The Ceiling Outside: The Science and Experience of the Disrupted Mind

As her mother slips into the fog of dementia, a philosopher grapples with the unbreakable links between our bodies and our sense of self.

A diabetic woman awakens from a coma having forgotten the last ten years of her life. A Haitian immigrant has nightmares that begin bleeding into his waking hours. A retired teacher loses the use of her right hand due to pain of no known origin.

Noga Arikha began studying these patients and their confounding symptoms in order to explore how our physic...