My memories aren't neatly stacked, they're all suspended alone, but with a myriad of links and connections to each other that probably only make sense to me. I can read a sentence fragment in a post, and suddenly I'm in 1972, watching a Brady Bunch episode, because the phrasing or tone reminded me of what Jan said in that one episode...
@markusl@fosstodon.org @cwebber@octodon.social @ginsterbusch @dpnash@mastodon.online @sentient_water @hosford42 @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity
@ScottSoCal @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @hosford42 @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity I've heard this unique autistic form of memory described as 'associational thinking' by Temple Grandin in the book 'The Autistic Brain'. She corrects her previous mistaken idea that all autists were visual thinkers. I'm not. I'm a linguistic thinker.
@sentient_water @ScottSoCal @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity What about blending and combining disparate ideas based on analogy? I'm interested in economic systems, forms of government, evolution, the scientific method, machine learning algorithms, etc., because they follow the same underlying pattern of asymptotic optimization. A lot of the ML algorithms and other computing paradigms I invent connect what appear superficially to be very distinct ideas, thanks to some sort of analogy that links them all together. It's a deep source of creativity, which to me is an expression of the associational thinking you mention. I'm wondering now if this creative mechanism through analogy is something other autistic folks might have in common with me. I literally can't think of a system without seeing its similarities to a long list of other systems.
That connects to my experience. I once resolved an issue at work, dealing with monocrystalline wafers, by connecting it to my hobby of woodworking.
Hey, don't laugh, there are similarities in processing.
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@ScottSoCal @sentient_water @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity Not laughing at all! But completely clueless about the connection nonetheless.
When cutting wood on a tablesaw, you have to adjust the feed rate and blade speed, or it can damage the wood. We were having trouble at work dicing the wafers - getting edge chipouts and cracks. In the meeting I flashed to my tablesaw, and the difference between feeding it soft pine or white oak, started asking questions and - hey, that's the problem, new crystal format.
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@hosford42 @ScottSoCal @sentient_water @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity
I experience this a great deal.
I've said that one of the reasons I lose nouns first in my language abilities is because I don't rely on them in my private thoughts.
In here are largely choreographies, patterns, chords, allegorical harmonics, behaviors, resonances, shapes, affinities ... nothing that gets retained in my brain is noun-like (an opaque container). It's much more similar to verbs and adjectives.
I have to look at everything holistically, and then apply whatever strategies, tools, orientation seem appropriate, according to their properties instead of their categories.
Nothing is a THING in my understanding. They/we are all collections of attributes that interact dynamically with context.
@anomalon @ScottSoCal @sentient_water @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity Wow, I never considered that explanation for why I (too) lose nouns first, but it makes sense! Like you said, nothing is an opaque container in my mind. I just never thought about whether other people might experience those concepts differently, in such a fundamental way.
@hosford42 @ScottSoCal @sentient_water @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity
Coarsely, some people map buildings, and some map streets.
From conversations, I've gathered that many people hold nouns, and then subgroup each noun with a collection of attributes and purposes. For those people, it is not intuitive to undo a lightswitch cover plate with a butter knife. They'll look for a screwdriver. (as an aside, in my experience, most screwdrivers are too fat for this purpose and a butter knife is my go-to, though honestly what I look for is *strong *thin *flat *narrowish)
@anomalon @ScottSoCal @sentient_water @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity Okay, this confirms it for me. Also, I'm confused by the existence of folks who would think of a screwdriver but not a butter knife. I always thought they were just giving up early. Not that they literally didn't know of more concepts to search.
Also, interesting analogy about the buildings vs streets, which I will be stealing.
Here's a question: Can telling someone that it's possible to map buildings ever affect the way they think about things? Or do you have to be a building-mapper in the first place?
And another: Is there an advantage to being a street-mapper? Why else would so many people work that way?
@hosford42 @ScottSoCal @sentient_water @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity
To be clear, in this rough binary, I see myself as a street mapper. There is a choreography to certain journeys, a relationship to the terrain, an awareness of proximities and context. Some streets move quickly because of their context, some more slowly. It's not a place where many things ARE in any permanent sense. It's a place where things are within a moment, for purposes personal and often undeclared. There are varying levels of rules, but my favorites are the ones where the main rules are PHYSICS. Like in India. It's a bit terrifying from a natal perspective of THERE SHOULD BE RULES, but once the luxury of being surrounded by other creatures that are paying attention to physics rather than rules becomes understood, it feels safer. The security privileges that small vehicles lack, they make up for in nimbleness. Diversity is to be expected. Roads can change names, but that alone doesn't change them at all, because their attributes and relational positioning is what makes them what they are.
It is easier for me to find a specific building by imagining the streets that lead there.
(Thank you for the impetus to write stuff. It's an energy boost my day needed.)
@anomalon @ScottSoCal @sentient_water @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity Huh, I took the analogy in a very different way. From the streets, the buildings are opaque like the object view of reality you mentioned. But I go inside them, as well. So from my interpretation, mapping the building would be analogous to breaking objects down into their attributes and properties.
@hosford42 @ScottSoCal @sentient_water @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity
In this map of mapping I've initiated here, in my version (lovely things about maps is how subjective their creation is) mapping the buildings would be more like THAT'S A HOME DEPOT: it's where the tools are and they don't sell eggs! (or that person was born with a vagina, they should defer authority and make less money and not really be important in medical research)... Having KNOWN OBJECTS with known things in them and known purposes. You can walk into the majority of buildings and all but expect it's going to have a place to put poop and a place to get water and ready illumination anytime of day. Buildings allow for expectation/categorization in a way that roads don't, and attention to your surroundings and your orientation to them is less of a requirement.
As a street person, I think of buildings with the element of time also. Just because a structure had one purpose at one time doesn't mean it does anymore. Because I'm used to assessing my environment constantly, I notice the small variances in otherwise stable scenes (and am thus never bored). I still have responses when things are distressing, but my expectations are so lightly held that I don't experience the pain of having expected a Home Depot and instead it's a Best Buy now and I need caulk and fuckfuckfuck. Natively, I just imagine the streets that eventually arrive at caulk if that's what I need.
@hosford42 @ScottSoCal @sentient_water @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity
Best thing about analogies is they aren't set in stone, either.
@anomalon @hosford42 @ScottSoCal @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity One quote which I often think about is
"I appear to be a verb." - Buckminster Fuller
It's just objectively true & that we constantly think of & refer to ourselves as nouns is the cause of much of our unhappiness.
@sentient_water @anomalon @ScottSoCal @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity We are more like the flames of the fire than the wood that fuels it.
@sentient_water @anomalon @ScottSoCal @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity This idea of myself as a process instead of an object helped me come to terms with my own mortality. It changes the ending from something unnatural, to be avoided, to something normal and inevitable. I still don't like it. But I understand it better and can accept it.
@hosford42 @sentient_water @ScottSoCal @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity
O man, I don't think I have the focus to fully elaborate my delight with fire (I have to put on pants and hang a soffit) but briefly:
Fire is, in my experience, the most tangible representation we have of "beyond the veil". We can summon it, in a quantity that depends on the fuel/adversity ratio in the environment we summon it to. We can very often banish it. It is neither created nor destroyed, just brought into and out of our experience. It behaves predictably, though according to factors that may be beyond our comprehension. It is generous and dangerous. It is to be, above all, respected. It is infinite, eternal, and nowhere in particular unless it is there specifically. It's fuckin cool. /rant
@sentient_water @anomalon @hosford42 @ScottSoCal @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity tbh, this is why I want to learn anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe language) I started learning about it because my partner is reconnecting, and I thought our kid would benefit. But learning it's mostly verbs sparked an intense curiosity for a lot of the same reasons mentioned in this thread. Now I just need to find the time to really dig into the resources...
@ScottSoCal @sentient_water @SQLAllFather @markusl @cwebber @ginsterbusch @dpnash @Tooden @actuallyautistic @neurodiversity Awesome! Out of left field, an analogy to something that seems totally unrelated that leads you straight to the answer. Yeah, this is similar to what I'm describing. Sometimes I explain it to people like this: I don't just look at the problem. I walk all around it, kneel down, stand on my tiptoes, turn my head sideways. But instead of moving around it physically, I'm moving around in idea space. Often looking at it from a novel perspective causes things to line up just right and then the answer just pops right out with minimal thought. And with a lot of practice, I've gotten good at finding those useful perspectives really quickly.