Tuesday, July 2, 2013

Bat Man

Bat Man is the title of an article in this month's National Geographic magazine.  I can't think of a better example of the Holism of the human body.  The article describes the extraordinary sensory abilities of Daniel Kish, a 47 year old man whose eyes were removed when he was 13 months old.  He is nonetheless able to "see" well enough to ride a bike, via "echolocation", using his tongue to create sound waves, the echoes of which are processed by his brain into dynamic images!  "It's like having a conversation with the environment" he said.

Talk about a "team effort"!  His other senses have clearly "picked up the slack", especially the sound faculties, in order to compensate for the lack of "visual" input.  And yet, a visual image is in fact generated in his conscious awareness!  Amazing!  He sums it up nicely:  "Vision isn't in the eyes; it's in the mind".  And, he teaches other blind people to do it too!  Wonderful and inspiring!

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