Through his analysis of dreams, Freud attempts to examine different dimensions of human thought processes by looking at the ways in which thoughts are expressed in dreams. In his discussion, he appears to depict dreams as the spaces in which repressed thoughts find expression.
Freud uses the term ‘repression’ to refer to the psychological condition in which certain thoughts fail to reach one’s consciousness. He sees the failure of those thoughts to reach one’s consciousness as a result of a psychological mechanism/function called ‘censorship’, which acts as a filter that allows only certain thoughts that it considers agreeable to enter the consciousness. According to Freud, the state of sleep marks a relaxation of this censorship, as a result of which the repressed thoughts of the mind gain access to the consciousness. Once they come to the conscious mind, they undergo an alteration, and these altered thoughts find expression in dreams. Of the three types of dreams that Freud talks about, the expression of repressed thoughts are associated with the second and third types. While the intelligible dreams that make sense without having to be analysed for their hidden meanings are regarded as ‘fulfilments of wishes’, those other dreams whose meaning is obscure, even confused, are regarded as ‘disguised fulfilments of repressed wishes’. The analysis of such dreams, a method that characterises the Freudian approach to the analysis of the human mind, enables the analyst to obtain information about a person’s conscious as well as unconscious thought processes.
As a result of condensation and displacement, the repressed thoughts undergo changes before they are expressed in dreams. They take forms that generally have nothing to do with the nature of those thoughts. Therefore, the repressed thoughts that get expressed in dreams cannot be considered accurate representations of the exact thoughts in the mind. Freud seems to assign the task of interpreting such dreams to the psycho-analyst. In a context where (1) there is no guarantee that the symbols that appear in dreams always have fixed, universal meanings and (2) the analyst has no way of accessing the special associations that the symbols that appear in the dreams may have for the subject, there is a considerable possibility of the interpretation being flawed. In a context where a psycho-analyst’s interpretation could be considered a verdict on the subject’s psychological condition, even sanity, a flawed interpretation would have a strong undue negative impact on the subject. My first question for the discussion: Does Freud recognize this possibility, and if yes, what is his stance in this regard?
My second question is a more general one, which goes beyond the immediate scope of the text: What is the difference between a dream and the reality? What evidence do we have to say that a dream and the reality are not two different states of existence or realities? How do we know if any given moment in time is part of the reality or a dream? What if we are to suddenly “wake up” one day and treat the present moment of existence as part of an obscure dream marked by repressed feelings/wishes?
Freud uses the term ‘repression’ to refer to the psychological condition in which certain thoughts fail to reach one’s consciousness. He sees the failure of those thoughts to reach one’s consciousness as a result of a psychological mechanism/function called ‘censorship’, which acts as a filter that allows only certain thoughts that it considers agreeable to enter the consciousness. According to Freud, the state of sleep marks a relaxation of this censorship, as a result of which the repressed thoughts of the mind gain access to the consciousness. Once they come to the conscious mind, they undergo an alteration, and these altered thoughts find expression in dreams. Of the three types of dreams that Freud talks about, the expression of repressed thoughts are associated with the second and third types. While the intelligible dreams that make sense without having to be analysed for their hidden meanings are regarded as ‘fulfilments of wishes’, those other dreams whose meaning is obscure, even confused, are regarded as ‘disguised fulfilments of repressed wishes’. The analysis of such dreams, a method that characterises the Freudian approach to the analysis of the human mind, enables the analyst to obtain information about a person’s conscious as well as unconscious thought processes.
As a result of condensation and displacement, the repressed thoughts undergo changes before they are expressed in dreams. They take forms that generally have nothing to do with the nature of those thoughts. Therefore, the repressed thoughts that get expressed in dreams cannot be considered accurate representations of the exact thoughts in the mind. Freud seems to assign the task of interpreting such dreams to the psycho-analyst. In a context where (1) there is no guarantee that the symbols that appear in dreams always have fixed, universal meanings and (2) the analyst has no way of accessing the special associations that the symbols that appear in the dreams may have for the subject, there is a considerable possibility of the interpretation being flawed. In a context where a psycho-analyst’s interpretation could be considered a verdict on the subject’s psychological condition, even sanity, a flawed interpretation would have a strong undue negative impact on the subject. My first question for the discussion: Does Freud recognize this possibility, and if yes, what is his stance in this regard?
My second question is a more general one, which goes beyond the immediate scope of the text: What is the difference between a dream and the reality? What evidence do we have to say that a dream and the reality are not two different states of existence or realities? How do we know if any given moment in time is part of the reality or a dream? What if we are to suddenly “wake up” one day and treat the present moment of existence as part of an obscure dream marked by repressed feelings/wishes?