Animals are autistic?

Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behavior

by Temple Grandin and Catherine Johnson

Very interesting book from a different point of view than the evolutionary biologists and so on I've read more often. Temple Grandin has years of knowledge as a scientist working in the livestock industry. It's a different perspective than someone who spends her time in the field observing wild animals, or someone who conducts experiments on them. I don't necessarily agree with all her speculations and theories, but they're good ideas and worth thinking about.

People are constantly trying to find something that makes humans unique among animals. It's like a Holy Grail (and like the Holy Grail, probably a mythical object: whatever humans have, some animals out there have it too, if not to the same degree.) Here, Grandin suggests that autism in humans may point to one of those differences. "Normal" humans are blind in ways that "animals" (here meaning mostly mammals and birds) are not. Interestingly, this blindness extends to the human scientists studying animals! Autism may be a help in overcoming that blind spot, as autistic humans may lack (to a greater or lesser degree) the same types of mental abstraction that animals lack, enabling the autistic human to perceive things better from the animal's
point of view. This also helps in understanding the talents that an animal may have which humans don't.

Highly recommended. Great insights and examples. VERY sensible approach to regulating meat-packing plants. Keep it simple, focus on the goal (humane treatment of the animals) by having a short, easily quantifiable checklist, rather than drowning the issue with complicated 100-item forms and administrivia and detailed regulations, which only causes people to ignore
the whole thing. Regulate the results (unstressed animals), and let the plant take care of the implementation. The speculations about the co-evolution of humans and dogs is also fascinating. Definitely worth further research!