Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is typically defined through behavioral deficits in social communication and restricted interests. This deficit framing can obscure the internal logic of autistic cognition and can flatten neurocognitive variation into a practical binary that governs credibility, eligibility, and expectations. This conceptual paper develops an Analog/Digital Cognitive Processing Modes (A/D CPM) model that reframes ASD as a difference in representational foregrounding and format-conversion cost rather than a capacity deficit. This paper distinguishes two cognitive processing modes—analog (continuous, relational, Gestalt-preserving) and digital (discrete, tagged, compressive)—and the representational formats they foreground, describing the diagnostic split between autistic spectrum (AS) and neurotypical (NT) individuals as a graded "tilt" that yields asymmetric analog-to-digital (A/D) extraction demands in digitally structured environments. The model reinterprets canonical paradigms: the Sally-Anne task as difficulty backgrounding the present Gestalt to extract a time-indexed belief-tag under forced-choice constraints; "weak central coherence" as the cost of stabilizing socially shareable tags from an analog field; reduced susceptibility to visual illusions as preservation of physical accuracy over contextual adjustment; and predictive coding accounts as consequences of format-enforcing measurement models that digitize social phenomena. To connect cognition with self-experience, I introduce the Sea of Consciousness model (state-self vs narrative-self) and conceptualize masking as chronic self-conversion. Finally, integrating symbol grounding with Baudrillard's simulacra, I outline grounding procedures for neurodiversity-affirming social design.
Shinsuke Inoue (2026) studied this question.