Miguel López Astorga

 

Rutherford and Ray think that human beings have mental mechanisms that help them to detect individuals that, deliberately, do not follow a rule. In the same way, they hold that autism is not a disorder in which these mechanisms are damaged.
This idea seems contrary to the thesis, supported by some researchers, that autistic people have a theory of mind deficit. This is because of, if Rutherford and Ray are right, autistic people can detect other people’s intentions.
In this paper, Rutherford and Ray’s experiment is analyzed and it is concluded that they do not prove that people with autism can understand intentions. Such an experiment only shows that autistic people and general population share common logical-linguistic abilities.

 

autism, cheater detection, intentions, logical-linguistic abilities, social contracts theory, theory of mind

 

 

Received on January 22, 2014
Accepted on April 15, 2014
Firstly published online on June 15, 2014