Opinion: Going viral: What Covid-19-related loss of smell reveals about how the mind works
A few months ago, a friend called me from New York in the middle of the day. “I just came out of the shower and thought of you,” she said. That exceeded our usual level of familiarity. “I cannot smell anything,” she continued. “I noticed I couldn’t sense my shower gel, so I ran into the kitchen and began to open and sniff all my spice jars. Nothing. This is spooky.”
My friend called because she knew I had just sent to my publisher the page proofs of a new book about olfaction, a subject I have been investigating for several years.
