This is certainly the case, but it does make it all the more amusing that the myth

> Commas denote a pause in speaking.... Speak the sentence aloud to find pauses.

made its way into this article. Hard to imagine that this particular point, to which I might attribute many of the comma splices I see in scientific writing, actually came from a professional writer.

McCarthy's books involve unrelenting violence. If he viewed commas as pauses, it makes sense that he would never use them.

It goes without saying that you're a better writer than Cormac McCarthy. Tell us something beyond that.