>Some people have argued [1] that it was not his autism, but his alexithymia which was altered by the TMS. Alexithymia is an orthogonal condition: it can occur

>Some people have argued [1] that it was not his autism, but his alexithymia which was altered by the TMS. Alexithymia is an orthogonal condition: it can occur with or without autism. We don't really know if the TMS actually cured his alexithymia or if it was due to psychological/behaviour factors of the treatment. That would require a placebo-controlled trial. It's certainly plausible that the treatment cured him, as there is a part of the brain that attaches emotions to experiences (the insular cortex). On the other hand TMS will have a huge placebo effect, so this needs to be considered. It also seems plausible that his lack of emotions is a protection mechanism that protected him from his highly dysfunctional childhood. I would recommend reading John Sarno's books: he has spent 50 years treating people who's problem is the opposite of this. Too much emotion tends to cause chronic pain/fatigue/depression and other issues. So I'm not sure it's generally a good idea to do something like this. Overall, I don't really see this as being any better than a behavioural treatment designed to help people identify with their feelings. TMS seems too much like hitting your computer with a hammer to fix a bug.