They added those with Asperger’s into the Autism bucket. I think that’s a mistake. I am very different from those that stim, can’t communicate, and so forth. As someone with this for my whole life, Asperger’s and Autism are NOT the same condition. But it bumps the numbers up.
Exactly right. From my perspective, people with Asperger’s are the font of most of the progress in the human race over the last 500 years.
It appears to me that Newton, Edison, Jefferson, Tesla, and many, if not most of those responsible for significant technical and scientific advances show strong signs of Aspergers.
Yep. I wrote part of the onboard space shuttle software along with a number of other interesting efforts. Everyone that I worked with at NASA and other entities that were gifted in some areas (and with great deficits in other areas) were just like me. We groked each other.
I have yet to meet someone that I consider gifted that doesn't display some Asperger traits. So, I do not consider those traits to be an aspect of Autism, but rather an aspect of being unusually good in specific areas. Those with Aspergers have been studied and have 40% more neurons than others. Just being that way makes us weird because we have a hard time relating to others and have a hard time shutting thoughts down. I never relax. My brain is always churning. It sucks now that I'm not working on anything difficult.