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Article: I dislike what I fancy I feel.(treatment of visual hallucinations)
- Article from:
- The Economist (US)
- Article date:
- April 27, 1996
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1996 Economist Newspaper Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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A MAN is sitting in a rocking-chair. Suddenly three leprechauns clad in pointy caps and short breeches appear in front of him, wordlessly pointing to a buried treasure. Another time, he sees bunches of odourless flowers on a windowsill where no flowers should be. And on still another occasion, he watches as a miniature policeman silently roughs up a midget pickpocket and tosses him without a thud into a tiny Black Maria. The man is not crazy. He just has Charles Bonnet syndrome.
Described in medical texts as "visual hallucinations in psychologically normal people", this syndrome--"seeing things" and hearing nothing--is one of three kinds of hallucination that are ...