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A neurological lesion can nurture philosophical reflection. I believe that Hemispatial Neglect in particular can nurture philosophical issues. Here I shall refer to the latter as USN (unilateral spatial neglect). A well-chosen name, as it is not strictly a blindness nor an ignoring, but something that lies somewhere between the two: disregard or neglect lie between blindness and not caring. When you are blind, you know you are blind; whilst the effects of Neglect are anosognosic: USN subjects are unaware of their spatial bias, so to speak, unless it is proven to them.
Also anosognosic are those affected by a mode of “perception” we can consider the opposite of USN: Anton-Babinski Syndrome (Critchley, 1979, 156). Sufferers are cortically blind (usually because of occipital damage) but think they can still see. Anton-Babinski syndrome is the visual equivalent of the phantom limb, the sensation felt by amputees of still having the arm or leg they lost. We could call Anton-Babinski Syndrome “phantom vision.” Sufferers move in the environment with no limits or precautions, as they are convinced they can see. Now, what is striking about these subjects is the very way they deny their blindness; they build themselves rationalizations to preserve their belief. If, for example, walking in a room they bump into a piece of furniture, they ascribe this not to their blindness but to the furniture being “out of place” (Sacks, , 236).
It is difficult to establish a precise link between USN and hemiasomatognosia, which is when subjects cannot feel the left part of their body. One such patient fell off the bed, trying to push away his left arm thinking it was somebody else's. These