Autism-Spectrum Skepticism

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I recently found out that some of Sweden's most influential science journalists like to refer, among themselves, to the Swedish Skeptics Society as "The League of Asperger Patients Against Superstition". It ain't pretty, and it ain't surprising. Skeptics need to learn from this.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) begins its list of Asperger Syndrome symptoms thus:

  • Qualitative impairment in social interaction;
  • The presence of restricted, repetitive and stereotyped behaviors and interests;
  • Significant impairment in important areas of functioning [specifically a lack of flexibility and adaptability in unfamiliar situations]

Hans Asperger referred fondly to children suffering from this disorder as "little professors". Is a bell ringing yet, Dear Reader?

The journalists' private joke reminds me of something I wrote in 2000 in Folkvett, the journal of the Swedish Skeptics. Here are a few extracts, translated into English.

Sore losers are no fun. But sore winners are worse. The chess game is over, the loser has been checkmated and one side of the board is lined with dead pieces, all the same colour. It's obvious to all onlookers who won. Now, what do we think of a winner who makes fun of his opponent's mistakes? OK, he won, but he's still obviously a dickhead. Then we buy the loser a beer.

A debate isn't a chess game and it's not always clear when it's over. But in our debate between scientific reason and superstition, it's pretty obvious who's winning. The telescopes that reveal the secrets of the universe are ours, our antibiotics keep child mortality down, even the most obscurantist books are written on our computers, we get to teach the students, our writings make the research libraries and citation indices.

[...]

The public has a pretty lukewarm attitude to science and superstition. It doesn't care much about the difference between how an electric toaster and a magazine horoscope work, because both actually do what they expect them to do. One obligingly toasts bread, the other offers a moment's entertainment. Joe Bloggs has a strongly skeptical attitude to brimstone fanatics on both sides of the debate. It's an ancient rhetorical insight that quiet matter-of-factness, dry humour and self-irony is far more effective in the long run than demagoguery.

[...]

When we make fun of parapsychologists in Folkvett, we are no better than creationists making fun of Darwin in Kansas churches. On the contrary: both groups appear as self-congratulatory unreasonable nerds, but we also reveal ourselves as sore winners.

I'd like to suggest that the main goal of the skeptical movement shouldn't be to defeat Deepak Chopra. Our goal should be to convince Joe Bloggs.

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Sore losers are no fun. But sore winners are worse. The chess game is over, the loser has been checkmated and one side of the board is lined with dead pieces, all the same colour. It's obvious to all onlookers who won. Now, what do we think of a winner who makes fun of his opponent's mistakes? OK, he won, but he's still obviously a dickhead. Then we buy the loser a beer.

But then, there's the other side to it. When a chess game is over, the loser acknowledges defeat. The purveyors of superstition do not. They keep on pitching the woo, and large numbers of the public keep buying it.

Quintus: People should know when they're conquered.
Maximus: Would you, Quintus? Would I?
From Gladiator, screenplay by David Franzoni

By Mustafa Mond, FCD (not verified) on 12 May 2007 #permalink

I'd agree with Martin. You're not going to convince a delusional fool that you've won. Ever. If you take the inane ramblings seriously then at the very least you'll lend them credibility, which is what the pseudoscientist craves.

The target really should be audience rather than the idiot. The problem is that audience isn't always easily read and Mustafa's right in saying that it's a constantly changing audience when different people get pulled in or move on. If the idiot's impervious to reality and static in his claims then that suggests a sceptic has to be more flexible and social in his rebuttals to emphasise the difference between engaging with reality and ignoring it.

Who is Joe Bloggs? Is he well-known in Sweden?

By Mustafa Mond, FCD (not verified) on 12 May 2007 #permalink

Mustafa, still we have non-woo-orientated science journalists looking at skeptics as Asperger sufferers. The important thing isn't whether superstitious people realise that we've won: we need to work on our perception in the eyes of the non-superstitious, non-skeptical majority.

With "Joe Bloggs" I intended "the man on the street", John Doe, J. Random Nerd, "the average Joe". My English is a sorry mix of idioms taken from various regional dialects. I don't even know if Mr Bloggs is a US or UK expression.

The Aussie expression is "Joe Blow". My British published dictionary lists "Joe Bloggs".

Ahem... well, as a sufferer of Asperger & ADHD I would like to say I do not always feel like a sufferer and that many a great scientist might very well have been AS, and might Churchill. And he ain?t surrendered!
Well, I am going to lift my firebrand as a believing christian and say "It ain?t over til its over!"

Of course some may find it insulting being called and Aspie, BUT I find it a tad insulting being labelled as a "victim" and a sufferer. Sure, life ain?t always easy, but we have a greater potential than many Neuronormals wants to admit.
And all Aspies ain?t skeptics, we are "believers" too but reasonably open-minded and source critical.

By Mattias Niord (not verified) on 14 May 2007 #permalink