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A related observation I've gotten from interacting with normies including my wife: Most people assume there is such thing as a "self" and that it is okay, natu

A related observation I've gotten from interacting with normies including my wife: Most people assume there is such thing as a "self" and that it is okay, natural, and desirable to preference yourself when interacting with other people. Indeed, for most normies, there is only various people and their selves interacting. My autistic perspective is that there is only a system of the world, various roles that people happen to occupy, and here are my options for where I can slot into it, might as well choose the best one, but it never occurred to me that the other people in the system could be individually influenced or that you could preference your self over others. At least, until I interacted with others enough to realize that that was all they were doing. Relatedly, most normies project this self-interest onto aspies and assume that when they are saying how the world is, they are pushing their own agenda, because in their worldview everybody has an agenda. As a result, the aspie tendency to make observations about broad sweeping systems comes off as arrogance, as preferencing themselves and their worldview over everybody else. But to an aspie, there is no such thing as arrogance, because arrogance implies that one preferences their self-worth over others, and there is no such thing as "self" or "worth", and it is nonsensical to talk about self-importance.

ajb 2y ago
Well that's an interesting theory. However, on reading it, my leading hypotheses are that people who express such disbelief in the possibility of their being selfish, either lack self-insight, or are lying. Your theory I would give a subjective probability rather lower than these. Of course, this might be my lack of insight into the aspie mind. But self-interest is highly evolutionarily favourable, and is built into our brains from very early in our evolutionary history - from the first organisms that had brains.
- ttpphd 2y ago
  Yeah it's your lack of insight and your projection of your own psychology onto others
  - ajb 2y ago
    The problem with that is: while it's true that one can't treat neurodivergent people fairly without taking heed of their testimony of how their mind works, selfishness is a behavior that has to be evaluated from an external perspective - for everyone, not just the neurodivergent. Because everyone who is ever selfish denies it, and has a story about why they're not being selfish. So it's always evaluated by POSIWID.
    - skissane 2y ago
      > Because everyone who is ever selfish denies it, and has a story about why they're not being selfish Ayn Rand wrote a book The Virtue of Selfishness - of course, if she views selfishness as virtuous, she is going to claim that virtue for herself Back to the realm of the more mainstream: a lot of people will admit they act selfishly sometimes - including me. I think you got to look after yourself, but you also should look out for other people - but if you go overboard on being selfless, you can start to be drained, and need to allow yourself a bit of selfishness to recharge. I think what we really need is a healthy balance between selflessness and selfishness. And that’s the ideal I am for. But do I always get the balance right? I’m sure I don’t, sometimes I go a bit too far in one direction, other times a bit too far in the other. I think what I’m saying here is pretty prosaic. Not everyone is going to agree, but heaps of people will.
- sutra_on 2y ago
  Selfless people do not exist for biological and evolutionary reasons (self-preservation and such). But then... you are responding to someone who calls other people "normies".
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
crazygringo 2y ago
This is a fascinating comment that really made me think. And I'd like to present you with a different perspective. You write that "My autistic perspective is that there is only a system of the world". But it's important to realize that the "system of the world" you've developed is from your perspective exclusively. You are modeling everybody in your system, and you may be doing your best to be 100% objective and not push your own agenda. However, your model is lacking because you can model your own "role" far better than anybody elses "role" -- you know your own preferences and desires with great accuracy, but not other people's. And you'll likely unconsciously assume that other people's preferences and desires as the same as yours, until proven otherwise. You write "the aspie tendency to make observations about broad sweeping systems comes off as arrogance". But what if it has nothing to do with broad sweeping systems, but the fact that your observations are extrapolating too much from your own preferences/desires that you are projecting onto others without realizing it? So the perceived "arrogance" may not be what you describe as an inappropriate reaction that you are bringing an agenda to things. But may actually be an appropriate reaction to the fact that you're making too many assumptions in your "observations about broad sweeping systems" that the systems in your head are reality, when they are not. When I have conversations with really smart people who come across as arrogant, it's not usually because they are being overly objective. It's because while their logic and deductions may be 100% correct, it's their starting assumptions that are wrong, which usually assume that other people have the same preferences/desires as themselves. But sometimes it's really hard to understand just how different people can be.
- threecheese 2y ago
  This reminds me of a quote from somewhere: All models are useful, none are correct. I (not OP) make a strong effort to be objective in my modeling of the world (even when it hurts), as it’s the only tool I have to understand and predict behavior and behavioral expectations. I wish we had access to predefined objective mental models, or could share them with each other (copy program structure and state across minds).
  - crazygringo 2y ago
    > or could share them with each other Honestly, I'd say literature and fictional works generally come the closest to that. Sitting down with a novel written by someone from a vastly different background from yours is kind of the closest you can get to seeing the world through someone else's eyes. Obviously not spy thrillers and the like, but novels that are more about real life. Another really interesting resource is some of the podcasts that do ~hour-long interviews with famous people and really dig into their childhood, motivations, etc. Dax Shephard is particularly good at this. Discovering how vastly different people's backgrounds are, the big choices they made in life, and the unexpected factors that contributed to those choices.
usefulcat 2y ago
> most normies project this self-interest onto aspies and assume that when they are saying how the world is, they are pushing their own agenda, because in their worldview everybody has an agenda. I have a theory (not claiming to have invented it, just something I often think about) that most people have a strong tendency to assume that other people think the same way they do.

ajb 2y ago

Well that's an interesting theory. However, on reading it, my leading hypotheses are that people who express such disbelief in the possibility of their being selfish, either lack self-insight, or are lying. Your theory I would give a subjective probability rather lower than these. Of course, this might be my lack of insight into the aspie mind. But self-interest is highly evolutionarily favourable, and is built into our brains from very early in our evolutionary history - from the first organisms that had brains.

ttpphd 2y ago
Yeah it's your lack of insight and your projection of your own psychology onto others
- ajb 2y ago
  The problem with that is: while it's true that one can't treat neurodivergent people fairly without taking heed of their testimony of how their mind works, selfishness is a behavior that has to be evaluated from an external perspective - for everyone, not just the neurodivergent. Because everyone who is ever selfish denies it, and has a story about why they're not being selfish. So it's always evaluated by POSIWID.
  - skissane 2y ago
    > Because everyone who is ever selfish denies it, and has a story about why they're not being selfish Ayn Rand wrote a book The Virtue of Selfishness - of course, if she views selfishness as virtuous, she is going to claim that virtue for herself Back to the realm of the more mainstream: a lot of people will admit they act selfishly sometimes - including me. I think you got to look after yourself, but you also should look out for other people - but if you go overboard on being selfless, you can start to be drained, and need to allow yourself a bit of selfishness to recharge. I think what we really need is a healthy balance between selflessness and selfishness. And that’s the ideal I am for. But do I always get the balance right? I’m sure I don’t, sometimes I go a bit too far in one direction, other times a bit too far in the other. I think what I’m saying here is pretty prosaic. Not everyone is going to agree, but heaps of people will.
sutra_on 2y ago
Selfless people do not exist for biological and evolutionary reasons (self-preservation and such). But then... you are responding to someone who calls other people "normies".
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

crazygringo 2y ago

This is a fascinating comment that really made me think. And I'd like to present you with a different perspective. You write that "My autistic perspective is that there is only a system of the world". But it's important to realize that the "system of the world" you've developed is from your perspective exclusively. You are modeling everybody in your system, and you may be doing your best to be 100% objective and not push your own agenda. However, your model is lacking because you can model your own "role" far better than anybody elses "role" -- you know your own preferences and desires with great accuracy, but not other people's. And you'll likely unconsciously assume that other people's preferences and desires as the same as yours, until proven otherwise. You write "the aspie tendency to make observations about broad sweeping systems comes off as arrogance". But what if it has nothing to do with broad sweeping systems, but the fact that your observations are extrapolating too much from your own preferences/desires that you are projecting onto others without realizing it? So the perceived "arrogance" may not be what you describe as an inappropriate reaction that you are bringing an agenda to things. But may actually be an appropriate reaction to the fact that you're making too many assumptions in your "observations about broad sweeping systems" that the systems in your head are reality, when they are not. When I have conversations with really smart people who come across as arrogant, it's not usually because they are being overly objective. It's because while their logic and deductions may be 100% correct, it's their starting assumptions that are wrong, which usually assume that other people have the same preferences/desires as themselves. But sometimes it's really hard to understand just how different people can be.

threecheese 2y ago
This reminds me of a quote from somewhere: All models are useful, none are correct. I (not OP) make a strong effort to be objective in my modeling of the world (even when it hurts), as it’s the only tool I have to understand and predict behavior and behavioral expectations. I wish we had access to predefined objective mental models, or could share them with each other (copy program structure and state across minds).
- crazygringo 2y ago
  > or could share them with each other Honestly, I'd say literature and fictional works generally come the closest to that. Sitting down with a novel written by someone from a vastly different background from yours is kind of the closest you can get to seeing the world through someone else's eyes. Obviously not spy thrillers and the like, but novels that are more about real life. Another really interesting resource is some of the podcasts that do ~hour-long interviews with famous people and really dig into their childhood, motivations, etc. Dax Shephard is particularly good at this. Discovering how vastly different people's backgrounds are, the big choices they made in life, and the unexpected factors that contributed to those choices.

usefulcat 2y ago

> most normies project this self-interest onto aspies and assume that when they are saying how the world is, they are pushing their own agenda, because in their worldview everybody has an agenda. I have a theory (not claiming to have invented it, just something I often think about) that most people have a strong tendency to assume that other people think the same way they do.