implicit worries me, surely it's just the name 'lambda' that is bad...)

[Michele Simionato]

Carl Banks <imbosol-1047882725 at aerojockey.com> wrote in message news:<Rteda.65505$gi1.40160 at nwrdny02.gnilink.net>...
> I think people with Asperger's "syndrome" just violated someone's
> arbitrary and very narrow idea of what they think is normal.
> Here's my advice: forget all this crap about Asperger's syndrome.
> Instead, go read about Myers-Briggs personality typing.  _Please
> Understand Me_, by David Kiersey, is a good reference.  Kiersey would
> probably dismiss Asperger's "syndrome" as nothing but a strong
> introverted and thinking personality.

This is a quite rude way of making the point, but still I think there
is some merit in what Carl is saying. I see that this is an unpopular view
in the newsgroup, so let me be clear in what I mean. 

I think there is a tiny line dividing the syndrome from the strong personality 
type, but still the line exists.

I would put the line here: or you have the control of your life, or the
syndrome has the control of your life.

If (to make a simple example) you don't enjoy social life and you would
rather go to the library than to the party, this does not means that you
have the syndrome: however, if you CANNOT go to the party, then you have the 
syndrome.

I agree that there are people that really are on the bad side of the line:
you cannot say to them "oh, be a good boy, make a little effort an go to the
party", because they *cannot*. It would denote complete incomprehension for 
them (and besides, rudeness and stupidity) to follow this approach.
However, I don't think Carl is addressing his words to the really
sick persons, that are the minority. I think he is addressing his 
words to the persons with "a strong introverted and thinking personality",
as he says, that do not have the syndrome but they think they have.

And they think they have the syndrome because of the strong social pressure 
(which is stronger in the USA than in Europe, as I can tell having lived in 
both countries, BTW): unfortunately, the society is trying to convince 
people that they are sick if they don't follow a very strictly defined 
"normal" behavior, where "normal" means conformism with the society 
stereotypes.

> Frankly, it sickens me that there are people out there who consider
> traits such as introversion, and reliance on thought instead of
> feeling, to be "diseases."

Well said Carl! The problem is more with "normal" people than with
the "non-normal". 

I think Carl does not like weenies and a victimism philosophy: I don't
like it either. More on philosophical terms, I am against the modern 
society when is trying to convince people that "life is (always) 
wonderful", and that there is something like the "right to happiness". 
Historically speaking,  these concepts are extremely recent and they 
were unthinkable in earlier epoch. According to the Ancient Greek, 
the aim to pursue was avoiding the pain, not reaching the "happiness". 
Happiness was thought to be a transient state, not a rightful expectation 
for a normal life.

If I look at my "normal" friends of my age (I am 33) they are all in 
existential crisis: they all had big dreams of a great or at least happy 
life whereas they are discovering now that they have just a plain, ordinary 
life that sucks (in the best cases) or not a life at all (many of the people
I know, alone, with bad sentimental stories, an horrible job, etc).

They say: look at me, I am still young, still sane, I have some 
money, I should be happy, why I am not so? I must be sick!! Which, of
course, it is a completely absurd point of view. The reality, as
Lacan says, is that "life is hard".

Carl is slapping people that have no reason of thinking to be sick,
not the people that really are! It really disturbs me to see people
(not referring to people on the mailing list here, but some people I
know) complaining, wondering about their psychological status, when they
are entirely and absolutely normal, plain and ordinary: it is their life
that it is not okay, not them!

On the other hand, surprisingly maybe, people with "a strong introverted and 
thinking personality" (notice: I am not saying people with the syndrome)
are quite advantaged with respect to the "normals". I hadn't big
expectations for my life at the age of seven: actually I was never
thinking about the future, all my effort were concentrated on surviving
in the present. I couldn't be fooled by society propaganda (at least 
not so completely fooled as others): I did not want a great life,
I only wanted a life.

I must say that I never heard about Asperger's before this threat: anyway, 
I wasn't surprised to have a score of 32. Nevertheless, as the test says 
"many who score above 32 and even meet the diagnostic criteria for mild autism 
or Asperger's report no difficulty functioning in their everyday lives."
I would go further and says that having "a strong introverted and 
thinking personality" is helping me in my life now (of course it was 
*not* helping me when I was a child :-(). Let me give a single example.
I am a physicists: I must give seminars and lectures at international 
congress. This would be a scary task for most normal people, but for me it 
is not very hard: I am trained. For me, it was hard even go the local shop 
and buy milk and bread for my mother: if I survived to that, I can easily give
a seminar to an audience of international scientists. I also have
a fiance' and a life that I think is much more interesting of the 
lives of my friends who stayed in our original little village in the 
countryside. I would say that I am happier than I was and even more happier 
than I expected to be.

Final thought: normality strongly depends on the milieu where you
live. I am sure the average score on the test for people on the
mailing list is much higher than 16.4, the "normal" average
(according to http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/9.12/aqtest.html)
As I often say to my fiance' "I have always thought to be a little strange
when I was younger, but now, if I compare myself with my colleagues
physicists, I am one of the most normal!" 

Whereas for most people life is easy when they are young and difficult 
when they are grown up, for people with "a strong introverted and thinking 
personality" it is probably the opposite.

My advice to the youngest people of the mailing list is simply "wait". 
I think this is the best advice I can give. Of course, IANAP and I
referring to people in the safe side of the line. When you pass the
line things get harder and harder, and I don't think anybody has a
good advice in those cases.

That's all for today, it was an interesting thread,

--
Michele Simionato - Dept. of Physics and Astronomy
210 Allen Hall Pittsburgh PA 15260 U.S.A.
Phone: 001-412-624-9041 Fax: 001-412-624-9163
Home-page: http://www.phyast.pitt.edu/~micheles/