There is a Cambridge professor named Simon Baron-Cohen who has this theory about just what autism is. In a nutshell, he says that biologically, female brains are better at empathizing, and that male brains are better at systems thinking. So, in his theory the tendency of the male brain towards systems takes an extreme form in autism. So autism could be just an extraordinarily “male” mind. Although, some girls do have autism, but it’s not even close to as many. I’d have to check statistics… There’s also this really stupid set of quizzes on the Guardian site to see how “male” and “female” you brain is. The biggest problem with that quiz is that it measures culture and personal preference. It really has no basis in biology or science at all, in my opinion. But it’s a (semi) fun diversion anyway.

While I’m on the topic of autism, also check out a really long good article on Wired, about how autism and Asperger’s syndromes are on the rise among children of technology companies in places like Silicon Valley. Plus, there’s this guy with Asperger’s who I once heard on NPR, and then looked up and contacted online. He’s a really good author, and I ended up making him a website for his stuff because I liked it so much. His name is Jonathan Mitchell. Actually, I’m supposed to post a couple new pieces to his website for him, one of which is an article about how some historical figures may have had Asperger’s. I’ll have to get on that…