Agnosias

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The condition characterized by an inability to recognize and interpret sensory stimuli, despite having sensory function
2. A form of neural impairment that affects a person's ability to process and make sense of sensory information
3. A disruption in the mental recognition of familiar objects, sounds, or people, resulting from brain damage or neurological conditions

Etymology: "Agnosias" is simply the plural of "agnosia," a term for the inability to recognise or interpret things through the senses, even when the senses themselves work. The core of the word is Ancient Greek "agnōsía," meaning "ignorance," built from "a-," a negating prefix meaning "not," and "gnōsis," "knowledge," from the verb "gignōskein," "to know." The same root gives English words such as "diagnosis," "prognosis" and "Gnostic." The Greek word was a plain, everyday term for not knowing something, with no medical meaning. English took it over in the modern period as a technical label. Neurologists and psychologists applied it to specific failures of recognition, such as being unable to name or identify a familiar object by sight, touch or sound. The Greek sense of simple ignorance survives in the clinical term's basic logic: the person lacks the knowledge their senses should deliver.