Phantoms in the Brain: Probing the Mysteries of the Human Mind by V. S. Ramachandran, Sandra Blakeslee Read Free Book Online Page B
Authors: V. S. Ramachandran, Sandra Blakeslee
circuits are hard−wired from birth, does it follow that they cannot be altered? How much of the adult brain is modifiable? To find out, let's meet Tom, one of the first people who helped me explore these larger questions.
CHAPTER 2
Knowing Where to Scratch
My intention is to tell of bodies changed to different forms.
The heavens and all below them, Earth and her creatures, All change, And we, part of creation, Also must suffer change.
— Ovid
Tom Sorenson vividly recalls the horrifying circumstances that led to the loss of his arm. He was driving home from soccer practice, tired and hungry from the exercise, when a car in the opposite lane swerved in front of him. Brakes squealed, Tom's car spun out of control and he was thrown from the driver's seat onto the ice plant bordering the freeway. As he was hurled through the air, Tom looked back and saw that his hand was still in the car, "gripping" the seat cushion—severed from his body like a prop in a Freddy Krueger horror film.
As a result of this gruesome mishap, Tom lost his left arm just above the elbow. He was seventeen years old, with just three months to go until high school graduation.
21
In the weeks afterward, even though he knew that his arm was gone, Tom could still feel its ghostly presence below the elbow. He could wiggle each "finger," "reach out" and "grab" objects that were within 21
arm's reach. Indeed, his phantom arm seemed to be able to do anything that the real arm would have done automatically, such as warding off blows, breaking falls or patting his little brother on the back. Since Tom had been left−handed, his phantom would reach for the receiver whenever the telephone rang.
Tom was not crazy. His impression that his missing arm was still there is a classic example of a phantom limb—an arm or leg that lingers indefinitely in the minds of patients long after it has been lost in an accident or removed by a surgeon. Some wake up from anesthesia and are incredulous when told that their arm had to be sacrificed, because they still vividly feel its presence.1 Only when they look under the sheets do they come to the shocking realization that the limb is really gone. Moreover, some of these patients experience excruciating pain in the phantom arm, hand or fingers, so much so that they contemplate suicide. The pain is not only unrelenting, it's also untreatable; no one has the foggiest idea of how it arises or how to deal with it.
As a physician I was aware that phantom limb pain poses a serious clinical problem. Chronic pain in a real body part such as the joint aches of arthritis or lower backache is difficult enough to treat, but how do you treat pain in a nonexistent limb? As a scientist, I was also curious about why the phenomenon occurs in the first place: Why would an arm persist in the patient's mind long after it had been removed? Why doesn't the mind simply accept the loss and "reshape" the body image? To be sure, this does happen in a few patients, but it usually takes years or decades. Why decades—why not just a week or a day? A study of this phenomenon, I realized, might not only help us understand the question of how the brain copes with a sudden and massive loss, but also help address the more fundamental debate over nature versus nurture—the extent to which our body image, as well as other aspects of our minds, are laid down by genes and the extent to which they are modified by experience.
The persistence of sensation in limbs long after amputation had been noticed as far back as the sixteenth century by the French surgeon Am−broise Paré, and, not surprisingly, there is an elaborate folklore surrounding this phenomenon. After Lord Nelson lost his right arm during an unsuccessful attack on Santa Cruz de Tenerife, he experienced compelling phantom limb pains, including the unmistakable sensation of fingers digging into his phantom palm. The emergence of these ghostly sensations in his missing limb led the sea lord to
CHAPTER 2
Knowing Where to Scratch
My intention is to tell of bodies changed to different forms.
The heavens and all below them, Earth and her creatures, All change, And we, part of creation, Also must suffer change.
— Ovid
Tom Sorenson vividly recalls the horrifying circumstances that led to the loss of his arm. He was driving home from soccer practice, tired and hungry from the exercise, when a car in the opposite lane swerved in front of him. Brakes squealed, Tom's car spun out of control and he was thrown from the driver's seat onto the ice plant bordering the freeway. As he was hurled through the air, Tom looked back and saw that his hand was still in the car, "gripping" the seat cushion—severed from his body like a prop in a Freddy Krueger horror film.
As a result of this gruesome mishap, Tom lost his left arm just above the elbow. He was seventeen years old, with just three months to go until high school graduation.
21
In the weeks afterward, even though he knew that his arm was gone, Tom could still feel its ghostly presence below the elbow. He could wiggle each "finger," "reach out" and "grab" objects that were within 21
arm's reach. Indeed, his phantom arm seemed to be able to do anything that the real arm would have done automatically, such as warding off blows, breaking falls or patting his little brother on the back. Since Tom had been left−handed, his phantom would reach for the receiver whenever the telephone rang.
Tom was not crazy. His impression that his missing arm was still there is a classic example of a phantom limb—an arm or leg that lingers indefinitely in the minds of patients long after it has been lost in an accident or removed by a surgeon. Some wake up from anesthesia and are incredulous when told that their arm had to be sacrificed, because they still vividly feel its presence.1 Only when they look under the sheets do they come to the shocking realization that the limb is really gone. Moreover, some of these patients experience excruciating pain in the phantom arm, hand or fingers, so much so that they contemplate suicide. The pain is not only unrelenting, it's also untreatable; no one has the foggiest idea of how it arises or how to deal with it.
As a physician I was aware that phantom limb pain poses a serious clinical problem. Chronic pain in a real body part such as the joint aches of arthritis or lower backache is difficult enough to treat, but how do you treat pain in a nonexistent limb? As a scientist, I was also curious about why the phenomenon occurs in the first place: Why would an arm persist in the patient's mind long after it had been removed? Why doesn't the mind simply accept the loss and "reshape" the body image? To be sure, this does happen in a few patients, but it usually takes years or decades. Why decades—why not just a week or a day? A study of this phenomenon, I realized, might not only help us understand the question of how the brain copes with a sudden and massive loss, but also help address the more fundamental debate over nature versus nurture—the extent to which our body image, as well as other aspects of our minds, are laid down by genes and the extent to which they are modified by experience.
The persistence of sensation in limbs long after amputation had been noticed as far back as the sixteenth century by the French surgeon Am−broise Paré, and, not surprisingly, there is an elaborate folklore surrounding this phenomenon. After Lord Nelson lost his right arm during an unsuccessful attack on Santa Cruz de Tenerife, he experienced compelling phantom limb pains, including the unmistakable sensation of fingers digging into his phantom palm. The emergence of these ghostly sensations in his missing limb led the sea lord to
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