Newton and Einstein may have been autistic. But is their genius an argument against a screening test?

The prospect of a screening test on a pregnant woman predicting her child's autism is not far away, and Professor Simon Baron-Cohen, leader of the Cambridge University research team that developed the test, has called for an ethical debate on its desirability. My first reaction was puzzlement. Why a debate? We have had the test for Down's syndrome for many years. It seems to be generally accepted without controversy. No expectant mothers are obliged to have it, and many, even those at some risk because of their age, choose not to. Those that do take it have the choice, if it proves positive for Down's, between terminating the pregnancy or bearing the child. It is, of course, an agonising decision, but I'm not sure it raises special ethical issues.

Why should the autism test be treated differently? It is a different kind of condition, says Professor Baron-Cohen, often linked with talent. "What would we lose if children with autistic spectrum disorder were eliminated from the population?" It is a philosophical question, which stakes the claim of society to be involved in the debate, and not just the parents of the unborn child.

I don't normally like to use the slippery-slope argument, but it is apposite for issues arising from the bewildering speed of medical advances. Screening for Down's syndrome has become commonplace; a test for autism is imminent. There is no doubt that more and more tests will be found for more and more conditions, many of them far less life-threatening or seriously affecting quality of life than the ones we now give priority to. Where would we stop in offering pregnant women tests?

Or are we prepared to accept, or even welcome, a less diverse society that has rid itself of autistic children and, in time, of sufferers from other conditions difficult to cope with by the sufferer, his or her immediate entourage, or the medical profession? It's a sustainable argument that losing the tiny proportion of the population made up of autistic children will not have much effect on diversity; but the slippery slope results in many other potentially sick children not being born.

What I can not accept is the argument put forward on behalf of autism alone, and no other condition - that among those autistic children not born, because their mothers had the test and decided to terminate, there might be brilliant autistic savants who would make an important contribution to society. It is being asserted - I have yet to see any supporting evidence - that Albert Einstein and Isaac Newton were autistic; their mothers, in modern circumstances, might not have had them. The logical corollary of that approach is to refuse to offer the test to all pregnant women, just in case they were in danger of bearing an autistic child who would be among the exceptionally gifted 1% or 2%.

If we take up Baron-Cohen's call for a debate, we will have to decide between three elements: the autistic person's predicted quality of life (though the test may not be that precise); the feelings of the parents who may suffer far more than their child; and the view of society as to its diminished diversity if we continue to prevent the birth of the imperfect. The last should be the least listened to.

Yes, all right, Berry Gordy's Tamla Motown label was exciting and innovative, the first to be run by a black entrepreneur, who brought you the Supremes, Smokey Robinson, Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye, but poor Detroit, look at it now etc etc. The label is celebrating its 50th birthday amid much nostalgic publicity and, as an admirer, I don't begrudge it its renewed moments of glory. But spare a thought for the forgotten other genius of early 60s American popular music. Or rather, not so
much forgotten as remembered for another reason: Phil Spector is currently being retried for murder. But if I had to take to a desert island discs chosen only from Spector or Gordy, most would be from the former's stable. Sure, Motown's golden years went on longer, but Spector produced the more memorable music, led by the Crystals' incomparable, unsurpassed Da Doo Ron Ron.

Two competing world championships of darts were
over the past two weeks, each claiming to have provided the real world's best. Inevitably, the traditional debate accompanied the action: is darts a sport or a game?

I have the answer. What's the difference in principle between archery and shooting, both Olympic sports, on the one hand, and darts on the other? All three are based on scoring points by accurately propelling a missile - arrow, bullet, dart - into a target. The main difference is that the first two require a weapon, while darts employs the human arm, surely making it more, not less, of a sport. Silly people argue that darts can't be a sport because many of its players are not necessarily slim or physically fit, nor unknown to drink. John Daly, winner of the British Open, fitted those categories, and no one is saying golf isn't a sport. As in shooting, archery and golf, success at darts requires hours of practice and self-discipline. And at least you can tell who has won, without controversy, unlike those so-called sports where results can depend on a tenth of a point here or there delivered by judges not always free from, let's say, influences. Anyway, darts is a sport because it is covered on the sports pages of this and other newspapers.

But then, so is chess.

This week Marcel saw an exhibition at the Grand Palais, Paris, of the works of the German expressionist Emil Nolde: "Some spectacular paintings, but he's not quite first division." Marcel saw Steven Soderbergh's Che: Part One: "Entertaining enough, but I was disappointed that the film seemed so uninterested in what drew a middle-class Argentinian to join the Cuban struggle."