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The study of patients to infer normal brain function has a long tradition in neurology and psychology. More recently, the motor system has been subject to quantitative and computational characterization. The purpose of this review is to argue that the lesion approach and theoretical motor control can mutually inform each other. Specifically, one may identify distinct motor control processes from computational models and map them onto specific deficits in patients. Here we review some of the impairments in motor control, motor learning and higher-order motor control in patients with lesions of the corticospinal tract, the cerebellum, parietal cortex, the basal ganglia, and the medial temporal lobe. We attempt to explain some of these impairments in terms of computational ideas such as state estimation, optimization, prediction, cost, and reward. We suggest that a function of the cerebellum is system identification …