Just a short note to xilman- Many thanks for pointing us at The Edge web site. I had never run across that site before, but can see it has a wealth of fascinating reading from many of my favorite authors, plus others that look like they may become favorites.

Norm

Maybe I am
 

I think there are a lot of people like me who exhibit all the signs pointed out (or think they might), but suffer from not being a very good mathematician :(

Seriously, there are a lot of people out there with happy families, balanced social life, who just enjoy looking for prime numbers in the same way others enjoy fishing.

I look upon my interest in primes as a part of my life which others joke about until I explain to them that it normal to seek out absolute truths, in the same way it is normal to seek out an understanding of the human condition, to have a healthy sex life, to enjoy food and drink, to make a contribution to society through work both paid and voluntary, to be a wise father, to understand the non absolute truths which pervade science, to find spirituality or moral suasion, to appreciate history and the lessons it teaches us and to enjoy art in all of its forms. Mmm, missed out a few things here. To me primes are just a part and a small part of what drives me. But it is a part!

Regards

Robert Smith

By the way, I thought I should mention that most many people show symptoms of many cognitive diseases and also many mental diseases simultaneously. I personally had a problem with that because I kept looking up all these diseases and suddenly thinking I had them. It took me a while to decide not to try to figure out "what disease I have". Unlike most people, it took me LESS time to try to figure out "who has what disease".

The truth is, many people in this site do show a few signs of AS. I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of people show many or most of the signs of AS. However, it is possible and actually more likely (according to my brother's father in law) for someone to show ALL the usual signs and still not have AS than it is for someone to show MOST but NOT ALL the usual signs and still have AS.

Sometimes One person's opinion is good enough for me :o)

This sure is a really interesting thread! A shame it died...

However, I don't believe we can judge each other of whether or not we have Asperger's Syndrome before actually meeting IRL.

But while on the subject, I have been diagnosed with having AS, so you may compare everyones contributions to mine and see if they give a positive match ;)
No. One cannot do that, since the AS spectrum is extremely wide and while some people may seem very socially handicapped others may seem to behave like any other person would do. I consider myself to be in the latter category.

I must admit that I have had trouble sometimes with understanding how to behave towards other people. However, I have actively tried to learn and I have become much better in acting like other people.

I think I've heard somewhere that among the common interests of "autistic people" are computers and mathematics..

That must be enough about myself ;)

OH

[QUOTE=xilman]Coincidentally, I was reading Slashdot earlier, where I was eventually lead to this page: [url]http://www.edge.org/q2005/q05_5.html[/url]

Scroll down about half-way, to the contribution by Simon Baron-Cohen.

The entire series is well worth reading, IMAO.[/QUOTE]Yes, Baron-Cohen is the leading proponent (and I must say he has amassed quite a lot of convincing evidence in this area) of the "extreme male brain" theory of Aspergers and autism. According to the theory, one begins by quantifying two personality metrics:

1) empathizing, as measured by being able to judge the emotional state of those around one (a classical hallmark of the "female" brain), call the resulting quantity E;

2) systematizing, as measured by ability to quantify, enumerate and perform related tasks (a classical hallmark of the "male" brain), call the resulting quantity S.

If one gives a standardized test designed to measure those to a bunch of people, then makes an x/y plot with E in the vertical (Y) direction and S in the horizontal (X) direction, the people with Asperger's and autism tend to cluster in the extreme lower right (low E, high S). Now this might seem like so much psychological mumbo-jumbo, except that Baron-Cohen et al have also related these alleged extreme-male-brain (EMB) symptoms to an excess of white matter - again, an extreme manifestation of the normal slight excess of white matter males have, relative to females. Interestingly, the extra white matter tends to contain neurons with relatively short-range connectivity, which is useful for systematizing tasks - for empathizing tasks one tends to need greater interhemispheric connectivity, which is contained in the grey matter - there tends to be less of that in male-type brains. Apparently, people with AS and autism tend to have larger-than-normal brains, but all the excess goes into white matter, not grey. These syndromes appear to also be related to ecxess fetal testosterone (it's not clear if that is a result of some genetic disposition, or if both genes and EFT are independently required). This would explain why it is predominantly males who exhibit AS and autism - a female with a genetic disposition of this type might only get shifted into the normal-male realm on the E/S scale by the excess fetal testosterone exposure, whereas a male brain would get shifted to an extreme male brain. One of the other curious physical traits that indicates a genetic component is at work here is that folks with AS and autism tend to have a shorter-than-normal ratio of [url=http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=11263685&dopt=Abstract]second-to-fourth-digit length[/url] in their fingers.

Baron-Cohen reasons that one tends to see a higher-than-normal incidence of AS and autism in places like Silicon valley is that those are hotbeds of systematizing brains - assuming there is a significant genetic component, then it makes sense that when a pair of geeky (i.e. systematizing) types marries and has children, their children would be likely to inherit the same tendency, perhaps in the extreme - it's clearly not as simple as eyecolor (which is also not quite as simple as most people think - but that's another thread), but the evidence is looking pretty compelling.

Fascinating stuff.

p.s.: edited the thread title to correct the spelling of "Asperger's"

I suggest all of you read DSM IV before discussing Asperger's Syndrome.

[QUOTE=ewmayer]One of the other curious physical traits that indicates a genetic component is at work here is that folks with AS and autism tend to have a shorter-than-normal ratio of [url=http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=11263685&dopt=Abstract]second-to-fourth-digit length[/url] in their fingers.[/QUOTE]
Fascinating! Thanks for posting that link. Note that the study had a rather small sample size and is open to criticism on those grounds.

For the record, my fourth fingers are noticeably longer than my second. The discrepancy is about 9mm on the right hand and 4mm on the left.


Paul

[QUOTE=Citrix]I suggest all of you read DSM IV before discussing Asperger's Syndrome.[/QUOTE]
For those of you who, like me, were previously unaware of the TLA "DSM", Google turned up: [url]http://www.psychologynet.org/dsm.html[/url]


Paul

Several interesting thoughts showed up in a google search on Aspergers syndrome. One of the more recent is that Aspergers may be linked to oxytocin metabolism.

I also found out that at least one Silverman has been associated with it.

"It seems as though the prevalence of AS in the gifted population may have contributed to the mythological stereotype of the socially impaired gifted child. It is also possible that some of the intensity issues and introversion attributed to gifted individuals with AS may have more to do with their giftedness than any neurological differences attributable to AS (Silverman, 1997)."

Thank you for correcting the spelling Ewmayer, I checked to be sure and found that the original documentation I was given has it spelled incorrectly as Aspberger's Syndrome. The correct spelling is Asperger's. Unfortunately, there are nearly as many web hits for one spelling as for the other.

Fusion

:no: Fusion_power, I get 1020 hits for the incorrect spelling and 1190000 for the correct one (with the word syndrome thrown in as well). Google even suggests the correct spelling when I input the wrong one.

[QUOTE=Fusion_power]

I also found out that at least one Silverman has been associated with it.


Fusion[/QUOTE]

I agree.

I have seen a child with Asperger's syndrome. He seemed normal to me, but he was obsessed with pictures of toilet seats. I guess that indicates something is wrong with him.

Citrix