Schizophrenia is the price we pay for minds poised near the edge of a cliff

Random layperson musing:

I wonder if schizophrenia (or perhaps psychosis) could be in some way analogous to the LLM temperature function becoming disregulated?

I mean, what is the extreme opposite of psychosis? If it is matter of degree, which it seems to be, then there is probably a tuning mechanism. Perhaps too little and you fail to account for factors that might not be apparent but might be guessed or inferred, too much, and too much seems plausible.

If so it would be possible to have a great deal of different “causes” given the tight and complex coupling of biological mechanisms.

There was a theory that autism and schizophrenia were opposite ends of a spectrum, but it's fallen into disfavor. The theory went that autism produces mechanical, rigid thought patterns while schizophrenia takes free association too far.

I think it is possible to be diagnosed with both schizophrenia and autism which is why the theory is not considered anymore.

Interesting. I wouldn’t have intuited autism as being on the opposing end of psychosis, really, at least not based on my experience of both in my family.

I think your LLM temperature analogy is interesting in this deprecated dichotomy between autism and schizophrenia.

One Youtuber Jreg used a breadth-first search (schizophrenia) vs depth-first search (autism) analogy when comparing the the two, but I think your temperature analogy is more apt. Higher temperature results in more disorganized thoughts like schizophrenia. And if you buy into the idea that the root of most schizophrenia is thought disorders, then this analogy implies that dialing up temperature corresponds to more signs of psychosis through speech

My experience with many friends on the autism spectrum is that their speech tends to be more scripted, but I certainly don't think autism and psychosis are mutually exclusive.

They are. Autism is normal, and neurotypicality is simply the socially acceptable/expected level of insanity.

I know I have unconventional beliefs, but the reason is the opposite of what people describe here. There are no patterns and commonly accepted beliefs seem unjustified, and crazy. So I need to find my own answers, but it's difficult. I think that people used to be more like this until recently, and people messed it up because iron is toxic, and heavy metals belong in the brain. I become more and more like this as I keep taking them, and it's better. I admit my IQ has probably dropped, but it's better this way.

Psychosis is a symptom of schizophrenia, which is a thought disorder according to psychiatry.

Psychosis can also be caused by a lack of sleep (like not sleeping for days) and in this case sleep can end the psychosis.

Which is to say that schizophrenia and psychosis have an intersecting relationship.