If a man has lost a leg or an eye, he knows he has lost a leg or an eye; but if he has lost a self—himself—he cannot know it, because he is no longer there to know it.
Interpretation
The quote explores the idea of self-awareness and the profound impact of losing one's sense of self.
Oliver Sacks highlights the critical nature of self-identity, suggesting that physical losses are tangible and can be recognized, while the loss of one's sense of self is deeply insidious and perhaps goes unnoticed by the individual experiencing it. This reflection raises questions about consciousness and the essence of what it means to be human, emphasizing that without a self to perceive it, one cannot comprehend such a loss.
In practice
In a discussion about mental health and identity loss, one might quote this to emphasize the importance of self-awareness.
There will be no one like us when we are gone, but then there is no one like anyone else, ever. When people die, they cannot be replaced. They leave holes that cannot be filled, for it is the fate - the genetic and neural fate - of every human being to be a unique individual, to find his own path, to live his own life, to die his own death.
In general, people are afraid to acknowledge hallucinations because they immediately see them as a sign of something awful happening to the brain, whereas in most cases they're not.
Dr. Kertesz mentioned to me a case known to him of a farmer who had developed prosopagnosia and in consequence could no longer distinguish (the faces of) his cows, and of another such patient, an attendant in a Natural History Museum, who mistook his own reflection for the diorama of an ape
Music can lift us out of depression or move us to tears - it is a remedy, a tonic, orange juice for the ear. But for many of my neurological patients, music is even more - it can provide access, even when no medication can, to movement, to speech, to life. For them, music is not a luxury, but a necessity.
We see with the eyes, but we see with the brain as well. And seeing with the brain is often called imagination.
I rejoice when I meet gifted young people... I feel the future is in good hands.
For an occurrence to become an adventure, it is necessary and sufficient for one to recount it.
Imprisonment is as irrevocable as death.
No reference is truly direct — every reference depends on some kind of coding scheme. It's just a question of how implicit it is.
We are all regionalists in our origins, however 'universal' our themes and characters, and without our cherished hometowns and childhood landscapes to nourish us, we would be like plants set in shallow soil. Our souls must take root - almost literally.
Maybe the best thing would be to forget being right or wrong about people and just go along for the ride. But if you can do that -- well, lucky you.
I am a lover of truth, a worshipper of freedom, a celebrant at the altar of language and purity and tolerance.
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