You have to be something other than a "regular joe" to even know that HN exists, much less want to hang out here. This forum was designed to be repellent to any but a very specific kind of technically minded "good hacker" personality, as defined by pg. The kind of person who cares about "information density," eschews design and UX as frivolous and prefers only "technical" topics is likely not neurotypical.

And yes many people in tech are on the spectrum. I suspect that much of what's dysfunctional with SV and tech culture is the result of raising a generation of socially awkward neurodivergent kids on 4chan and making them millionaires before their frontal lobes have even fully developed. That necessarily bleeds into HN and becomes normalized within the culture as performative cynicism, misanthropy and toxicity.

Also doomerism, but I'd argue that a prominent figure that might fit this nihilism bill is / are Elon Musk and similar technocrats / futurists who strongly believe in Roko's Basilisk (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roko%27s_basilisk), that is, to paraphrase, "the world is doomed, AI will rise, become our God, and exterminate humankind, but we have to ensure it actually emerges so maybe they will be merciful to us". Which I believe (but I'm no philosopher) is both nihilistic, fatalistic and religious thinking.

To the point where I wouldn't be surprised if these people have or would kill people if they aren't in line with their agendas. They have the connections, power and money.