When I was a kid, I read Clive Barker’s The Great And Secret Show and have never been able to shake a passing image he made to a character receiving a hand job from the phantom limb of an amputee. And for the record, that’s not because I found it hot or anything. But I’d never heard of the concept of a phantom limb before, and the idea was interesting.

Time has marched on and the idea of a phantom limb now makes some sense to me. It’s not the ghostly leftovers of the soul, but rather a strange and natural confusion of the brain. Inside our minds, we have a representation of our physical body, and in some cases when a limb is lost, the brain does not make the necessary adjustment and leaves it’s representation of the physical body intact.

This, of course, is a little awkward.

In today’s Neurologica entry, Steven Novella talks about some new research that relates to the plasticity of that sector of the mind responsible for this representation. It’s a fascinating article about experiments that were performed recently that show the ability of the mind to adjust this representation through conscious effort.

It reminded me of this presentation from TED.comby Vilayanur Ramachandran  about his work with neurological  research. He talks about two other neurological conditions, and then moves into this description of his work with phantom limbs. It turns out that some phantom limbs can be paralyzed or in agony even after amputation. Through rather creative problem solving, he has some insights into the cause of and solution to some of these problems.

I know it’s almost patronizing to say this, but our brains sure are neat. I find it stunning that we’re learning how to work with this plasticity, and I’m curious to see how much more we can do with various types of paralysis and discomfort just by properly massaging the gray matter.

Jim