Bernabé Mallo
Doctor en Filosofía por la Universidad del País Vasco (UPV/EHU)
Investigador
en neurofilosofía, evolución humana y origen del arte. / PhD in
Philosophy – University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU)
Researcher in neurophilosophy, human evolution, and the origins of art.
A commentary on akinetopsia and what it reveals about our perception of reality
What would happen if the world suddenly transformed into a succession of frozen images, like an old film projector missing most of its frames? For most people, this idea evokes science fiction scenarios. Yet there exists a real neurological disorder that produces exactly that experience. It is called akinetopsia, also known as "motion blindness," and those who suffer from it describe a reality where objects, vehicles, and even people seem to move in jerks, as if time itself had fragmented.
The journalistic article I comment on here, published by the site Mi Punto de Vista, presents this fascinating syndrome in an accessible manner, drawing on one of the most famous cases documented by neuroscience: that of patient "LM," studied in the 1980s by neurologist Semir Zeki and his collaborators. LM, who suffered bilateral damage to her visual cortex following a series of strokes, described how coffee seemed to fill the cup in a single jump, how cars suddenly appeared in different positions with no intermediate trajectory, and how the gestures of her interlocutors fragmented into disconnected scenes.
This is a fascinating case that opens a privileged window into the deepest mechanisms of human perception. In this commentary, I offer a complementary perspective from Surgical Philosophy and the Law of Biological Coherence S/Y/C that form the core of my current research on the origin of art in the Homo species, to show how such a singular neurological disorder can illuminate fundamental aspects of our relationship with time, movement, and the construction of reality.
The MT/V5 Area: The Brain's Engineering of Motion
The article clearly explains that akinetopsia is associated with lesions in a specific region of the visual cortex known as the MT (Middle Temporal) area or V5, located in the middle temporal lobe of the brain. This region plays a crucial role in interpreting visual motion, integrating thousands of continuous visual changes per second to create the fluid sensation of displacement.
The existence of a brain region specialised in motion —and not, for example, in colour, shape, or depth— reveals something fundamental about the architecture of the mind. As contemporary neuroscience has shown, human vision does not function like a camera passively capturing complete images. Rather, it functions like a modular system composed of multiple semi-autonomous subsystems, each responsible for a specific aspect of perception. There are areas that process colours, others that recognise faces, others that detect edges, and others, like area MT/V5, that analyse motion.
Akinetopsia empirically demonstrates that the fluid perception of motion is not a direct given of reality, but rather an active construction of the brain. When area MT/V5 is damaged, this construction fails. The patient continues to see shapes and colours —because the areas responsible for those functions remain intact— but the world becomes a sequence of static scenes, as if someone had broken the invisible thread connecting instants into a temporal continuity.
Surgical Philosophy and the Paradox of Static Motion
From the perspective of Surgical Philosophy that I develop in my work, a case like akinetopsia offers an opportunity to apply the surgical method's phases to the analysis of a complex phenomenon.
Philosophical Anamnesis: Gathering Data on the Phenomenon
Akinetopsia presents us with a clinical fact that challenges our intuitive understanding of perception. The patient continues to see —they recognise objects, colours, shapes— but has lost the ability to perceive continuous displacement. The philosophical question that emerges from this anamnesis is: what does this disorder tell us about the relationship between time, movement, and consciousness?
Analytical Incision: Separating the Components of Perception
The phenomenon allows us to perform a precise analytical cut. Under normal conditions, we perceive movement as an intrinsic property of objects: a moving car, a rising hand, flowing water. But akinetopsia demonstrates that what we call "perceived motion" is, in fact, the result of the integration of multiple visual signals by a specific brain mechanism. When that mechanism fails, motion as a subjective experience simply disappears, even though objects continue to move in the external world.
Extraction of Contradictions: The Tension Between Physical Reality and Perceptual Experience
Here emerges the central contradiction that akinetopsia brings to light: there exists a dissociation between the physical reality of motion (objects change position in space-time) and the subjective experience of motion (the perception of continuous, fluid displacement). For the patient with motion blindness, physical reality continues to occur —the car moves, the hand rises— but that reality becomes inaccessible to conscious experience in its continued temporal dimension.
Ethical Suturing: Reconstituting the Problem of Lived Time
The ethical and philosophical lesson we can draw is that our experience of time is not a direct reflection of physical time, but rather a neurological construction. The temporal continuity we take for granted —that sensation that the present flows into the past and projects into the future— is a feat of brain engineering, not a given of external reality. Understanding this allows us to approach with greater humility and precision fundamental philosophical questions about the nature of time, consciousness, and the construction of reality.
S/ Y/ C: The Single Neuronal Function Model and the Experience of Motion
These reflections connect directly with the Law of Biological Coherence S/Y/C that forms the theoretical core of my research on the origin of art. Let us briefly recall its three dimensions:
S (Survival) is the primordial substrate of neuronal functioning: the preservation of the organism, the optimisation of resources, the avoidance of threats. The MT/V5 area does not exist by chance: it evolved because detecting motion —an approaching predator, a fleeing prey— is crucial for survival. Akinetopsia, by deactivating this function, shows us what happens when that adaptive mechanism fails: the world becomes dangerous, incomprehensible, uncertain.
Y (Symbolon) is the capacity to create, manipulate, and share symbols: the bridge between the internal and external world through language, art, and shared representations. The perception of motion is not just survival: it is also meaning. When we see a hand rising, we do not merely detect displacement; we interpret an intention, a gesture, a message. Akinetopsia also damages this symbolic dimension: gestures cease to be gestures because they fragment; communication becomes unintelligible.
C (Wholeness) is the driving force toward totality, the need to integrate parts into a coherent whole. The brain does not settle for processing fragments: it seeks to close the form, to construct a unified narrative. In normal motion perception, wholeness manifests as the experience of a fluid continuity, a temporal totality that transcends isolated instants. Akinetopsia is, above all, a fracture of wholeness: the world breaks into disconnected fragments, and with it, the sense of a stable self in time also breaks.
These three dimensions —S / Y / C— do not operate separately. There is no first survival, then symbol, then wholeness. They are three concatenated subfunctions of a single primordial neuronal function that constitutes the substrate of all conscious experience. Akinetopsia shows us, dramatically, what happens when one of these dimensions is compromised by a brain lesion. It is not that only the S component (survival) disappears, nor only the Y (symbolisation), nor only the C (wholeness). It is that the functional unity of the nervous system fractures, and with it, the experience of the world as a coherent and meaningful whole also fractures.
What Does Akinetopsia Teach Us About the Origin of Art?
This question is central to my current research project, titled The Origin of Art in the Homo Species: from Makapansgat to MoMA, from Primate to Sapiens.
If the perception of motion is a neural construction that can fail —and which, under normal conditions, integrates S, Y, and C into a unified experience— then art, and especially figurative art, can be understood as an exploration and expansion of this constructive capacity. When a Palaeolithic artist painted a galloping horse on the walls of the Chauvet cave, they were not passively copying an external movement. They were activating the same neural mechanisms —S for the detection of relevant motion, Y for the symbolisation of form, C for the wholeness of the scene— but now in the context of a symbolic creation.
Art, from this perspective, is not a late cultural luxury. It is a tool of biological coherence: a means by which the nervous system explores, trains, and celebrates its capacity to construct meaningful totalities from perceptual fragments. The motion represented in a cave painting is not real motion, but it activates the same neural circuits. It is a symbolon that evokes survival (the hunt) while simultaneously satisfying the need for wholeness (the closed scene, the resolved visual rhythm).
In this sense, akinetopsia shows us, through absence, what art does through presence: suture continuity between the fragments of the world, reconstructing a meaningful totality where motion —and with it, time and life— can flow without interruption.
References
López Mallo, J. B. (2026a). De la filosofía quirúrgica a la ley de coherencia biológica S/Y/C: Hacia una investigación sobre el origen del arte en la especie Homo. Lopez Mallo, Javier Bernabé. https://isbn.bibna.gub.uy/catalogo.php?mode=detalle&nt=57196
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GYGTJD5C
López Mallo, J. B. (2026b). From surgical philosophy to the law of biological coherence S/Y/C: Toward a study of the origin of art in the Homo lineage. Lopez Mallo, Javier Bernabé. https://isbn.bibna.gub.uy/catalogo.php?mode=detalle&nt=57197
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GY89SZS1
Zeki, S. (1991). Cerebral akinetopsia (visual motion blindness): A review. Brain, 114(2), 811-824.
Zihl, J., von Cramon, D., & Mai, N. (1983). Selective disturbance of movement vision after bilateral brain damage. Brain, 106(2), 313-340.
Original article commented on: Las personas que dejaron de ver el movimiento. (2026). Mi Punto de Vista. https://www.mipuntodevista.com.mx/las-personas-que-dejaron-de-ver-el-movimiento/
Autor / Author
Bernabé Mallo
Doctor en Filosofía – Universidad del País Vasco / Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea (UPV/EHU)
Investigador independiente en neurofilosofía, evolución humana y origen del arte.
Bernabé Mallo
PhD in Philosophy – University of the Basque Country / Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea (UPV/EHU)
Independent researcher in neurophilosophy, human evolution, and the origin of art.
Enlaces / Links
Página de autor Amazon / Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/author/bernabemallo
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9002-9728
Plataforma EHUenRed / Link EHUenRed: https://www.ehu.eus/es/web/masterrak-eta-graduondokoak/red-latinoamericana-de-posgrados
Canal YouTube / Channel YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@neuroideas815
Canal YouTube / Channel YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBsf6OZ482NjST6QA-hvYtQ
Publicaciones y proyectos en desarrollo / Publications and projects:
https://www.amazon.com/author/bernabemallo
https://ehuenred.theglocal.network/ideas/el-origen-del-arte-en-el-cerebro-de-makapansgat-al-moma-del-primate-al-sapiens
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