Fiction, Fantasy, Myth

Most people never give much thought to where and why dreams they have come about. They often tell a friend or a family member about the dream because it is “weird” or it was a “crazy” dream but after the dream is done being told they forget about it. Freud, in his excerpt “On Dreams”, gives us a way to help understand dreams that when after waking up and looking back on it gives us a bit of confusion. He tells us that every dream we have comes from a thought, may not be obvious, or a event that has happened that maybe insignificant to you but unconsciously effects your thoughts. This, to me, makes sense because when Freud breaks down a dream he had himself he breaks down the context of the dream seperately and he found events or items that may have caused him to dream that. Though this may not be true, it makes the most sense. Me myself, cannot think of a dream that has baffled me to a point where I became irritated. Most dreams I have, like many others, are dreams of something I want to occur in reality and not just in my dream world.

What are dreams? This is a question i have never really given much thought. However after reading an excerpt from Freud subtitled  “on dreams,” the subject of dreams really astonished me. Prior to this point i considered dreams as something unexplainable and unconscious. Never the less i was astonished to find out that dreams are actually a small reproduction of  small, real, wake time events that took place in our lives. According to Freud, dream combines few events(in most cases very distinct from each other) and combines them in an odd and often unusual way in which it is hard to comprehend or make sense off. Freud states in his excerpt “i am led to regard the dream as a sort of substitute for the thought process.”

In addition Freud claims that there are two contents to dreams, the latent content and manifest content. However i did not clearly comprehend this matter of the argument. Freud describes another type of dream that is very common in children and occasionalyy occur in adults. He distinguishes these dreams as wish fulfillments. Freud argues that these dreams serve primarily as wish fulfillments and help the children acquire what they long for in real life, through a dream. Hence if a kid is forbidden peanuts in waking existence, the child will dream about peanuts and therefore fulfill his or her wish.

Freud introduces the idea of condensation in his excerpt. He describes this as ” each element in the content of a dream is ‘overdetermined’ by material in the dream-thoughts; it is not derived from a single element in the dream-thoughts, but may be traced to a whole number.” Honestly i didnt quite understand the condensation idea of dreams. None  the less, after reading this short excerpt i can now have a decent idea of how dreams work. In my experience i can especially relate to the wish fulfilment concept of dreams. Mostly because i have experienced really wanting something and dreamt about that. I really regreted waking up. Those wish dreams, boy do they get you excited and into the moment.

In The Third Meditation Descartes is basically reviewing what he has ascertained to date. He still doubts  the existence of bodily things, however he  is certain that he exists and that he is a thinking thing that doubts, understands, wills, imagines, and senses, among other things. He realizes that he could not be certain unless all clear and distinct perceptions can be certain. Therefore, he concludes that whatever he perceives clearly and distinctly must be true. The Meditator says that he cannot yet be certain which ideas come from where, or even if perhaps all of our ideas are innate, adventitious or invented. Having ascertained that he exists and that he is a thinking thing, the Meditator tries to determine how he can know these things, and whether he might come to know other things as well by similar means. Descartes seems to want to escape the problems involved in clear and distinct perceptions by relying on God’s existence to make them true. However, Descartes also seems to want to prove God’s existence by claiming it as a clear and distinct perception. Descartes claims that God is infinite and is perfect and only if God derives his existence from itself than he can be God. If a certain soul derives its existence from something else, than it can’t be a God.

In a way I agree with Descartes’ Philosophy. To me God is the most supreme and powerful being and he grants himself existence. Meaning that he created himself and no one is above him. Therefore God is the ultimate power and he grants existence to us. But on the other hand I strongly disagree with Descartes on the account of doubting bodily things and perceptions. I believe that I exist and my body exists. In my opinion I am real and most of the objects that I perceive actually exist.