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Alicorn comments on Introduction Thread: May 2009 - Less Wrong
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You certainly prove your chops in your comments, which I always enjoy reading. I was curious: Do you think it is wholly rational to self-diagnose mental/social abnormalities, problems, or diversities?
It seems like it would be a difficult problem to tackle objectively, because:
1) The payoff, one way or another, is pretty intense: Either understanding a label that makes you unique and explains a lot about your life, fitting in a new piece to your identity, or learning of another thing that is wrong. These are intensely personal revelations either way.
2) If you suspect something is seriously different about your brain, you may suffer a confirmation bias in reviewing the data, quick to jump on different topics.
3) The existence of a supportive social groups like the neurodiversity community you listed allow a quick admission into a network of people that seem to understand your problems and eventually will likely respect you and your opinions, which is one of the basic requirements people have for happiness and something that is generally sought after i.e. Maslow's pyramid and all. This is another element of incentive, subconscious or conscious.
I'm not that you're wrong-- from the things you've described, you're probably right. I'm just curious what you think: self-diagnosis of a brain-related, social-affecting, central-to-personal-identity disorder seems like an extremely tricky position to maneuver through even for absolutely exceptional minds.
The trouble with disallowing self-diagnosis of high-functioning autism - especially in adults - is that it's possible to conceal outward signs of the atypical thought processes or avoid triggers entirely. I have a (not self-) diagnosis of Asperger's syndrome, but since I've moved away from home, I'm in almost complete control of my surroundings, associating with people of my choosing, and generally not subject to anything that would be likely to make me behave in any unusual way. I doubt I could get a diagnosis if I walked into a psychologist's office today, but this isn't because I no longer freak out in contact with certain offensive textures or because I have learned to read minds. It's because I have created an environment for myself that is free of those textures and have made friends who are able to explain themselves to me, whereas as a child, my parents were not-particularly-accommodating obstacles between me and environmental/social self-determination.