“judgment is the most important faculty we have. An animal, or a man, may get on very well without ‘abstract attitude’ but will speedily perish if deprived of judgment. Judgment must be the first faculty of higher life or mind—yet it is ignored, or misinterpreted, by classical (computational) neurology. And if we wonder how such an absurdity can arise, we find it in the assumptions, or the evolution, of neurology itself.” —- Oliver Sacks, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat
In the book The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Oliver Sacks narrated several fun little stories about his patient who suffers in different and strange mental deficiencies. There are 24 of them, including the the patient Ray with Tourette’s Syndrome, or the face blindness with Dr.P, or Mrs. S who can’t understand the concept of left. I think inclusiveness and understanding is the most valuable thing that I get from this book, besides these funny little story that has made me laugh and feeling warmed.
The most inspiring section of the book is how Sacks has discussed about the medical bias and preference in studying the left brain, and right brain are always recognized as primitive and not as important as the left brain which has the control over logic, reasoning, and sensations. However, Oliver has challenged such saying through the case of Dr. P. Human beings do not just simply translate their vision into informations through the logical left brain, but many times such translation is highly personalized with abstracted temperament, which relies on the right brain, too. That reminded me of myself. As an artist, or a person like to perceive and intuitive, I always remember people through intuitions and associations. I just met a friend today in the bathroom who I only met once in a gallery event. Since we were all wearing mask, I was recognize her immediately, but she recognized me and talked with me. After talking, I suddenly recalled all her information— her name, her ancestry, her major. She looked much like a stranger to me, but I still could recognize her through my feeling about her while having a conversation.
But still, even for me after reading these stories, it is still hard for me to fully understand their circumstance, because not like our feelings, people’s sensational ability are hard to empathize with. For example, I can feel others feeling, but I can never resonance to ones’hallucination because I can’t perceive through a different brain. That has caused people’s prejudice toward the patients having mental illness. In Oliver Sacks book we see how these people are finding a way out to live their life. For Sacks himself, helping his patients to cope with their brain is more important than curing them, when curing is scarcely possible. For us, we should be mindful of taking our perceptive abilities for granted, and take more compassionate care for these groups.
