Signs--Origins & Causes

Review: SIGNS -- ORIGINS & CAUSES William C. Stokoe John M.Robson (ad.). (rV& A &Evo/ution ofI/he Unives Evidwa for Ars/p7? Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press. xii &297 pp. 6X9in.ISBN 0-7735-0618-7. Cloth $35, Paper $15.95. Readers of these pages are already familiar with the transition from questions about gestural systems that possess linguistic organization to questions about origins, whether origins of language, of consciousness, or even of the human species. In its simplest form the question addressed by Origin &Evolution of the Universe: Evidencefor esign? asks if current science has any certain knowledge that intelligent, conscious life on our planet has come about by (divine) plan or by chance. So stated the question is relevant to the interest of many readers of SignLanguage Studies A great deal of the attention paid to sign languages and the deaf persons who use them, from the days of Ponce de Leon and Carrion to the present, has been a direct consequence of the concern of religious persons and their churches or orders for the welfare of the deaf. We realize also that much recent attention to the grammar of sign languages has resulted from interest in the purely rational structure found in or attributed to language, the human brain, and the world of phenomena. To the surprise of no one the symposium's question is still open. The value of this collection of essays is not to be found an any breakthrough the authors have made but in the wisdom they present, thoroughly backed as it is by first class scientific knowledge and meticulous wide ranging thought. To the surprise though of this, admittedly naive, reviewer the contributions of the professors of religion and theology are as impressive as those of the astrophysicist, biochemist, geologist, molecular biologist, and psychologist contributors. o 1988 by Linstok Press, Inc. 341 ISSN 0302-1475 See note Inside front cover. Review: Orih7&EvolutiA Those in the former group are comfortable discussing the origin and evolution of the universe in the context of knowledge currently held by science. They see no more unmistakable scientific evidence than do the physical scientists for knowing with certainty whether divine foreordination or pure chance brought about the universe as we "know" it. Naturally, in the absence of certainty, the theologians and philosophers recommend a state of mind open enough to admit that in the light of present knowledge and the trend of scientific investigations there is no evidence to rule out something beyond or above nature. The chief reason, however, for reviewing this symposium volume here is not the unresolved question it explores but the importance of the scientific, and the theological, thinking it contains. The fifteen Canadian and two British contributors provide a curious reader with what must come as near as possible in our time to a compendium. From the details of the "big bang" theory of the origin of the universe, and theories that postulate other successive or contemporary universes, to the structure of genes, DNA, and its constituents, and the mass of carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and sulfur in Earth and its biosphere, the state of knowledge about our universe is set forth briefly and clearly. And the theories are presented along with the phenomena that they attempt to explain. Although the lay reader must miss much that a specialist will absorb easily, the excellence of the exposition as well as each contributor's close adherence to the central question are unique in this reader's experience. An anecdote from my days of attempting to teach exposition to college freshmen is pertinent here. Afellow teacher of English from the state of Washington observed in thel950s that among his freshman students the Canadians as a group invariably wrote better themes, paragraphs, and sentences than those from U.S. high schools. Setting about the question of causes systematically, he eliminated all possibilities except one for the difference: the Canadian schools generally taught and tested English and the rest of the subjects in the curriculum with set questions to which students wrote essay answers; the students from most U.S. schools, on the other hand, were tested "objectively," had never written as much as a sentence in any other class than...