To Take Away What Is Unnecessary, You Must First Define What is Necessary

Through the fictional autistic narrator, Christopher, author Mark Haddon introduces a vital theme, not only apparent throughout The Curious Incident of the Dog in Night-time, but also evident in the non-fictional accounts of autism provided by Oliver Sacks (throughout his Anthropologist on Mars). The theme is that of Occam’s razor, which (in Christopher’s translation from latin) states, “no more things should be presumed to exist than are absolutely necessary” (Haddon 90).
There is certainly evidence enough to argue that Christopher’s mental state is an illustration of this tenet. For one, he (like other autistic individuals) considers the non-goal-oriented chit-chat that so greatly comprises human interaction as unnecessary: “I didn’t reply to this either because Mrs. Alexander was doing what it called chatting, where people say things to each other which aren’t questions and answers and aren’t connected” (Haddon 40). [As Feinberg describes this phenomenon, albeit rather bluntly: individuals with Asperger’s (the less-severe and more functional form of autism), “…cannot see the point in social chit-chat. They do not ming having a discussion…on a particular issue in order to establish the truth of the matter…But just a casual, superficial chat? Why bother? And what on earth about? How?...it is both too hard and pointless” (Feinberg 172). Perhaps a more neutral and reflective tone is found in Oliver Sacks’ description of the same sentiments (or lack there of) in Temple Grandlin: “By professional standards, she is extraordinarily successful, but other human interactions—social, sexual—she cannot ‘get’” (Sacks 260). Indeed, the emotional understanding and communication that serves as the basis for such social interactions (be it chit-chat or deep empathic exchange) rests on an individual’s ability to share the emotions of the other person, an ability that is also lacking in Sacks’ other true-life character, Stephen: “He seemed not to understand different emotions and would laugh if one of the children had a temper tantrum or screamed” (201).
In turn, Christopher’s direct, simplistic thinking is another example of the reductionist motif. He does not waste time in mincing words or thoughts, but states and attends to things without the presumed prefrontal cortical inhibition that causes otherwise neuro-normative individuals to hold their tongues: i.e. when Christopher explains to Mrs. Alexander why he does not feel sad about his mother’s (supposed) death: “I don’t feel sad…because mother is dead. And because Mr. Shears isn’t around anymore. So I would be feeling sad about something that isn’t real and doesn’t ecist. And that would be stupid” (Haddon 75). Or, when Christopher shows up at his mother’s house and genuinely asserts to Mr. Shears that “I’m going to live with you because Father killed Wellington with a garden fork and I’m frightened of him” (192). Likewise, Oliver Sacks’ depiction of Temple’s lack of “…diffidence or embarrassment (emotions unknown to her)” (Sacks 262) while displaying her bedroom and squeeze-machine “…with a complete absence of inhibition or hesitation” (265). Thus the regular tentativeness, humbleness, or self-consciousness that might be expected of a non-autistic individual is not apparent. Such is the case, as well, with Steven Wiltshire who “…seemed to have no sense of either vanity or modesty, but showed [Oliver Sacks] his drawings, commented on them, in an ingenuous way and with total absence of self-consciousness” (Sacks 205).
A further embodiment of the theme present in Occam’s razor is the presumed “hypertrophy of a single mental faculty” (Sacks 193) to the exclusion of all others that characterize savant talents. Inherent in this distinction is a cleavage of all (or most) other mental faculties that unrelated (and thus unnecessary to) the hypertrophized faculty—i.e. verbal/communicative skills, emotional competence, etc. Christopher compares this to the otherwise normative state of mind, wherein “most people are almost blind and they don’t see most things and there is lots of spare capacity in their heads and it is filled with things which aren’t connected and are silly, like ‘I’m worried that I might have left the gas cooker on” (Haddon 144). Thus, at least to Christopher, such non-autistic minds to not cleave the unnecessary or surperfluous.
It is crucial to note, however, that to define “necessary” or its counterpart, “superfluous” is entirely subjective. Indeed, Christopher sees what others may deem necessary as silly, or stupid (in his words); while most non-autistic individuals would deem his retention of every detail when looking at a farm field, for instance, as equally unnecessary—disadvantageous, in fact. Thus it can be argued that perspective is inherently correct.
This, of course, leads into the discrepancy over whether savantism is a deficit or a gift. Most would see it as a disadvantage, if it is to be accompanied by social deficits and interpersonal dysfunctional; however, as Temple asserts, “If I could snap my fingers and be nonautistic, I would not…Autism is par of who I am” (Sacks 291); “It is possible that persons with bits of these [autistic] traits are more creative, or possible even geniuses…If science eliminated these genes, maybe the whole world would be taken over by accountants” (292).
In summation, then, one individual’s take on Occam’s razor may be entirely different than another’s: unnecessary and necessary (and the removal of and/or implementation of each) are highly dependant upon perspective—which, itself, is colored by an individual’s predisposition, emotional interior, exterior, and cognitive capacities. The very insistence that deficits such as autism are unnecessary can even be lumped into this discrepancy.