http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjRxUVLxdYI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKNv6ZrC5mg

I recall reading of a population, in Saudia Arabia (maybe) which has a high level of sickle cell, but have one of the fetal hemoglobin genes left turned on. Thus it is not that much of a problem.

Another anecdote. German aquarists, in search of live food, appreciate the WWII craters in the forest, as they are a source of mosquito larvae.

When times are good, there is low stress, and so NO levels are high and people develop in utero along the neurologically typical neurodevelopment pathway. During good times, humans need to compete with other humans for mates and food, so the most important characteristic is a good â??theory of mindâ? with which to communicate with and manipulate those other humans.

When times are hard, there is lots of stress, nitric oxide levels are low, and people develop along the ASD neurodevelopment pathway which leads to a good â??theory of realityâ?, but at the expense of having a not-so-good â??theory of mindâ?. The trade-off of theory of mind for theory of reality is necessary because the maternal pelvis is limited in size, which limits the size of the brain that can successfully be born through it, so that brain must be â??optimizedâ? which can only be done during the first trimester when the fundamental structures and geometry are developing.

The behavioral traits of ASDs, reduced ability at communication, reduced social ability, and repetitive behaviors are necessary to allow one to ignore the â??conventional wisdomâ? which is leading to the high stress living conditions, the ability to resist peer pressure to conform to doing things the way everyone else is doing, and the compulsion for repetitive behaviors so as to develop the manual dexterity and skill necessary to make stone tools by banging stones together while everyone else is berating you for uselessly banging stones together.

NTs can only understand the technology developed by ASDs as â??magicâ? because to them it is sufficiently advanced so as to be indistinguishable from magic. They impute their normal â??top-downâ? information hierarchy (leaders, parents, prophets, teachers are the only source of â??knowledgeâ?) and assume that the inventor of the technique learned it from a supernatural entity (because it is like magic). This is why all myths have the common structure outlined by Joseph Campbell in the Hero with a thousand faces. When the invention is adopted and the times become good again, and future generations develop under high NO conditions, they are more NT-like, and are able to transmit the cultural knowledge with high fidelity, but only by using the anthropomorphic terms that their NT brains are limited to thinking. Even if the ASD originator of the innovation understood it in scientific terms, future generations of NTs canâ??t, so the cultural information devolves into myth.

http://daedalus2u.blogspot.com/2008/10/theory-of-mind-vs-theory-of-reality.html