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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 6 of 6. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by alexandra_k on October 19, 2013, at 1:17:23
One thing Temple Grandin has done quite well is made a case for differently empathetic rather than deficiently empathetic.
Her understanding of what gets cattle anxious / upset. Her ability to detect the things that are upsetting them. Her ability to think like a cow. That is empathy, of course.
She reckons it is because her psychology is more like a prey animal. I think she might well be onto something there...
The animal I like most is the Alpacka. I can't spell that. They seriously are a prey animal and they have a prey response to people. So... Their one desire is to get pretty far from people. Learning to train them involves thinking your way into their psychology. If you want them in the far left corner of the pen the way to bring that about is to put yourself in the near right corner. In their efforts to move as far away from you as possible you can predict how they will respond to your movements... And move yourself about accordingly. You can even train them to tolerate touch etc. But you need to remember: You have trained them to tolerate touch. Don't kid yourself that they like it. Or you.
I think they are pretty f*ck*ng cool.
I also like cats. I'm good with cats. Especially when people are like - oh yeah, I have a cat, but he won't come say 'hey' to visitors. I'm good at getting those cats to come say hey to me. All the cat wants is an invitation and not an intrusion. It just wants to know that you are the kind of person who can take no for an answer. The cat wants teh opportunity to approach you at their own pace and piss off again when they have had enough. They need to know you won't grab them or pick them up or whatever - not at this stage of the relationship anyways. Adn most human beings... Are incapable of that. Most human beings are like overly friendly puppies.
Maybe austistic spectrum is curently being overdiagnosed. Really... The worrying thing is this increase in low level, perhaps currently considered sub-clinical William's syndrome. I think that is more of a problem. Honestly. I wonder if there is an inverse relationship between intelligence (or perhaps responsivity to reason) and sociality (or perhaps responsivity to all things non-reason).
But this idea of different empathy. I think there is something to this. I also think that yes, there is something qualitatively to the point of quantitatively different between an infant who never engages in shared attention, has seroiusly delayed language acquisition, and movement stereotypies and me.
I feel bad they are extending the class so broadly as to include individuals like myself. I think the idea is to do this to decrease stigma. Get the high functioning individuals to poster child in understanding for us all... A bridge to the more serious cases. One worry is that people like me getting assistance... Takes assistance away from those more serious cases... But perhaps it is more that publicity for the phenomenon results in better assistance across teh baord?
I think it is a scary one for people because a-sociality... Well... There is a fear of this. Society pulls people back to the middle... To the masses... The most powerful individuals are expected to use their power to huddle safely in the middle.
Only: Wake up peple! Homo Sapiens won the apex predator war! The most dangerous thing for people: Is people!
Posted by alexandra_k on October 19, 2013, at 1:19:27
In reply to different vs deficient, posted by alexandra_k on October 19, 2013, at 1:17:23
and nobody thinks it is funny (strange not funny haha) that she uses her empathy with cows to design... more 'humane' ways of bringing about their slaughter.
something seems to be wrong... with the society who thinks... killing the cows is alright. yeah?
who the f*ck gets to decide who is f*ck*d up? that it f*ck*d up.
Posted by Partlycloudy on October 19, 2013, at 5:05:02
In reply to Re: different vs deficient, posted by alexandra_k on October 19, 2013, at 1:19:27
Yes. Temple Grandin is the most humane among us. She is pragmatic, but utterly empathetic.
HBO did a movie about her that was alright. It's on the rental market by now. Can't remember the title but the actress playing her was good, though lacking her physical presence and coming across as too feminine, in my eyes.
Ask Racer about her. She holds her in high regard as well. (Or did, it has been years since we have communicated.)
Posted by alexandra_k on October 19, 2013, at 17:23:33
In reply to Re: different vs deficient, posted by Partlycloudy on October 19, 2013, at 5:05:02
i haven't seen the movie. i bet they did for her what they did for whats his name... beautiful mind...
i know people who were at Princeton around the time he was there. they said they remembered him writing on the windows etc. only... he wasn't writing brilliant stuff... he had in fact lost it in his later years. the movie... beautiful-ed him up, for sure. most people need that... most people are very superficial.
like how stephen hawking gets to be poster child for brilliant physicist though he has lost the plot these days, better work is being done by others, etc etc. he of course deserves respect for work he has done... but mostly what work he is doing now is more work in the public imagination than any real physics. there are philosophers like that, too... i guess they serve a function / play a role. something something about science communications...
there were people who designed 'better', 'more humane' execution chambers for the Nazi's.
how do we feel about them? were they empathetic?
i don't think autism is about lack of empathy... i don't think that is the right way to characterize it.
i think there is something about lack of shared gaze / shared attention. i think there is also something about failure to find shared attention / shared activity intrinsically rewarding.
could be developmental (is in some cases - never acquired). others seem to regress - like they have caught something... others seem to get a bit like this after nasty life experiences... a lot of work needs to be done in figuring out the different mechanisms... then eventually carving the 'spectrum' up into better (more valid) kinds...
i know this is overly simple... but i do think there is something cat vs dog going on, or whatever.
this emotional resonance thing that people do... for me... it is deeply personal / intimate. for most people it seems as casual as saying 'hey'. for me... it is something i'm only willing to do with people once there is a meeting of minds / once i feel that we connect on a rational level. other people don't speak what is on their minds (so we can see whether we connect or not) they speak whatever they think i want to hear so they get the emotional connection they desire.
the most frustrating thing to me (outside the university) is the number of people who say 'yes i totally see what you are saying' in order to get emotional connection when they didn't even understand what i was saying.
much of my life is spent in confusion that people don't follow through on things they say they will do, they don't expect me to follow through on things i've promised to do, they are unable to follow simple instructions, they are unable to follow simple explanations etc etc etc.
i feel... used. dirty. invaded. icky people. get them the hell away from me.
i really do think a large part of it is literacy. literacy teaches you to understand the meaning of words because there aren't other cues. the story isn't about 'daddy is feeling happy right now'. there is an actual plot. some people... just go from the feelings of one person to the feelings of the next person to the feelings of the following person... with no ability to think or reflect or make any sense of what is going on...
like the animals.
apparently these people are more 'socially skilled' than me
wtf?
that doctor lady who looked me in the eyes, genuinely smiled, and said 'you interviewed well'. she blatently lied to me. she is supposed to have better social skills than me.
social skills are about... emotionally connecting at all costs. never mind the actual meaning of the words being said. 'of course dear, have this pill you want' medicine. of course. people think grandin has good social skills because she is good at designing 'humane' execution chambers... people... are f*ck*d up.
most people...
it really is like they aren't people at all.
which is really a rather disturbing thought.
most people... don't even seem to have much of a capacity to suffer...
in sofar as they lack the ability to mental time travel (empathise in a kantian way) or even consider their own futures...
they need to put me back or i'm in danger. for sure.
the idea... this is freudian - right? that life would just be one big massive orgy if it wasn't for social norms. that the id... that that was what the id was like. maybe the male id is like that...
maybe it isn't repression... maybe there just are people who are more discriminate in their desires for human contact. i bet most women are lolz. i know i surely am. i have no desire for an emotional connection with people who are insensitive to backing off when i need them to. there is this poster 'no means no'. only... most people don't get it - right? most people are fine with knowing full well you are unwilling and proceeding to do whatever it is that they want to do...
that is why people are attracted to fields like 'health'. because there are a lot of vulnerable people over there... i guess teaching is the same...
i don't like most people.
Posted by alexandra_k on October 19, 2013, at 17:53:32
In reply to Re: different vs deficient, posted by alexandra_k on October 19, 2013, at 17:23:33
why do we value this emotional resonance / connection thing as humans?
it isn't particularly correlated with prosociality. i mean... people are capable of looking you in the eyes and smiling you off to your (supposedly humane) slaughter.
it isn't particularly correlated with any of the things that we find to be distinctively human. or is it? perhaps i'm missing something in this respect...
the funny thing is that i do value it. it is just that i find it to be far too valuable to indiscriminately engage in with just anyone...
perhaps because my nervous system is more sensitive to most so it affects me more. like how an accidental touch leaves an imprint for hours...
i guess most people are (relatively) desensitized.
which makes them more empathetic. yeah, right.
i'm interested...
some early anthropological studies suggested some indigenous peoples (without written language) lacked the ability to think hypothetically. the example was abstract. something about... if there were 40 women in the tribe over and half of them were married then how many were available? they wouldn't? couldn't? answer. that was taken to be evidence of inability to reason. then they thought actually it was a culturally valid unwillingness to speculate on things that didn't make any difference to their practical lives... we were being culturally insensitive in our questions... oh yeah? i'll give you 40 muskets if you tell me the right answer. now it is relevant to your daily life. now can you do it? it isn't genes... it is lack of cognitive ability because the environment is impoverished: there isn't any written documents. same thing happens today with kids who are emotionally regulated up to a state of excitement / squeeling all the time and nobody reads to them or teaches them to take pleasure from quiet activity. it is cultural. how do you get a culture to not invent written language? how does that happen? it is not 'friendly' it is 'invasive'. it is not 'friendly' it is 'inconsiderate'. it is not 'friendly' it is 'inability to be alone'.
(i'd say about 3/4 of first year university students have trouble thinking hypothetically. in critical reasoning / logic people ALWAYS have trouble understanding that in a hypothetical expression like 'IF IT WERE raining then the ground would be wet' is not false even though it isn't currently raining. and even though there might be no such thing as rain. this is a distinct point from the fact that around 1/2 do have (legitimate) concerns about paradoxes of material implication (it is odd to think that a conditional with a false antecedent is true and we have third truth value intutions))
boarding school is the solution. actually... even earlier... free childcare. like how uni is (sort of) an even playing field for all those accepted into university accommodation at least. insofar as those students need not worry about internet access, dishwashing detergent, quiet places to study etc etc. because universities (and not techs who want to make a little extra money from handing out degrees) actually prioritize learning as the greatest goal and the only real rule is not to interfere with / prevent the learning of others and that carries through to student accommodation. REAL student accommodation. not the pile of sh*t i've found myself in currently where they cant' even organize their toilet paper and dishwash detergent.
there is a concern with the state taking your children... especially with teh kinds of people who are attracted to early childhood (aka the ones who are unable to function outside the creche themselves). but what is the alternative? roam freely and struggle yoruself up somehow? how well is that working for y'all?
if i dont' get into medicine i think i'm going to do a double degree in science / health science. then i can write... policy. whether i work for the government (contrating) or stay within teh university. i think i am interested in government policy... i need to learn much more... but society is presently f*ck*d up. and there MUST be better ways...
Posted by alexandra_k on October 19, 2013, at 18:03:35
In reply to Re: different vs deficient, posted by alexandra_k on October 19, 2013, at 17:53:32
how do you protect those who most need to be protected (the ones who have the ability to solve the problems of the world, cure the diseases, figure out fair distributions of resources etc) while also trying to provision for a decent quality of life for all.
we don't even have the latter... but without special protection for the former we probably never will... but something seems wrong worrying about special protection for the former (in the form of appropriate quiet and appropriate temperature and internet and toilet paper and stuff like that) while some people don't even get enough food to be free from malnutrition. and others are too stupid to organize less money than i currently have to nutritious diets. and yet they are given money to forage freely...
the world is so f*ck*d up. it makes me want to cry. but yeah, sure. i have no empath.y and no social skills. because i don't have that whole 'i'm so upset the world is not one big massive orgy' desire that is supposedly normal.
This is the end of the thread.
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