HallucinationsNATIONAL BESTSELLER • The "poet laureate of medicine" (The New York Times) and author of The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat weaves together stories of mind-altering experiences to reveal what they tell us about our brains, our folklore and culture, and why the potential for hallucination exists in us all. "Sacks has turned hallucinations from something bizarre and frightening into something that seems part of what it means to be a person. His book, too, is a medical and human triumph.” —The Washington Post “An absorbing plunge into a mystery of the mind.” —Entertainment Weekly To many people, hallucinations imply madness, but in fact they are a common part of the human experience. These sensory distortions range from the shimmering zigzags of a visual migraine to powerful visions brought on by fever, injuries, drugs, sensory deprivation, exhaustion, or even grief. Hallucinations doubtless lie behind many mythological traditions, literary inventions, and religious epiphanies. Drawing on his own experiences, a wealth of clinical cases from among his patients, and famous historical examples ranging from Dostoevsky to Lewis Carroll, the legendary neurologist Oliver Sacks investigates the mystery of these sensory deceptions: what they say about the working of our brains, how they have influenced our folklore and culture, and why the potential for hallucination is present in all humans. |
Contents
Sensory Deprivation | |
Hallucinatory Smells | |
Hearing Things | |
The Illusions of Parkinsonism | |
Altered States | |
Visual Migraines | |
The Sacred Disease | |
Hallucinations in the HalfField | |
Acknowledgments | |
Permissions Acknowledgments | |
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activity amputated appeared associated attacks auditory hallucinations aura became blind body image brain called CBS hallucinations Charles Bonnet syndrome colleagues color complex consciousness delirium deprivation described disappeared disorder dreams drugs ecstatic emotional epilepsy epileptic experience experienced eyes faces feeling felt figures flashbacks frightening geometrical hallucinatory hallucinogenic hand happened heard hearing voices hypnagogia hypnagogic hallucinations hypnopompic illusions imagery imagination L-dopa later looked memory mescaline migraine mind minutes move movement musical hallucinations musical notation narcolepsy neurological neurologist never normal occipital lobe occur one’s Parkinson’s disease patients patterns perception perhaps phantom limbs proprioception psychosis recognized remember Rosalie schizophrenia seemed seizures sensation sense sensory side sleep paralysis smell someone sometimes sort started strange subjects suddenly surgery symptoms temporal lobe temporal lobe epilepsy things thought traumatic vision visual cortex visual field visual hallucinations vivid waking wrote