Greetings Economists,
Jim Devine quotes Temple Grandin book review in the NYTimes;
Grandin writes,
<x-tad-bigger>Also, since I am a person with autism, I do not agree with de Waal's
view that emotions are required for making choices and storing
memories. I use my visual thinking all the time to make logical
choices. When Kuni helped the injured bird, emotion may have been the
motivation, but visual thinking was the method. She compared the wing
to her visual memories of flying birds and spread it to fit that
image. I think her brain and mine would perform the task the same way.
Doyle,
For those that don't know Grandin, the Times has this brief comment at the bottom of the book review,
Temple Grandin is an associate professor of animal science at Colorado
State University and the author of "Animals in Translation."
Doyle,
Jim Blount once clashed with me on the Marxism list run by LP about the issue of brain modularity of the mind wherein Blount was arguing for an associative view of mental processes related to a concept of equality and blank slate like origin of consciousness in human beings. That the brain is modular seems rather clear to me, but I take seriously the issue of equality of consciousness and the cultural contribution to consciousness that Blount's view epitomizes. Grandin's example in the use of language for writing this essay is a jumping off point in this sort of debate.
Language for autistics is often quite different from the main human population. For autistics brain resources are pointed in different ways to each different 'module'. The over all requirements for language are diminished for autistics and other areas of the brain then can benefit by more inputs of resources. In other words the majority arrangement of modules that provides the foundation for human language structure is altered in varying amounts amongst Autistic persons.
This amounts to a question of two significant areas for the left about cognition. First how much contribution to human culture and society do non-language brain structures provide. Mathematics is not really a language for example though often the label language is applied to aspects of mathematics. Another aspect of non language is the smartness of physical activity, which is based in the cerebellum not the cerebrum and is deeply related to athletic intelligence, to dance intelligence etc. And visually, as Grandin says in her book review, the visual thinking aspect of cognition that is not language, but right brain dominated which is very extensive in human cognition.
Secondly, how much can technology incorporate these elements of non language into human culture. Of course mathematics has long been in human culture. As has the impact of making pictures. So this is not so much a mystery as how these historical debates will come to the fore now given grid computing.
Grandin's visual thinking is a very important part of disability rights, but has a universal aspect that all humans share as well. Text based communications have a problem with conveying emotion structure in language, and visual forms like movies have therefore had quite an impact in the movies depending for commercial success upon conveying actor face based emotion structure. But Grandin points to another neglected area which movies can't do, visual thinking. This area which is a specialty of learning disabled people as well as Autistics is looming before us as the entertainment industry slowly moves toward a convergence of movies and computer video.
In this sense disabled rights will dominate the discourse of socialist views of society because of the breakdown in traditional language assumptions based upon able bodied theory of brainwork, and the impoverished network properties of written culture. Primarily the collapse of the publishing industry in the face of conversational media that restructures the broad universals of brainwork.
thanks,
Doyle Saylor</x-tad-bigger>
