The world needs all kinds of minds Temple Grandin
I think I’ll start out and just talk a
little bit about what exactly autism is
autism is a very big continuum that goes
from very severe the child remains
nonverbal all the way up to brilliant
scientists and engineers and I actually
feel at home here because it’s a lot of
autism genetics here you wouldn’t have
any it’s a continuum of traits when does
a nerd turn into you know Asperger which
is just mild autism
I mean Einstein and Mozart and Tesla
would all be probably diagnosed as
autistic spectrum today and one of the
things that really is going to concern
me is getting these kids to to be the
ones that are going to invent the next
two energy things now that Bill Gates
talked about this morning okay
now if you want to understand autism
animals and I want to talk to you about
different ways of thinking you have to
get away from verbal language I think in
pictures I don’t think in language now
the thing about the autistic mind is it
attends to details okay this is a test
where you either have to pick out the
big letters or pick out the little
letters and the autistic mind picks out
the little letters more quickly and the
thing is the normal brain ignores the
details well if you’re building a fridge
details are pretty important because
I’ll fall down if you ignore the details
and one of my big concerns is a lot of
policy things today is things are
getting too abstract people are getting
away from doing hands-on stuff I’m
really concerned that a lot of the
schools have taken out the hands-on
classes because art and classes like
that those are the classes where I
accept okay in my work with cattle I
noticed a lot of little things that most
people don’t notice would make the
cattle book like for example is flag
waving right in front of the veterinary
facility this feed yard was going to
tear down their whole veterinary
facility all they needed to do was move
the flag rapid movement contrast in the
early 70s when I started I got right
down in the chutes to see what cattle
were seeing people thought that was
crazy a code on offense would make em
block shadows would make them bark a
whole
was on the floor people weren’t noticing
these things a chain hanging down and
that’s shown very very nicely in the
movie in fact I loved the movie how they
duplicated all my projects
that’s the geek side my drawings got the
star in the movie too and actually it’s
called Temple Grandin not thinking in
pictures so what is thinking in pictures
it’s literally movies in your hat my
mind works like Google for Images now
when I was a young kid I didn’t know my
thinking was different I thought
everybody thought in pictures and then
when I did my book thinking in pictures
I started interviewing people about how
they think you know shocked to find out
that my thinking was quite different
like if I say think about a church
steeple most people get this sort of
generalized generic one now maybe that’s
not true in this room but it’s going to
be true in a lot of different places
I see only specific pictures they flash
up into my memory just like Google for
pictures and in the movie they’ve got a
great scene in there where the word shoe
is said in a whole bunch of 50s and 60s
shoes pop into my imagination okay
there’s my childhood Church that’s
specific there’s some more Fort Collins
okay how about famous ones and they just
kind of come up kind of like this just
really quickly like Google for pictures
and they come up one at a time and then
I think well okay well maybe we can have
it snow or we can have a thunderstorm I
can hold it there and turn them into
videos now visual thinking was a
tremendous asset in my work designing
cattle handling facilities and I’ve
worked really hard on improving on how
cattle are treated at slaughter plant
I’m not going to go into any gucky
slaughter slides I’ve got that stuff up
on YouTube if you want to look at it but
one of the things that I was able to do
in my design work is I could actually
test run a piece of equipment in my mind
just like a virtual reality computer
system and this is an aerial view of a
recreation of one of my projects that
was used in the movie that was like just
so super cool and there were a lot of
kind of Asperger types and I had autism
types working out there on the movie set
too but one of the things that really
worries me is where’s the younger
version of those kids going today
they’re not ending up in Silicon Valley
where they belong
now one of the things I learned very
early on because I wasn’t that social is
I had to sell my work and not myself and
the way I sold livestock jobs as I
showed off my drawings I showed off
pictures of things another thing that
helped me as a little kid is boy in the
50s you were taught manners you were
taught you can’t pull the merchandise
off the shelves in a store and throw it
around now when kids get to be in third
or fourth grade you might see that this
kid’s gonna be a visual thinker drawing
in perspective now I want to emphasize
that not every autistic kids going to be
a visual thinker now I did the head this
brain scan done several years ago and I
used to joke around about having a
gigantic internet trunk line going a
deep into my visual cortex
this is tensor imaging and my great big
internet trunk line is twice as big as
the controls the red lines there are me
and the blue lines are the sex and age
matched control and there I got a
gigantic one and the control over there
the blue one has got a really small one
and some of the research now is showing
that people on the spectrum actually
think with primary visual cortex now the
thing is the visual thinker is just one
kind of mind you see the autistic mind
tends to be a specialist mind good at
one thing they added something else and
when I was bad with algebra and I was
never allowed to take geometry or trig
gigantic mistake I’m finding a lot of
kids that need to skip algebra go right
to geometry and trick now another kind
of mind is the pattern thinker more
abstract these are your engineers your
computer programmers now this is pattern
thinking that praying mantis is made
from a single sheet of paper
no scotch tape no cuts and there in the
background is the pattern for folding it
here are the types of thinking
photorealistic visual thinkers like me
pattern thinkers music and math minds
some of these oftentimes have problems
with reading you also will see these
kind of problems with them kids that are
dyslexic you’ll see these different
kinds of minds and then there’s a verbal
mind they know every fact about
everything now
another thing is the sensory issues I
was really concerned about having to
wear this gadget on my face and I came
in half an hour beforehand so I could
have it put on and kind of get used to
it and like they got it bent so it’s not
hitting my chin but sensory is an issue
some kids are bothered by fluorescent
lights others have problems with sound
sensitivity you know on it’s going to be
variable now visual thinking gave me a
whole lot of insight into the animal
mind because think about it an animal’s
a sensory based think are not verbal
thinks in pictures thinks and sounds
thinks and smells think about how much
information there is there on the local
fire hydrant he knows who’s been there
when they were there are they friend or
foe
is there anybody they’ll mate with
there’s a ton of information on that
fire hydrant it’s all very detailed
information and looking at these kind of
details gave me a lot of insight into
animals now the animal mind and also my
mind puts sensory-based information into
categories man on a horse and a man on
the ground that is viewed as two totally
different things you can have a horse
that’s been abused by a rider they’ll be
absolutely fine with the veterinarian
and with a horse sure but you can’t ride
you have another horse where maybe the
horseshoer beat them up and he’ll be
terrible for anything on the ground or
the veterinarian but a person can ride
them cattle are the same way man on a
horse a man on foot there are two
different things
you see it’s a different picture see I
want you to think about just how
specific this is now this ability to put
information into categories I find a lot
of people are not very good at this like
when I’m out troubleshooting with
equipment or problems with something in
a plant they don’t seem to be able to
figure out do I have a training people
issue or do I have something wrong with
the equipment
in other words categorizing equipment
problem from a people problem I find a
lot of people have difficulty doing that
now let’s say I figure out is an
equipment problem is it a minor problem
with something simple I can fix or is a
whole design of the system wrong people
have a hard time figuring
that out let’s just look at something
like you know solving problems with
y’all making airlines safer yeah I’m a
million-mile flyer I do lots and lots of
flying and then you know like if I was
at the FFA what would I be doing a lot
of direct observation of it would be
their airplane tails you know five fatal
wrecks in the last 20 years tail either
came off or coasteering stuff inside the
tail broke in some way its tails
pure and simple and when the pilots walk
around the plane guess what they can’t
see that stuff inside the tail you know
now as I think about that I’m pulling up
all of that you know specific
information it’s specific see my
thinking’s bottom up I take all the
little pieces and I put the pieces
together like a puzzle now here’s a
horse that was deathly afraid of black
cowboy hats you’ve been abused by
somebody with a black cowboy hat white
cowboy hats that was absolutely fine now
the thing is the world is going to need
all of the different kinds of minds to
work together we’ve got to work on
developing all these different kinds of
minds and one of the things that’s
driving me really crazy so I travel
around than I do
autism meetings is I’m seeing a lot of
smart geeky nerdy kids and they just
aren’t very social and nobody’s working
on developing their interest in
something like science this brings up
the whole thing on my science teacher my
science teacher has shown absolutely
beautifully in the movie as a goof ball
student when I was in high school I just
didn’t care at all about studying until
I had on mr. carlock’s science class
he was now dr. Carlock in the movie and
he he got me challenged to figure out an
optical illusion room this brings up the
whole thing he got to show kids
interesting stuff you know one of the
things that I think maybe Ted ought to
do is done tell all the schools about
all the great lectures that are on Ted
there’s all kinds of great stuff on the
Internet to get these kids turned on
because I’m seeing a lot of these geeky
nerdy kids and the teachers out in the
Midwest and other parts of the country
when you get away from these tech areas
they don’t know they do with these kids
and they’re not going down the right
path the thing is you can make a mind to
be more of a thinking and cognitive mind
or a mind can be wired to be more social
and what some of the research now is
showing autism is there may be extra
wiring back here and then really
brilliant mine and we lose a few social
circuits here it’s kind of a trade-off
between thinking and social and then you
can get into the point where it’s so
severe you’re going to have a person
that’s going to be nonverbal in the
normal human mind language covers up the
visual thinking we share with animals
this is the work of dr. Bruce Miller and
he studied alzheimerís patients they had
frontal temporal lobe dementia and the
dementia ate out the language parts of
the brain and then this artwork came out
of somebody that used to install stereos
and cars now van Gogh doesn’t know
anything about physics but I think it’s
very interesting that there was some
work done to show that this Eddy pattern
and his painting followed a statistical
model of turbulence this brings up a
whole interesting idea of maybe some of
this mathematical patterns is in our own
head and the Wolfram stuff I was taking
notes I was write down all the all the
search words I could use because I think
that’s going to go on in my autism
lectures we’ve got a show these kids to
interesting stuff and they’ve taken out
the auto shop class and the drafting
class in the art class I mean art was my
best subject in school we’ve got to
think about all these different kinds of
minds and we’ve got to absolutely work
with these kind of minds because we
absolutely are going to need these kind
of people in the future and let’s talk
about jobs okay my science teacher got
me studying because I was a goofball it
didn’t want to study but you know what I
was getting work experience I’m seeing
too many these smart kids that haven’t
learned basic things like how to be on
time I was taught that when I was eight
years old you know how to have table
manners at Granny’s at Sunday party I
was taught that when I was very very
young and when I was 13 I had a job at a
dressmakers shop by selling clothes I
did internships in college I did I was
building things
and I also had to learn how to do
assignments you know all I want to do is
draw pictures the horses when I was
little mother said well let’s do a
picture of something else they got to
learn how to do something else let’s say
the kids fixated on leg
let’s get them working on building
different things
think about the autistic mind as it
tends to be fixated like if the kid
loves race cars let’s use race cars for
math let’s figure out how long it takes
a racecar to go a certain distance in
other words use that fixation in order
to motivate that kid that’s one of the
things we need to do and really get fed
up when the you know the teachers when
especially when you get away from this
part of the country they don’t know what
to do with these smart kids it just
drives me crazy
what can visual thinkers do when they
grow up they can do graphic design all
kinds of stuff with computers
photography Industrial Design on the
pattern thinkers they’re the ones that
are going to be your mathematicians your
software engineers your computer
programmers all of those kinds of jobs
and then you’ve got the word minds they
make great journalists and they’re also
make really really good stage actors
because the thing about being autistic
is I had to learn social skills like
being in a play it just kind of just
have to learn it and we need to be
working with these students and this
brings up mentors you know my science
teacher was not an accredited teacher he
was a NASA space scientist now some
states now are getting it to where if
you have a degree in biology or degree
in chemistry you can come into the
school and teach you know biology or
chemistry we need to be doing that
because what I’m observing is the good
teachers for a lot of these kids are out
in the community colleges but we need to
be getting some of these good teachers
into the high schools another thing that
can be very very very successful is
there’s a lot of people that may have
retired from you know working in the
software industry and they can teach a
kid and it doesn’t matter if what they
teach them is old because what you’re
doing is you’re lighting the spark you
get nected turned on and you get them
turned on then you’ll learn all the new
stuff mentors are just essential I can’t
emphasize enough what my science teacher
did for me and we’ve got to mentor them
hire them and if you bring them in for
internships and your company’s the thing
about the autism Asperger II kind of
mine you got to give a specific task
don’t just say design new software
you’re going to tell them something a
lot more
specific well we’re designing a software
for phone and it has to do some specific
thing and it can only use so much memory
that’s the kind of specificity you need
well that’s the end of my talk and I
just want to thank everybody for coming
it was great to be here
oh yeah question for me okay thank you
thank you so much for that you know you
once wrote I like this quote if by some
magic autism had been eradicated from
the face of the earth then men would
still be socializing in front of a wood
fire at the entrance to a cave hey guys
who do you think made the first stone
spear Jose Asperger guy and if you were
to get rid of all the autism genetic
said they know more Silicon Valley and
the energy crisis would not be solved
someone shot you a couple of the
questions and you know if any of these
feel inappropriate it’s okay to say next
question but if if there’s someone here
who has an autistic child or knows an
autistic child and feels kind of cut off
from them what advice would you give
them well first of all I got a look at
age if you have a two three or four year
old you know no speech no social
interaction I can’t emphasize enough
don’t wait you need to at least 20 hours
a week of one-to-one teaching you know
thing as autism comes in different
degrees there’s going about half the
people on the spectrum that are not
going to learn the talk and they’re not
gonna be working in Silicon Valley that
would that would not be a reasonable
thing for them to do but then you got
these smart geeky kids you know the
touch of autism and that’s where you’ve
got to get them turned on with doing
interesting things I got social
interaction through shared interests I
rode horses with other kids I made model
rockets with other kids did electronics
lab you know without the kids and then
60s it was gluing mirrors on the under
rubber membrane on speaker to make a
light shell that was like we can serve
that super cool look is it unrealistic
for them to hope or think that that
child loves them as some might most well
let me tell you that child will be loyal
if the house is burning down they’re
gonna get you out of it Wow
so most people if you ask them what are
they most passionate about that say
things like my kids or or my lover or
what are you most passionate about I’m
passionate about that the things I do
are going to make the world a better
place when I have a mother of an
autistic child say my kid went to
college because of your book or
something or wanting our lectures that
makes me happy you know like the
slaughter plants I’ve worked with them
in the 80s they were absolutely awful
I developed a really simple
scoring system for slaughter plants
where you just measure outcomes how many
cattle fell down how many cattle got
poked with the Prada how many cattle are
moving their heads off and it’s very
very simple you met you directly observe
a few simple things it’s worked really
well I get satisfaction out of seeing
stuff that makes real change in the real
world we need a lot more of that and a
lot less abstract stone what are you
talking on the phone one of the things
you said that really astonished me was
he said one thing you were passionate
about was server farms talk about the
reason why I got really excited I read
about that
it’s contains knowledge its libraries
and to me knowledge is something that is
extremely valuable so maybe over 10
years ago now our library got flooded
this is before the internet got really
big and I was really upset of all the
books being wrecked because it was
knowledge being destroyed and server
farms or data centers are great
libraries of knowledge temple can I just
say it’s an absolute delight to have you
at Ted well thank you so much thank you