Temple Grandin's most recent book, ANIMALS IN TRANSLATION, is all about animal psychology and how animal brains work. Really great book, as she ties a lot of this together with her experiences as an autistic person and how she thinks that folks in the spectrum and animals have very similar brain wiring.

I just finished the book and want to read it again!

Also kept thinking about the zoo at Mili's house and how much she'd love this book....

Anyone else read it yet?

Kim

Hey, Kim.

Thanks for the recommendation. I haven't read it yet. I have a ridiculous list of things ahead of it yet, but now I'm intrigued.


'Preciate it!

LIZARD

i see similarities of animalistic and autistic traits inside of dogs and cats. i haven't been around other animals enough to notice though.

think of how a cat can just stare off into space. i do that all of the time for hours sometimes. how a cat likes to be pet, i just so happen to have my OCD kick that is stroking my goatie hair and mustache constantly and religiously, it feels euphoric! talking about temple granadine (or what ever) she ilkes to be in a pressure suit or what not. and my cat likes to be held tight applying pressure to her body she purrs (like a light squeze all over) and can be held for a good while like that before she get board of me.

sorry just thought i'd ramble on for a bit.

Sounds like a good book!

Although I think of animals as nt - the amount of body language they absorb is amazing. Monkeys, wolves, all so aware of social ranking. The omega wolf breaks my heart, I feel like one so often...like I'm sort of assigned to this rank and can't do much about it. I mean, not now so much, but when ever I watch wolf documentaries.

Monkeys/apes though, wow...like humans, they make their body do one thing while their brain thinks another and that is totally nt as far as my thinking. Like, they'll pretend not to be interested in something of interest for reasons of strategy or social strategy...wish I could think of an example. I know they go out of their way to treat the 'lead' monkeys better than the 'lower' monkeys. The totally get the 'heirarchy' thing, something Vince doesn't get at all, and something I get but then again I don't. I get it on paper, I get it in my brain, but not in my heart. Like if the queen of England tried to get in front of me in line, I'd be like 'no way' and I don't see why just cause she's the queen she should get preferential treatment, but, I get that that's the way it is. I have a major problem still with 'authority', yet, I wouldn't at all mind a hard working janitor on his feet all day cutting in front of me. Anyhow, good thing I get Vince not getting the heirarchy thing. It helps.

I can't imagine any animal being on the spectrum and surviving, unless perhaps it was a loner anyway such as a hamster. So many critters LEARN so much that is not instinct.

Instinct though is completely amazing...migration, all that kind of thing.

Well, sounds like a cool book, dunno how much simularity I'd find between asd wiring and critter brains, I would think there's a lot of sensory simularity though.

I actually read something awhile ago about how cats are autistic, and after talking with my best friend about her cats, I saw a lot of similarities between their behaviors and Drew's from a few years ago!



LIZARD

Actually, you read it on BT1. I know, because it was my first post in the
Autism forum!