Genetic variants linked to autism spectrum disorders (ASD) contribute to enhanced cognition and are therefore positively selected in spite of the problems they also bring along – new evidence has just been published in PLOS Genetics [1]. The problems these genes bring along are the price to pay for relatively rapid evolutionary advancements. It needs a much longer time for further natural selection to smooth the bugs out – this is all obvious, simple science. Another example is the genetic predisposition of Ashkenazim Jews to diseases such as Tai-Sachs, which comes along with their high average verbal IQ, also a relatively recent evolutionary advancement.

The best example for how these genes are cognitively enhancing is the might of the greatest philosopher of the last century, Ludwig Wittgenstein, who “suffered” from both, being Ashkenazim as well as Aspergerian; see also [2]. His autism facilitated his perspectivism, and only similarly autistic people understand him naturally while others usually just cannot wrap their heads around it. Autistic people “lack” a certain sort of emotional empathy (‘affective empathy’), and high functioning autists substitute with a more rational, less emotionally biased understanding of other perspectives. Society usually answers with bullying – nobody un-enhanced can stand admitting such truths as autists are able to analyze rationally. Autistic children need to get a whole different kind of ‘The Talk’ that is often given to children: “Normal (neuro-typical) people do not mean it when they say they want the truth – do not tell the truth or they will beat you. The rules they tell you are not the rules the actually go by, be very careful …”

For yours truly, also Asperger enhanced, the enhancement of cognitive function through the somewhat anti-social autistic perspective has always been obvious – as naturally obvious as Wittgenstein. The normal human mind is far too dependent on emotions and social constraints for merely intelligent and educated people to truly think on the next level outside the Overton box. The current Western crisis and the masses of intellectuals crying their eyes out about the oh-so-racist and unfair reality is a good example – my Aspergerian mind is in total “told ye’ so mates”-mode in 2016/2017. Interestingly, Donald Trump is indeed hated for doing something characteristically autistic: Mentioning forbidden truths by simply saying as it is, he also dared not deceiving like usually and instead actually told people what he wanted to do and then had the autistic audacity to actually do what he told people he would do – f’n unheard of – end of democracy. No surprise/big surprise (for me/ for most), the intellectual establishment is in super bully Nazi-scream mode, the media doubling down and trying to deceive even more.

But for those not so enhanced, it is always good to have some peer reviewed “evidence” in support, as if the just discussed bias of un-enhanced intellectuals has not made it so that there are as many peer-reviewed papers supporting nonsense.

From the Abstract [1]:

Previous genetic studies demonstrated that ASD positively correlates with childhood intelligence, college completion, and years of schooling. Accordingly, we hypothesize that certain ASD risk alleles were under positive selection during human evolution due to their involvement in neurogenesis and cognitive ability.

Translated: This is all basically known and indeed no longer a surprise but instead an incremental advance. From Author Summary:

We observed a strong finding related to the genetics of autism spectrum disorders (ASD): common risk alleles are enriched for genomic signatures of incomplete selection (loci where a selected allele has not yet reached fixation). The genes where these alleles map tend to be expressed in brain and pituitary tissues, to be involved in molecular mechanisms related to nervous system development, and surprisingly, to be associated with increased cognitive ability.

“surprisingly” – well, you have to still try hype your paper.

Let me tell you another such “surprise”: My paper about male Aspergerian thinking being needed in the so-called “social sciences” in order to turn them from biased BS into actually emancipatory sciences is rejected by all journals for several years. I gave up and wait for the time when the rejection letters may start transitioning from “this is unacceptable but we are too pussy-lashed to even dare tell you why we will never even fucking dream about publishing it” to “this is all known in the relevant literature”. The new PLoS paper is one small step toward that transition. Perhaps someday the scientific community has embraced Aspergerian perspectives sufficiently that I actually can publish my best research instead of having to hide it.

-------------------
[1] Renato Polimanti, Joel Gelernter: “Widespread signatures of positive selection in common risk alleles associated to autism spectrum disorder.” PLoS Genet 13(2): e1006618. doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1006618 (2017)

[2] Sascha Vongehr: “Hyper-Aged Men Finished Off by Ageism and Misandry: from Deadly Discrimination of Men in Society, Social Science, and Andragogy Practice, Toward Emancipatory “male” Applied Empirical Social Science” (2016) http://vixra.org/abs/1612.0216