Can Autism Enhance Animal Empathy? The Story of Dr. Temple Grandin

[PIT2]

The show is called 'horizon' and is on tv tonight on BBC2:

The amazing story of Dr Temple Grandin's ability to read the animal mind, which has made her the most famous autistic woman on the planet.

Dr Temple Grandin has a legendary ability to read the animal mind and understand animal behaviour when no one else can. But this is no feat of telepathy; her explanation is simple. She's convinced she experiences the world much as an animal does and that it's all down to her autistic brain.

...

The slaughterhouse seems an unlikely place to look for an animal lover like Temple but it's here that she has carved a unique career. Until Temple stormed on to the scene, in the 1970s, animal welfare was an unheard of phrase in the meat industry. The animals were destined for slaughter and no one cared what happened to them along the way.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/horizon/temple.shtml

Now how do we know she isn't a sadistic psychopath and all those cows are going down horribly?

 

[Q_Goest]

That's an amazing story, thanks Pit

Edit:
What I'm really curious about is this part at the end of the story:

The slaughterhouse seems an unlikely place to look for an animal lover like Temple but it's here that she has carved a unique career. Until Temple stormed on to the scene, in the 1970s, animal welfare was an unheard of phrase in the meat industry. The animals were destined for slaughter and no one cared what happened to them along the way.

But Temple has changed all that. Using her unique ability to observe the world through an animal's eye she has fundamentally redesigned the equipment and buildings where they are held and slaughtered. Today her advice is sought from around the world and half the cattle in the US go to their deaths in humane equipment designed by her.

First of all, it seems strange for someone sympathetic to the animals to be designing slaughter house equipment. Second, I have to wonder what it is that she designed.

 

[Math Is Hard]

You can see a sketch of one of her designs in "An Anthropologist on Mars" by Oliver Sacks. He devotes an entire chapter to Temple Grandin in this book.

 

[Q_Goest]

I just found her website here:
http://www.grandin.com/

She provides numerous tips and designs for slaughtering animals.

Caution: Not for the squeemish

 

[PIT2]

I watched horizon yesterday, but i didnt think it discussed the subject properly. They combined the topic of autism with an autobiographic tale of Grandins life, and the result was entertaining show, but it didnt explain how she was able to know what animals think/feel.

Her stories were interesting, she said that as an autistic child, she was focussed on little things so much that people around here were transparent and that their voices were far away.

They said autistic people see light and hear sound differently.

 

[PIT2]

On the 'center for consciousness' website I saw a picture of Grandin, where she was giving a presentation with the subtitle "http://www.consciousness.arizona.edu/images/temple_000.jpg". I looked up what the presentation was about and this is what i found:

I do not use language when I think and solve problems. All thoughts are images. When I design livestock equipment, images pop into my imagination and language only serves as a narrative of the images. If I think about what I will do tomorrow, I visualize activities such as driving to the university, teaching my class or going to the airport. I have no subconscious, I think with the part of my brain that is subconscious in most other people. I can see the decision making process in my brain. One day an elk ran across the freeway and I had about three seconds to react. Three images popped into my imagination like a menu on a computer screen. The images were a car rear ending me, the elk crashing through the windshield, and the elk passing in front of me. Each image was a consequence of a different action such as jamming on the brakes, swerving or slowing down. I clicked on slowing down and the elk passed by in front of me. I made a decision that was not a reflex. This may be similar to how a deer makes a decision when he hears a strange sound. I think this orienting response is the beginning of conscious behavior. When a deer hears a strange sound, it will turn and look. When it orients it makes a decision. Do I stand still and listen, run away, or continue grazing. It makes a decision and it is a choice not a reflex.

http://www.consciousness.arizona.edu/templeabs.htm

There are some really interesting statements in there

 

[Moonbear]

First of all, it seems strange for someone sympathetic to the animals to be designing slaughter house equipment. Second, I have to wonder what it is that she designed.

Not really. She doesn't object to using animals for food, just focuses on ensuring they are treated as humanely as possible as long as they are alive. Her ideas and input are well-accepted in the industry, mainly because, not surprisingly, if animals are less stressed/fearful, they are easier and safer to work with.

Yes, she claims her autism gives her a similar perspective to that of the animals, but it really seems mostly that she notices the small details that a lot of people overlook. Nonetheless, having worked with large animals and having studied their behaviors myself, these things are not out of the grasp of others who are not autistic. While we might not appreciate why it is that a horse will spook when there's a little piece of string or plastic fluttering on the fence of a show ring, careful observation tells us, nonetheless, that it happens, and in the interest of the animals' AND riders' safety, anyone running a show will walk those fences meticulously scanning them for the smallest thing that can move or reflect a glare, and remove any such objects. This is the sort of thing Temple Grandin does, except, her own explanation is that such things also startle or disturb her, so she is more likely to notice them when others have missed them. That is the basis of her statements that she perceives the world similarly to the animals.

The thing to also keep in mind is that the people setting up and designing these facilities aren't always the ones who actually work with the animals on a daily basis, so they make some really bad design decisions. What Temple has done is reach that audience with the information those of us who work with animals daily have known for so long that we forget it's not second nature to everyone. As an example, back when my step-sister's kids were active in 4-H, they had a show at a park that had a fairly newly built show ring for equestrian events. It didn't take more than a few minutes before one of the more experienced riders noticed a major flaw in the placement of the show ring...it was right next to a soccer field, with the back of the goal facing the ring. Sure enough, a practice ride demonstrated that the horses would spook when they reached that end of the rink with the fluttering net visible to them. The event couldn't begin until the net on the soccer goal was removed.

Many of the changes Temple has made seem equally obvious, but for some reason, those running facilities such as slaughter houses really hadn't taken into account, probably because they really weren't even considering the animals' natural behaviors. For example, Temple recommends using curved chutes to run animals through rather than having straight runs connected by right angles, as was more common. When you think about how an animal normally behaves, and what a right angle at the end of a run looks like from the direction they're heading, what they see is a wall in front of them. They don't see that there's a bend with more open path around it, they just see that wall. When they're being chased by someone from behind, and see an obstacle ahead, they panic and start to turn back away from the wall, likely injuring other cattle and the people behind them as they do this.

If you instead have a curving path for them to follow, they can always see ahead to open space, so it continues to appear as an escape route from the person chasing them.

So, yes, her involvement has changed a lot about how the animals have been handled, and she continues to be a strong advocate of animal welfare, but I don't really think her autism is the reason for it, although that's her claim. It's just that she actually took the time to observe the details. Now, it could be that because of her autism, she is more likely to focus in on details unlike others who must make a conscious effort to do so.