Talk:Retrospective diagnoses of autism

This article was nominated for deletion on 19/3/2006. The result of the discussion was no consensus.

And the rest...

And there are many other names that are missing from this list. Tesla was identified as autistic in this piece by a professor of psychology:

Gernsbacher, Morton Ann (2007) A conspicuous absence of scientific leadership: the illusory epidemic of autism. http://jepson.richmond.edu/academics/projects/ESSAYGernsbacher.pdf

Has Asperger is the subject of this paper:

Lyons V, Fitzgerald M (2007). Did Hans Asperger (1906–1980) have Asperger Syndrome? (letter). Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders. Volume 37, number 10, November 2007. p. 2020-2021. http://www.springerlink.com/content/n00w0xl46510v681/?p=4cff7f36c3b2461b918cf2bf081aabcd&pi=18

Robert Boyle, William Rowan Hamilton, Daisy Bates and Samuel Beckett are in this book:

Walker, Antionette and Fitzgerald, Michael (2006) Unstoppable brilliance: Irish geniuses and Asperger’s syndrome. Liberties Press. 2006.

All of these famous people are in Prof Fitzgerald's latest book: Archimedes, Charles Babbage, Gregor Mendel, Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Nikola Tesla, David Hilbert, H.G. Wells, John B. Watson, Bernard Montgomery (of Alamein), Charles de Gaulle, Alfred Kinsey, Norbert Wiener, Charles Lindbergh, Kurt Godel, Paul Erdos.

Fitzgerald, Michael, and O’Brien, Brendan (2007) Genius genes: how Asperger talents changed the world. Autism Asperger Publishing Company, 2007.

Paul Erdos is also in this paper:

Fitzgerald, Michael (1999) "Did "The Man Who Loved Only Numbers", Paul Erdos, Have Asperger syndrome?" Nordic Journal of Psychiatry. 53.6 (1999): 465-466.

There are probably more ... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.169.77.207 (talk) 16:55, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Stephen Colbert

Come on, guys. Can we really cite a single blog entry as evidence of valid speculation? Especially when the blogger in question seems to have very little evidence to support their claim. Clearly she has some experience in the area, being autistic herself, but her opinion alone is hardly concrete enough to warrant Colbert's inclusion in this entry.

Correct, I removed it. Garion96 (talk) 21:33, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Problems with the case against Einstein/Newton having AS

I just tried to fix this section, but it is still desperately in need of citations.

Furthermore, half of this putative case against involves repudiation of the case against. This leads to an appearance of extreme bias and non-NPOV. Those counter-arguments should not dominate this section.

I think the Case For section also needs cleanup, but at least it has citations.

I went into this article with an open mind and was disappointed by how unbalanced and non-NPOV it is. I improved it, but it still needs cleanup.

Aroundthewayboy 19:42, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Removed for Lack of Citations

I also removed the following unsourced entries on the list. Feel free to reintroduce them if and only if you can cite a reliable source.

• Lewis Carroll, English writer, mathematician, logician, Anglican clergyman, photographer and inventor
• Bill Gates: founder of Microsoft
• Emily Dickenson
• Ludwig Wittgenstein - major philosopher. Noted as possible or likely by philosophers; noted explicitly by Christopher Gillberg

Aroundthewayboy 19:59, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

I think the list could do with a further culling - even the title makes me cringe, 'People speculated to have been autistic'? WP:BLP? WLU 18:44, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Does anyone else see this list as wishful thinking on the part of autism researchers? It reeks of "hey, look, Famous Person X was ONE OF US so we're not that bad." Not to make light of autism, but seriously... it is possible to be utterly brilliant and yet still be socially clumsy without being autistic... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.84.19.246 (talk) 13:32, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

That's exactly what it is. It's also part of the bill of goods sold to parents of the diagnosed kids. This article should be deleted. 216.125.196.2 (talk) 16:19, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Disagree. The article is entirely valid: it is indeed notable that respected researchers have identified certain individuals as displaying AS traits. We are only reporting this. Malick78 (talk) 22:45, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Webmaster?

Since when is a webmaster a source for anything (other than possibly his field of being a webmaster)? I think this seriously needs to be removed. We could also add speculations by pie salesmen if we keep this. --DanielCD 16:30, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Everyone on the Internet thinks they are autistic. We should just make this page a redirect to LiveJournal. 86.142.240.58 11:21, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Sourcing

I've just started trying to source this article a bit, please forgive me if I leave some things in an ugly state while in the process. I did remove John Draper from the list, because I didn't feel that the WSJ article which it was cited to said explicitly that he might have a touch of autism, it just kind of hinted at it. (I also happen to know Mr. Draper, and while I wouldn't rule it out, my speculation doesn't satisfy BLP either).

Anyway, I'll be continuing with the sourcing, and occasionally deleting things which aren't reliably sourced, just yell if I do anything which seems unwarranted. Poindexter Propellerhead 00:58, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

OK, there are now 28 cited statements in this article, using reasonably reliable sources (as reliable as speculation can be, anyhow). There is still a lot to be done in turning dozens of inline URLs into proper citations. I removed the article's unreferenced tag, but would recommend that anyone interested in maintaining this article start paring back some of the statements which are still tagged, there is a lot of questionable stuff left unsourced. I may yet whack a paragraph or two. Poindexter Propellerhead 04:09, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Make that 40-some cites. And I did whack some stuff which had been tagged for months. We now return you to our regularly scheduled programming. Poindexter Propellerhead 05:16, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Uncited text

I've removed the following uncited speculative text; perhaps some version of this can be sourced and added back:

• However, some with AS would dispute the claim that they have usually have lack of sense of humour: there is commonly a good understanding of humour, especially in a setting where it can be adequately processed (such as when watching a TV show or movie) and use of humour in certain settings. People with AS expecially seem to appreicate the humour of characters who have social impairment themselves, such as Mr. Bean or David Brent in "The Office". Perhaps the studies examining humour in AS have examined the more severe end of the spectrum, exaggerating the significance of this trait.

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:03, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

External Links

You people can't be bothered keeping this article up to date with the latest books and papers (by professors, academics etc), but you are too small-minded to cite a link to the one document on the internet that does attempt to keep on top of this subject. You Wikipedians really are pathetic. It's no wonder that people choose to do their own things and not contribute. There is a difference between being scholarly and having high standards, and being small-minded and mindlessly critical. I can't believe you people couldn't find any citations to documents about Wittgenstein or Lewis Carrol having AS. I think it's a case of not wanting to find information. How come one writer has been able to dig up 92 dead famous people, all of them undisputedly famous and many geniuses, who have been the subject of speculation or well-argued professional diagnosis of AS, each name supported with a reference to a published document, while this article has a piddly little list of thirty-odd famous names?

I think the undue emphasis on the writing of Professor Fitzgerald may be an attempt to depict this whole area of scholarship as the invention of one clinician, which it most certainly is not. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.169.199.35 (talk) 12:44, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

You seem to be referring to the removal of a non-reliable blog, which erroneously claimed by the way that Mozart had Tourette syndrome, a point on which no reputable scholar agrees. If you have reliable sources that can be used to replace Fitzgerald, by all means suggest them, but we don't cite articles to blogs on Wiki. Please see WP:V, WP:RS, WP:NOT and WP:EL. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:36, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

So if the list was published on a web site, that would make it more reliable? Could you please explain how the medium in which a document is published alters the quality of research or scholarship of the document? I think people like you are TOO LAZY to read and properly evaluate documents, so you just take a short-cut and judge the quality of a document according to prejudices about how the document is published. It's pretty laughable when one considers that this is the Wikipedia.

I might remind you that this severly limited and flawed article has a document with a noted mispelling of Einstein's name in it's title as a linked-to reference supporting the "sholarship" in this article. I personally wouldn't bother citing such rubbish in any references list.

Where did the blog make the claim that Mozart had Tourettes? Do you have literacy issues? I quote from the blog list

"...thought by some to have had Tourette syndrome, ..."

Oh, and by the way, the list did cite the bibliographic details of the published book in which it was argued that Mozart had Tourettes, "Simkin, Benjamin (2001) Medical and musical byways of Mozartiana. Fithian Press. 2001." The list doesn't even mention speculative claims that aren't backed up by some published document (which is a lot more than I can say for the Wikipedia). Can you cite a published book that argues the case that Mozart didn't have Tourettes? I hope you aren't going to argue that Mozart was just a regular normal guy. His eidetic memory and perfect pitch abilities appear to be generally accepted as true by those who study such people, and of course, these two rare (savant?) abilities have been found by academic researchers to be more common in autistic people. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.169.199.35 (talk) 07:08, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Hitler's place here highly questionable

I read the book about autism in which Prof. Fitzgerald wrote about Hitler, and in that book, if my memory serves me well, the professor gave Hitler the diagnosis of "Autistic Psychopath", which was clearly intended by Fitzgerald to be an autistic variant of the present day notion of "psychopath" rather than the antiquated terminology for autistics as "psychopaths" as was used in the early part of the 20 th century. Therefore, in that book, Prof Fitzgerald gave Hitler a diagnosis that is not recognized by the medical commmunity and which I am sure you will not find in the DSM. Therefore, I don't think that diagnosis should be taken seriously by the Wikipedia. Fitzgerlad has given Hitler a different diagnosis than that which he generally gives to famous people, which is Asperger syndrome. At the very least there needs to be a lengthy note in the article explaining what the diagnosis given actually was, and that it is not a scientifically-recognized diagnosis. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.59.197.25 (talk) 16:39, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

You left the *y* off autistic psychopathy, which is the spelling Fitzgerald used. Fitzgerald says that Hitler "meets all the criteria for autistic psychopathy as described by Hans Asperger" who employed the term psychopathy in its old-fashioned generic sense meaning any abnormal mental condition. Asperger and Fitzgerald were NOT using the term to refer to the disorder known in modern times as psychopathic/sociopathic personality. See here for more details of Hitler's probable AS traits, as researched by Fitzgerald.

The only questionable issue here is your conflation of Aspergers syndrome with the psychopathic personality when Fitzgerald is clearly writing about Asperger's syndrome. 124.179.131.177 (talk) 12:42, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Just for the sake of clarity here's the contemporary definition of psychopathy from the Penguin Dictionary of Psychology: 1. Any abnormal mental condition. 2. A forensic psychiatric term for a condition described under psychopathic personality disorder. 124.179.131.177 (talk) 13:01, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

It isn't me that is confused about the two different usages of the term "psychopath". I'm well aware that the psychopathy referred to by Asperger is nothing like the psychopathy that experts such as Hare have researched. I no longer have access to the specific book by Fitzgerald in which he discussed Hitler. The only way to settle this is by consulting this book. The Wikipedia needs to be based on what is written in printed books and journal papers, not questionable pieces that are only found on the internet. So, if YOU have access to the book in question, can you tell us what exactly were the two different conditions described in that table in the book near Fitzgerald's discussion of Hitler? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.169.77.207 (talk) 16:20, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Quote from the Hitler article: "Fitzgerald claims, therefore, that Adolf Hitler meets the criteria for autistic psychopathy described by Hans Asperger and was not schizophrenic." So, if this sentence is supposed to mean that Hitler was only diagnosed as having Asperger syndrome by Fitzgerald, then why oh why is the term Asperger syndrome not used, rather than the confusing and outdated term "autistic psychopathy"? This statement appears to be designed to confuse the reader. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.169.77.207 (talk) 16:28, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Read History of Asperger syndrome; the condition was called autistic psychopathy for many years. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:00, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

In the year 2004, when the book "Autism and Creativity:is there a link between autism in men and exceptional ability?", by Prof. M. Fitzgerald, in which he wrote about Hitler, was published, the term "autistic psychopathy" was most certainly NOT a term in current usage by any reputable autism or AS expert in reference to ordinary, plain Asperger syndrome. Professor Fitzgerald was proposing a new, specialized diagnostic category on the autistic spectrum in his use of this antiquated term in the year 2004. This idea was, and I believe still is, not accepted by the scientific community, therefore Fitzgerald's diagnosis of Hitler, specifically using this novel and unrecognized diagnosis, is at the very least controversial, and should not be read as a simple diagnosis of AS.

In your arguments you deliberately refuse to engage with the argument that I have explained. The fact that "autistic psychopathy" was a legitimate clinical term way back in the 1940s has absolutely no relevance to the point that I have argued here more than once. It has not been a legitimate term in current usage for many years, so it's usage by any notable autism expert should raise questions.

Professor Fitzgerald is simply referring to the historical phrasing 'Autistic Psychopathy' (quote) "...as described by Hans Asperger". F was not canvassing a brand new diagnostic entity. SandyGeogia has provided information on the use of this term above. see: History of Asperger syndrome. 121.223.117.85 (talk) 04:42, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

There's a world of carefully researched printed books in libraries and there's the world of Wikipedia and questionable web site fact sheets and articles. It's a pity there is so little proper interface between these two worlds. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.169.244.114 (talk) 08:08, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Please see talk page guidelines at WP:TALK and please sign your entries by adding four tildes ( ~~~~ ) after your entries. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:59, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Arthur Schopenhauer: read his bio & you'll see why he should be on this page...

Hitler might not be Autistic for these reasons

1. many peole say that Hitler had Parkinsons disease, a disorder when the Brain does not produce enough Dopamine, In Autism this is the opposite, the Autistic Brain produces excess Dopamine, this is why people with severe autism have risperidome which is a Dopamine Blocker. I used to have risperidome because of my aspergers Syndrome, but i decided to stop taking it. 2. Hitler killed people with mental or Physical disorders during the Holocaust

La convivencia (talk) 13:21, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Officially Diagnosed?

Are there any famous people who have officially been diagnosed as autistic or is it all speculation? And are there actually any LIVING famous people with autism or have they all died out in this lifetime?

Well, autism and especially Asperger's were not that very commonly diagnosed until the 1990's, and most people who are famous today were already adults by that time. It would probably not benefit anybody to go in and get themselves diagnosed with AS ... e.g. if you were a multibillionaire whom people looked to for sound financial advice, and then they found out you had AS, they would be less likely to come to you for advice in the future. So it isn't in their best interest to get a diagnosis. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 23:09, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Another way to put it might be to say that there are few or no famous people with autism living today who are famous for something other than being autistic. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 16:09, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Craig Nicholls, lead songwriter, lead singer and guitarist of the Australian rock band The Vines was formally dignosed with Asperger syndrome in 2004 by Australia-based Asperger syndrome expert Dr Tony Attwood. There are numberous reports of this in the Australian and rock music press. Nicholls more recently reportedly had problems with anxiety, leading to the cancellation of numerous concert appearances.

The long process of diagnosing Fields Medal winning mathematician and academic Richard Borcherds was described in the book "The Essential Difference" by Professor Simon Baron-Cohen. In this book Baron-Cohen, a world-class authority on AS and autism, refers more than once to Prof Borcherds as having AS, but Baron-Cohen also writes that Borcherds "... is not currently severe enough in his symptoms to warrant a diagnosis in adulthood ..." To meet the diagnostic criteria one must apparently be suffering impairment in daily life. But Baron-Cohen goes on to speculate that if Prof. Borcherds was placed in a less suitable environment "... in all likelihood his AS would cause him some degree of distress." So a world authority on AS appears to be telling us that a person can have AS but still not be eligible for a formal diagnosis of AS, because the official diagnostic criteria define AS as a condition that necessarily causes impairment and distress. Borcherds had AS and he also apparently didn't AS. For all I know, after the publication of this book, he could have become eligible to meet these stupid criteria. Does that settle the matter?

Nobel Prize winner Vernon L. Smith has been describing himself as having AS for a number of years now (as has his wife) and Prof. Smith had an autobiography published last year. I do not know if Smith was formally diagnosed. Haven't read the book yet.

On pages 7-8 of the biography "Courtney Love: the real story" Poppy Z. Brite wrote "In school, Courtney had always performed poorly despite her obvious level of intelligence. Most of the other children shied away from her, and she from them. She was diagnosed by one of her therapists as mildly autistic."

At least two different internet sources state that actress Darryl Hannah was given some type of autism diagnosis as a child, and in a recent feature article about Hannah published in the Weekend Australian Hannah is quoted as saying "They wanted to institutionalise me." In that article Hannah claimed she was given a battery of tests and she described why she gave a supposedly incorrect answer in some type of pictorial theory of mind test.

In a 2004 radio interview broadcast by NPR actor Dan Aykroyd claimed to have been diagnosed as a child with Asperger and Tourette syndromes.

Gary Numan has been openly refering to himself as a person with Asperger syndrome for a number of years, and numerous media records of this can be found in at least on TV interview, press and internet sources. Apparently his wife agrees with this label. I believe Numan was self-diagnosed.

Enough examples? One could also mention Bram Cohen of BitTorrent fame, and all of the stuff that has been attributed to Richard Stallman on the subject of Stallman's childhood and autism. Helen Dale/Darville/Demidenko claimed in a 2008 media interview that she could have AS, which is I believe the solution to a fascinating and conntroversial puzzle that many Australians were wondering about since 1996.

There are also plenty of famous people who have speculated in published media interviews that they have mild AS, might have AS, might have once had AS, etc etc. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.169.201.103 (talk) 13:29, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

What's the point of this article?

Seriously though? I find it baffling that an article that even has the term "speculated" within it would ever be in an encyclopedia! Does it actually get any more unencylopaedic? If I were a proper Wiki editor instead of just a person who dips in and out, I'd be considering nominating this garbage for deletion. The main pillars for this reasoning are (a) it's speculation (b) many of the the speculations are based upon extremely insubstantial reasoning or evidence; and (c) if Wikipedians believe that there is worthy evidence suggesting autism in a historic person then this can be placed in context within that person's own Wiki article. It seems to me that having a page like this gives license to insubstantial claims so as to justify the pages' very existence. Roobens (talk) 15:59, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

It's already been through one round of deletion discussion before and survived. Not to say it won't happen again, but if you read that page you can see (in my opinion) some good reasons for letting it stay. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 16:05, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

This entire article is just worthless speculation and needs to be deleted. Surely people don't really believe this crap? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.9.168.162 (talk) 22:07, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Sometimes there should be articles about speculation, so long as the speculative nature of the material is clear. The fact that people are speculating about something is itself a fact. The important thing is not whether the speculation itself is true or false, but the fact that the speculation exists and is popular. People's feelings and opinions are real and verifiable. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aebarschall (talk • contribs) 21:35, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

What are the objections to Martin Bryant being included here?

There was disagreement between Dr Sale and Professor Mullen in their findings as to whether Bryant is on the Autistic Spectrum or not. The citation that I included clearly showed this.[1]

How was my citation unreliable? 114.76.80.160 (talk) 10:18, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

See WP:MEDRS, WP:RS, and WP:BLP. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:28, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

Title

The title seems a bit odd: "speculated to have been" is an awkward construction, to say the very least. Rumored or supposed might be an improvement on speculated, which can only be an intransitive verb, although the former sounds vaguely unencyclopedic and the latter introduces a new problem of double meaning. How about conjectured? Conjecture v. (tr.): form an opinion or supposition about on the basis of incomplete information Rivertorch (talk) 04:30, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps a better title is "People proposed to have been autistic". Proposed is more often used in the scientific literature than speculated. Speculated is too suggestive of an unsubstantiated claim. --Diamonddavej (talk) 01:07, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that's better. Should we give it a little while or be quick and bold? Rivertorch (talk) 09:47, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Its not just the title that needs changing, all throughout the article Speculated should be changed to Proposed. Speculate is common in everyday speech but its not used in scientific literature. Leave the Title as is for a few days, if no one objects it should be changed. --Diamonddavej (talk) 22:53, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Autistic Spectrum Disorders

Autism is a spectrum of disorders including people with few if any autistic features to people who are profoundly handicapped. It follows that everyone *can* be considered to be on this spectrum, even if they have negative values for autistic features. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aebarschall (talk • contribs) 21:39, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

To be considered on the spectrum, you'd probably have to be autistic enough to be diagnosed. Doctors probably won't diagnose someone as "a little bit autistic". You wouldn't diagnose someone as antisocial for the one fist fight they've ever been in or someone as OCD (Obsessive-compulsive spectrum) or OCPD because they tie their shoes a certain way. Also, "Spectrum disorder in psychiatry is a term used to describe a mental disorder when there is thought to be "not a unitary disorder but rather a syndrome composed of subgroups" that can range from relatively "severe" to relatively "mild and nonclinical deficits".MichaelExe (talk) 19:34, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

A Criticism Section

would be great. I haven't found anything, unfortunately. MichaelExe (talk) 20:19, 16 October 2009 (UTC)