Freud - Complete Works (121 page)

The Interpretation Of Dreams

701

   It would appear, then, that
‘nervous stimulation’ and ‘somatic
stimulation’ are the somatic sources of dreams - that is to
say, according to many writers, their sole source.

   On the other hand, we have
already found a number of doubts expressed, which seemed to imply a
criticism, not indeed of the
correctness
, but of the
adequacy
of the theory of somatic stimulation.

   However secure the supporters of
this theory might feel in its factual basis - especially as far as
accidental and external nervous stimuli are concerned, since these
can be traced in the content of dreams without any trouble at all -
not one of them could fail to perceive that it is impossible to
attribute the wealth of ideational material in dreams to external
nervous stimuli alone. Miss Mary Whiton Calkins (1893, 312)
examined her own and another person’s dreams for six weeks
with this question in mind. She found that in only 13.2 per cent
and 6.7 per cent of them respectively was it possible to trace the
element of external sense-perception; while only two cases in the
collection were derivable from organic sensations. Here we have
statistical confirmation of what I had been led to suspect from a
hasty survey of my own experiences.

   It has often been proposed to
separate off ‘dreams due to nervous stimulation’ from
other forms of dreams as a sub-species that has been thoroughly
investigated. Thus Spitta divides dreams into ‘dreams due to
nervous stimulation’ and ‘dreams due to
association’. This solution was, however, bound to remain
unsatisfactory so long as it was impossible to demonstrate the link
between the somatic sources of a dream and its ideational content.
Thus, in addition to the first objection - the insufficient
frequency of external sources of stimulation - there was a second
one - the insufficient explanation of dreams afforded by such
sources. We have a right to expect the supporters of this theory to
give us explanations of two points; first, why it is that the
external stimulus of a dream is not perceived in its true character
but is invariably misunderstood (Cf. the alarm-clock dreams on
p. 541 f.
); and secondly, why it is
that the reaction of the perceiving mind to these misunderstood
stimuli should lead to results of such unpredictable variety.

The Interpretation Of Dreams

702

   By way of answer to these
questions, Strümpell (1877, 108 f.) tells us that, because the
mind is withdrawn from the external world during sleep, it is
unable to give a correct interpretation of objective sensory
stimuli and is obliged to construct illusions on the basis of what
is in many respects an indeterminate impression. To quote his own
words: ‘As soon as a sensation or complex of sensations or a
feeling or a psychical process of any kind arises in the mind
during sleep as a result of an external or internal nervous
stimulus and is perceived by the mind, that process calls up
sensory images from the circle of experiences left over in the mind
from the waking state - that is to say, earlier perceptions - which
are either bare or accompanied by their appropriate psychical
values. The process surrounds itself, as it were, with a larger or
smaller number of images of this kind and through them the
impression derived from the nervous stimulus acquires its psychical
value. We speak here (just as we usually do in the case of waking
behaviour) of the sleeping mind "interpreting" the
impressions made by the nervous stimulus. The outcome of this
interpretation is what we describe as a "dream due to nervous
stimulation", that is, a dream whose components are determined
by a nervous stimulus producing its psychical effects in the mind
according to the laws of reproduction.’

   Wundt is saying something
essentially identical with this theory when he asserts that the
ideas occurring in dreams are derived, for the most part at least,
from sensory stimuli, including especially coenaesthetic
sensations, and are for that reason mainly imaginative illusions
and probably only to a small extent pure mnemic ideas intensified
into hallucinations. Strümpell (1877, 84) has hit upon an apt
simile for the relation which subsists on this theory between the
contents of a dream and its stimuli, when he writes that ‘it
is as though the ten fingers of a man who knows nothing of music
were wandering over the keys of a piano’. Thus a dream is
not, on this view, a mental phenomenon based on psychical motives,
but the outcome of a physiological stimulus which is expressed in
psychical symptoms because the apparatus upon which the stimulus
impinges is capable of no other form of expression. A similar
presupposition also underlies, for instance, the famous analogy by
means of which Meynert attempted to explain obsessive ideas: the
analogy of a clock-face on which certain figures stand out by being
more prominently embossed than the rest.

The Interpretation Of Dreams

703

   However popular the theory of the
somatic stimulation of dreams may have become and however
attractive it may seem, its weak point is easily displayed. Every
somatic dream stimulus which requires the sleeping mental apparatus
to interpret it by the construction of an illusion may give rise to
an unlimited number of such attempts at interpretation - that is to
say, it may be represented in the content of the dream by an
immense variety of ideas.¹  But the theory put forward by
Strümpell and Wundt is incapable of producing any motive
governing the relation between an external stimulus and the
dream-idea chosen for its interpretation - is incapable, that is,
of explaining what Lipps (1883, 170) describes as the
‘remarkable choice often made’ by these stimuli
‘in the course of their productive activity’.
Objections have further been raised against the presupposition upon
which the whole theory of illusion is based - the presupposition
that the sleeping mind is incapable of recognizing the true nature
of objective sensory stimuli. Burdach, the physiologist, showed us
long ago that even in sleep the mind is very well able to interpret
correctly the sense impressions that reach it and to react in
accordance with that correct interpretation; for he recalled the
fact that particular sense impressions which seem important to the
sleeper can be excepted from the general neglect to which such
impressions are subjected during sleep (as in the case of a nursing
mother or wet-nurse and her charge), and that a sleeper is much
more certain to be woken by the sound of his own name than by any
indifferent auditory impression - all of which implies that the
mind distinguishes between sensations during sleep (cf.
p. 562
). Burdach went on to infer from
these observations that what we must presume during the state of
sleep is not an
incapacity to interpret
sensory stimuli but
a
lack of interest
in them. The same arguments which were
used by Burdach in 1830 were brought forward once more without any
modifications by Lipps in 1883 in his criticism of the theory of
somatic stimulation. Thus the mind seems to behave like the sleeper
in the anecdote. When someone asked him if he was asleep, he
replied ‘No’. But when his questioner went on to say;
‘Then lend me ten florins’, he took refuge in a
subterfuge and replied: ‘I’m asleep.’

  
¹
[
Footnote added
1914]: Mourly Vold
has produced a two-volume work containing detailed and precise
reports of a series of experimentally produced dreams. I should
recommend a study of this work to anyone who wishes to convince
himself of how little light is thrown on the content of individual
dreams by the conditions of the experiments described in it and of
how little help in general is afforded by such experiments towards
an understanding of the problems of dreams.

The Interpretation Of Dreams

704

   The inadequacy of the theory of
the somatic stimulation of dreams can be demonstrated in other
ways. Observation shows that external stimuli do not necessarily
compel me to dream, even though such stimuli appear in the content
of my dream when and if I do dream. Supposing, let us say, that I
am subjected to a tactile stimulus while I am asleep. A variety of
different reactions are then open to me. I may disregard it, and
when I wake up I may find, for instance, that my leg is uncovered
or that there is some pressure on my arm; pathology provides very
numerous instances in which various powerfully exciting sensory and
motor stimuli can remain without effect during sleep. Or again, I
may be aware of the sensation in my sleep - I may be aware of it,
as one might say, ‘through’ my sleep -(which is what
happens as a rule in the case of painful stimuli) but without my
weaving the pain into a dream. And thirdly, I may react to the
stimulus by waking up so as to get rid of it.¹ It is only as a
fourth possibility that the nervous stimulus may cause me to dream.
Yet the other possibilities are realized at least as frequently as
this last one of constructing a dream. And this could not happen
unless the motive for dreaming lay
elsewhere than in somatic
sources of stimulation
.

   Certain other writers - Scherner
and Volkelt, the philosopher, who adopted Scherner’s views -
formed a just estimate of the gaps which I have here indicated in
the explanation of dreams as being due to somatic stimulation.
These writers attempted to define more precisely the mental
activities which lead to the production of such variegated
dream-images from the somatic stimuli; in other words, they sought
to regard dreaming once again as something essentially
mental
- as a psychical activity. Scherner did not merely
depict the psychical characteristics unfolded in the production of
dreams in terms charged with poetic feeling and glowing with life;
he believed, too, that he had discovered the principle according to
which the mind deals with the stimuli presented to it. On his view,
the dream-work, when the imagination is set free from the shackles
of daytime, seeks to give a
symbolic
representation of the
nature of the organ from which the stimulus arises and of the
nature of the stimulus itself. Thus he provides a kind of
‘dream-book’ to serve as a guide to the interpretation
of dreams, which makes it possible to deduce from the dream-images
inferences as to the somatic feelings, the state of the organs and
the character of the stimuli concerned. ‘Thus the image of a
cat expresses a state of angry ill-temper, and the image of a
smooth and lightly-coloured loaf of bread stands for physical
nudity.’ The human body as a whole is pictured by the
dream-imagination as a house and the separate organs of the body by
portions of a house. In ‘dreams with a dental
stimulus’, an entrance-hall with a high, vaulted roof
corresponds to the oral cavity and a staircase to the descent from
the throat to the oesophagus. ‘In dreams due to headaches,
the top of the head is represented by the ceiling of a room covered
with disgusting, toad-like spiders.’ A variety of such
symbols are employed by dreams to represent the same organ.
‘Thus the breathing lung will be symbolically represented by
a blazing furnace, with flames roaring with a sound like the
passage of air; the heart will be represented by hollow boxes or
baskets, the bladder by round, bag-shaped objects or, more
generally, by hollow ones.’ ‘It is of special
importance that at the end of a dream the organ concerned or its
function is often openly revealed, and as a rule in relation to the
dreamer’s own body. Thus a dream with a dental stimulus
usually ends by the dreamer picturing himself pulling a tooth out
of his mouth.’

  
¹
[
Footnote added
1919:] Cf. Landauer
(1918) on behaviour during sleep. Anyone can observe persons asleep
carrying out actions which obviously have a meaning. A man asleep
is not reduced to complete idiocy; on the contrary, he is capable
of logical and deliberate acts.

The Interpretation Of Dreams

705

   This theory of
dream-interpretation cannot be said to have been very favourably
received by other writers on the subject. Its main feature seems to
be its extravagance; and there has even been hesitation in
recognizing such justification as, in my opinion, it can lay claim
to. As will have been seen, it involves a revival of
dream-interpretation by means of
symbolism
- the same method
that was employed in antiquity, except that the field from which
interpretations are collected is restricted within the limits of
the human body. Its lack of any technique of interpreting that can
be grasped scientifically must greatly narrow the application of
Scherner’s theory. It seems to leave the door open to
arbitrary interpretations, especially as in its case, too, the same
stimulus can be represented in the dream content in a variety of
different ways. Thus even Scherner’s disciple, Volkelt, found
himself unable to confirm the view that the body was represented by
a house. Objections are also bound to arise from the fact that once
again the mind is saddled with the dream-work as a useless and
aimless function; for, according to the theory we are discussing,
the mind is content with making phantasies about the stimulus with
which it is occupied, without the remotest hint at anything in the
nature of
disposing
of the stimulus.

   There is one particular
criticism, however, which is gravely damaging to Scherner’s
theory of the symbolization of somatic stimuli. These stimuli are
present at all times and it is generally held that the mind is more
accessible to them during sleep than when it is awake. It is
difficult to understand, then, why the mind does not dream
continuously all through the night, and, indeed, dream every night
of all the organs. An attempt may be made to avoid this criticism
by adding the further condition that in order to arouse
dream-activity it is necessary for
special
excitations to
proceed from the eyes, ears, teeth, intestines, etc. But the
difficulty then arises of proving the objective nature of such
increases of stimulus - which is only possible in a small number of
cases. If dreams of flying are a symbolization of the rising and
sinking of the lobes of the lungs, then, as Strümpell has
already pointed out, either such dreams would have to be much more
frequent than they are or it would be necessary to prove an
increase in the activity of breathing in the course of them. There
is a third possibility, which is the most probable of all, namely
that special motives may be temporarily operative which direct the
attention to visceral sensations that are uniformly present at all
times. This possibility, however, carries us beyond the scope of
Scherner’s theory.