Scott Alexander suggests that studying human fetishes could provide insights into AI alignment challenges, particularly regarding generalization and interpretability.

Scott Alexander investigates the unexpectedly high prevalence of joint hypermobility in transgender individuals, exploring various theories and presenting survey data on the phenomenon.

Scott explores the puzzling relationship between congenital blindness, schizophrenia, and autism, discussing potential explanations and the need for further research.

Scott Alexander examines whether psychiatric conditions result from evolutionary failures or tradeoffs, proposing that most disorders involve a combination of both.

Scott Alexander examines taxometrics in psychiatry, finding that most mental health conditions are dimensional rather than categorical, and discusses the implications for diagnosis and treatment.

Scott Alexander analyzes survey data to investigate whether assortative mating among highly analytical people increases autism risk in their children, finding no significant evidence for this hypothesis.

Scott Alexander argues that psychiatric diagnoses, while imperfect, are useful tools despite potentially combining multiple conditions with different causes.

Scott Alexander examines the paradoxical relationship between autism and intelligence, discussing genetic and environmental factors, and proposing explanatory models for the observed lower IQ in autistic individuals despite genetic links to higher intelligence.

The post explores the diametrical model of autism and schizophrenia, suggesting they represent opposite ends of a spectrum from mechanistic to mentalistic cognition.

Scott Alexander reports on weak correlations and inconclusive results from the latest SSC survey on optical illusions and visual perception.

Scott Alexander preregisters hypotheses for the 2018 SSC Survey, planning to explore relationships between perception, cognition, personality, and demographics.

Scott proposes a speculative theory of depression as pathologically low confidence in neural predictions within the predictive processing framework, explaining how this could account for various depressive symptoms.

Scott Alexander examines the conflict between predictive processing theory and evolutionary psychology claims about innate knowledge, questioning how genes could directly encode complex preferences.

Scott Alexander reviews 'Surfing Uncertainty' by Andy Clark, exploring the predictive processing model of brain function and its wide-ranging explanatory power.

Scott Alexander hypothesizes a link between transgender identity, optical illusions, and NMDA receptor function, based on survey data and existing research on schizophrenia and autism.

The post explores how neurotypical social interactions often involve indirect communication, which can be confusing for autistic individuals, and suggests that conversations may be deliberately designed to be unpredictable.

Scott Alexander examines a theory linking autism and schizophrenia to human self-domestication, initially dismissing it before reconsidering its merits in light of Williams Syndrome.

The post explores how Bayesian processes in the brain might explain perception and various mental disorders, linking neurotransmitters to different aspects of Bayesian reasoning.

A links post collecting interesting stories from around the web, including scientific studies, historical oddities, media criticism, and current events, with Scott's commentary and analysis.

Scott Alexander analyzes 2D:4D ratio data from LW/SSC surveys, finding unexpected correlations with feminism and masculinity, despite failing to replicate basic gender differences in digit ratios.

Scott Alexander critiques the autism rights movement's opposition to curing autism, arguing that severe cases cause immense suffering that justifies continued research into cures.

The post analyzes survey data to examine if effective altruism attracts people with mental disorders, finding slightly higher rates of autism but no evidence of unusual self-hate or scrupulosity.

Scott shares a diverse collection of interesting links and brief commentary on topics including linguistics, science, economics, and social issues.

Scott Alexander discusses the lack of scientific research on nerds, exploring potential explanations for their distinct traits, including the possible role of testosterone.

Scott explores how antibiotics and antiprotozoal drugs unexpectedly affect mental health, suggesting that random chemicals may frequently influence mental processes.