Pomona; or, the future of English

The essay examines whether language will survive technological change and whether speech might be displaced by direct mind-to-mind transmission, arguing that language is integral to thought and social life. It surveys evolutionary and historical perspectives, using the metaphor of roots, trunks, and leaves to show how lived experience, literature, and conversation sustain linguistic vitality. It rejects technocratic or prescriptive attempts to redesign language, warns against scientific hubris and fashionable reforms, and questions whether English can continue to grow organically, adapt, and purify itself rather than become engineered or fossilized.