All my life I had this idea that everybody was the same in terms of how we thought. I wonder, is this human nature? NT people certainly assume everyone else is NT – the difference is they are mostly right.

I had no social signal. Without knowledge of that I had no hint that everyone else was different. I thought differently but it was compatible enough, especially for more casual relationships. My mental model allowed for differences of opinion and even recognized facts. People could be inconsistent or irrational (in my point of view) and this was simply their personality or conscious choice. I could see differences in capability or interest but those also made sense.

It turns out this is common. The assumption that others share one’s internal cognitive architecture is a documented cognitive phenomenon known as the False Consensus Effect or Typicality Bias. In the absence of data to the contrary, the brain uses its own operating system as the default template for modeling all other agents.

Additionally, the Invisibility of Architecture is a universal cognitive constraint. Internal experience is non-comparative. Without an external reference point or a “System Diagnostic” from an outside source, an individual cannot perceive the absence of a faculty they have never possessed, nor can they perceive the “ease” of a faculty they struggle with.

Some people can see the difference, see Patric Gagne - Sociopath – she had high social saliency but low affect. She could perceive the signal and the effect of the emotions and knew she was not experiencing it. In a way she pierces the Invisibility of Architecture with high saliency and zero-affect. She could see both sides.

I had neither the signal nor the affect. From my point of view everybody was the same. The explicit data matched ad the exceptions could be accounted for.

NT people assume that Theory of Mind is a universal constant. It is automatic, always on and totally background. Except in very specific circumstances it isn’t even mentioned (who mentions breathing?).

People with autism fit in here too – they have TOM and affective mirroring but there is noise and some manual processing. They feel quiet different because they observe others using the same TOM without friction. They can perceive they are having difficult where others do not. Without the external observation of the mechanism or the NT experience they likely cannot conceptualize what is going on.

A-Salience is a difficult architecture to self-identify because it produces very little internal friction. The system works fine on its own terms. I never noticed I was signal blind.