The neurodiversity movement/argument really gained strength as improvements in diagnostic instrument sensitivity produced diagnoses with less profound forms of autism.

While I respect the message of neurodiversity, it has often come at the expense of individuals with profound autism where one would be hard-pressed to not apply labels like disability, impairment, and such. Profound autism represents a substantial proportion of the autistic spectrum, but they are the least able to represent and advocate for themselves.

I think it's difficult with autism because autism applies to people who cannot feed themselves as well as people who would be defined by others as 'quirky'. There's no differentiation, so it'd be like calling all men disabled because some men are disabled. Of course, calling all men completely healthy isn't right either. There's no granularity.

These days it's also a lot of pretty much random people who were sent to the school psychologist for some reason or other, plus a bunch of people who went to see a GP for things like a runny nose and were hoodwinked into a couple of psychiatric diagnoses they'll never get rid of, plus a lot of depressive narcissists who cling to their unfounded diagnosis to feel better about themselves, and the doctors play along because it's the easiest way to deal with them.

I suspect >90% of so called ASD cases have little real clinical basis these days and the entire disorder looks very fishy.

The two should be treated differently.

Many are diagnosed with “autism”, seemingly not for any lack of ability, but præferences the diagnostician does not necessarily agree with.

I also object to “neuro-” morpheme. The diagnosis of these conditions are psychiatric, not neurological, and in many cases where such a diagnosis was made, there is nothing neurologically unusual that could be found, but in some cases there is.

Autism is simply with the current understanding not a neurological, but a psychiatric disorder. — the understanding may grow such that it might become one one day, but that is not the current level of understanding, and such understanding would most likely lead to the realization that all which is currently grouped under “autism”, has many different underlying neurological causes.

Unless you believe in mind-body dualism, then your objection of the neuro morpheme is on shaky ground.

All psychiatric disorders ARE neurological...i.e. is rooted in the brain and associated systems. Moreover, there are plenty of neurological differences between ASD and TD groups, both at the cellular and morphological levels. However, a lot of the morphological differences are too small, and heterogeneity too large, to be useful as a means of diagnosis.

The problem with your reasoning is that you assume that what psychiatrists group together based on behavior and culture must share single identifiable neurological causes.

It's entirely possible that there is nothing neurologically objectively different about an autistic person from a non-autistic person, and that it's simply a cultural quirk that led to it; this has been the case with many historical diagnoses.

In fact, I would argue that this is not simply possible, but likely, given that usually, if such a neurological discriminant exist, it is typically quickly found. That they have searched for so long without being able to find it, is indicative of a nonexistence.

No where did I assume a 1-1 correspondence between psychiatric label and neurological cause. Many disorders likely show variation precisely because they have different underlying causes....much like a car might not start for a number of reasons, including faulty wiring, bad battery, bad starter, no fuel, etc. It is also this heterogeneity of underlying causes that make precise neurological diagnosis difficult.

Nevertheless, the biggest claim is trying to claim that some behavior/symptomology/quirk does not involve the brain.

> The diagnosis of these conditions are psychiatric, not neurological

Oh, I'm pretty new to this myself, but my understanding was that autism was considered a neurological disorder, not a psychiatric one. [1]

"Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) refers to a group of complex neurodevelopment disorders..."

1. https://www.ninds.nih.gov/Disorders/Patient-Caregiver-Educat...

So why is the diagnosis made by psychologists and psychiatrists, and not neurologists?

It definitely feels like that redefinition would be a difficult thing to use for any practical purpose.

Death redefined as a situation where people continue to have the ability to occupy space and don't require any food or oxygen.

Dead people don't have higher income insurance premiums. The neurodiverse do because they're more likely to have problems holding down a job.... Because people keep perpetuating a society that punishes difference.

Interesting. It's certainly a lighter way about talking about things but it does seem problematic from a pragmatic view. Likely it'd run into a wall when a person has more than one disorder (i.e. you can't composite things by listing them) or when the list of things that are affected is much shorter than the list that isn't (which should be the case for most folks).

"Neurodiversity" does sound like a thing to be encouraged, or at least not to be avoided/minimized. Do we really want more autism?

Autism is an extremely broad term. At one extreme, those who will never speak and spend their lives enraged by being unable to communicate. At the other, a very substantial fraction of the worlds finest science & engineering minds.

I wouldn't mind a few more of the latter.

It's also true that a large portion of the high support needs cohort have other developmental disabilities. Autism is often co-diagnosed but doesn't account for the entirety of that demographic.

you see, mentally right now choosing between neurodiversity and selection you voted for selection.

Okay, fair enough: that was a shit way for me to make a point.

There's nothing wrong with preferring that people have the ability to communicate with others (vs them not having that ability).

The moral issue is externally-enforced selection (AKA eugenics), which seems to persistently rear its ugly head as soon as you start talking about disability.

My friend (edit: redacted) chose not to have kids, because every ancestor he could trace on his paternal line had died of cancer around age 40, and he didn't think it was fair to inflict that on somebody else. I think that was a wise and moral choice - but it would not be wise or moral to take the choice away from him.

Wouldn't it be justified to find a family member in his family tree that did not follow this "rule of thumb"?

Then you merely have to marry someone from that same family.

Or just marry a single mother who already has children.

How’s he doing on the cancer front so far?

He's made it to 50 via monthly blood tests, early intervention & staying extremely fit. Has still had more than his share of chemotherapy though.

We certainly want to be more welcoming and accommodating to autistic people, even we don't want to forcibly induce more autism in people.

"Neurodiversity" and "Neurodivergence" are browser terms than "autism".

And calling any single person "diverse" is icky.

At no point in my comment did I imply anything to the contrary. "things like autism" does not refer to autism exclusively nor to a person.