Truths and Lies: Part Two

Robert Thorpe's Office

Robert Thorpe’s pain is real. The pain’s location isn’t.

He feels pain because his nervous system is damaged. The kind of pain changes: sometimes he has headaches, sometimes he has muscle cramps, sometimes he has sharp, stabbing pain going up and down an arm, or a leg. Today his pain is in his lower back, and it’s more severe than usual.

There’s never anything specifically wrong with the part of his body that’s suffering at any given time, but he feels the pain all...