“The preferred term in neurology is "deficit", which denotes an impairment or inability of a neurological function: speech loss, language loss, memory loss, vision loss, loss of dexterity, loss of identity and a myriad of other shortcomings and losses of specific functions.

But it must be said from the outset that a disease is never simply a loss or an excess, that there is always a reaction, on the part of the organism or the affected individual, aimed at restoring, replacing, compensating and preserving. their own identity, however strange the means used may be.

In Korsakov's syndrome, or in dementia or other such catastrophes, no matter how great the organic damage and Humean dissolution may be, the possibility of reintegration through art, communion, contact with the human spirit remains intact; and this can survive even in the presence of a state of neurological devastation that at first appears hopeless. "

(The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat,Oliver Sacks)