Lili Marlene - Daniel Tammet: the Boy with the Incredible Story

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Copyright 2013,2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 Lili Marlene

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Thank you foryour support.

My interest inthe subject of the lesser-known aspects of the life of DanielTammet was sparked, informed and supported by knowledgeablecommenters at my blog, some anonymous. I thank them all but one whouses the name Tomas deserves the greatest part of my gratitude forhis kind and intellectually stimulating online company and crucialinformation. Thank you Tomas, whoever you are!

I would like toacknowledge Joshua Foer, author of the book Moonwalking withEinstein, as the person who has done the most to publicise theunacknowledged side of Daniel Tammets biography.

I would like tothank the people at Smashwords for making this ebook and countlessother ebooks possible. The world of publishing and books will neverbe the same again.

I would like tothank Google Blogger for making my blog Incorrect Pleasurespossible, and for making it so easy to translate foreign-languagesources for the research that I have done on this book. I neverdreamt such clever feats would be possible in my youth.

I would like tothank the people at Internet Archive Wayback Machine, who provide aunique and essential service of archiving web pages. This free andopen online archive has made it possible for me and anyone on theinternet to view and date long-defunct web pages, which can includehistorical and biographical information that is no longer availableanywhere else.

I would like tothank the people of the United States of America, who have awonderful first amendment of their constitution which I believeguarantees freedom of speech and freedom of the press. Theconstitution of Australia, the country where I live, does notexplicitly protect freedom of speech or expression. This isprobably the reason why my words are published in the USA and notin Australia.

Many peoplehave known for a long time that the story of the life of theauthor, celebrity and performer of intellectual feats Daniel Tammetwhich has been retold many times by mass media and scientificpublications is incomplete in ways that matter and questionable intoo many ways to count. Evidence pointing towards a more completeaccount of Tammets life has always been available to anyone whohas access to the internet, and much of this evidence consists ofwords written by the man himself. In his first book, anautobiography, Tammet revealed many things about himself thatcontradict or at least sit oddly next to some of the inflatedclaims about his supposed savant abilities and autisticdisabilities that have been repeated countless times by universityresearchers and journalists. If professors and reporters cant bebothered to sit and read cover-to-cover an autobiography by the manthey intend to report on, is the subject of their scrutiny to blamefor the shortcomings of their investigations? An alternative Tammetbiography has always been known and accessible, but has beenobscured by the size and the dominance of the expertly-promotedcommercial version of Tammets life story. In this book I aspire toshow readers where to look to find the many elements of thealternative narrative of Tammets biography. In the spirit ofscientific journalism, and idea championed by the AustralianWikileaks founder and whistleblower Julian Assange, in one verylarge section of this book I present the reader with a collectionof sources of information about Tammet, and I invite the reader tocheck out these documents and media items for themselves using theinternet and draw their own conclusions. I have attempted to conveya sense of the impact that Tammet has made on neuroscience andpopular culture at a global level by creating a fairlycomprehensive list of published and broadcasted items about or byTammet or that refer to Tammet (in English and other languages).Despite the many good reasons to regard Tammet with scepticism,Tammet and his books have been given positive, often rapturouscoverage in some of the worlds most prestigious newspapers andscience magazines and he has appeared on some of the worlds toprating television shows. Practicing doctors have recommended hisfirst book to other doctors as a depiction of autism. Tammets lifeand mind have been the focus of a number of unskeptical researchstudy papers published in peer-reviewed neuroscience journals. As acase study Tammet has been cited as evidence or an interesting casein countless neuro-psychology books and journal papers, even in apsychology textbook. He has also been mentioned without scepticismin a textbook for journalism students published by the OxfordUniversity Press. Tammets first book has even been found among thebelongings of one of Americas most despised and pitied massmurderers.

To mark out theitems in the large list of items about Tammet that are moresignificant or interesting I have written the titles of these itemsin bold lettering. It is up to the reader whether she or he shouldapproach my list selectively or as a whole, or skip it altogetherand read only the regular text content of this book. I wouldrecommend that the reader at least look at the earliest items inthe list, including the YouTube video clips of a youthful DanielCorney. This is your copy of this book, so read it any way youlike, just dont get lost.

Unlike theclich, the full truth about Daniel Tammet is not stranger thanfiction, but it is truly more interesting and instructive. Thereare many important lessons that we could learn from looking at thestory behind the headlines, and many intriguing questions areraised. There is a disturbing lesson to be learned about thepervasiveness of low journalistic standards. Theres an even moreconcerning lesson to be discovered here about the yawning chasmbetween theoretical models of how medical and psychological scienceis believed to work and how it actually works. Science is mostcertainly not a perfect system or a closed system. It is run byindividual researchers who have human flaws and interests beyondacademia, science and a quest for pure scientific knowledge. Manyof the researchers who have studied Tammet are specialists in areasof neuropsychology such as synaesthesia, autism and savantsyndrome who are as much popularizers of science asscientists.

Your attitudetowards Daniel Tammet might take some negative turns while readingthis book, but I am sure you will find that the person discoveredamongst these words is much more of a human being than the odditythat has been presented to the public by journalists, agents,publishers and a collection of neuroscience researchers.

dont write crap, cant be that hard, um, and, uh, when youhave written complete crap, then I think you should, ah, I thinkyou should correct it.

Within thesequotes we can find the basic elements of the incredible, amazingand astounding story that has been told by Daniel Tammet in hisbooks and interviews, by university researchers and professors, byjournalists working for some of the worlds most popular andrespected newspapers and current affairs television programs, byFrench and English-speaking magazine writers and by journalistsworking for influential government-funded news services.