Ethics and neurodiversity: moral problems in the context of autism

Abstract

This article conducts a philosophical investigation into the ethical issues of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) based on the neurodiversity paradigm, in contrast to the traditional biomedical model. Autism is commonly defined as a neurological condition that can lead to impairments in social interaction, communication, and behavioral aspects of the autistic individual. With the advent of neurodiversity, autism is reinterpreted as a legitimate variation in human ways of being, feeling, and relating to the world. Thus, the present study is developed from the intersection of three axes: (1) an introductory presentation on autism and the foundations of the neurodiversity movement; (2) a discussion of the forms of epistemic injustice directed at autistic individuals, especially concerning the silencing, discrediting, and pathologizing of the autistic experience in social and institutional contexts; and (3) an analysis of affectivity and loneliness in autism, under the neurodiversity paradigm, as a relational and structured phenomenon. It is argued that the autistic experience is marked by injustices – epistemic and affective – that do not stem from inherent limitations, but from social, environmental, and normative practices that refuse recognition and reciprocity to divergent forms of functioning. The article concludes that an ethics of autism requires the reconfiguration of these structures to accommodate and value the plurality of neurocognitive existences.