👁️ autosurveillant 👁️ @pee_zombie@schelling.pt
ofc, the situation is different for those significantly more disabled than me; & make no mistake, autism is a disability. what else do you call a permanent condition which significantly increases the effort level required for you to exist in normal society?
its ok to admit this.
there's a sizable contingent which claims this should not be the goal, that instead we should seek to reform society such that our peculiar brand of behavior is accepted as perfectly normal; this is a ridiculous cope by those terrified to admit they're afraid to try and improve.
for me, this took the form of athletics, mindfulness meditation, CBT, astronautical expeditions, quite a bit too much rationalism, and many instances of fucking up horribly.
but eventually, I found myself passing as neurotypical consistently
---
RT @pee_zombie
sufficiently advanced autism is indistinguishable from just being competent
many people IRL don't actually believe me when I tell them i'm an aspie; i'm too sociable, too perce…
https://twitter.com/pee_zombie/status/1397985417639698432
naturally, when pharmacological interventions are introduced for this sort of problem, only the symptoms are temporarily alleviated, rather than the underlying dynamics generating the pathologies.
the correct answer is, instead, for us to improve our self-regulatory capabilities
for many like me, this leads us to develop behavioral complexes like ADHD, anxiety, depression, often misattributed to "chemical imbalances", rather than pre-existing neuropsychological dynamics. crediting neurotransmitter distributions is rather like saying diplomats cause war.
unmoderated, this can lead you into a degenerative cycle of mania, as you allow your intensity of sensation to build past your regulatory system's ability to moderate, and feedback loops set in, accelerating the effect, self-perpetuating until meltdown
---
RT @pee_zombie
3. the ADHD mind, naturally, is great at introducing randomness and "heating up" the attention function, jumping around with great intensity, which can lead to a wide …
https://twitter.com/pee_zombie/status/1338975731280474115
there are many ways to define vividness. to me, it's something akin to experiencing every part of the world at equal intensity, being in a state of lowkey ecstasy continuously, feeling every sensation to its utmost; tuning into the frequency of your élan vital
this is dangerous
over time, w/ much introspection, I learned to access the level where this muting occurred, and to willfully loosen it; to increase my sensitivity to the world to normal levels, & beyond, to those I'd naturally have. this allowed me to glimpse what @Meaningness terms "vividness"
this, ofc, is all an autonomic process, and many of us never become consciously aware of this dynamic, causing us to go through life believing this insensitivity to be an inherent aspect of our psyches, when in fact, the opposite is true. this can be okay, but it's suboptimal.
in our case, the primary lever is downregulation of sensory inputs, ie, weighing the data coming from the outside world much lower than is typical, in order for it to not overwhelm the comparatively weaker internal signals. this is desirable to avoid pathological feedback cycles.
this is ironic, as the common conception of autists is as being blunt and insensitive; this is accurate, but it's an N-ary effect, not the ground. a cybernetic system naturally seeks to remain within parameters, using whatever regulatory levers it has at its disposal.
what can seem to many as an unreasonable arbitrary preference can, to us, quite literally feel like the only thing standing between sanity and hell; autists are extraordinarily sensitive, contrary to popular belief, and as such predisposed to extreme reactions.
many classic autistic behaviors are, in fact, learned responses after several iterations of meltdown cycles. we learn what triggers us, and try very hard to avoid it. some of us manage to learn how to moderate our reactions to said overstimulation, but many others don't.
autism is, fundamentally, about sensory disregulation; all else flows downstream from the consequences thereof. I'm pretty bad with that; I get easily overwhelmed, and am militant about controlling my environment as a consequence
---
RT @pee_zombie
it stems from genetic predisposition & environmental triggers for increased neural sensitivity. all else is downstream of this: from sensory issues to poor theory of mind, overly-rigid think…
https://twitter.com/pee_zombie/status/1402299721633480706
y'all seen Atypical? its this Netflix show about an autistic high schooler and his various struggles. I've seen it around but only just watched the first episode; it's wild how relatable it is, tbh. I'm not nearly as autistic as he is, but I'm honestly not as far as many think.
periodic reminder that I also have an aesthetic alt, @cryptoqualia. if you're into computational/memetic/geometric-themed poasting, you may be interested!
a practical corollary is that just because you can envision a desirable future state, that doesn't mean it's reachable from your current
it also means your just-so personal narrative of how you've arrived at where you are thru expression of agency is likely postrationalization
---
RT @architectonyx
in a cellular automata, a state is a garden of eden configuration if it can never follow from a previous configuration by the automata's…
https://twitter.com/architectonyx/status/1419470513131245574
---
RT @taalumot
@_StevenFan @pee_zombie pill me, pz
https://twitter.com/taalumot/status/1425195372209745920
my bitch efficiently constructed from universal NAND gates, your bitch requires 3 distinct gate types to implement her logic
---
RT @chaosprime
tfw you got yourself a ride or die bitch when what you needed was a ride xor die bitch
https://twitter.com/chaosprime/status/1425151461621702660
learning about this, unironically, helped my lil autist self figure out why I felt stiff while talking to people and others looked like they felt much more natural. physical posture determines mental posture!
---
RT @eigenrobot
https://twitter.com/empathy2000/status/1424757692187426820
https://twitter.com/eigenrobot/status/1424794068123471888
