► “suspected of Autism”.

Not my favourite topic, but I was explained and told so by friends who were extensively and personally familiar with autism and with me. Otherwise there are many symptoms that could also be written down to introvert personalities, so the only way to be sure is an official psychology test. But I’m not that fond of labels.
I’m pretty convinced that it’s a biological trade-off of resources at birth and not something that develops over time or by external cause. I was hoping to find Michelangelo on that list

Don Patrick - Oct 19, 2013:

8pla; Until recently I thought autism was something other people had, but I can’t say that the trademark social weakness has ever been a pleasure, to put it mildly. The pleasant flipside is that I get to use my intellect to compensate, which gives me above-average abilities of prediction. Autism might also be an advantage in programming AI, as my own understanding is fairly ‘artificial’ as well.

Being autistic (Asperger’s, technically) myself, I can relate to this. There’s still a lot that I don’t get, and my limitations are a lot more obvious in real-time social situations, but given time to consider certain social situations I sometimes achieve insight that others tend to lack, because my lack of intuitive understanding has forced me to develop more explicitly thought-out models of social behavior. Although there are obviously downsides, I tend to be quite positive about my Asperger’s, and I wouldn’t eliminate it if I could (though if there were a treatment which could eliminate the negative aspects without touching the positive aspects I’d be all over that).

Don said, “Not my favourite topic…”

So let’s start a new topic then. 

Would you like to be my friend, Don?

Oh and…

I just embedded a rudimentary chatbot into gmail.
It can tell you the time, down to the second, give
you a unique New York City greeting, and more.

Send a test email to: Elizabotmail {at} gmail {dot} com

Please use HTML formated email, instead of plain text.
Gmail policy limits one response every four days per
email address.  No personal information gets saved,
not even to the gmail inbox or send folder.

I know what you’re saying, Jarrod
Sorry 8pla, I have already reached my limit of five friends per lifetime. Your gmail breakthrough sounds interesting, though I suggest we continue that in Marcus’ email interface topic. I originally started this topic to find research material on conversation, unaware that most chatbot creators may have simply gone with what they knew. By now I have found sufficient material to work with and I believe this topic has run its course. Thank you all for contributing