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Carpal Tunnel
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Is that one with a falling inflexion?

Yep. Purdy much so.


Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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Hydra Offline OP
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Quote:
I have even had a patient who had not spoken French since age 5 (moved to an English speaking area) and whose English was indistinguishable from the English only speakers around her. She woke up from a stroke fluent in French but with no knowledge of English. This suggests to me that there is actually a different area of the brain involved.


Interesting.

Was her French the French of a 5 year old child?

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I think her vocabulary was limited but I am not sure about grammar and pronunciation. I worked with her several years later and we spoke English although hers was a bit limited and with a very strong French accent.

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Carpal Tunnel
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In Musicophilia , the case histories of brain damage and its effect on different aspects of musical memory and functions, Oliver Sachs tells that those different aspects are related to different parts of the brain for specific details such as absolute pitch, amusia and more.
He refers to language and vision as having, equally, separate specific parts for different aspects in those fields. (memory and functions). Also that other parts of the brain may take over parts of lost functions . /Shiftings. But he as a dedicated and expert neurologist admits that many mysteries of the brain remain as yet hidden.

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Another interesting case is described by Oliver Sacks in The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat. The patient had visual agnosia. He could describe things in great detail, but was unable to name them. One object was, "a unicursal plane infolded on itself with five outpouchings." He did not know it was a glove.

It raises another interesting question about language and brain dynamics. How is it the man could describe the object but not give it its proper name, but could give it its proper description? Is there a different part of the brain for nominal and descriptive language production?

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Carpal Tunnel
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Maybe reread the book?

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Hydra Offline OP
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Oh, you.

Sacks (I repeat, Sacks) did not supply the answers to these questions. The Man Who Mistook, etc. is in essence a book of clinical descriptions.

>But he as a dedicated and expert neurologist admits that many mysteries of the brain remain as yet hidden.

An understatement. I have read a few books on the brain and they all agree: When it comes right down to it, very, very little is known about it. In particular I direct your attention to the chapter "What We Know, What We Might Know, And What We Can't Know" in "The 21st-Century Brain" by Steven Rose and "Phantoms in the Brain" by V. Ramachandran.

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Carpal Tunnel
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Originally Posted By: Hydra

Is there a different part of the brain for nominal and descriptive language production?

Oh, you too you too.

Just because so very, very little is known about it, and I already said in post above that Sacks admits there are many unsolved mysteries , why put the question when you already know there is no answer to it?
At least not one you might expect to get here. (most probably)

Last edited by BranShea; 02/29/08 03:48 PM.
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Originally Posted By: BranShea
Originally Posted By: Hydra

Is there a different part of the brain for nominal and descriptive language production?

Oh, you too you too.

Just because so very, very little is known about it, and I already said in post above that Sacks admits there are many unsolved mysteries , why put the question when you already know there is no answer to it?
At least not one you might expect to get here. (most probably)


Different part of the brain, or different neural pathways? Who knows. All I know is "I am fearfully and wonderfully made" (Psalm 139).

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A Neurology prop once said that if the human brain was simple enough for us to understand it we would be so simple that we could not.
edited because it was actually a neuro prof not a prop

Last edited by Zed; 03/01/08 06:33 AM.
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