The Kingdom of Speech

Questions About The Kingdom of Speech

by Tom Wolfe

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Answered Questions (2)

Sorry. Evolution has such mountains of evidence backing it--from biological, geological, paleontological, medical and chemical bases--that any book purporting to declare that speech is somehow an event, or phenomenon, apart from evolution is, to be blunt, hokum. For a reporter-then-novelist to write about evolution is like me writing a treatise on brain surgery. Should you take neither tome seriously? No.
Mackenzie Your rebuttal would be compelling if it weren't just an appeal to authority. I'm not sure that I disagree - I'll wait until I've read the book to dete…moreYour rebuttal would be compelling if it weren't just an appeal to authority. I'm not sure that I disagree - I'll wait until I've read the book to determine that - but for now this seems - quite ironically - no better than the drivel you accuse Wolfe's book of being. (Have you even read the book?)(less)
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Did Wolfe touch a lot of raw nerves with this book? Seems a lot of 1 star reviews don't like Wolfe's take down on Darwin. Defenders of the faith?
Ted Burke Perhaps more along the lines that those who gave the book one star are defenders of scientific protocols for verification of proof. Remember that scie…morePerhaps more along the lines that those who gave the book one star are defenders of scientific protocols for verification of proof. Remember that scientific theories are coherent statements of verified, measured and replicated facts that are related in an effort to find out how things work. No where in any credible theory of scientific endeavor does it say that the interpretation of the facts is final. Protocol requires if new evidence emerges that credibly challenges established conclusions, scientists reexamine the issue at hand and alter theories as required to accommodate new data. This applies across the board , in all areas of research endeavor, whether biology, astrophysics, or linguistics. Chomsky would be the first to insist that his frameworks need to under go the same rigorous challenges as theories in other disciplines do. Scientific investigation leaves itself room to be modified in deal with new input as a matter of course. That is how they do things in the disciplines that are interested in facts that can be measured. Wolfe , of course, is a former journalist, a novelist who overrates his worth, and a clever ironist who can catch the flaws and contradictions in the statements of other creative writers. His world , though, is literary, not scientific, not one predicated on hard facts, which means that its one thing to eviscerate a Mailer, an Updike or a John Irving on the basis of having a quicker, snarkier tongue and quite another to put on the gloves and climb into the ring to take on science. Poor Wolfe simply cannot dissect what he thinks he understands.(less)
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