Atheism and Autism--Are They Correlated?
This month's issue of Psychology Today has an interesting piece that reminded me of everybody's dear friend, Vox Day. He asserts in his blog and his book on many occasions that atheists are more likely to suffer from what he terms "social autism"--disorders such as Asperger's Syndrome or mild forms of autism. He bases this on informal internet surveys that questioned people on their personality traits. But is the correlation really there, or is this just another attempt to disparage atheists?
"It's All Geek to Me" by Benjamin Nugent discusses the difference between the systematizing brains of so-called "nerds" and the empathic brains of the more socially inclined. Although nerds, the "intellectually gifted but socially awkward" (p.39), do share some traits of those with ASD (Autistic Spectrum Disorders) but not to a severe enough degree to be classified as a pathology. In fact, the behavior can be brought on solely by parenting style according to Dr. Mel Levine, and the socially inept can be taught the skills necessary for more intuitive social interactions. This is where nerdiness differs from ASD. ASD is persistent despite attempts at socialization.
So what does this have to do with atheism? Vox insists that atheists are more likely to be “socially autistic,” which is slightly redundant since autism necessarily entails a type of social ineptness, but I think that the correlation there is purely coincidental. We already know that atheism/nontheism is more prevalent among those of above average intelligence. If people with above average intelligence are also more likely to be “nerds,” or have S-type brains, then it stands to reason that the true connection has nothing to do with atheism and everything to do with the fact that there are more educated and intelligent people in the atheist community who have the aforementioned traits. It is also important to keep in mind the fact that social awkwardness does not imply a pathological disorder.
Obviously, this is not a scientific study. This is my own inference based on what appears to be a logical correlation—as opposed to the completely illogical idea that atheism somehow causes autism or that autistic people are more likely to be atheists. Vox will probably backpedal and say that he was using the term “autistic” loosely, but he does spend quite some time reiterating these sentiments both in his book and on his blog.
Anybody with Lexus-Nexus or JSTOR subscriptions—I would love to get copies of any journal articles that may be relevant to this topic if you wouldn’t mind sharing. 
kelly i have a lexus-nexus,
kelly i have a lexus-nexus, j-stor, and netlibrary subscription through GMU. i'd be happy to give you my user id... e-mail or PM?
Beltway Atheists "We're good people, just not god people."
I'm not so sure there is a coorelation
In my experience, people with AS live by "rules." If they grew up in a house where god existed, then that's a "rule" and it's not likely to be broken. If they grew up questioning or in a family with no god, then they are more likely to at least be skeptical. People with AS are highly intelligent but once they make up their mind on something, it's very hard to change it. My husband is undiagnosed but I've found support groups and I haven't seen more atheists in these groups.
Psychology and Brain Chemistry
I can't remember which book I read this in, or it might have been a TTC lecture, but as more and more people with different brain chemistries are catalogued, there are going to more and more "disorders." Everyone will have a different one, so whose to say what is normal?
I'm slightly socially inept, but I would blame that on my parents and them sending me to a school with the same 12 kids/class for 7 years. I'm also an atheist with degrees in Physics and Electrical Engineering, so I guess he would probably classify me as autistic then as well.
Back on topic, you should suggest to Vox to check out the TTC lectures on Psycology along with "Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors" by Carl Sagan and "Mapping the Mind" by Rita Carter, to at least be somewhat educated on what he spews from his mouth.
The problem with psychology
The problem with psychology its that its always been one of the more politically and socially effected sciences. The reality of gravity or evolution is not effected by which country the scientist was born in.
The posting you put up at least implies that 'atheism' is in some how unusual and make up an interesting subject matter. That however is a highly 'American centric' view point.
Atheism is the 'norm' or at least close to the norm in most Western countries the only real exception to this is America.
Now if these psychologist wish to demonstrate that 'autism is of a higher level in Europe than it is in America (I have absolutely no idea if that is true or not) and that the reason that it is higher is due to a lack of religion there then we would be looking at some interesting research.
It's a bit like saying are Americans more prone to violence due to their abnormal religiosity ( its a question which in itself is loaded)
On the note of American Atheism
"In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy, and abortion in the prosperous democracies (Figures 1-9). The most theistic prosperous democracy, the U.S., is exceptional, but not in the manner Franklin predicted. The United States is almost always the most dysfunctional of the developed democracies, sometimes spectacularly so, and almost always scores poorly."
Here's the refrence. http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html
I'm American and I love my country, but this is just ridiculous. We even know the cause of the problem!
"Life Is Far Too Important A Thing Ever To Talk Seriously About" Oscar Wilde
I wasn't aware "social
I wasn't aware "social autism" was an actual condition. Then again, my DSM is out of date. I suppose he's just using it as a phrase like Deepak Chopra likes to use quantum mechanics despite quantum mechanics having nothing to do with the garbage he spews.
So why don't we just claim religious people have a case of underlying cyclical mild schizophrenia. It usually tends to reveal itself on Sundays and on religious holidays. It's not a real condition but, in the world of scientific illiterates, it sure sounds plausible especially if you are wearing a nifty lab coat.
Vote McCain, he brought back Czechoslovakia and will veto beer. The Real McCain
Autism of all forms is
Autism of all forms is significantly more prevalent in males. Interestingly, Simon Baron-Cohen, of Cambridge, and his student Svetlana Lutchmaya, have done studies that seem to indicate that autism may be an overabundance of instinctive male behavioral traits. In babies 24 hours old, males preferred to look at a mechanical mobile slightly more often than their mother's face. Females preferred to look at their mother slightly more than the mobile. At one year, the difference is pronounced. The really interesting thing is that within the males, the degree of interest in the mobile was proportional to the amount of prenatal testosterone they had been exposed to. In other words, the more testosterone in the womb, the more someone is geared towards how things work instead of how people relate.
In a related study, young children were asked to solve a simple problem involving an error in physics and an error in empathy. Boys consistently identified the physics error faster than the empathy error, and again, there was a correlation to prenatal testosterone. Boys with signs of autism seldom, if ever, identified the error in empathy.
The bottom line is that it does appear to be a scale, not an on/off switch, and it does appear to have something to do with prenatal testosterone.
As far as the assertion that autistic people might be more inclined to be atheists, I don't see why that would be an insult. The disorder often manifests itself as prodigious talent in logic and math. Duh. The reason so many people with Asperger's are engineers and physicists is that they are really freaking good at it. The reason they are not swayed by the emotional appeals of religion is that they don't get it. They are unaffected by appeals to emotion, or at least are significantly less affected than people without the condition.
Credulity is much easier to sustain when we've been taught that facts are things to be memorized and repeated, rather than sought out and discovered.
-- Me
That's funny, my parents
That's funny, my parents seem to think I'm over social. Especially during summer I spend a huge amount of time with friends. My dad even has tried to limit me going out at night to two nights a week, with no success.
I think the results of this "study" are referring to an atheists tendency to avoid mainstream society, probably because we can see all the bullshit in it. And of course when society distrusts you (and America certainly doesn't trust an atheist), you tend to also distrust society.
"We are the star things harvesting the star energy"
-Carl Sagan
There was a thread about
There was a thread about this a while back (started by a girl in her intro post - but she never came back.) I thought maybe because those of us with ASD tend to be more logical that we realize that religion makes no sense quicker than others would. Notice how many of us on here have Aspergers. We also don't care as much about being socially acceptable so we're more likely to admit to atheism.
The main problem with born-again Christians is they're even more annoying the second time around.
Vox's own social autism
Rather than being speculative in response to Vox Day's oft repeated accusations of 'social autism', why not just point out that he himself possesses such 'social autism' in spades? Go through his blog and count the number of times he refers to Barack Obama as "the magic negro".
There's a difference between
There's a difference between autism and being an asshat. Vox Day is the latter.
whoa
im kindof autistic... so is my galfriend... whoa (real short higher note surprised kind of whoa slightly comical to)
p.s my eyes got a little bigger reading that.
evolution theory
i tend to notice the people with autism tend to have high intelligence or good ability's in certain area'a such as math and language learning
although they do have trouble communicating it to other people is a down side they have.
but what if it an evolutionary attempt at increasing intelligence of mankind just the mutation didnt queit go right but will adapt in the future providing enough of them manage to have enough social skill to reproduce.
autism and athiesm
There might be a connection between autism and pantheism of a one of those beliefs that suggest a horizontal diety as opposed to one that comes from above. Consider that autism is an evolutionary condition, derived from those with a matrifocal neurology, characteristic of the ancient goddess religions.
Visit http://www.neoteny.org/?cat=7 for details.