West Whim

The Itch

via science:

A fascinating New Yorker article that starts off with the case of M., who had such a terrible itch that she — or so the story goes — scratched through her skull to the brain; from there, it continues with a discussion of the nature and neuroscience of itching, of phantom sensations and ultimately of perception itself.

“Scratching is one of the sweetest gratifications of nature, and as ready at hand as any,” Montaigne wrote. “But repentance follows too annoyingly close at its heels.”

(via Neurophilosophy)