The Wondrous Human Brain, Dyslexia and Other Stuff
Robert A. Herrmann [This article contains material that is different from that which appears in my Testimony. However, I do hope that the revelations I present will be useful to someone.] I have been convinced for some time that the capabilities of the human brain may be ample evidence that the God of the Scriptures designed us. I can find no convincing evidence that many of its "backup" mechanisms and the fact that it appears to be designed for future activities have any evolutionary basis. Among the backup mechanisms are those used when portions of the brain are missing and those we use to compensate for the many different aspects of dyslexia. I specifically detail my personal experiences with a speech disorder and a few somewhat unusual learning disabilities and how I have compensated for their effects. There are considerably more severe forms than I discuss. Some of my experiences are rather subtle in character.
As I have mentioned in various forms, I spent the last half of my first-grade school year sitting on a dunce stool wearing a dunce cap. And, necessarily, I failed the second half of the first-grade. (They did these things in the "good old days.") One of the problems came from my inability to speak in any coherent manner. I had what some would call severe speech impediments. But Dr. Nibblet, a kindly country-styled physician, gave me a single instruction that allowed me, after considerable practice, to eliminate all of these speech impediments; he cured me, so to speak. He simply said that my brain worked much faster than my mouth could work. He instructed me to first say mentally what I wanted to speak aloud. Then I should, slowly at first, copy orally what my brain was "saying" in its mental voice. Yes, I was to talk to myself mentally, to "think in words before I spoke." This I tried. And after considerable practice, I could almost speak in a normal manner, for I had increased the transfer speed of this brain to speech process. I have had to do this my entire life. When I speak, people might sometimes notice the short often dramatic pauses. This is where now and then I am quickly composing what I next intend to say. If I don't do this, my speech impediments return. Indeed, when I speak, I "hear" two voices, almost in unison, my mental voice and my oral voice. It's interesting to note that I made my living many years ago in the entertainment business due to my speaking ability. And, I have just completed 40 years of teaching, 6 high school years and 34 on the college level, where I am actually paid for being able to communicate orally. But this speech problem is not the major difficulty. I suppose that some may not consider this a learning disability. So, let's go to the forth-grade where I again failed one-half a year.
I failed due to two reasons. One was my inability to write in the required cursive form. I'll first illustrate the exact facts of the second difficulty. I'd be sitting in class when the "teacher," we might call her that, would start the reading and spelling lesson for the day. This was the time the class was to have some fun at my expense. She would post a list of new words to learn. This was done by reading each aloud and then spelling it. One of my classmates, and it was probably a girl, would stand up and say the words perfectly, I supposed. Then it was time for the fun and laughter. I would be called next to read the list. In many cases, this I could not do without making incomprehensible sounds. I failed reading and cursive writing. Why did I have such troubles? During summer "vacation," I spent part of the day sitting at the kitchen table first practicing my cursive writing by simply writing "swirls" and then attempting to read "flash cards." Hundreds of pages of swirls, connected cursive "m"s and the like did nothing to help me "write" in the required manner. The "flash cards" were useless and for a good reason. They were written in the same manner as the teachers list, words broken into syllables or letter sounds. I still could not read then. This was most discouraging since I knew my mother could read two 400-page books in one evening and I had no idea how this was possible.
Here I was trying to achieve the usual educational advancement but, of course, this was also during the 1943-44 World War II period. Significantly, various learning disorders were not recognized as such or something that could be eliminated by compensation. So, I had a conversation with my own brain, my mental voice. Well, at the least, I thought that it was "my" mental voice.
Hey, how can I correct this writing problem. "Memorize." What do you mean by "memorize," memorize what? "Well, just watch how an individual draws the cursive alphabet. Then memorize the motions of the pencil point that are needed to form the letters. You can see how the letters also connect together. In fact, memorize the diagrams just like they look on those cards at the top of the blackboard in your classroom."I mention that the alphabet cards being used did not have any indication as to how you would draw the symbol. But, I watched my mother write and memorized exactly as my mental voice had instructed. I had no trouble passing the cursive writing requirements. But, my normal handwriting in no way looks like these cursive forms. Indeed, its my own creation where 50% is composed of printed symbols. But, even today, if I wish to write in that exact form that appears on those alphabet cards, I can do it. It's also interesting that at times I have had to write with my left-hand. I quickly analyze how my right-hand would move and then I transfer this motion to my left-hand. But, what can be done about the reading problem?"I can tell you your problem." What is it? "I won't let you put certain combinations of letter sounds together; that is put those pieces of a word together, and sound them as a complete word." Thanks a lot. "But, there's a way out of this. What you need to do is to listen when someone else does what you can't do and memorize the sound of the word as an entire set of symbols. Also memorize its meaning."Fortunately, God has gifted me with just such a memory. For reasons only my "brain" knows, I could not read or spell or even speak, some words, by separating them into syllables or letter sounds, and then put the pieces together. Did any individual help me over this difficulty? No. But there was "something" that did "talk" to me, so to speak, and tell me what to do. I recall how elated the teacher was when I tried out this new procedure. She was convinced that she was the greatest of all of the forth-grade teachers, she had taught me to read. But, alas, this was not so. She did little to aid me. Even after all these years, for words that are new to me, this problem persists for certain letter sound combinations. But, this is not the last of these nasty problems for the next one is very subtle.The problem is related to many of the published dyslexia problems. My father worked for some major newspapers and my mother was Dutch and she come from Holland at a young age. My parents would speak with relatively correct grammar. So, I learned correct grammatical constructions by sound. If I heard a sentence and the grammar was not exactly correct, I would know this since "it just didn't sound right." Today, I sometimes have a difficult time listening to "news" and other such broadcasters since for educated people they certainly "butcher" the English language. So, I know in my mind the correct words, how they are spelled and where they are used in sentences but getting them from my brain to paper or through a keyboard is another matter. I'd get back a written composition, upset with the grade. I seem to have misspelled many words. I know how to spell these words. But, still many were marked wrong. Yet, I was convinced that I had spelled the words correctly prior to handing in the composition. But, when they were noted in red, then I had to agree that they were misspelled. How was this possible? "Study harder," I was told. But this did not improve the results. Now what do I do and why is this happening?
I let my "brain" analyze itself, so to speak. And here is how it explained my difficulties. There appears to a shift that takes place somewhere in my brain. As I go from the word as sounded correctly by my mental voice, a type of mental shift takes place only when I try to write the word. The shift is often slight, to a slightly different form, a single incorrect symbol, or to a different spelling for a word with the same sound. There have been times when a blank space appeared where I believed I had written the symbol-string. If I casually read a sentence that has these peculiarities, my brain shifts in the other direction and substitutes the correct sounding word so that what I "read" now makes complete sense to me. For example, I might have in my mind the sentence "They chose the correct color." But when I write this sentence it might appear as "They choice the correct color." Then when I read it quickly or casually, I read it as "They chose the correct color." Or I might simply leave out the word "the." But reading it, my brain puts "the" into the sentence in the missing place so that it actually makes perfect sense to me. Then, of course, there's the "most" and "must" symbol problem and I even spell the same word in two different ways in the same sentence. Now how does one compensate for this?
Unfortunately, I can't compensate completely for this strange behavior. I often warn my students to expect this to happen. I can eliminate most of the errors that occur, but not when I write on a blackboard and don't have a lot of time. And there's the difficulty, "time." Even doing a computer screen search for the "most" verses the "must" problem, I often "see" the correct spelling although using the process below for a printed version of the page, this error is mostly revealed.
If I wish to eliminate this problem as much as possible, I need considerable time and, for physical reasons, I need a printed version. I must slowly read each word, one at a time, and often speak it. Then I must do the same thing with phrases. It is a remarkable thing that sometimes I actually see a change take place in the string of symbols. Using the above example, in the sentence "They choice the correct color" when I reach the word "choice" I sometimes actual "see" chose, then I blink and the word is now "choice" and I recognize my error. It's more remarkable fact that, usually, this does not happen with mathematical symbols. I don't know how all of this is possible, but as my daughter Laura would say, "Stuff happens." (Of course, I could also try and find a better grammar checker. Until recently, I didn't know how bad the MS "checker" is.)
As a federal employee, I am restricted in the time frame I can use for any commercial projects. For what is now the first edition of my book "Science Declares Our Universe IS Intelligent Designed," I was very restricted. I wrote most of this book over a two-month period while "on leave without pay." But, I ran out of time and could not apply the last process needed to eliminate such errors. I did re-read the book a few times, but line-for-line rather than word-for-word. I made a big mistake. I trusted the Microsoft spelling and grammar checker. [I note that the only edition of this book now available is the first revision where almost all of these errors have been corrected.] However, what really does this have to do with actual intelligence? Just consider that I began studying special relativity, atomic physics, and the calculus at 12 and graduated with honors from a special high school devoted to engineering and science, as well as with honors from both the Johns Hopkins University and my graduate school. Apparently, these problems need not stifle actual intellectual achievement. I wonder if these difficulties would have affected my SAT scores and whether such affects would have stopped me from continuing my education. (In my day, the SAT was not required of those who would graduate from the "Polytechnic" A course. Universities and colleges trusted the school's reputation.) I wonder????
By the way, the reason I place much of my work on the Internet is that I am able to make these corrections more easily. But, I am also sure that when I pass from this life that there still will be some word somewhere on my Web site that is incorrect. Maybe this is all that the critics of my work can criticize. And such criticism will make them somewhat foolish. I purposely wrote this article without immediately checking for errors. So, I will now spell and grammar check to see how well MS does the job. [Well, it corrected 20 typing errors. I'll now check the "checker" by using my word-for-word procedure. [I've found 15 that MS missed. Are there any more? Unless they change content, is it really important if there are?]] 6/20/02, revised 7/1/02, corrected again 12/31/02.
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