As a fellow slight dyslexic (though probably a different subtype given mine seems to also have a factor of temporal physical coordination) who didn’t know until later in life due to self-learning to read very young but struggled badly with new languages or copying math problems from a board or correctly pronouncing words I was letter transposing with—one of the most surprising things was that the anylytical abilities I’d always considered to be my personal superpowers were probably the other side of the coin of those annoyances:
Areas of enhanced ability that are consistently reported as being typical of people with DD include seeing the big picture, both literally and figuratively (e.g., von Károlyi, 2001; Schneps et al., 2012; Schneps, 2014), which involves a greater ability to reason in multiple dimensions (e.g., West, 1997; Eide and Eide, 2011). Eide and Eide (2011) have highlighted additional strengths related to seeing the bigger picture, such as the ability to detect and reason about complex systems, and to see connections between different perspectives and fields of knowledge, including the identification of patterns and analogies. They also observed that individuals with DD appear to have a heightened ability to simulate and make predictions about the future or about the unwitnessed past (Eide and Eide, 2011).
The last line in particular was eyebrow raising given my peak professional success was as a fancy pants futurist.
I also realized that a number of fields are inadvertently self-selecting away from the neurodivergency advantages above, such as degrees in certain eras of history which require multiple ancient language proficiencies, which certainly turned me off to pursuing them academically despite interest in the subject itself.
I remember discussing in an academic history sub I used to extensively partake in how Ramses II’s forensic report said he appeared to be a Lybian Berber in relation to the story of Danaus, the mythological Lybian leader who was brother to a pharaoh with 50 sons, and the person argued that Ramses II may have had only 48 sons according to some inscriptions so it was irrelevant (for a story only written down centuries later). It was refreshing to realize that the difference of our perspectives on the matter, and clearly attitudes towards false negatives in general, was likely due to just very different brains.
As a fellow slight dyslexic (though probably a different subtype given mine seems to also have a factor of temporal physical coordination) who didn’t know until later in life due to self-learning to read very young but struggled badly with new languages or copying math problems from a board or correctly pronouncing words I was letter transposing with—one of the most surprising things was that the anylytical abilities I’d always considered to be my personal superpowers were probably the other side of the coin of those annoyances:
Developmental Dyslexia: Disorder or Specialization in Exploration?
The last line in particular was eyebrow raising given my peak professional success was as a fancy pants futurist.
I also realized that a number of fields are inadvertently self-selecting away from the neurodivergency advantages above, such as degrees in certain eras of history which require multiple ancient language proficiencies, which certainly turned me off to pursuing them academically despite interest in the subject itself.
I remember discussing in an academic history sub I used to extensively partake in how Ramses II’s forensic report said he appeared to be a Lybian Berber in relation to the story of Danaus, the mythological Lybian leader who was brother to a pharaoh with 50 sons, and the person argued that Ramses II may have had only 48 sons according to some inscriptions so it was irrelevant (for a story only written down centuries later). It was refreshing to realize that the difference of our perspectives on the matter, and clearly attitudes towards false negatives in general, was likely due to just very different brains.