The eminent neurologist Oliver Sacks wrote a letter to The New York Times that touches on the subject of a recent Rifftides posting. Here is the final paragraph:
The human brain is exquisitely sensitive to, susceptible to, the sound patterns of speech and music, but it is only with music, curiously, that we can be so readily overloaded – we see this, in a minor way, with catchy tunes. And I am inclined to agree with Dr. Victor Aziz that such hallucinations may well become more common as we are all constantly bombarded with music, whether we desire it, attend to it, are conscious of it or not.
Dr. Sacks’s entire letter is here. The article to which it refers, “Neuron Network Goes Awry, And Brain Becomes an IPod,” is here, but because it is older than a week, it will cost you $3.95. Sorry; it’s not MY policy.
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