The Threat of Mystery: Dreams as a site of tension between the measurable and the unknowable

Abstract

Throughout western history, dreams have been a focal point of tension in the search for knowledge, because their very existence brings up unsettling and perhaps unanswerable questions. From the very beginning of philosophy, dreams have the ability to cast doubt upon the veracity of our senses and the experiential world; and this universal and yet interior, subjective phenomenon has seemingly baffled all attempts to systematize it. The reaction to dreams has thus varied: from those who want to pursue knowledge of it, and those who want to ignore it, or dismiss it as unimportant, both in philosophy and in science. Each viewpoint has its own biases and its own limitations, and each might miss something, in search of the ‘right' way to think about dreams. Thinkers have struggled with these questions, built upon and rejected each others' theories. From Plato, through various medieval mystical texts, through Descartes, Locke, and Freud, to modern neuroscience, as well as in literature, dreams have served as a place that illustrates fundamental ideas of how we relate to the world, and to ourselves.