How did this situation occur? How did autism which, until quite recently, was an unusual diagnosis of little broader concern, come to hold a central place in debates over human nature? That’s what I’d like to think about in this essay. My argument, in short, is that the thing which is ‘missing’ in autism, crudely put, is assumed to be social functioning and this is crucial when it comes to understanding why autism is taken to be so important for the human.