The Strange Case Of Oliver Sacks

Jun 26, 2017

Professor Anthony David published a commentary in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry in September 2012 entitled, Functional disorders, Cartesian dualism and stigma: where does the dualism really lie?

He was responding to a reappraisal of one of Oliver Sacks' lesser known books describing the doctor's own paralysis and body image disorder. He writes:

 

 

This is a timely reappraisal of one of Oliver Sacks' less well-known works. The authors argue that the sense of detachment from his leg that Sacks felt after his injury and surgery was ‘functional/psychogenic’. Stone and colleagues take Sacks' account at face value and are at pains to label it repeatedly as ‘genuine’. Their aim is to go beyond Cartesian dualism, a common aspiration but one hard to achieve in practice, such is the hold it has on our explanatory frameworks. Stone et al approach the ‘case’ like the good clinicians that they are and attempt to ‘get above the lesion’. There is no mind–brain divide but there is a hierarchy: from the peripheral nerves up through the neuraxis to the cortex. But that is as far as it goes: in the materialist world, there is nothing else. A disorder of will seems the best formulation and is made without implied criticism or facetiousness...

 

The piece continues and can be found at the link below - hear Professor Anthony David discussing his take on Oliver Sacks in this free to download podcast

 

J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry. 2012 Sep;83(9):869. doi: 10.1136/jnnp-2012-303051

 

References

1. ↵
   1. Stone J,
   2. Perthen J,
   3. Carson A

   . ‘A Leg to Stand On’ by Oliver Sacks: A unique autobiographical account of functional paralysis. J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry 2012;83:864–7.

   Abstract/FREE Full TextGoogle Scholar
2. ↵
   1. Sacks OW

   . A leg to stand on. New York: Harper & Row, 1984.

    
3. ↵
   1. Ramachandran VS

   . The Tell-Tale Brain. New York: Norton and Co, 2011.