Rethinking Autism

媒体、科研人员和诊断及统计手册均将孤独症视为单一的疾病或广谱的单一疾病。但是，孤独症在许多方面都不像单一疾病。我们在大脑中找不到导致其发生的缺陷，也找不到可以治疗它药物，也找不到任何病因或者治疗手段，尽管我们殚精竭虑，所有的研究发现仍只是如上所述。《再探孤独症》回顾了病因、症状、病程和到目前为止的治疗手段等方面的科学研究…….，并最终得出可能令人震撼的结论：孤独症并非以单一疾病存在。症状同时存在，这些症状本身不是疾病，而是一些其他原因的结果，例如发热。只有当我们停止认为孤独症是单一疾病，我们才可能将研究推进，更精确地剖析为何这些症状会发生，病因是否不同和存在差异。

The media, scientific researchers, and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual all refer to "autism" as if it were a single disorder or a single disorder over a spectrum. However, autism is unlike any single disorder in a variety of ways. No single brain deficit is found to cause it, no single drug is found to affect it, and no single cause or cure has been found despite tremendous research efforts to find same. Rethinking Autism reviews the scientific research on causes, symptomology, course, and treatment done to date…and draws the potentially shocking conclusion that "autism" does not exist as a single disorder. The conglomeration of symptoms exists, but like fever, those symptoms aren’t a disease in themselves, but rather a result of some other cause(s). Only by ceasing to think of autism as a single disorder can we ever advance research to more accurately parse why these symptoms occur and what the different and varied causes may be.