I'm not stubborn. I'm just right.

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Yup, agreed (exept for the disability part) BUT....

We live in the same reality, with the same physics etc. Doing it my way would have brought us a better grade in those school group works for example. If we are talking facts, it really doesnt matter which method we use, it just should be the better one. And if social hierarchy as an example interfers with this, we are hardly getting any way.

Last edited by Maje on 16 Sep 2011, 5:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Let’s put a slightly different perspective on this. For many years, like the OP, I too thought that I could see solutions very quickly, especially complex technical solutions. I used to get very frustrated at not being able to get the obvious way forward acknowledged. On occasion I won a few battles against heavy odds, which took considerable effort and time to do what I thought was obvious.

Over the years, I have learned that the actual problem that needs to be addressed is often not the problem that you are tasked to solve. The workplace, in particular, is very complex and resistance to a straightforward solution may be because of many, seemingly unrelated, issues; often down to office politics and to individuals guarding their own turf.

I work very well with my current boss who is very good at quickly seeing and understanding the wider issues that are not obvious to me. He is very good at identifying the key stakeholders, understanding what it is that really needs to be addressed and setting out what the real problems are. I am then able to use my AS problem solving skills to address these real but hidden problems. It works well. Unfortunately, my boss retires at the end of the year. I am trying to learn as much as I can from him to be able to cope as well when he has left. I think I will be able to do this in the workplace, which is relatively predictable. Outside work, however, things are less well defined and predictable. I wish I could understand how to apply similar skills to my social life.

I have an unusual variation of that problem because my personal obsession for the past 31 years has been precisely those bigger pictures. They want me to solve a task like "how to extract money from this customer" and I wan to solve the task of "how do we maximise the value we create, both for ourselves and society." The end result, as you say, is that we are trying to solve completely different problems. But I question whether NTs see the bigger picture. The VERY big picture is a narrow specialism in itself* and thus more likely to be an aspie domain.

* The good thing about complexity is that if you go deep enough it all becomes simple again. Eventually everything we do is random actions plus math.

Yes I am always right, stubbornness

I gotta say that in most situations i'm right and came up with a solid solution but people find it so rude when i"m always right..?
Though i don't feel ashamed to admit myself being wrong or uncomplete.

What I am trying to explain is more than the big picture. By the big picture, I mean all of the things known that influence or are influenced by a given topic. One can easily document and analyse these. It is the hidden things, which often can't be written down, that are the real hard nuts to crack. Weaselling out these issues is something hindered by my AS that others don’t find so difficult. My current boss refers to it as being able to smell out the issues. While I have a good view of the bigger picture I don’t have the same metaphorical sense of smell.

When talking about the issues your boss can cope with, definitely. But throw in a recession where he becomes powerless and the nerdy economics specialist has a much better grasp of what is going on, because the economics specialist sees the even bigger picture. Even though the same graduate has trouble with the day to day randomness that the big picture causes.

The big picture is a continuum, as I see it. At its biggest, the world is very simple: it's all math. I'm talking the mathematics of theoretical physics or the most basic laws of economics (the VERY basic ones, in the 1 + 1 =- 2 range), or the mathematical laws of genetics. Each step may be abstract, but it is simple and absolutely provable, and controls every other aspect of life. Then we follow the chain of cause and effect we get to the fabulously complex physical universe, containing fabulously complex organisms (e.g. people) and their fabulously complex interactions. Then if we follow the chain of cause and effect further we get to the simple again: if I push a door it opens; if I make a noise you hear it, etc.


As aspies, if we find ourselves in the middle section we are in trouble. and to some extent that is unavoidable, but the more we can position ourselves at the extremes, the safer we are. So ideal jobs for an aspie would be either the highly abstract (e.g. theoretical physics or low level economic modelling) or the highly physical (laboring). And since laboring is extremely dependent on the chaotic middle section of the graph, the abstract theoretical end is the place to be. The abstract people control everyone else. The managers may rely on their phones to make money, but the real money goes to the bankers and the phones are made by engineers. If you stay on the left extreme of the graph, and crucially make sure others depend on your knowledge, then you have all power. IMO.

I don't disagree with your point but I think it goes further than this. Your point about the recession. I do not agree that my boss is more powerless than anybody elsre. In fact, the recession was totally predictable. Just in the same way that it was predictable several months ago that the UK government policy on the recession was going to make things worse, ashes proved to be correct. All of these things are analysable. This is not what I am getting at.

Unfortunately, for Apies, the world is not all math. If it were, I would have no problem. One day the world will be able to fully analyse the NT mind and make things more predictable. Until then, thee will be more twists and turns from the ideal that the Aspie mind can cope with.

Sorry for the rant. I am under the influence. At the moment.

Very intelligent words. But allow me, despite my inferior writing style... to question a point.
Are we really two different species regarding NTs, or are we just better in seeing facts? I dont question human interaction, Im in there myself, but to a limited degree, as I e.g. overcome myself for the sake of solving problems effectively. I feel part of the whole picture you posted, but I often think human interaction is superfluous. Living in the same physical reality, isnt it likely that all humans have more or less predicting abilities and that the middle zone of your picture illustrate the point where there is less of this, and where people put themselves above facts? I realize how condescending it sounds, but as a human being Im speaking for myself aswell. Interaction can be funny and helpful and more.. but it can also be egoistic and therefore inhibiting for development. This fact prevents me from being egoistic in a lot more cases than a normal person. A person who just want to have "right" for the sake of having "right" is an example. Thus... in the very middle of your picture we are back to the stone age?

If that was a rant, please rant more.


Not "anyone" else, but he is dependent on others. But how powerful is he really? Here is an example of a truly powerful man: Grigori Perelman. He lives with his mother and doesn't wash very often, but he knows how to control the universe. That is why he refused a million dollar prize for his math:


Long after the rich and powerful of today are forgotten and discredited, Perelman's work will be controlling the world, through discoveries we cannot even dream of. Just as today's mobile phones rely on quantum mechanics (in the tiniest chips) and relativity (for synchronizing GPS). Just as economics and electronics rely on Girolamo Cardano' statistical theories from the 1500s. It's not just mathematicians: many obsessives have changed the world forever. Norman Borlaug created the Green Revolution and saving millions of lives. Rachel Carson saved the world's wildlife from DDT. Thomas Edison invented the things we take for granted. Louis Goldenberg created a better washing machine and freed the world's women from servitude. Martin Luther could not cope with inconsistency in his church, so he changed western civilization. Alfred Marshall was determined to rescue millions from poverty and he did. Malcolm McLean was obsessed by shipping containers, and revolutionizing the global economy. Florence Nightingale, Louis Pasteur, the list goes on.

People who are obsessive and right change the world. People who merely make money just live off the backs of the obsessives. Rational principles last forever. Palaces don't. The billionaires and presidents and movie stars of today create works like the vast statue of Ozymandias, that sooner or later are just dust in the wind.

This is why I sympathise with the OP. Yes, we have autism or something like it, and yes we have major problems in day to day activities in a world designed for NTs. Our weaknesses are not in question. But I want to stand up for the power of obsession. In the areas where we are measurably right, we are measurably right, and sometimes in dramatic ways.



Because the world is designed for NTs. An aspie world would be more predictable because we are less interested in obfuscation. An NT in a world full of aspies would have problems too. An Aspie world would be very different (plainer speaking, more focused activities, less intense social groups), but I don't know if it would be worse.

Definitely. The brain is a survival machine. The easiest way to survive in the short term is to intimidate (or deceive or kill) the person next to you. At the edges of the graph, in the worlds of thought or simple activity, the negative results are too obvious so we don't do it. But in the middle section, where life is confusing, the strong prey off the weak as they have always done.

"Civilized" societies merely institutionalize and whitewash this. Take theft for example, if I own a home then it will generally increase in value even if I do nothing. The longer I do nothing, the richer I become. This is a transfer of wealth from wealth creators (all wealth is created by somebody) to the idle (me). So the "social good" of home ownership is institutionalized theft. Or take murder. The "social good" of paying taxes allows me to rain bombs on other countries, just because I don't like their leaders. If I did that to my local neighbors I would be put in jail. Or take honesty: web sites rely for their funding on adverts that tell lies. or take bullying: the economic system allows the powerful (who gain their money partly by theft and murder) to force their will on the weak (who have to live by the rules of the powerful, or they have no money for food). There are endless examples: in the complicated mid section of the graph, where proving guilt is difficult, we all default to being liars, murderers, thieves, and bullies.

I don't think we put ourselves "above the facts" - we simply do not care about the facts. This is true even among experts. My interest is economics and sovereignty. These are are based on concepts of ownership that have no rational basis. Facts have no value to us. In the middle zone we use words for one reason only: to get what we want from our neighbor for as long as we can get away with it.

I do sympathise with the OP. I've been there but I have realised that the obvious solution that we see is not necessarily the one that is wanted or needed. My own obsessiveness and stubbornness have been successful in influencing change, to address real working issues, going as far as driving change to European Law. These changes, however, are meaningless if they are not applied as intended, because of undeclared, hidden, issues.

I agree that an AS world, particularly to Apsies, would be very predictable and analysable but not necessarily better. We have to live up to the facts that we do live in a world set up for NTs and we have to be able to understand what the real issues are in that world. These hidden, unspoken issues are just as real and as important as the ones that are fully declared, analysable and so easily understood by the Aspie mind.

Those are my obsessions.

As a child I wanted to be a politician, but then I realized the world was far more complicated than I thought, and I resolved not to fight for anything that I could not prove. And I mean prove in the strictest sense, because as you say, those pesky unknowns are dangerous. The slightest gap in logic can render an entire theory false. So in serious matters I don't touch anything that cannot be proven from zero assumptions. I leave the messy and risky stuff to other people.


Why do you have to be so darned reasonable all the time? I don't accept the NT world at all. I recognize it, and I recognize that for many people that may be the best, but I plan to create a society where everyone can choose the world they individually want.

Sorry for editing my post...
What if I say that I have in the middle of the picture seen the opposite of bloodsucking and also seen words/actions used to give neighbors something he/she needs? To be able to do this you have to understand the other person. When all comes down... isnt the dog-eat-dog mentality basically animalic egoism, where your neighbors dont matter? My suggestion is that egoism obscures our capability of finding the best solution, so that a development in everybody regarding egoism would gain humanity. Human interaction could like this become more meaningful.

Being survival machines, do we need certain types of egoism to survive? What if the person who wants to have right just for the sake of having right, overcomes him-/herself and realizes the egoism in him/her that prevents progress and the discussion can lead to something better? Is this the development that has to happen because it is the best, or is the human brain not developing, but maintaining the egoism that slows down intellect -> which we see is the path humanity has succeeded on... for ever? ...because we need it to survive? Do we need it? Or is it the wrong question?: Is it going to stay or has there been any development regarding egoism over time?

I would not put neighbors in the middle of the graph. The situation with neighbors is fairly simple: what you give is very likely to come back. But the money that is given (and the time you give, which is only available because you have money) - where does that money come from? Does anyone care?

Let us say person X gives 2 percent of their income to charity. That puts them in the very top ranks of givers. This means 98 percent of their income goes on normal expenses, and ends up invested in obtaining the best return, the cheapest products, etc. A little of the money may be in "ethical" products, but these seldom have any rational underpinning, and mainly exist to make the giver feel good. The bottom line is that a "good" person spends 2 percent of their time solving a problem, and 98 percent of their time causing it.


What do you mean by overcoming egoism? Does it require a change to human nature? That might be difficult.

There are reasons for our actions... We all care about our own reasons... (when we have one)



Example of overcoming egoism: "What if the person who wants to have right just for the sake of having right, overcomes him-/herself by realizing that the egoism in him/her prevents progress, so that he/she can be reasonable and the discussion can lead to something better?"

First his/her reason is "having right". He/she realizes that it isnt productive other than feeding his/her own ego = he/she understands his/her own natural need and how egoistic it is. He/she can search other solutions to the situation that would be productive, and make a conscious choice.

I suggest that he/she cannot choose to feed his/her own ego by accepting being an egoistic a**hole, because that will hurt the own ego, but I dont exclude the possibility as morality is relative.

I dont know if it can change or if some people dont have the ability to understand themselves... but I think everybody does.