Topics Mind

Question Hello philosophers, I have a question concerning experience. I have dreamt that I have had a French kiss. Although, I have never had such empirical experience in my real life. However, how have I managed to fell like it tastes in my dream? I mean, how have I managed to understand and feel the sense of it if I have never had it?

Accepted:
May 12, 2011

Comments

Hm, if you haven't *really* experienced it, then how do you know that what you dreamt was accurate? Moreover, even if you haven't had such a kiss exactly, isn't it possible that the specific sensory components of the kiss ARE all things you've experienced, if not exactly in that combination? (Why couldn't the mind rearrange sensory components to creat new overall arrangements -- as it does when we use our imaginations, say?) Most importantly, your question presumes we could never dream about something we haven't experienced while awake -- but why believe that, esp. when this very dream might well refute it? (No doubt your sensory organs have the capacity to detect far more tastes and smells and feels etc. than they ever in fact meet with during waking life; why can't the brain fire, during dreaming, so as to reflect those preivously unactivated capacities?)

best, ap