Autism- The Way Of The Future?

I got diagnosed with Asperger in my late teens, and yeah, id would have LOVED if it had been more researched and understood at the time (and thusly detected earlier)...Im not one of the a-hole Asperger's out there that use it as an excuse to be selfish, self-focused fucks and never even attempt to try and fight it, but i still cant see it being something that can be cured, just dealt with.

In a nerdier note, you "next step" comment reminded me of this bit of Morrison genius when he describes his take on The Joker:
"We're beginning to think it may be a neurological disorder, similar to Tourette's Syndrome. It's quite possible we may be looking at some kind of super-sanity here. A brilliant new modification of human perception, more suited to urban life at the end of the twentieth century."

The very idea of the human mind evolving to deal with modern life (instead of our bodies) is fucking creepy as hell, while fascinating.

Dear Aspergians/Autistics - Are you all inevitably attracted to message boards like moths to flames?

Disorder since it's complex and a multi-causal issue. And there are some evolutionary biologist that dissent with you ryoken. Visit

In bold is stated what makes most of the work of Ballard and Cronenberg.

..organized into topics and sub-topics and such. Makes a lot of sense, actually.

My son has Autism (diagnosed by professionals). He's 2 1/2 and doesn't speak beyond a fairly meaningless babble (There's plenty of mama dada baba, but not neccesarily in conjunction with the proper subjects). There are other symptoms he displays (lining things up in perfect straight lines, etc), but as a parent of an autistic child, I can tell you that research and help can't come fast enough. Especially when your child has no verbal way of communicating his needs/wants to you. We work with him with county projects dedicated to helping with autistic kids as much as we can, but it's very frustrating. Also, the fact that insurance companies completely ignore the condition is bullshit, especially since specialists cost hundreds to thousands of dollars an hour for their services.

Dammit, I knew it in my heart that I should had referenced Ballard and Cronenberg instead of Morrison.
And I'm going to hunt one of that guy's books down; Its seems like it would make for an interesting read.
Although i have to admit that when i saw the name "Simon Baron-Cohen" in the link, i did a double take.

The key to that report is that it's about ASD and not Autism specifically. ASD is a pretty large spectrum from the very minor to the socially crippling versus Autism which has very specific criteria. 1 in 91 seems shocking but when you realize that the incidence of full blown autism is much smaller it's not nearly as bad as the report suggests.

It's the new ADHD or ADD. It's getting diagnosed a lot which is really bad for the people who actually have it because it becomes a punchline or overexposed so people get sick of hearing about it. Understanding is necessary but it first needs to have an awareness campaign of what it actually is and how it affects people is it's not to become the diaognosis of the week.

You are absolutely right and that is exactly what I told my wife yesterday. Autism is becoming a joke because of the over-diagnosis. My son can spend all day lining up cars and monster trucks but that doesn't mean he has Autism, it means he is a boy.

I hope the parents who have autistic children are in an uproar over this study.

Ah, yes, those people. One of my exes was like that. She blamed all the personality traits that led to her having two friends outside of me on her Asperger's. Said something to the effect of: "They're just autistic traits, I'd rather replace people than change." My favorite retort to this was from a female friend of mine about a year later: "I, too, have Asperger's but it doesn't make me a sadistic sociopath. This girl is just plain mean."

I've always wondered... is autism actually a desease, or is it part of the natural process of evolution? The human genome mutating in an attempt to find a more hardy human that will stand up to the 'survival of the fittest'?


As far as I've been able to gather, autistics and 'pergers often have abilities no normal human possesses. Called 'savants', these porcelain supermen have powers no average person could ever hope to achieve, but a cruel twist of genetic fate often leaves them ill suited for life in the real world. Kind of the more mundane version of the X Men, you could almost say

One day, might we see a kind of autism that in fact is simply a better version of people as they already exist? People who can preform complex calculations instantly in their head, or memorize large chunks of text at will? All without the debilitating problems often associated with the condition?



I have no background in genetics or anything, but if anyone has any insight, that would be great. If it turns out it will always be a terrible and isolating setback to those aflicted, that would be really pretty awful

I've known people with autism before, and it can be heart breaking. I do wonder though if that is always going to be the case. How could humanity have made it this far if we're always producing mentally crippled offspring? One in a hundred Americans now have Autism. The way of the future? Very possibly...

Oh, and show me all the blueprints.. (Reference to The Aviator)

Well if we didn't we wouldn't meet class acts like yourself.

The real issue is that Autism becomes the new ADD and is used as a way to mask general anti-social behaviour. Just because you're a snotty douchebag doesn't mean you have aspergers and some people with Aspergers manage to control their symptoms enough to function in the real world.

I blame the information age. There's just too much out there to process (thanks, TEH INTERNETS!) until we start utilizing more than 10% of our brains.

I also blame Jenny McCarthy. For writing books instead of taking her top off.

EDIT: If all the idiot savants excellent at math/physics got together and invented a time machine, we could go back and prevent Jenny from following such a career-path. Or go into the future and determine if it really is the way of the... future... er present...

Well, autism presents very specific codified (irony, no?) behaviours. Asperger's, on the other hand, is a wide ranging condition. And, no, the condition should not be ignored but honest, real information has to make it out there or this study will mean absolutely nil. People will quote the headline and not the facts.

I said this in another thread, I've been asked twice if my 18 month old daughter has been tested for Autism/asperger's. Both times were apropos of nothing. It was asked in the way one asks if your child has received their vaccinations. It's become a soccer mom trendy disorder.

She's also to blame for so many idiots not getting their kids vaccinated because she's too dumb to understand that there is no correlation between the two.

What does Jim Carrey see in her? She comes off as a total nutcase. From a purely scientific stand point, she is no better than the creationists who say the earth is 6000 years old.

Jenny McCarthy, Dr. Oz, Dr. Phil, Suzanne Sommers, and The Secret being foisted upon the public should tell most thinking persons that Oprah Winfrey, not Satan, is humanity's greatest adversary. Each one of these people harms the public in different and profound ways.

McCarthy helps spread existing and recover lost diseases by scaring stupid housewives away from vaccinating their children.

For every medically and scientifically valid idea Dr. Oz introduces, there are about two or three truly harmful "holisitic" treatments he advocates, my favorite being the sauna/tanning bed he championed on the show (get dehydrated WHILE exponentially increasing the liklihood for melanoma later in life without even having to go to the desert!).

"Dr." Phil, like Dr. Laura, doesn't have the credentials he lets people assume he has and uses them as appeals to authority for really, really shitty treatment plans.

Suzanne Sommers is helping convince people that holistic therapy is not only an alternative but a better alternative to chemotherapy for cancer treatment. As a cancer survivor, for this, I hope Hell exists and Oprah abides there forever.

The Secret, like most of the New Age bullshit Oprah endorses, is just plain dangerous. It takes people who probably need the services of a mental health professional and fills their heads with pseudo-scientific Buddhism-for-dummies bullshit and instills a pathologically narcissistic worldview in the reader who takes it seriously.

In summation, fuck Oprah.

Yeah, I sit next to one of those at work. Rather than do the research, or have a real heart-to-heart with her pediatrician, she vacillates between getting her son vaccinated or not vaccinated. There's no connection, but she just doesn't get that - she hears something and takes it as fact.

Not every Autistic person is some sort of evolutionary miracle that can perform amazing mathematical feats and count cards in Vegas. Most of them require the same care a toddler would their entire life. A cure would be wonderful.

Spectrum, that's the one word that almost everyone glosses over in this kind of thing. The leaps forward in diagnosis and treatment mean that every parent who hears the tiniest bit about what ADHD or Asperger's or Autism is on some website or the local news starts to wonder about their own child. And an ever-growing percentage of parents want to *name* their child's problems so they think they can get a handle on them. But not every kid who won't look you in the eye is full-blown autistic.

Schools do it too, unfortunately. My 5-year-old son is a...well, the touchy-feely crowd calls it a "Spirited Child", which is true, and people (including myself) have been trying to put him into a category since he was 18 months old. Luckily my wife is a pediatrician, and keeps my tendencies to want to label him in check. He's a little ADHD, but he can focus on things for hours at a time if they interest him. He exhibits some autistic and asperger-y behaviors, but is also very loving and handsy. And he's a five-year-old boy...which probably should be a defined syndrome all of its own. He fits the broad stereotypes for a lot of the trendy diagnoses, and every time one of his teachers, or a counselor, or some fucking ill-informed parent trots out their opinion, or tells me I should have him evaluated for Sensory Intergration Disorder I have to keep myself from screaming.

And as someone mentioned above, understanding is the key. I think it's unlikely that there will ever be a cure for autism or ADHD, or any other broad-spectrum behavior "disorders". I sincerely doubt that my son will be freaking out twice a month over things like a toy duck or the letter "I" when he's 15, but understanding more about *why* he freaks out is going to help him a lot.

EDIT: Chris Miller, I certainly don't mean to say that I don't think work towards a cure is of great benefit. I think I'm stuck in my own situation with my son, and don't want to come off like a jackass who doesn't think a cure would be a great benefit to truly autistic people.

I agree with all of this but the last part. I have met way too many parents who use it as an excuse for not disciplining their child "Well, he has ASD so he doesn't know what he's doing." Some even go out of their way to self diagnose from dumb ass shit like Jenny McCarthy or Dr Phil instead of going to the doctor.

You're little guy sounds exactly like a five year old boy who is very bright with a few personality quirks. Find me one little kid who deosn't have some weird little quirk about them and I'll start worrying about how they're being parented.

And you.

Use internet google search. Type in "Jenny McCarthy nude".

My sister-in-law (single mother living with her parents) has a young son who had been diagnosed with Oppositional Defiance Disorder (sounds like AKA "typical brat" or "angsty teen" by their definition) for awhile now. He was home-schooled, due to being expelled. The teachers didn't want to deal with him or didn't believe he has a disorder (despite being diagnosed by a doctor and a case worker). He has meltdowns which are disruptive or more dangerous to himself than others, especially when he makes mistakes. Additionally, his younger brother was kicked out of school for bullying (in elementary). There's definitely something not right under the hood, and you might be able to say that they have syndromes, but I just think they need a father in their life.

I'm not trying to come off as Touchy Autism Parent or anything, there are plenty of treatments and options we work with to try and help our kid, and there's a good chance he'll be able to catch up developmentally. There's a chance he won't as well. The trouble with the big "fad" of the whole thing now is that there are two big camps and one small camp. One big camp freaks out and thinks every quirky kid is autistic. The other big camp thinks it's overdiagnosed, and therefore overlooks some serious problems. The third and smallest camp knows that the truth is somewhere in the middle.

Truth be told, most experts agree there will never BE a cure, and that the closest thing to it is therapy to help people. Again, I'm aware I'm coming off way touchy, and it's hard not to. It's hard to look at something completely academically when you're in the thick of it I suppose.

I should also amend my statement you quoted to say that Many (not necessarily Most) autistic people will require life long care, because I don't know enough hard numbers to say that it's a majority.

I personally am not so quick to dismiss the possible correlation. The causes of autism are not fully understood. I read an article last year, in Time or Newsweek, or maybe Nat Geo, that said there was some evidence exposure to heavy metals, particularly mercury, can be a possible cause. They pointed to a town in the Midwest where firefighters who had worked to put out a fire at a factory that used mercury in its processes had a much higher incidence of autistic births among their children than the surrounding population, suggesting to the researchers exposure to the heavy metals in the line of duty may be the cause. Mercury is used to preserve many vaccines. While I agree the correlation between vaccinations & autism is not proven & hotly disputed, I have a nephew who was diagnosed - who developed the symptoms - shortly after receiving a heavy round of vaccinations. He's got a fairly mild case, but even so it's clear he's not "normal". The idea of my son (now 3) ending up like that or worse frankly terrifies me, and my wife, too. I see no harm in spacing out the vaccines rather than getting them in large bundles, as was the usual method for years, just to be on the safe side. They probably thought Thalidomide wasn't the cause of birth defects for awhile, too.

I don't know for sure if getting your child vaccinated can cause Autism, but I do know for sure that not getting them vaccinated can cause smallpox.

Our approach as well.

Not to mention, that if there is any reaction or side effects to any vaccines, it's good to have the possible causes already narrowed down.

The largest risk period for vaccines contributing to Autism is in the first 4 years. There are many of the more mercury laden vaccines that can wait until after that window, especially if your kid isn't in school or day care.

To those who are spacing out vaccinations, just curious, what kind of reactions are you getting from your pediatricians?

I'm a father of a 7 month old and our pediatrician is rather aggressively dismissive of ANY talk of a vaccine-ASD connection. If pestered to modify vaccine schedules, he'll acquiesce, but certainly not gladly. The general vibe he gives off is "if you're actually concerned about this, you're an idiot", which seems sort of incongruous with all other aspects of his (typically very understanding, more-than-cooperative) demeanor. Curious if anyone else is getting that same message from their pediatricians - that you're some sort of tinfoil-hat wearing paranoiac for expressing reservations.

Fucking great thread, Clark.

Have started to learn more about this kind of stuff lately. Interesting stuff, and maddening.

I wasn't going to wade in here because so many of you have expressed such firm belief that there is no correlation between vaccination and autism. As you know my profession you probably infer where I stand on the issue of vaccination. I am not against vaccination, I am for informed choice. I do not vaccinate my children and when I have parents asking questions I educate them about possible links as well as the things one must do prevention-wise and treatment-wise should you choose not to vaccinate.

I stepped in because you mentioned mercury. The problems with vaccines and their potential link to autism are not simply limited to mercury though.

1) Pertussis- The DPT shot(or Death, Pain and Trouble shot as it was termed) was the most notorious for causing vaccine related injuries and deaths. So much so that it was reformulated in 1996 to DTaP or acellular pertussis. Pertussis vaccines, both prior to and since 1996, contain aluminum to make them more functional. Pertussis toxin easily crosses the blood brain barrier and brings this aluminum with it. Pertussis, both wild caught and vaccine induced carries with it a high degree of encephalitis or brain inflammation. This brain inflammation carries with it a high risk of death and a mild to moderate risk of neural tissue damage. Aluminum is toxic to neural tissue much the same way that mercury is. It also makes the blood brain barrier more permeable making it more likely that other toxins can cross through and disrupt neural tissue. Cases of reaction, injury and death are still reported from the DTaP shot.

2) Mercury- In 1999 the federal government said they wanted mercury removed from vaccines routinely administered to infants and children. The manufacturers began to remove this in 2000 yet were allowed to leave already manufactured stock on the shelves even though the government had admitted that mercury was not safe. In 2001 the Institute of Medicine recommended that thimerosal be removed from all vaccines administered to pregnant women, infants and children. This included flu shots but the CDC has yet to fully act on this. It was 2004 before one could safely say that mercury was not present in the majority of vaccines.

According to the EPA, one in every six women of childbearing age already have blood levels of mercury high enough to cause neurological damage to their unborn children due to environmental exposures alone. You mentioned firefighters. I am going to make an assumption that many of them were male and therefore if the correlation was made that the mercury toxicity affects gametes or sperm cells as well and is thusly passed on to children.

As of 2003 the only vaccines routinely administered to infants and children still containing mercury should be the flu vaccines. However the change in CDC requirements for children aged 2-5 regarding flu shots means they are still potentially exposed to mercury toxicity levels prior to the reduction of thimerosal in 2000.

3) Combination shots- It has been theorized that combination shots such as MMR, DPT(DTaP) and Influenza(which contain multiple strains as the CDC makes a statistical guess each year as to which strains will "hit" and they order vaccines tailored to those. That is why every few years we get a flu outbreak and the shots don't seem to help. Occasionally the guesswork doesn't work out right.) put too much of a load on the developing immune systems of children. Giving combination shots as well as multiple shots at the same time increase this loading and contribute to a theorized overwhelming of the system. As the system becomes overwhelmed the defense mechanisms drop and the likelihood of high fevers and low grade encephalitis increase.

4) Developing Tissues- It is theorized that the developing immune and neurological systems of infants just cannot take the onslaught of thirty vaccines prior to the age of two. Japan, at least, as well as a few other developed nations have moved their "mandatory" vaccination schedules back so that they do not begin until the age of two.

The above items are all things I counsel patients who seek my advice about vaccination with. As the pediatrician is telling them how great vaccines are I simply provide the other side and tell them to make the best decision for themselves and their children. If they choose to vaccinate I make a recommendation that they delay onset until the age of two and then allow only single doses and non-combination shots to be given.

Vaccine theory is inherently flawed once you consider that many vaccines don't confer long lasting immunity thus the need for "boosters." However studies show that in some cases, measles for instance, that vaccines may only provided immunity for a few months before titers disappear from the blood. The booster being several years apart in most cases though.

The mechanism for infection of most diseases "treated" via vaccine is usually a mucous membrane introduction to the body not intramuscular. Therefore the antigen-antibody reaction isn't being stimulated the way the immune system expects it to. This has been theorized as a why for the above mentioned inefficiency of vaccines.

The diseases that vaccines "treat" are no longer the scourges they were at the turn of and through the beginning of the 20th century. Advancements in sanitation and treatment have been the deciding factor here, not vaccines. Also when vaccines are introduced there is usually a routine "tweaking" of the diagnostic criteria that inevitably leads to a massive reduction in cases and the vaccine is lauded as the champion.

Polio, prior to the introduction of its vaccine, was diagnosed by examination of paralysis present on two separate occasions at least a day apart. After the vaccine was introduced the diagnostic criteria was changed to indicate paralysis that was present six weeks after initial exam. Of course cases are going to drop dramatically once the misdiagnosed are weeded out.

I could go on and on about whether or not HepB or chicken pox is even something that should be on the schedule linked above.

As for a cure? Autism isn't a behavioral modification issue and it is far from an evolutionary advantage. Autism is a neurological disorder. Rain Man is not the case for most people with autism. I highly doubt a cure can be found for something that is at best an improper wiring of the brain and at worst damaged brain tissue.

I can't speak for what's happening in the States but thimerosal isn't in any of our vaccinations other then Hep B vac. There hasn't been since 1994 yet somehow we still get kids with autism in Canada. The connection seems tenuous at best.

I've found chiropractors to be the most vocal "doctors" against vaccinations. I also find them to be a step removed from Voodoo and phrenology in terms of validity as a scientific discipline.

Not entirely sure that this is germane to this conversation at this point, but sort of an interesting bit from an article at NPR pertaining to the CDC study results from last Friday:

"On the bright side, nearly 40% of children ever diagnosed with ASD didn't have trouble with it anymore, though it's not clear what that means exactly."

Odds of ASD four times greater for boys than girls? That would seem to be a pretty strong argument against vaccinations as the culprit, no?

Terrifying shit.

Chowder, a lot of people in this thread are parents, including BobClark.

Yeah. I apologize for that comment, Chris. That was a pretty capricious & stupid thing for me to say. Comment edited.

I think that all Bob means is that autism may be something that we can't cure or control, and we should work more towards understanding it and helping those affected by it integrate more effectively into society, rather than treating them like they're diseased.

I don't see whats offensive about it. Evolution doesn't necessarily mean some sort of starchild advance in consciousness - it's a continuity of response. The increase in autism cases is so significant as to be far more than the product of increased reportage.

Ultimately, the cause of this is either environmental or physiological (or a combination of the two). If its physiological in any way, considering how widespread its diagnosis is, it seems more than likely that evolution is playing some part in that development. But no one knows.

It is kind of scary to look at the incidence rates of autism and compare the timeframe of that increase with the spread of childhood vaccination. On the one hand, a lot of the vaccine bogeyman stuff is fear and paranoia. On the other hand, taking a cursory glance at the stuff they actually put in those vaccines, and always considering that our species rarely knows as much as it thinks it does, I wouldn't be able to rule out a correlation entirely. I don't doubt the medical profession is entirely sincere when they say 'there is absolutely relationship between vaccination and autism.' I also do not doubt that they could all be wrong. Professionals have a historical track record of being proven wrong that approaches 100%; the only reason we make any progress at all is because practitioners of objective science, unlike other human social endeavors, have to accept new and better information as it comes to pass.

Moral of the story is: don't get your girlfriend pregnant during a flu pandemic. This whole question has been an intense exercise in practiced helplessness. The incidence of (statistically low) influenza related complications verses the (potentially limitless) unknown quantities involving childhood vaccination is incredibly weighty, and difficult.

I imagine we'll end up getting the vaccination, but there is simply too much we don't know about this condition. If it was strictly environmental, you would think you could have come up with numerous 10-year sample groups and measured incidence there. Also consider the fact that the southern hemisphere is wrapping up it's flu season, largely without the input of swine flu vaccine, and the rates of serious complication there aren't any worse than what the CDC is projecting for here.

As to rates of incidence in males vs females: you would have to assume the physiological development of male and female fetuses are the same to rule out environmental impact. I'm not an expert on it, obviously, but in fetal development and well into young childhood there are marked differences in the ways that boys and girls develop. I guess that goes without saying, but it's just another complicating factor in an impossibly complex debate.

Well, seeing as the human genome has no will of its own, I hardly think it's attempting to do much of anything. If it's mutating, it's mutating, but it isn't because the genome wants to. Let's not give the genome some kind of sentience.

Anyway, I think it's difficult to see how the principle of "surival of the fittest" could be generically applied to humanity, where such basic "survival" conditions no longer directly relate to which carrier gets to procreate. If humanity is to continue evolving, it will be through a far more complicated set of conditions than the "survival of the fittest" principle.

That's eerily similar to the view that mental diseases aren't "diseases" but merely personality traits that society deems unacceptable.

The "we only use 10% of our brains" thing is a misconception. We use 100% of our brains.

I only brought it up because Princess Asperger and her Wikipedia knowledge of all things was suggesting that autistics are some kind of super race.

Zhukov, point taken, which is why I immediately apologized for and amended that comment. It's a subject that inspires a great deal of fear in me, and I reflexively responded in annoyance to a argument with obvious scientific merit. Which was very...uh....Republican of me. Again, apologies to Bob and everyone else for the inappropriate comment.