The 56 best famous phrases of Oliver Sacks
Oliver Sacks was a great British neurologist and writer. that he passed away in 2015 due to terminal liver cancer.
Throughout his life he published numerous works, among which are: "The man who mistook his wife for a hat", "An anthropologist on Mars" either "Awakenings".
- Related article: "The 55 best phrases about Psychology... and the meaning of it"
The best phrases and reflections of Oliver Sacks
There were many quotes full of wisdom that this character uttered. Therefore, in this article, We have prepared a list with his most brilliant phrases.
1. We speak not only to tell people what we think, but we say what we think. Speech is a part of thought
Thanks to speech we can communicate our thoughts and emotions with others.
2. There are defects, diseases and disorders that can play a paradoxical role, revealing capacities, developments, evolutions, latent life forms, which could never be seen, or even imagined in the absence of those
Mental problems and illnesses can change our way of relating to the environment.
3. I can't pretend to be someone without fear. But my predominant feeling is one of gratitude
Oliver Sacks reflecting on what his life had been like.
4. And then, as if painted with a giant brush, a huge, quivering, pear-shaped stain of the purest indigo emerged. Luminous, numinous, it filled me with ecstasy: it was the color of the sky, the color, I told myself, that Giotto he had spent his life trying to find it without success, perhaps because the color of the sky is not visible in the land
A quote taken from his work called "Hallucinations".
5. When faith in traditional figures - demons, witches or harpies - is lost, new ones take their place: aliens, apparitions from "a previous life"
He was always interested in the inner world of people with psychotic disorders.
6. Patients showing delirium were almost always in medical or surgical wards, not in neurological or psychiatric wards, as delirium generally signals a medical problem, a consequence of something that affects the whole body, including the brain, and that disappears as soon as the medical problem is resolved. solution to
A reflection on how people who suffer from a delusional disorder are treated.
7. Humans share many things with other animals - the basic needs for food and drink, or sleep, for example-but there are additional mental and emotional needs and desires that are unique to humans
Humans have superior capabilities that other animals do not possess.
8. Studies carried out by Andrew Newberg and others have shown that the continuous practice of meditation produces important alterations in blood circulation in parts of the brain related to attention, emotion and some functions autonomous
Meditation has been shown to have enormous benefits for people's emotional health.
9. There is only one golden rule: one must always listen to the patient
Dealing with the patient must be individualized and, therefore, needs must be listened to.
10. Every act of perception is to some extent an act of creation, and every act of memory is to some extent an act of imagination.
A phrase by Oliver Sacks that invites the reader to deep reflection.
11. Music, unique among the arts, is both completely abstract and deeply emotional.
Music has the power to modify our behavior and affects our emotional state.
12. People are going to build a life on their own terms, whether they're deaf or color blind or autistic or whatever. And your world will be as rich and interesting and full as our world can be.
We all build our scheme of the world even having limitations.
13. There will be no one like us when we are gone, there is no one like anyone else, ever. When people die, they cannot be replaced. Holes come out that cannot be filled, since it is the destiny – the destiny and the neural genetics – of all beings. human to be a unique individual, to find his own way, to live his own life, and to die his own death
Each of us has unique personal characteristics that make us different and irreplaceable.
14. I believe that the brain is a dynamic system in which some parts exert control or control and other parts suppress it. And if perhaps one has damage to one of the areas that they control or suppress, then it is possible for the appearance something unexpected, it could be a seizure, a different trait or even a sudden passion for the music
Our brain allows us to experience unique and impressive things.
15. If a man has lost a leg or an eye, he knows that he has lost a leg or an eye; but if he has lost the self, if he has lost himself, he cannot know it, because he is no longer there to know it.
When someone does not know himself in depth or connect with himself, he is in a state of confusion and existential crisis.
16. Just as we can be horrified by the havoc caused by the development of a disease or disorder, so too we can see them as something creative, because even when they destroy particular procedures, a particular way of doing things, things, they may force the nervous system to create other procedures and ways, which force it to develop and evolve unexpected
A positive mentality, despite the negative aspects of a disease, is the best way to deal with it.
17. The brain is much more dedicated to movement than the tongue. Language is only a little of what exists within this immense ocean of movement.
There are things that we cannot express with words, but we must limit ourselves to feeling.
18. I have to live in the richest, deepest and most productive way that I can
When someone suffers from a disease like cancer, he learns to accept the immensity of life.
19. Personality change in temporal lobe epilepsy may be the most important clue we have to when it comes to deciphering the neurological systems that are the foundation of emotional forces that guide the behavior
When the frontal lobe is affected by a disease, the person's personality changes.
20. Above all, I have been a sentient being, a thinking animal on this beautiful planet, and this in itself has been a tremendous privilege and adventure.
Oliver Sacks considered himself a great person.
21. I feel like I should be trying to complete my life, whatever it means to complete a life
A phrase that he uttered once he found out that he had cancer.
22. Each one of us has a life story whose continuity, whose meaning, is our own life.
Throughout our lives we are forming an image of ourselves that accompanies us throughout our lives.
23. I am a man of a vehement disposition, with violent enthusiasms and lack of moderation in all my passions.
Possibly, Sacks got so far in the professional field because of the passion he felt for what he did.
24. And, in its broadest sense, neural Darwinism implies that we are destined, whether we like it or not, to a life of uniqueness and self-development, to create our own individual paths through life
Our brain has an immense capacity for adaptation.
25. All of us (with very few exceptions) can perceive music, tones, timbre, intervals, melodic contours, harmony, and (perhaps in a mostly elemental way) rhythm. We integrate all of these things and “build” the music in our minds using many different parts of the brain. And to this largely unconscious structural appreciation of music is added an often intense and profound emotional reaction.
This character has always been interested in the relationship between music and the brain.
26. The power of music to integrate and heal…it's pretty fundamental. It is the deepest non-chemical medicine
The power of music is such that it is used as a form of therapy. It is what is known as music therapy.
27. Remembering is always rebuilding, not reproducing
Imagination and our perception of life greatly influence what we remember about events or occurrences.
28. Empirical science, empiricism, does not take into account the soul, it does not take into account what constitutes and determines the personal self.
Too much empiricism can leave out some phenomena that are difficult to measure.
29. My religion is the nature. This is what awakens feelings of wonder, mystique and gratitude in me.
Nature can surprise us many times, but it is gratifying to get lost in it.
30. Psychotic hallucinations, whether visual or auditory, seduce you, direct you, humiliate you, mock you… You can interact with them
People who suffer from hallucinations feel them as real, and perceive them as if they really exist.
31. We see with our eyes, but we see with our brain as well. And seeing with the brain is often called imagination.
If the area of the brain that is responsible for vision is affected, our vision will not be the same.
32. Many revolutions, transformations, awakenings are reactions to immediate (and unbearable) circumstances.
Many times, change occurs as a result of an unsustainable situation.
33. I also have to remember that sex is one of those things – like religion and politics – capable of arousing intense and irrational feelings in otherwise decent and rational people.
Sex is one of the best experiences that human beings can feel.
34. I feel a clear focus and a sudden perspective. There's no time for anything inessential
Living in the present is the only thing we can experience unlike the present and the past.
35. In examining disease, we gain wisdom about anatomy, physiology, and biology. In examining the person with disease, we gain wisdom about life
When the disease affects a person, he becomes more aware of his surroundings.
36. Any disease introduces a duplicity in life: an "it", with its own needs, demands and limitations.
The disease brings with it a different vision of life, something that perhaps we have not stopped to reflect on.
37. Now I am face to face with death. But I'm not done with life
Sacks' illness got the better of him, but at the time of pronouncing this sentence he didn't know it.
38. They are great survivors, and while the dinosaurs came and went, the ferns are still here.
A reflection that talks about the complexity of the mind.
39. The human being does not lack a mind, he is not mentally deficient, because he does not have language, but he is very severely limited in the realm of his thought, confined in reality to an immediate world, little
Language has a great effect on how we think and relate to each other.
40. You can have feelings for plants, although they probably don't have feelings for you.
Humans and plants are different, and plants cannot think because they do not have a brain.
41. No two people describe an event in the same way. None of them lie: they see things from different perspectives, they make their own associations, they have their own emotions.
Each person experiences life differently and interprets it based on their beliefs, expectations, schemes, etc.
42. To be ourselves we must have our life stories. We must "remember" ourselves, remember the inner drama, the narrative of ourselves. A man needs a continuous inner narrative, to maintain his identity, his self
Memory is essential for us to be able to build our identity and a vision of the world.
43. I almost certainly won't be witnessing my polonium birthday (it's 84th), nor would I want polonium anywhere near me, with its intense and killer radioactivity.
Sacks knew that his illness could bring about the end of him, but he never lost faith.
44. I knew that the music seemed to somehow overcome, at least for a few minutes, Parkinson's disease, and set them free, allowed them free movement.
Music has amazing therapeutic benefits even for those with Parkinson's.
45. I have loved and I have been loved, I have received much and I have given something in return, I have read, and traveled, and thought, and written.
A definition of what Oliver Sacks' life was like, told by himself.
46. Three times I tried to be a serious scientist, but all three times it went terribly wrong and I could see the relief on my colleagues' faces when they understood that I was giving up.
Despite these words, Sacks was a great popularizer of science.
47. Remember that you can be old without being close to death.
There are people who, despite not having an advanced age, feel older and do not enjoy their lives to the full.
48. It is easy to detect a lie with a detector or with physiological programming because lying is difficult. Telling the truth is easier, but if you leave out the word truth, if you use the term believe, you will see, for example, that there are people who believe they have been abducted by aliens. And they are not lying, they are confused, which is different
You have to know how to differentiate between the one who lies intentionally and the one who believes that he is telling the truth despite not being true.
49. Being a patient forces one to think
When one feels sick, he can seriously reflect on what life is.
50. Flexibility, resistance, and uncertainty, that kind of adventure, are in our nervous system, they are part of life.
When he talks about the nervous system, he means our brain. In other words, the reality we live in is his construction.
51. Everything that has a beginning must have an end.
Unfortunately, everything that begins, sooner or later, ends.
52. Sometimes the disease can teach us what is valuable in life and allow us to live it more intensely
Cancer, without a doubt, made Oliver Sacks reflect deeply on his existence and on what life is.
53. We must study the disease with the sensitivity of a novelist
A quote that refers to the need to study pathologies with impetus.
54. I have had a relationship with the world, the special relationship of writers and readers
Throughout his life, Sacks did things he was very proud of.
55. And above all, I have been a sentient being, a thinking animal on this beautiful planet, and that alone has been a tremendous privilege and adventure.
Sensitivity was one of the characteristic features of this character.
56. I don't know what I just did or where I came from right now... I can remember my past very well but I have no recollection of my present
A phrase taken from his work "The man who mistook his wife for a hat."