5 ms·

Fascinating find, but I wouldn't call this a disorder, rather a desired trait. The only issue with this "syndrome" is that they cannot process social danger sig

Fascinating find, but I wouldn't call this a disorder, rather a desired trait. The only issue with this "syndrome" is that they cannot process social danger signals--which I believe can be taught even though it is a fundamentally an intuitive defense. The trade-off? "They do not experience the jitters and inhibitions the rest of us feel." Talk about a huge advantage.

jganetsk 17y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williams_syndrome http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williams_syndrome The disease comes with a large number of physiological problems, and also serious problems in intelligence outside of social behavior.
- sethg 17y ago
  ...which raises the question: do these people lack the capacity for racial prejudice, or do they lack the intelligence required to determine what race a person belongs to? The boundaries between races are, after all, determined by culture (a hundred years ago, Italians, Russians, and Jews would not have been considered “white”), and culture has to be learned. To make matters worse, Williams is associated with severe deficits in visual perception (http://www.udel.edu/PR/UDaily/2004/WSDrawingslg.jpg http://www.udel.edu/PR/UDaily/2004/WSDrawingslg.jpg), so it’s possible that someone with the syndrome would have trouble even recognizing the facial characteristics that neurotypical folks associate with various races.
sp332 17y ago
Yeah, at first I thought it was something like "neurotypical." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neurotypical http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neurotypical
ryandvm 17y ago
It wouldn't be an advantage. I hate to break it to you, but Mother Nature knows her shit. We've evolved the "negative" tendencies we have for very good reasons and most of them are still doing their job at improving your odds for reproduction. I suspect that (seemingly) ugly tendencies like confirmation bias, stereotyping, vengeance, shame, etc. all increase your personal odds of reproduction. Likely at the expense of society, but it is what it is. I can understand how complete social trust and lack of anxiety would be beneficial in a perfect world; alas, we do not live in one.
- wmorgan 17y ago
  Disagree. We humans are emphatically not optimized for the world we live in today. We're adaptation executors, not fitness maximizers. http://lesswrong.com/lw/l0/adaptationexecuters_not_fitnessmaximizers/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/l0/adaptationexecuters_not_fitnessma...
goodside 17y ago
Simon Baron-Cohen (cousin to the comedian) has an incredible book on gender differences in psychology called "The Essential Difference", where he puts forth the theory that Williams Syndrome is a condition diametrically opposite from autism: whereas autistics exhibit hyper-masculine behavior, children with Williams Syndrome exhibit hyper-feminine behavior. As he describes it, children with WS have verbal and social abilities that far outpace their physical development, while suffering severe mental retardation in pretty much all other areas, especially spacial and quantitative reasoning. As others have mentioned, the condition also results in physical changes including pale skin, stunted growth, and abnormal facial features. It's not something one might wish upon one's children.

jganetsk 17y ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williams_syndrome http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williams_syndrome The disease comes with a large number of physiological problems, and also serious problems in intelligence outside of social behavior.

sethg 17y ago
...which raises the question: do these people lack the capacity for racial prejudice, or do they lack the intelligence required to determine what race a person belongs to? The boundaries between races are, after all, determined by culture (a hundred years ago, Italians, Russians, and Jews would not have been considered “white”), and culture has to be learned. To make matters worse, Williams is associated with severe deficits in visual perception (http://www.udel.edu/PR/UDaily/2004/WSDrawingslg.jpg http://www.udel.edu/PR/UDaily/2004/WSDrawingslg.jpg), so it’s possible that someone with the syndrome would have trouble even recognizing the facial characteristics that neurotypical folks associate with various races.

sp332 17y ago

Yeah, at first I thought it was something like "neurotypical." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neurotypical http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neurotypical

ryandvm 17y ago

It wouldn't be an advantage. I hate to break it to you, but Mother Nature knows her shit. We've evolved the "negative" tendencies we have for very good reasons and most of them are still doing their job at improving your odds for reproduction. I suspect that (seemingly) ugly tendencies like confirmation bias, stereotyping, vengeance, shame, etc. all increase your personal odds of reproduction. Likely at the expense of society, but it is what it is. I can understand how complete social trust and lack of anxiety would be beneficial in a perfect world; alas, we do not live in one.

wmorgan 17y ago
Disagree. We humans are emphatically not optimized for the world we live in today. We're adaptation executors, not fitness maximizers. http://lesswrong.com/lw/l0/adaptationexecuters_not_fitnessmaximizers/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/l0/adaptationexecuters_not_fitnessma...

goodside 17y ago

Simon Baron-Cohen (cousin to the comedian) has an incredible book on gender differences in psychology called "The Essential Difference", where he puts forth the theory that Williams Syndrome is a condition diametrically opposite from autism: whereas autistics exhibit hyper-masculine behavior, children with Williams Syndrome exhibit hyper-feminine behavior. As he describes it, children with WS have verbal and social abilities that far outpace their physical development, while suffering severe mental retardation in pretty much all other areas, especially spacial and quantitative reasoning. As others have mentioned, the condition also results in physical changes including pale skin, stunted growth, and abnormal facial features. It's not something one might wish upon one's children.