Evolution

The Path That Chose Me

These past few days, I’ve been realizing that, from the time I was small, I’ve lived with an odd kind of bifurcated consciousness about myself. On the one hand, I was The Child Destined to Do Grea... [Read More]

on 12/23/11 | 3 Comments | Read More

The Illusion of Typicality

The cypress trees of Louisiana’s bayous (to continue Shift Journal’s venerable landscape metaphor tradition) are very well adapted to their natural habitat. They can get along just fine with most... [Read More]

on 09/22/10 | 3 Comments | Read More

On the Border

My daughter, the newly minted freshman, came home from college over Labor Day weekend. The first thing she did when she got back here Friday evening was to go out to the high school football game wit... [Read More]

on 09/8/10 | No Comments | Read More

Shift Journal at One Year

Imagine … beyond the one percent of the population … with autism … another four percent … describable under the less rigorous category of the Broad Autism Phenotype … five percent for whom a... [Read More]

on 09/3/10 | 2 Comments | Read More

Alloparents and Evolution

…considering that autism features individuals exhibiting the characteristics of our evolutionary forebears, and noting that the environment and child-rearing practices of those forebears might b... [Read More]

on 04/1/10 | No Comments | Read More

Autism and Evolution

That I might have featured Asperger’s when I was young never crossed my mind until this year. I’d been studying autism for 12 years. Working for 12 years with the thesis that testosterone inform... [Read More]

on 03/22/10 | 2 Comments | Read More

Autism, Diet and Sexual Hormones

I’m still trying to grasp the concept that testosterone and estrogen and their associated hormones are together managing ontological, social and biological evolution by adjusting to changes in the e... [Read More]

on 02/18/10 | No Comments | Read More

What Darwin Never Knew

Here’s a link to an excellent PBS Nova show I saw the other night. It’s nearly 2 hours long, 1 hr 51 min, but I hope those who are interested will find time today or over the long weekend... [Read More]

on 02/15/10 | No Comments | Read More

Hybrid Vigor and Autism

On page 575 of the May 1 issue of Science there is an article, “Africans’ Deep Genetic roots Reveal Their Evolutionary Story.” Examining the blood of 3,194 Africans from 113 populations, researc... [Read More]

on 02/9/10 | 2 Comments | Read More

Corpus Callosums, Autism & Aboriginals

Regarding autism, I’ve hypothesized that the autistic brain is an ancient brain primed for aesthetic manipulation/appreciation with a larger brain size and larger hemispheric bridge having evolved a... [Read More]

on 02/3/10 | No Comments | Read More

Becoming Human…

The other day, on “Cat in a Dog’s World”, Sarah takes to task the originator of “The Neanderthal Theory”, Leif Ekblad. His theory is the result of his desire to justify ... [Read More]

on 01/27/10 | 7 Comments | Read More

An Increase in Left-handers

A superb 25-year study in the UK by Marian Annett ending in the 1990s seemed to prove that in that part of the UK, left-handedness was not increasing over time. It’s been a difficult issue to parse ... [Read More]

on 12/21/09 | No Comments | Read More

Neuropsychology and Autism

Marian Annett (Annett & Manning, 1990; Annett & Kilshaw, 1984) has hypothesized a balanced polymorphism in dyslexia that neatly fits with my theory of biological and societal evolution I am ... [Read More]

on 12/14/09 | No Comments | Read More

Ruminations

The work of scientists is not often poetry. But they do reveal patterns that are profound. “A corollary of our hypothesis is that hormonal effects on the brains of offspring may vary with the ti... [Read More]

on 12/7/09 | No Comments | Read More

Down Syndrome Riddle

Before the conventions, Sarah Palin caused a stir among the parents of children with Down Syndrome. My Leftist buddy Martin has a kid with Downs. Martin was moved by this Alaskan elected official’... [Read More]

on 12/3/09 | No Comments | Read More

Predictions

Writing these daily entries, I discover something new almost as often as I record something I’ve earlier discovered. A year ago this is what I collected connected to the hypotheses or predictions of... [Read More]

on 11/30/09 | 1 Comment | Read More

Somali Children in Minnesota and Autism

A child’s lifelong maturation rates are set several weeks before birth by the mother’s testosterone levels. A mother with high testosterone gives birth to low testosterone males and high testoster... [Read More]

on 11/25/09 | 2 Comments | Read More

Neurodiversity’s Neighboring Conditions

I’ve sometimes wondered what a theory of human personality and psychotherapeutic intervention would look like if contemporary psychodynamic theory was based on a theory of human evolution that embra... [Read More]

on 11/18/09 | 2 Comments | Read More

Autism’s Female

Autism researchers such as Simon Baron-Cohen have noted a pattern. The mother’s testosterone levels influence the likelihood of a child having autism. The higher the mother’s testosterone level, t... [Read More]

on 11/4/09 | 1 Comment | Read More

Dancing Theory

A couple entries ago, I proposed a predictable display of variation of the physical features in the children of a family over time as a mother’s testosterone level slowly rose with age. This predict... [Read More]

on 10/28/09 | No Comments | Read More

Idea Drawing

Georges Cuvier was an early French biologist, a contemporary of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck. Lamarck, unfortunately, died before Cuvier and ended up vilified in a famous eulogy by his younger, very influent... [Read More]

on 10/27/09 | No Comments | Read More

Autism Family History

It could be said that it all begins in the womb. It is even deeper and more subtle than that. Autism researchers such as Simon Baron-Cohen are coming to the conclusion that a mother’s testosterone l... [Read More]

on 10/22/09 | No Comments | Read More

Road Map

Autism expert Simon Baron-Cohen has a theory that the autistic male shows evidence of a brain that is too male for his own good, the autistic personality being male to the extreme, evidencing exaggera... [Read More]

on 10/20/09 | No Comments | Read More

Legends in Our Own Minds

There is a tribe of males more than a little infatuated with themselves and their own ideas. We’re often described as narcissists. Upon discovering I fit into this group, I was appalled, and predict... [Read More]

on 10/19/09 | 6 Comments | Read More

Brains and Testicles

When I was exploring the possibility of a human genetic precursor that was random-handed with a larger brain encouraged by a song-and-dance-based matrifocal culture, I hypothesized that if representat... [Read More]

on 10/14/09 | 2 Comments | Read More

Politics and the Environment: Cause of Autism #3

A child exhibits characteristics from both parents. The parents’ features in their children can complement each other in ways that reinforce and even encourage specific maturational trajectories. Fo... [Read More]

on 10/7/09 | No Comments | Read More

Time Machine: Cause of Autism #2

Though little discussed, the ability to send our children back in time is an ability all of us have. This ability has to do with how we choose a mate. It has been estimated that our lineage of homo de... [Read More]

on 10/5/09 | 1 Comment | Read More

Revenge of the Nerd: Cause of Autism #1

There are many ways to kill a dragon. I counted several hundred strong-man dragon interventions in the almost one hundred books I read when I was snake-charmed by the subject. Courage, strength and cl... [Read More]

on 10/1/09 | 1 Comment | Read More

Superstition and Obsession

It crossed my mind awhile back that individuals with autism are less likely to be superstitious. This conclusion would also suggest that autistics are not magical thinkers. If this generalization has ... [Read More]

on 09/28/09 | 1 Comment | Read More

Neurodiversity, Hidden Knowledge and Hidden Talent

Anything that is understood or known consciously is understood or known unconsciously first. I can’t imagine how the reverse would be true. Knowledge has to come from somewhere, right? I often know ... [Read More]

on 09/19/09 | 2 Comments | Read More

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