Some blue sky specualtion on the evolutionary advantages of

[hedgehog]

Asperger's/autism.

Some scientists hold that it was good for the tribe to have a few people around with depression/anxiety disorders. Back when we weer in the trees, the other monkies could go about their business while the worried monkey kept looking around for leopards. Being depresssed didn't help that monkey, but it helped the group as a whole.

I look around and I see some people who are near to manic disorder, and they get a lot done.

Now consider some of the Asperger/Autistic traits such as obsession with small details, intense study of particular subjects, intense sensitivity to sound or light, obsession with collecting, etc. If a person has a few of these traits or minor versions of these traits, then they are the ones liable to be persistant enough to invent a light bulb or to realize that grain grows from seeds etc. I suspect that there are a lot of people with some traits who pass as neurotypicals. I think it's when someone winds up with too many traits in the genetic lottery that they find it hard to function.

[KamaAina]

1. Oliver Sacks' "Island of the Color-Blind"

delves into the increased incidence of colorblindness on certain islands in Micronesia in the west Pacific.

Turns out that people with colorblindness can more easily see shadows -- such as those cast by a school of fish beneath the surface of the ocean. Thus, if an island's population includes people with colorblindness, they will catch more fish, and there will be more for everyone.

I once worked up a short roundtable conference presentation out of that.

[AndyTiedye]

2. We May be Optimized for Space Travel

We tend to be loners. We don't need as much social interaction as NTs do, for the most part.

We are really good with computers and the like.

We have a natural defense against sitting still for too long (something that WILL be a problem in space, it is already a problem for some particularly sedentary NTs on long plane flights).