Comments on: Human Savants https://blog.speculist.com/transhumanism/human-savants-1.html Live to see it. Thu, 16 Dec 2021 08:21:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.6.1 By: AnneC https://blog.speculist.com/transhumanism/human-savants-1.html#comment-263 AnneC Thu, 20 Jul 2006 21:42:07 +0000 http://localhost/specblog/?p=215#comment-263 One thing I think is essential in any discussion of autism is the acknowledgement that “autism” is not a set of behaviors or deficits, but a set of perceptual and cognitive extrema that are nevertheless part of the spectrum of human characteristics.

There are a lot of myths and misconceptions about autistics and the autism spectrum — a lot of them very damaging, such as the idea that autistic people can never learn to communicate or that we are incapable of complex emotions.

What I’ve found in my own experience and research is that autistic people simply lack an assumption set (pertaining to gestures, tone, and the significance of certain sorts of social reciprocity) that is shared with the typical person. One thing I really think medical science needs to look into seriously is the phenomenon of autistic people being able to communicate and socialize quite effectively with one another.

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