Reply to comment

It seems that we have more or less dismissed Descartes separation of the mind and body, however, our discussion of paralysis and csandrinic's post above got me thinking about this idea again. Paralysis is caused by severe injury to a part of the nervous system or a deficiency in the flow of blood to the brain. Both of these are physical injuries that impact the body and can impair one's controlled movement of certain areas of the body. The cases of denial of paralysis described in the above post occurred in those who had suffered from stroke. In the case of a stroke the afflicted person does not always have a severe accident such as someone like Christopher Reeves who received spinal chord injury, as a stroke is caused by a disturbance in the brain. In other words, a person who has suffered a stroke may not be aware of the damage that they are receiving to their body unlike Reeves who was well away that his paralysis was due to his falling off a horse. In one case the damage is very physical and affects the entire body, while in the other the damage is only internal and is not physically the result of an impact to the body. I am curious to know if paralysis denial has been studied in those who received spinal injury through extreme physical damage. People in that situation physically experienced the damage and therefore may be more accepting of the fact that parts of their body are paralyzed. Csandrinic wrote that in the case of a stroke victim, while “… a specific part of their brain can no longer allow them to move, there is another closely related region of the brain which remains intact and continues to tell them that their bodies are responding normally.” Although I can not say for sure, it would seem that in the case of a spinal chord injury due to accident this part of the brain would not be damaged as well. That being said, why do we think this denial is prone to those who have had internal brain damage rather than external physical damage that has also affected their nervous system? Just a thought…

Also, another situation I was thinking about was in the case of amputated limbs. My uncle had to have his leg above his knee amputated a few years ago and said that he could still feel the sensation of his leg even after it was gone. In his case, a physical part of his body was missing, and he knew that it was missing, yet his brain still conveyed the message that the leg was still attached. This seems to be almost the opposite case as in paralysis where the eyes can see that the body is still their, yet it can not feel the sensation of a pinch to the foot, whereas in my uncle’s case he was aware that his leg was missing, yet could still feel the sensation of his leg.