Hallucinations
"Illuminate[s] the complexities of the human brain and the mysteries of the human mind." --The New York Times
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 us all.BUY THE BOOK
Community Reviews
Sacks details all the reasons why someone might have visual, olfactory, or disassociative hallucinations. Most of the conditions he covers are not related to psychosis, meaning the person is often aware that the hallucinations are not real (at first or eventually- though some of these conditions do cause confusion as to what is real and what is not). The book structure and focus seems to be because Sacks is determined to protect patients against a misdiagnosis of psychosis. There is no sense of what the psychosis and non-psychosis percents are though.
I probably didn't need so many real-life examples of all the hallucinations themselves, particularly the repetitive kind- I guess a lot of conditions cause people to hallucinate Lilliputians? Okay, understood.
I probably didn't need so many real-life examples of all the hallucinations themselves, particularly the repetitive kind- I guess a lot of conditions cause people to hallucinate Lilliputians? Okay, understood.
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