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Tantricbadass
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04 Jun 2011, 1:30 pm

The other day, I was watching the daily show and there was a guy on there who wrote this book called "the psychopath test."It was very interesting to hear him speak about psychos.He said they have no anxiety and take pleasure in hurting other people.They are knieving and deceitful.One out of a hundred people are psychopaths.I thought about it for a while and aren't aspies the opposite of psychos?They are deceitful and charming, aspies are honest and have bad social skills.They have no anxiety, we have tons.I think most bullies are psychos.I plan on buying the book.I just wanted to break this up.What are your thoughts?



Jonsi
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04 Jun 2011, 1:38 pm

So, what does this have to do with this section? The book?

But anyway, I don't think so. Aspies can be quite deceitful as well. I'm pretty sure there are tons of members here who lie quite a bit. Psychopaths can be honest but only when it suits them. Some aspies are like this. Not all, but some.



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04 Jun 2011, 2:31 pm

Tantricbadass wrote:
The other day, I was watching the daily show and there was a guy on there who wrote this book called "the psychopath test."It was very interesting to hear him speak about psychos.He said they have no anxiety and take pleasure in hurting other people.They are knieving and deceitful.One out of a hundred people are psychopaths.I thought about it for a while and aren't aspies the opposite of psychos?They are deceitful and charming, aspies are honest and have bad social skills.They have no anxiety, we have tons.I think most bullies are psychos.I plan on buying the book.I just wanted to break this up.What are your thoughts?


People with AS aren't psychopaths and I blame any connections people make between someone with AS and psychopaths on the ill conceived notion and entirely false that people with AS lack empathy.

Psychopaths lack empathy in that they actually do not care about other individuals. They literally view others no differently than objects. Tools which they can use to acquire that which they desire. This is confirmed on brain scans. Their brains show little activity outside of the visual context upon viewing images which evoke strong emotions in others.

In contrast, the brain of the relatively normal subject light up as areas involved in emotional processes are stimulated.

I do not know that any similar study has been done on those with AS. AS used to be called "autistic psychopathy" and so it's difficult to search for studies comparing those with AS to actual psychopaths.

However I'm quite positive I'm not a psycopath, and while perhaps my emotional responses and the way I perceive and analyze may be slightly different than others, I'm not without compassion or affinity for others. I do feel things such as guilt and remorse when I have wronged someone (which was almost always done unintentionally) and to be perfectly honest I fail to believe that NT's are actually as empathic or caring of others as they claim to be with respect to those with AS.

I ask, what is empathy without action? While those of us with AS may not feel as strongly connected to a character in a movie, or be nearly as disturbed by certain images as those without AS, consider; those in whom trying situations elicit overly emotional responses, are frequently disabled by their emotions. They are more prone to panic or fleeing, causing a situation to worsen or refusing to put themselves in a situation of perceived danger, and leaving those in need to suffer.

In other words, when empathy becomes so strong that it translates from survival of the species to survival of ones self, it has lost it's point.

People with AS are not psychopaths as they do indeed posses empathy, and equally importantly, people with AS are not empathic psychopaths, as that empathy rarely translates to intentional preservation of one's self over others.



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04 Jun 2011, 3:40 pm

Aspies yeah are nothing like psychopaths. If aspies ever seem un-emotional, it's because sometimes our emotions 'shut down'.



TheSnarkKnight
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04 Jun 2011, 6:21 pm

Tantricbadass wrote:
The other day, I was watching the daily show and there was a guy on there who wrote this book called "the psychopath test."It was very interesting to hear him speak about psychos.He said they have no anxiety and take pleasure in hurting other people.They are knieving and deceitful.One out of a hundred people are psychopaths.I thought about it for a while and aren't aspies the opposite of psychos?They are deceitful and charming, aspies are honest and have bad social skills.They have no anxiety, we have tons.I think most bullies are psychos.I plan on buying the book.I just wanted to break this up.What are your thoughts?


I saw that episode, as well. I can't say for certain if psychopathy is the opposite of AS, but I think the reason they lack empathy is different from why people with AS lack empathy. I think the lack of empathy in AS a consequence to our mind-blindness--we cannot know intuitively what someone might be thinking and therefore we cannot feel the way they feel. Psychopaths, on the other hand are not mind-blind, and the reason they lack empathy is just a true inability to feel anything outside themselves, so they do not feel guilty about taking advantage of people. I think these might also be the same people that can fool polygraphs, since they do not feel uncomfortable when they lie.



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05 Jun 2011, 12:29 pm

I don't think psychopathy is an actual mental illness.....its something people assume about you when you come of as weird. I see it the same was as when people use the term ret*d to describe anyone who seems a little slow regardless of their actual intelligence.

Basically its kind of an old term for anti-social PD, and is now used inaccuratley for the most part.



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05 Jun 2011, 12:30 pm

TheSnarkKnight wrote:
Tantricbadass wrote:
The other day, I was watching the daily show and there was a guy on there who wrote this book called "the psychopath test."It was very interesting to hear him speak about psychos.He said they have no anxiety and take pleasure in hurting other people.They are knieving and deceitful.One out of a hundred people are psychopaths.I thought about it for a while and aren't aspies the opposite of psychos?They are deceitful and charming, aspies are honest and have bad social skills.They have no anxiety, we have tons.I think most bullies are psychos.I plan on buying the book.I just wanted to break this up.What are your thoughts?


I saw that episode, as well. I can't say for certain if psychopathy is the opposite of AS, but I think the reason they lack empathy is different from why people with AS lack empathy. I think the lack of empathy in AS a consequence to our mind-blindness--we cannot know intuitively what someone might be thinking and therefore we cannot feel the way they feel. Psychopaths, on the other hand are not mind-blind, and the reason they lack empathy is just a true inability to feel anything outside themselves, so they do not feel guilty about taking advantage of people. I think these might also be the same people that can fool polygraphs, since they do not feel uncomfortable when they lie.


I don't feel uncomfortable when I lie....but usually I feel my reasons for lying are justified so maybe that is why.