The main importance of this study in Nature lies in what it has not found. It has involved a huge amount of time and effort expended on seeking for pathological genetics underlying this so-called 'disease' or 'disorder' (ASD), and yet such pathology as it has found can account for only about three percent of all the autism-related cases under study. That doesn't surprise me at all. It is entirely in accordance with the still-unchallenged antiinnatia theory. Therein, I agreed with those who reckoned that autism was a polygenetic condition just as IQ genetic variance was polygenetic. The vast majority of genetic variations genuinely associated with autism would be the very same "normal", non-pathological, variations that contribute to IQ differences -- for the reasons the theory explained.
These authors are scraping the bottom of the wrong barrel, looking for the wrong things, and as a result they find the wrong things which then lead them away from the main story of autism causation. So-called ASD is a very rough and broad empirical diagnosis which is liable to include quite a number of cases who do not really belong in the true autism broad syndrome but just have some genetic twirks that make them behave rather similarly (like a bee misleadingly resembles a wasp). All the vast media/discussion hype then goes on to assume, falsely, that the study results really are about autism per se rather than such false trails. Their study could have had more hope if it had used narrowly-defined core autism as its cases.
But the people there are working to a pre-set paradigm, within what we might call the disease model. This presumes that something has "gone wrong" with these individuals and seeks out that "wrong". Furthermore they assume it is genetic! It may be significant that their 90% genetic stat is supported only by a reference that is 15 years old. In my 1993-published theory I indicated conditions in which autism would change from being mainly genetic to being mainly environmental. And exactly that has now happened in the last 2 decades.
Their pre-set paradigm is to find what has "gone wrong" and then find a drug to "put it right" and voila! a profitable patent emerges (they hope).
Huge publicity is being given to these marginal fringe findings, while the real central ressearch is all but completely hidden by this hype. For instance the Autism Research Institute's evidence that DMSA chelation to remove mercury can cure about 70% of cases, as documented by online videos of the cured children. But that doesn't generate profits for big corporations, or jobs for the 170 researchers listed here. So it is ignored, despised and even persecuted just as was Semmelweiss's immense discovery, inter many alias. Or they could have just spent a little time more enlighteningly reading my 1993 paper. But then Wegener's continental drift had to wait through 50 years of professional derision so perhaps I'm calling time a little prematurely here.
There's reason to suspect there's already a fairly good genetic test for autism, namely whether both parents have Mensa-level IQs. An even better test is how many non-gamma-2 dental amalgams the parents have, and how little outdoor air. But why follow the facts when you can follow the crowd that's following the money instead?
Edit: There's now appeared a much more detailed (but far longer) critique by Mark Blaxill. My only reservation about it is that the claim in the title that it "proves that inherited genes don't cause autism" is absolutely unfounded.
Good review of autism increase question
A notable review of the debate on whether or not autism has increased can be found here. Interestingly, it leads to the same conclusion as myself - that the increase was real - even though not raising what I would consider the trump card fact presented in my update review. But then, no one else besides myself has noticed that point yet.
Gradual regression notably in line with the theory's gradual causation
It has this month been reported that the regressive form of autism does not tend to have an abrupt start (as commonly perceived, especially by those blaming vaccines for causing a sudden start of the condition). Instead the condition develops gradually from age 6 months up to 3 years (and possibly onwards as the study stopped there).
This is of course very compatible with the causation proposed in the update review of the antiinnatia theory, because that causation itself does not strike suddenly (like a vaccination shot) but instead builds up gradually with the infant's cumulating constant inhalation [breathing in] of the mother's dental mercury vapor.
The accompanying observation that parents tend to under-perceive their child's abnormality can be simply understood in terms of the universal natural reluctance to believe bad news. Which for a parent who already has an autistic child, is even badder news.
This is of course very compatible with the causation proposed in the update review of the antiinnatia theory, because that causation itself does not strike suddenly (like a vaccination shot) but instead builds up gradually with the infant's cumulating constant inhalation [breathing in] of the mother's dental mercury vapor.
The accompanying observation that parents tend to under-perceive their child's abnormality can be simply understood in terms of the universal natural reluctance to believe bad news. Which for a parent who already has an autistic child, is even badder news.
Flawed study of adult autism in UK
The NHS has recently published a study of the extent of adult autism in the UK ("Autism Spectrum Disorders in adults living in households throughout England - Report from the Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey 2007").
It supposedly shows that there has not been any real increase of autism over recent decades. This is the same NHS that's just made a huge scare-campaign in support of the swine-flu scam, and that gives its endorsement to the fraudulent SCENIHR report as supposedly proving the safety of dental amalgams, even despite numerous people pointing out the falsities of that report.
This autism report is also unacceptably flawed. Some of the flaws are detailed at this campaigning website (at which some of the other content is itself flawed wishful-thinking):
http://childhealthsafety.wordpress.com/2010/02/10/uksurveyautismlink/.
I myself had dismissed the NHS report for the simpler reason that there is no way indicated of establishing comparability of a test applied to children and a test (even if the same one) applied to adults. But I now welcome the additional critiques raised by childsafetyhealth. Another critical review can be found in issue 34 of The Autism File.
It supposedly shows that there has not been any real increase of autism over recent decades. This is the same NHS that's just made a huge scare-campaign in support of the swine-flu scam, and that gives its endorsement to the fraudulent SCENIHR report as supposedly proving the safety of dental amalgams, even despite numerous people pointing out the falsities of that report.
This autism report is also unacceptably flawed. Some of the flaws are detailed at this campaigning website (at which some of the other content is itself flawed wishful-thinking):
http://childhealthsafety.wordpress.com/2010/02/10/uksurveyautismlink/.
I myself had dismissed the NHS report for the simpler reason that there is no way indicated of establishing comparability of a test applied to children and a test (even if the same one) applied to adults. But I now welcome the additional critiques raised by childsafetyhealth. Another critical review can be found in issue 34 of The Autism File.
"Whose side is Robin P Clarke on?"
Since the publication of the theory, three entrenched factions have appeared in the autism causation world. A first faction believes autism can never be a problem, so cannot need curing or be a disorder. A second faction believes that vaccines, either MMR or mercury-containing thimerosal (or latestly Hep-B) have caused autism to increase. A third faction is the corporate medical establishment which promotes the idea that autism is a primarily genetic disorder and that the increase is not real but just the effect of increased awareness or diagnosis.
My involvement in autism research pre-dates all these factions and I partly disagree with all of them, but also partly agree with them all. I see some sound work from all of them and also some abysmally unsound work from all of them. I'm not in the business of taking sides. I judge publications on their reasoning and evidence rather than the partisanship of the conclusions or authors. In my experience as exclusively a theorist, I have to conclude that it is very rare for even biased parties to actually falsify their raw data; if they did so it would be impossible for my theories to so comfortably accommodate them as they do. Meanwhile, far too many people insist on following the false "logic" that "there's no smoke without fire". A crooked institution arranges a cover-up even if there is in reality not something genuinely there to be covered up anyway.
My involvement in autism research pre-dates all these factions and I partly disagree with all of them, but also partly agree with them all. I see some sound work from all of them and also some abysmally unsound work from all of them. I'm not in the business of taking sides. I judge publications on their reasoning and evidence rather than the partisanship of the conclusions or authors. In my experience as exclusively a theorist, I have to conclude that it is very rare for even biased parties to actually falsify their raw data; if they did so it would be impossible for my theories to so comfortably accommodate them as they do. Meanwhile, far too many people insist on following the false "logic" that "there's no smoke without fire". A crooked institution arranges a cover-up even if there is in reality not something genuinely there to be covered up anyway.
Why Bernard Rimland made just one mistake
Bernard Rimland's contribution to autism research has been unequalled. To him belongs the credit for debunking Bettleheim's theory of "refrigerator mothers", and replacing it with the modern understanding of autism as genetic/biochemical in nature.
He had much responsibility for the discovery of the benefits of vitamin B6 and magnesium. He was one of the first to discern that autism was increasing. And he recognised that mercury was involved in causing it.
He made just one mistake (as I see it), namely taking the view that vaccines were the cause of the autism increase [note: cause of the increase]. I think part of the reason for that mistake was a situation of having one's nose too close to the grindstone, so-to-speak. This is liable to lead into that other metaphor of the frog not bothering to jump out of the slowly heating water.
Given the assumptions that:
Myself? As a fatigue-disabled person, struggling to just survive, and with much wider interests than Dr Rimland's focus on autism, it was not within my capabilities to keep up with all the details of the dispute about the increase. And as my "excellent" "fine work" 1993 paper had been totally pretended into non-existence by all but a tiny elite anyway, there seemed little point in taking such an interest in a dispute of no practical importance to myself.
It was only by fluke that I got involved again. I began to wonder if my decades of severe disability (not autism; since age 15) had been caused by dental mercury. I now had, for the first time, increasing billions of webpages that I could search on the subject. I gradually became more informed and more suspicious. Then I read that mercury binds to DNA and thereby inhibits gene-expression at doses far lower than producing other effects. This rang a bell because it was exactly what I had said would cause autism, in my 1993-published paper. I also learnt that the type of amalgam had switched from the 1970s to non-gamma-2 which emit 30-50 times more mercury vapour into the air. Thanks to my autism theory (which everyone else was ignoring) I also knew that the process was like holding the genes hostage rather than like a shattering hammer blow. I also understood that amalgam delivers its poison through the air, and thus can be breathed in by the (post-natal) infant as well as the parent.
Dr Rimland didn't know these facts, so the idea that dental amalgam could have caused the increase would have rightly seemed daft to him. How could a non-increasing source cause an illness increase in people who aren't even having it installed in them? In 2006 I sent to Dr Rimland a draft of my update review but I got a reply from Dr Edelson that Dr Rimland was too ill to read it. I'm sure that if I had not been delayed by the callous harassment conspiracy www.2020housing.co.uk I would have been able to persuade Dr Rimland that it was dental mercury that was the main cause of the increase.
He had much responsibility for the discovery of the benefits of vitamin B6 and magnesium. He was one of the first to discern that autism was increasing. And he recognised that mercury was involved in causing it.
He made just one mistake (as I see it), namely taking the view that vaccines were the cause of the autism increase [note: cause of the increase]. I think part of the reason for that mistake was a situation of having one's nose too close to the grindstone, so-to-speak. This is liable to lead into that other metaphor of the frog not bothering to jump out of the slowly heating water.
Given the assumptions that:
- autism was increasing;
- mercury was involved;
- the increase was in second-year onsets;
- vaccinations were the only noticeable input of infant mercury;
- vaccinations had increased at ~sort-of~ the same era as the autism increase;
- parents were increasingly reporting autism onset "immediately" after vaccinations;
- the only other notable source of mercury, dental amalgams, had been in use for 150 yrs before the increase, and not in infants anyway;
- the medical establishment were engaged in their usual conspiracy tricks, publishing misleading studies about vaccines, hiding their Simpsonwood data, and persecuting those who challenged them;
Myself? As a fatigue-disabled person, struggling to just survive, and with much wider interests than Dr Rimland's focus on autism, it was not within my capabilities to keep up with all the details of the dispute about the increase. And as my "excellent" "fine work" 1993 paper had been totally pretended into non-existence by all but a tiny elite anyway, there seemed little point in taking such an interest in a dispute of no practical importance to myself.
It was only by fluke that I got involved again. I began to wonder if my decades of severe disability (not autism; since age 15) had been caused by dental mercury. I now had, for the first time, increasing billions of webpages that I could search on the subject. I gradually became more informed and more suspicious. Then I read that mercury binds to DNA and thereby inhibits gene-expression at doses far lower than producing other effects. This rang a bell because it was exactly what I had said would cause autism, in my 1993-published paper. I also learnt that the type of amalgam had switched from the 1970s to non-gamma-2 which emit 30-50 times more mercury vapour into the air. Thanks to my autism theory (which everyone else was ignoring) I also knew that the process was like holding the genes hostage rather than like a shattering hammer blow. I also understood that amalgam delivers its poison through the air, and thus can be breathed in by the (post-natal) infant as well as the parent.
Dr Rimland didn't know these facts, so the idea that dental amalgam could have caused the increase would have rightly seemed daft to him. How could a non-increasing source cause an illness increase in people who aren't even having it installed in them? In 2006 I sent to Dr Rimland a draft of my update review but I got a reply from Dr Edelson that Dr Rimland was too ill to read it. I'm sure that if I had not been delayed by the callous harassment conspiracy www.2020housing.co.uk I would have been able to persuade Dr Rimland that it was dental mercury that was the main cause of the increase.
Do von Economo neurons produce bigotry?
There is occasionally a scientific paper that stands out with its joining of the dots. One such is that of John Allman et al in respect of von Economo neurons (vens):
Allman JM, Watson KK, Tetreault NA, Hakeem AY: Intuition and autism: a possible role for Von Economo neurons. Trends Cogn Sci 2005, 9:367-73. His paper could have been even hotter if it had managed to mention how various of its elements had already been raised long ago in my 1993-published paper. For instance the idea that features that are recent in phylogeny (evolutionary history) are more liable to be impaired, and that that is what gets lost in autism (both key concepts in antiinnatia theory). And the antiinnatia theory had started out in its first minutes with the concept of "autism = deficiency of innate prejudices", which is strikingly close to some of the notions therein.
What is rather curious about his von Economo paper though, is the standard values-laden language it contains. We are told that autism is a "disorder" in which these rapid decisions about people are "impaired". I would beg to suggest that the characterisation of the vens as enabling rapid crude decisionmaking about whether or not to view people as friends is a description of bigotry. So perhaps it would be better to consider normal neurotypical to be a "disorder" and autism to involve freedom from an "impairment" which might be advantageous to the knee-jerker but harmful (in excess) to community cohesion. I guess Dr Allman would agree about this now that I have pointed it out.
Allman JM, Watson KK, Tetreault NA, Hakeem AY: Intuition and autism: a possible role for Von Economo neurons. Trends Cogn Sci 2005, 9:367-73. His paper could have been even hotter if it had managed to mention how various of its elements had already been raised long ago in my 1993-published paper. For instance the idea that features that are recent in phylogeny (evolutionary history) are more liable to be impaired, and that that is what gets lost in autism (both key concepts in antiinnatia theory). And the antiinnatia theory had started out in its first minutes with the concept of "autism = deficiency of innate prejudices", which is strikingly close to some of the notions therein.
What is rather curious about his von Economo paper though, is the standard values-laden language it contains. We are told that autism is a "disorder" in which these rapid decisions about people are "impaired". I would beg to suggest that the characterisation of the vens as enabling rapid crude decisionmaking about whether or not to view people as friends is a description of bigotry. So perhaps it would be better to consider normal neurotypical to be a "disorder" and autism to involve freedom from an "impairment" which might be advantageous to the knee-jerker but harmful (in excess) to community cohesion. I guess Dr Allman would agree about this now that I have pointed it out.
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