Autism reminds us that the uniquely human sense of self is not an “airy nothing” without “habitation and a name.” Despite its vehement tendency to assert its privacy and independence, the self actually emerges from a reciprocity of interactions with others and with the body it is embedded in. When it withdraws from society and retreats from its own body it barely exists; at least not in the sense of a mature self that defines our existence as human beings. Indeed, autism could be regarded fundamentally as a disorder of self-consciousness, and if so, research on this disorder may help us
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