ALTER

catégories pour penser la fragmentation d'un acte, d'une propriété

vécue comme un tout insécable. Les questions que pose la pratique
de la description, l'élaboration de catégories descriptives, l'invention
de vocabulaires descriptifs ou de procédés de substitution me pa-
raissent des questions parmi les plus urgentes a élaborer.

Éléments pour une conclusion.

Se référer a des textes-résultats me semble inévitable si 1' analyse
phénoménologique ne veut pas rester étrangere aussi bien aux
sciences naturelles et mathématiques actuelles, qu'aux travaux de
recherche philosophique. Réciproquement, un psychologue ou un
neuro-physiologiste intéressé par la référence a 1' expérience subjec-
tive ne saurait ignorer Husserl, Sartre, Merleau-Ponty, Henry etc. Et
j'en déduis tout l'intéret de constituer des équipes de recherches
pluri-disciplinaires.
Cependant tabler uniquement sur des textes-résultats me semble
cantonner le chercheur dans une position d'élaboration réflexive et
privilégier le póle idéel sur le póle expérientiel. Or, c'est un des
points les plus délicats a clarifier dans l'articulation méthodologie-
domaine disciplinaire pour la phénoménologique et la psycho-phé- ·
noménologie. D'une part, la psycho-phénoménologie en tant que
discipline empirique liée au point de vue en premiere personne, vise
l'acces aux vécus et en sollicite la description et provisoirement, il y
a un déficit de ce genre de donnée, un déficit quant a la formalisa-
tion d'une méthodologie permettant d'y accéder et de les décrire.
O' autre part la phénoménologie transcendantale, et dans une me-
sure moindre la psychologie intentionnelle ou psychologie pure ou
encore psychologie phénoménologique dans les sens ou Husserl a
utilisé ces appellations, me semble etre ancrée dans le póle idéel de
fa<;on dominante. La démarcation pourrait etre simple d'un point de
vue principie!, mais des que la psychologie intentionnelle vise un
objet portant le meme nom que celui que lui attribue la psycho-phé-
noménologie, la divergence du poids des polarités idéelles- expé-
rientielles conduit a des analyses différentes, la ou peut-etre il fau-
drait aller vers une co-émergence. Memela phénoménologie trans-
cendantale ne me parait pas épargnée par cette tension entre póle
idéel et póle expérientiel. Seule une analyse descriptive des pra-
tiques de recherches (réelles effectivement vécue par un philosophe
ou un psychologue a un moment de sa vie) appartenant a ses diffé-
rentes disciplines permettra de distinguer ce qui est de 1'ordre des
principes de ce qui est de 1'ordre de 1'effectuation.
SLEEP, SELF-AWARENESS AND DISSOCIATION 1
Dan Zahavi
University of Copenhagen
Thus , methinks, every drowsy nod
shakes their doctrine, who teach that
the soul is always thinking 2 .
One of the reasons why topics such as birth, death, sleeping,
dreaming, sickness and madness are intriguing, is that they chal-
lenge our standard description of subjectivity, based as it often is on
the average experiences of a normal, healthy, and awake adult. In
the following I intend to take up this challenge by seeking to inves-
tigate the relationship between sleep and self-awareness, in order to
determine whether the sleeping subject can be said to be self-aware.
First, however, I need to show why this question is relevant to
our understanding of the nature of subjectivity, and in order to do
that I have to make a few general remarks about the relationship
between subjectivity and self-awareness.
One prevalent conception to be found both within and outside of
phenomenology, for instance in Sartre and Dieter Henrich, is the
idea that experiencing subjectivity is characterized by a pervasive
pre-reflective self-awareness.
l. This paper was presented at a seminar in Paris arranged by the group Alter, De-
cember 13, 1995.
2. Locke J., An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, London, 1976, chap. 11.1.13.

137
136
 ALTER
Sartre claims that consciousness is essentially characterized by
intentionality, but he also claims that each and every intentional act
is characterized by self-awareness. What kind of justification does
Sartre present in support of this strong thesis? Sartre claims that self-
awareness constitutes a necessary condition for being intentional
conscious of something. If I were conscious of a blustery autumn
day, an uncomfortable chair or a burning pain without also being
aware of it, it would be a consciousness oblivious of itself, an un-
conscious consciousness, and Sartre takes this suggestion to be a pa-
tent absurdity3.
This line of thought is elaborated in the important introduction
to L'Etre et le néant. Basically Sartre claims that an ontological analy-
sis of intentionality leads us to self-awareness, since the mode of being
of intentional consciousness is to be for-itself (pour-soi), that is self-
aware. Justas an extended object can only exist three-dimensionally,
so too an intention can only exist as a self-aware phenomenon. Ob-
viously, we are able to experience a very weak, almost negligible,
toothache, but this is not to be confused with the weak or partial
awareness of pain. The feeling of pain can only exist consciously,
that is, the feeling of pain and the awareness of the feeling of pain
cannot be separated. Not even conceptually4 . This reasoning, highly
convincing as it is when it comes to feelings of pain or pleasure, is
such as to hold true, Sartre insists, of all intentional acts:
Cette conscience (de) soi, nous ne devons pas la considérer comme une nou-
velle conscience, mais comme le seul mode d' existence qui soit possible
pour une conscience de quelque chose5.
When speaking of self-awareness as a permanent feature of our
intentional consciousness, Sartre is, however, not referring to what is
known as reflective self-awareness, since this is considered a derived
type of self-awareness. Reflection is generally understood to be the
process whereby consciousness directs its intentional "gaze" at itself,
thereby taking itself as its own object. But as Dieter Henrich's pene-
trating criticism of the reflection theory has shown, this model cannot
explain self-awareness: the reflection theory claims that self-aware-
ness is the result of reflection, which is to say that an act of perception
in order to become self-aware (and not merely remain unconscious),
must await its objectivation through an act of reflection. But in order
to speak of self-awareness it is, however, not sufficient that the act in
3. Sartre J.-P., l'Etre et le néant, Gallimard, col!. << Te! >>, 1943/1976, p. 18, 20, 28;
<< Conscience de soi et connaissance de soi », Bulletin Soc. Franf. de Philosophie XLII,
1948, p . 62.
4. Sartre, op. cit., 1948, p. 64-65; op. cit., 1943, p . 20-21.
5. Sartre, op. cit., 1943, p. 20.
138
Sleep, Self-awareness and Dissociation
question be thematized and made into an object. It must be conceived
of as identical with the act of reflection. In order to qualify as a case of
self-awareness, it is not sufficient that A is conscious of B, A must be
conscious of B as being identical with A. This poses a difficulty, ho-
wever, for how can the act of reflection (which lacks self-awareness)
achieve the realization that it is identical with the act of perception?
If it is to encounter something as itself, if it is to recognize or identify
something as itself, it needs a prior acquaintance with itself. Conse-
quently, the act of reflection must either await a further act of reflec-
tion in order to become self-aware, in which case we are confronted
with a vicious infinite regress, or it must be granted that it is itself al-
ready in a state of self-awareness prior to reflection, and this would of
course involve us in a circular explanation, presupposing the very
phenomenon which was to be explained, and thereby implicitly re-
jecting the thesis of the reflection model of self-awareness: that all
self-awareness is brought about by reflection 6 .
Of course, the criticism directed at the reflection theory is not
meant to imply that reflective self-awareness and objectifying self-
thematization is impossible, but merely that it always presupposes a
prior unthematic and pre-reflective self-awareness as its necessary
precondition. That is, if we are able to reflect upon our consciousness,
or recall a previous experience, it must already have been pre-reflec-
tively self-aware. When I recollect I am not simply confronted with a
random past experience, I am re-presenting something which has al-
ready been present tome, that is experienced consciously by me.
Against this background, Sartre explicitly states that the reflec-
tive cogito presupposes a pre-reflective cogito, and he speaks of ori-
ginal self-awareness as an immediate and non-cognitive "relation" of
the self to itself7. Pre-reflective self-awareness is not an addendum
to, but a constitutive moment in the original intentional act. The ex-
perience is aware of itself at the time of its occurrence. If I see, re-
member, know, think, hope, feel or will something I am ea ipso aware
of it, and need no further act in order to be so. Let me add that the
thesis examined in the following will only concern the relation be-
tween self-awareness and fully fledged intentional acts or sentiments
like pain or happiness. Whether there are deeper processes in sub-
jectivity like the pre-affective passive syntheses which can be said to
occur unconsciously is a question left asideB.
6. Henrich, »SelbstbewuJStsein, kritische Einleitung in eine Theorie<<, in Bubber, Cra-
mer, Wiehl (eds.) Hermeneutik und Dialektik, Tübingen, 1970, p. 268.
7. Sartre, 1943, op. cit., p. 19.
8. Mishara A., "Husserl and Freud: Time, Memory and the Unconscious", Husserl Stu-
dies, 7, 1990, p.29-58.
139
 ALTER
When Sartre says that every positional consciousness of an object
is simultaneously a non-positional consciousness of itself, it is essen-
tial to emphasize that the pre-reflective self-awareness is not to be un-
derstood as an intentional, thetic, objectifying or epistemic act, and is
thus to be interpreted neither as sorne kind of inner perception, nor,
more generally as a forro of knowledge. To speak of pre-reflective
self-awareness is not to speak of explicit and thematic self-aware-
ness9. Thus the self-awareness in question might be accompanied by
total ignorance. Although I cannot be unconscious of my present ex-
perience, I might very well ignore it in favour of its object, and this is
of course the natural attitude. In my everyday life I am absorbed by
and preoccupied with projects and objects in the world. Thus perva-
sive pre-reflective self-awareness is definitely not to be understood as
total self-comprehension, but is rather to be likened to pre-compre-
hension, that allows for subsequent reflection and thematization.
* On ne dort jamais si profondement qu'on n'aye que/que sen timent foible et
So far I have presented arguments for the familiar thesis that ex-
periencing subjectivity is per se characterized by pre-reflective self-
awareness. But now the question arises whether this thesis can hold
out when one leaves ordinary perceptions and turns to a range of
more enigmatic phenomena.
As already indicated, I am seeking to investigate whether the
sleeping subject is self-aware. Why is this question crucial? Because
it will be necessary to abandon or at least modify the conception
outlined above if it turns out that the sleeping subject is not self-
aware. If sleeping subjectivity is a subjectivity without self-aware-
ness, self-awareness cannot be part of the definition of subjectivity.
This way of presenting the problem faces an immediate objec-
tion, however. It has been argued that any supposed lack of self-awa-
reness during sleep is only a problem if subjectivity has experiences
during sleep. That is, if it is an experiencing subjectivity which lacks
self-awareness, and this is exactly what has been denied. (Yes, it has
even been suggested that the claim that subjectivity sleeps, and that
its self-awareness is thereby interrupted, is unjustified, based as it is
on an external third-person description, made in objective time. From
the first-person perspective, the only relevant one when it comes to
self-awareness, there is in fact no sleep, and no interruption, but one
9. Sartre, 1943, op. cit., p . 19; Sartre J.-P., la Transcendance de I'ego, Paris, J. Vrin,
1936/1988, p. 23-24, 66.
140
Sleep, Self-awareness and Dissociation
continuous ever-present self-awareness 10 . A suggestion which seems
to overlook the fact that although I might have difficulties saying
how much time has passed, I usually know whether or not I have
been sleeping. Ido not have to ask around in arder to find out) . On
the face of it this would seem to be a cunning suggestion, but it is
based on a false premise: it is in fact possible to witness manifesta-
tions of awareness, manifestations of intentional activity, during
sleep. Let me give sorne examples, and then turn to the question of
whether these types of awareness involve self-awareness or not. If
not, it will be necessary to abandon or modify the thesis asserting
the pervasive pre-reflective self-awareness of subjectivity.
1- If I start with dreamless sleep, what indications do we have
that there is in fact an awareness present? In contrast to what might
be the case of individuals in coma or under an anaesthetic 11 , we are
capable of waking up, whether it be a case of our sleep being dis-
turbed or it happens to be the customary hour at which we awake.
As Leibniz writes:
confus, et on ne seroit jamais eveillé par le plus grand bruit du monde, si on
n'avoit que/que perception de son commencement qui est petit [... ]1 2 .
That many people are able to wake up at the same time day after
day, or even to wake up at an unusual hour, if they decide to do so
befare going to sleep, is also very revealing, since it seems to indicate
that people have an ability to register the passing of time when
asleep. I find that I usually wake up a few minutes befare the alarm-
clock goes off if I ha veto get up early. And if it is important that I get
up at a specific time, I almost always wake up several time during
the night, to check that the alarm-clock is still functioning. Thus it
seems likely that sleep and sensibility do not exclude each other. A
well known example of this is presented by the parents who are able
to sleep through a good deal of noise, but will awaken the moment
their child cries. This seems not only to indicate a continual aware-
ness, but also a kind of monomanic vigilance or highly selective at-
tentiveness. Perhaps we do in fact have experiences continuously
10. Klawonn E., Jeg'ets ontologi -en ajhandling om subjektivitet, bevidsthed og personlig
identitet, Odense Universitetsforlag, 1991, p. 139-140. Cf. James W., Principies of Psy-
chology I-II, Holt, 1890, 1, p. 238.
11 . But even general anesthesia does not appear to elimina te awareness. Thus experi-
ments have shown that if a patient is hypnotized after undergoing an operation, he
may recall items such as the conversation taking place between the surgeons whilst
the operation was in progress, cf. Hilgard, Divided Consciousness: Multiple Controls in
Human Thought and Action, New York, John Wiley & Sons, 1977, p. 85.
12. Leibniz G.W., Nouveaux Essais sur I'entendement humain, Darmstadt, Wissenschaft-
liche Buchgesellschaft, 1985, p . XXII.
141
 ALTER
during dreamless sleep, but experiences which we simply neglect
to attend to, just at we during our waking hours may be insensible
to habitual sounds. To quote Linschoten:
[T]his means that we never sleep through and through. But then perhaps
"complete sleep" is a mere theoretical construction, a limit-idea. When in my
sleep I-in-my-origin have slid back into an almost plantlike mode of exis-
tence, then still a last, extreme/y vague kernel remains ready to unfold itseif
again into a living center of interest at the slightest signa/. In my sleep I
have not disappeared; I am sleeping, and in so doing remain ready to show
my originality. Sleep is a state in which I, anonymously, just mere/y live,
but am continuously ready to wake up as I-myself. [ ... ] When sleeping I
"deal" with a number of disturbances as being unimportant; they reach me
vague/y because I am still "somewhere" awake in an anonymous way; but I
disinterest myseiffrom them and that means that I renewedly fall asleep 13 .
Our ability to wake up seems to require the persistence of a core
of consciousness. But there are also more direct manifestations of
awareness during sleep. According to Evans it is possible to hypno-
tize a person who is asleep 14 , and if you tickle a sleeping person
with a feather, that person might become restless, turn his head etc.
Should this behaviour simply be dismissed as a mere automatic re-
flex, or should it not rather be taken as evidence that something can
be felt and experienced during sleep? Sleep does not seem to present
us with the total suspension of experiencing subjectivity, but rather
with a fundamentally altered state of consciousness.
2 - This becomes far more obvious once we turn from ordinary
sleep to the so-called parasomnias, viz. sleep disturbances and sleep
abnormalities such as night-terrors, sleeptalking and sleepwalking.
The night-terror (pavor nocturnus) is a disturbance that occasio-
nally occurs in small children between the age of three to five years
(it does not occur in normal adults). Suddenly, whilst fully asleep,
after a short period of agitation and one or two groans, the child sits
up in bed, eyes wide-open and his facial expression one of terror.
Pale, covered with perspiration, he may scream or extend his arms,
as if to protect himself against an approaching enemy. This pheno-
menon differs from an ordinary nightmare in a number of ways. It
lasts much longer, namely up to half an hour. It is accompanied by a
profuse perspiration, and most importantly: it is usually not follo-
wed by an awakening, though even if the child is awakened he will
13. Linschoten J., "On Falling Asleep", in Kockelmans, J.J. (ed.), Phenomenological Psy-
chology. The Dutch School, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1987, p . 110.
14. Lynn S.J. & Rhue J.W. (eds.) Theories of Hypnosis. Current Models and Perspectives,
New York, Guilford Press, 1991, p . 149.
142
Sleep, Self-awareness and Dissociation
not recall any dream-sequence, and the next morning the child will
have no awareness of the entire incident15 .
As regards sleeptalking, it is not a particular rare phenomenon.
It has been described in the following way:
Although the majority of sleep speeches contain at least a few words, sorne
consists of only one, such as "good", "no", "okay", "yes " or "Mm-mm".
Others are of paragraph length, occasionally in excess of one hundred
words. Most speeches Iast a few seconds or less, but longer ones may conti-
nue for a minute or more. The range of clarity extends from unintelligible
mumbles to crystal-clear words ... Often, speeches contain silent pauses,
in which case the context sugges ts sleep dialogues with hallucinated part-
ners, sometimes resembling one side of a telephone conversation 16 .
Interestingly, and contrary to popular beliefs, the sleeper will
hardly ever reveal any secrets during sleep, it is always common
and ordinary utterances, as from overheard daily conversations. Al-
though sleeptalking may occur during night-terrors, this is certainly
not common, nor can sleeptalking in general be taken to describe
dreamed events 17 . In none of these cases however, and this is again
the decisive point, are people aware when they are awakened of ha-
ving spoken out loud 1 .
Now, finally to the most spectacular phenomenon of them all:
sleepwalking. Episodes of sleepwalking normally last from a few
seconds toa few minutes, but they can last up to half an hour or lon-
ger. Examples of sleepwalking might be briefly standing up, then
going back to bed. Partially dressing, or going to the bathroom. But
more unusual cases are known as well: for instance the case of a col-
lege student who formed the habit of getting up in his sleep, dres-
sing, walking clown to the river almost a mile away, undressing, ta-
king a swim, dressing, walking back to his room, undressing and
retiring, only to wake up in the morning without any awareness of
what had happened during the night. Sleepwalking might be partly
hereditary. And one bizarre case concerns an entire family, consisting
of husband, wife and four children, who were all afflicted by som-
nambulism, and who, one night around three in the morning, ga-
thered around the tea table, all asleep .
15. Kleitman N., Sleep and Wakefulness, University of Chicago, 1939, p . 281; Farthing
U.W., The Psychology of Consciousness, New Jersey, Prentice H all, 1992, p. 245.
16. Farthing, op. cit., p . 247-248.
17. It has however in rare cases proven possible to hypnotize a person in the following
way: "Tonight you will sleep normally and natural! y, and dream normally and na tu-
rally just as you do at home, but w henever you do have such a normal dream, you
will talk in your sleep without awakening and describe the dream in detail while the dream is
going on.", Hilgard, op. cit., p. 94.
18. Farthing, op. cit., p . 247-249.
143
 ALTER
In order to prevent the sleepwalker frorn engaging in his noc-
turnal activities several remedies have been tried. One has been to
place pots of cold water next to the bed, and another to tie the per-
son to the bedpost, but they all usually fail, since the sleepwalker
often "leams" to avoid the pots or even to untie the cord.
How should the state of the sleepwalker be described? In one
sense his behaviour rneets the criteria of wakefulness: his eyes are
open, he is able to stand and walk, to see and hear, to avoid ob-
stacles, to find his way about in familiar surroundings. He can even
answer questions correctly, rnaking rnonosyllabic answers. On the
other hand, his face expression is rigid, and he perforrns habitual
acts characterized by autornaticity and rigidity, thus giving hirn the
appearance of a robot, or of sornebody in a trance. And rnost irnpor-
tantly, if you awaken a sleepwalker during the episode, he will be
very confused and will not know where he is or what he has been
doing, nor will he have any recollection of the incident whatsoever
the next rnorning.
Although it was previously assurned that sleepwalking was the
acting out of a drearn, this is no longer taken to be the case, since the
sleepwalker does not recall any drearns if awakened. The sleepwal-
ker rernains in deep sleep if the sleepwalking episode is brief, but in
the course of a longer episode, the EEG changes to look more like
the pattem of sorneone who is awake or just falling asleep. And to
retum toan earlier observations: sorne persons start their sleepwal-
king at exactly the sarne time every night, a phenornenon which has
been interpreted as evidence of a sense of time retained during
sleep 19 .
Now in all of the cases discussed -disturbed sleep, night-terrors,
sleeptalking and sleepwalking- it is reasonable to assurne that we
are confronted with rnanifestations of awareness, and not sirnply
with autornatic reflexes. But are these rnanifestations accornpanied
by self-awareness or do they rather constitute proof that mental ac-
tivity and self-awareness can be dissociated, and that unconscious
experiences obtain? What are the argurnents for and against? We
take ordinary drearning to be a self-aware experience because we
can often recall it when we are awake. And as I have said earlier, if
we are able to reflect upon or recollect an earlier experience, it rnust
airead y have been pre-reflectively self-aware. But it is precisely this
ability that we lack in the cases described. And if we are not able to
19. Kleitman, op. cit., p. 282-283, 289; Farthing, op. cit., p . 246-247; Étévenon P., Du réve
ii l'éveil, Albín Michel, 1987, p. 202; Borbély A., Secrets of 5/eep, Basic Books, 1986, p. 96-
97; Pélicier Y. (éd.), Somnambules et Parasomniaques, Economica, 1985, p. 16, 19.
144
Sleep, Self-awareness and Dissociation
recollect the experiences, what kind of proof do we have that they
were self-aware when they occurred? So far none. This does not
prove, of course, that the experiences were unconscious, since we
rnight rnerely have forgotten thern, owing to profound amnesia. But
so far this hypothesis is unsubstantiated and rnerely postulatory.
To try to shed sorne light upon the problern, a brief digression is
in order at this point. In French, hypnotisrn is known as a somnam-
bulisme provoqué. And the state of the hypnotised subject rnay in fact
resernble that of the sleepwalker. If the hypnotic state is sufficiently
deep, it rnay be accornpanied by spontaneous amnesia, and the sub-
ject will have no awareness of what has passed when he retums to
normal consciousness20 . It is however also possible for the hypnotist
to provoke such amnesia in the subject artificially, justas during the
hypnosis he rnight instruct the hypnotized to be capable of rernern-
bering everything afterwards, in which case the subject will do so 21 .
Finally, it is also possible in a subsequent hypnotic session to lift the
amnesia and rnake the subject recall everything that transpired in a
forrner session. Now, what is particularly rernarkable is that the
sarne holds true of the sleepwalker. If the individual is later hypno-
tized he rnight recall everything that occurred during the episode
of sleepwalking. This procedure was used in the case of a wornan
who had cornrnitted a crirne while sleepwalking. She was unaware
of it, but was able to recall her criminal act under hypnosis 22 .
Since it is in fact possible to recall the experiences had during
sleepwalking, these experiences _sannot have been unconscious -only
that which is originally self-aware can be recollected- and the phe-
nornenon of sleepwalking fails to constitute a refutation of the thesis
asserting the intrinsic relation between subjectivity and self-aware-
ness. This is not to say, however, that it is not a very paradoxical
phenornenon, and Ido in fact think that it poses a pro]Jlern. Not for
the thesis concerning self-awareness, but for that concerning the
unity of the strearn of consciousness.
In his Principies of Psychology James gives a long and very inter-
esting account of hypnosis, reporting on the research done by Janet
and Binet. Both originally argued that consciousness rnight be split
into parts which co-exist but ignore each other. Let me give sorne
exarnples. A cornrnon syrnptorn in persons suffering frorn hysterics
was anaesthesia. Sight, hearing, srnell, taste or feeling rnight fail. But
20. Hilgard, op. cit., p . 158; Kihlstrom J.F., "Conscious, subconscious, unconscious: A
cognitive perspective", in Bowers & Meichenbaum, (eds.), The Unconscious Reconside-
red, New York, John Wiley & Sons, 1984, p . 180.
21. Beaunis H ., le Somnambulisme provoqué, París, 1887, p . 118; James, op. cit., l. p . 201.
22. Pélicier, op. cit., p . 20.
145
 ALTER
Janet and Binet showed that in the case of such types of anaesthesia
there remained a sensibility in the "anesthetic" part in the form of a
secondary consciousness, which was cut off from the primary or nor-
mal one. If the subject was pricked or burned in the "anaesthetic"
region, he would not feel it, of course. But if subsequently hypnoti-
zed, he would often complain about the pain. Thus the pain was felt,
not by the normal subject, but by a secondary self which could be
evoked under hypnosis. The latter might have experiences or even
act without the normal subject being aware of it. Thus on one occa-
sion Janet whispered suggestions toa man in alcoholic delirium, who
was being questioned by a doctor, and thus led him to walk, sit,
kneel, and even lie face-down on the floor whilst he remained firm in
the belief that he was standing beside his bed 23 .
In recent time this line of research has been continued by Hil-
gard, who counts as the foremost representative of the so-called neo-
dissociation theory of hypnosis. According to Hilgard numerous expe-
riments have shown that hypnosis can present us with the pheno-
menon of co-consciousness: the existence of two separate, dissociated
but concurrent experiences. Of one the normal hypnotized subject is
aware, of the other he is unaware 24, and it is only by using special
techniques that responses may be elicited from this secondary
consciousness, which Hilgard has dubbed the hidden observer:
He [E.A. Kaplan] gave a deeply hypnotized subject the suggestions that his
left arm was analgesic and insensitive and that his right arm would write
automatically; the subject would not be aware of what he was writing.
When the experimenter pricked the left (anesthetic) arm severa! times with
a hypodermic needle, the other hand wrote: "Ouch, damn it, you 're hurting
me. " After a few minutes had passed, the subject, oblivious to what had
transpired, asked Kaplan when he was going to begin the experiment 25.
If one interprets the hypnotic state in terms of dissociation, whe-
reby dissociation in its broadest sense might be defined as the pro-
cess of creating and maintaining amnesic barriers or vertical splits
between the various sectors of conscious experience 26, hypnosis ob-
viously does not confront us with unconscious experiences in any
absolute sense. The hypnotized subject might be unable to smell
household ammonia, or only see two out of three coloured boxes in
front of him, or become incapable of hearing certain words, and may
even perform actions, such as automatic writing, without being
23. James, op. cit., l. p. 208.
24. Hilgard, op. cit., p . 185, 236.
25. !bid., p. 201.
26. Beahrs J.O., Unity and Multiplicity: Multilevel Consciousness of Self in Hypnosis, Psy-
chiatric Disorder and Mental Health, New York, 1982, p . 61; Hilgard, op. cit., p. 18.
146
Sleep, Self-awareness and Dissociation
aware of it. These behavioural features notwithstanding, what we
are confronted with is best described not as instances of unconscious
experience, i.e. experiences lacking self-awareness, but as ordinary
self-aware experiences rather, which have been rendered inacces-
sible due to a particular kind of hypnosis-induced dissociation 27 .
Thus, the various objects and actions are still experienced
consciously, as is clear from the response from the "hidden obser-
ver", but what we have are experiences which are momentarily hid-
den behind an amnesia-like barrier. As James puts it:
It is therefore tono "automatism " in the mechanical sense that such acts
are due: a self presides over them, a split-off, limited and buried, but yet a
fui/y conscious, selfB.
We must never take a person's testimony, however sincere, that he has felt
nothing, as proof positive that no feelíng has been there. It may have been
there as part of the consciousness of a "secondary personage" of whose ex-
periences the primary one whom we are consulting can natural/y give no
account 29 .
To conclude: neither hypnosis and sleepwalking seem to
confront us with unconscious perceptions, but rather with situations
where self-aware subjectivity is split in two: into a normal and an
abnormal stream of consciousness. It must be emphasized however,
that the separation or doubling is not absolute. Through hypnosis or
therapy the amnesic barrier can be raised and the two streams of
experiencing integrated, so that the subject gains awareness of
both30 . As Hilgard writes, the term "hidden observer" or "secondary
personage" are metaphors for cognitive processes which have be-
come inaccessible for the normal consciousness of the hypnotized
person. It does not mean that there is a secondary personality with
a life of its own -a kind of homunculus lurking in the shadows of
the conscious person31 . Rather than to assign the dissociated pro-
27. Beahrs, op. cit., p. 183-184. 1 am consequently in disagreement with Armstrong's
materialistic interpretation of hypnosis and sleepwalking, since he takes both to pre-
sent us with perceptions and feelings which lack self-awareness (cf. Armstrong D.M.
& Malcolm N., Consciousness and Causality. A Debate on the Nature of Mind, Oxford,
Blackwell, 1984, p. 119-120, 133-135).
28. James, op. cit., l. p. 209.
29. lbid., p. 211 .
30. Hilgard, op. cit., p . 190. Insofar as hypnosis seems to involve a dissociation or ver-
tical splitting it is little wonder that attention has often been drawn to the striking si-
milarities between the hypnotic state and the even more fundamental splitting obser-
ved in patients suffering from multiple personality disorder. A presentation of sorne of
the truly puzzling phenomena encountered in this disorder would exceed the bounds
of this article but for an introduction cf. Braude S.E., First Person Plural, London, Rout-
ledge, 1991.
31. Hilgard, op. cit., p. 188.
147
 ALTER
cesses to distinct agents, they should be assigned to the subsystems
of a single agent.
Let me, at this point, return to the putative counter-examples:
sleepwalking, night-terror, sleeptalking, disturbed sleep and dream-
less sleep. Sleepwalking, night-terror and sleeptalking are all usually
characterized as dissociated processes and might therefore be ana-
lyzed in analogy with hypnosis. Moreover night-terror certainly dif-
fers from sleepwalking in one essential respect: the person is ob-
viously very emotionally affected by the incident, and this feature
makes it even harder to suggest that the episode should have been
unconscious. When it comes to disturbed sleep, perhaps one has
simply been looking for the self-awareness in the wrong place. The
person who was tickled with a feather might be unaware of having
been tickled by a feather during his sleep, but he might for instance
have dreamt that he ducked his head in order to avoid a bird. In
such cases we are not confronted with unconscious experiences or
actions, but merely with experiences and actions integrated into
dream-sequences. That this can in fact happen, is well known. Just
think of the experiments undertaken to prove that one can influence
the dream-content through externa! stimulation. To quote Borbély:
A subject who had dreamed he was acting in a play related the following
narrative when he was awakened thirty seconds after [... ] cold water had
been sprayed on his back: I was walking behind the leading lady when she
suddenly collapsed and water was dripping on her. I ran over to her and
water was dripping on my back and head. The roof was leaking. I was very
puzzled why she fell down and decided sorne plaster must have fallen on
her. I looked up and there was a hole in the roof I dragged her over to the
side of the stage and began pulling the curtains. fust then I woke up32.
When all is said and done, the last and most difficult problem is
still dreamless sleep. Even if it is acknowledged that I remain
conscious at sorne leve! during sleep, it still needs to be shown that
this level is itself self-aware. Otherwise the difficulty remains. At
present I can only come up with three provisional suggestions:
-Sorne people have argued that there is no such thing as dream-
less sleep. When asleep we always dream. In which case the pro-
blem disappears, since the apparent lack of self-awareness during
sleep is merely the result of spontaneous amnesia. As Kant declares:
Man kann aber wohl für sicher annehmen, dafl kein Schlaf ohne Traum
sein konne, und wer nicht getriiumt zu haben wiihnt, seinen Traum nur
vergessen habe33.
32. Borbély, op. cit., p . 54.
33. Kant I., Werke VI. Schriften zur Anthropologie, Geschichtsphilosophie, Politik und Piida-
gogik, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1966, p. 497.
148
Sleep, Self-awareness and Dissociation
-If it is possible to expand the dimension of wakefulness through
meditative practices, as is claimed by certain Oriental Schools, and
by so doing enter the realm of sleep, fully awake so to speak, this
must imply that there was already self-awareness beforehand. But
this would be self-awareness of a particular kind, since it is not ame-
nable to reflection in the same way as our ordinary experience. This
paves the way for my third suggestion, which has deeper theoretical
implications.
-Perhaps there is a completely straightforward explanation for
the apparent absence of self-awareness during dreamless sleep: one
which draws on the interdependence between awareness and self-
awareness. It might be argued that the gradual decrease of interest in
the world which occurs as we drift into sleep affects the way in
which we are aware of ourselves as well. When I am no longer
paying attention to the "call of the world", when I am no longer
"pursuing any affections", when that which reaches my awareness
becomes more and more undifferentiated, my self-awareness be-
comes concurrently more and more diffuse and anonymous as well,
ultimately allowing of neither reflection nor recollection. Thus one
could opt for something close to Sartre's theory, which claims that
consciousness can only be non-positional aware of itself if it is posi-
tional aware of something else; that it acquires self-awareness exactly
insofar as it is conscious of something other than itself, and that it
would loose every determination and dissipate as pure nothingness
without this hetero-affection34 . This suggestion finds support in
sorne intriguing remarks made by Husserl, to the effect that reflec-
tion presupposes a differentiated field of hetero-affection35 . Thus
Husserl would seem to claim that only a consciousness affected by
differentiated unities can remain awake, whereas a gradual dimini-
shing of this differentiation would eventually cause consciousness to
fall asleep 36 . Sleep means that there is nothing which gains relief,
there is no discrimination, but a complete fusiona samaness without
difference. This state of complete non-differentiation (the state of
34. Sartre, op. cit., 1943, p . 212; Sartre, op. cit. , 1936, p. 23-24; Binswanger L., Grundfor-
men und Erkenntnis menschlichen Daseins, Zürich, Max Niehans, 1953, p . 474-475; Mon-
tavont A., << Le phénomene de l'affection dans les Analysen zur passiven Synthesis »,
Alter, n° 2, 1994, p. 119-139.
35. For a more detailed presentation of this aspect in Husserl's thinking, ej. my forth-
coming article "Self-awareness and affection", in Depraz and Zahavi (éds.), Alterity
and Facticity. New Perspectives on Husserl, Kluwer, Dordrecht, 1998.
36. Husserl E., Phiinomenologische Psychologie, Husserliana IX, Den Haag, Martinus Nij-
hoff, 1962, 486; Husserl E., Analysen zur passiven Synthesis, Husserliana XI, Den Haag,
Martinus Nijhoff, 1966, 149, ibid., 160.
149
 Sleep, Self-awareness and Dissociation
ALTER
lenges to this conception even more formidable than those which I
unconsciousness and dreamless sleep) is not nothing, is not the ne-
have discussed here, it might not be wholly inappropriate to end
gation or suspension of the ego, but merely the zero limit of
conscious vitality (Bewufitseinslebendigkeit 37 ). It is a state where no with a quotation from Freud:
Der Artz kann nicht anders, ais die Versicherung, »das Bewufltsein sei der
intentional action can take place, and consequently a state that ex- unentbehrliche Charakter des Psychischen<< mit Achselzucken zurückwei-
eludes the possibility of thematic self-awareness: sen, und etwa, wenn sein Respekt vor den Auflerungen der Philosophen
Nur wo Eriebnisse abgehoben sind, nur wo hyietische Daten z.B. »für sich« noch stark genug ist, annehmen, sie behandelten nicht dasselbe Objekt und
bereit Iiegen, Vorstellungen für sich, auch Leervorstellungen, da kann Af- trieben nicht die gleiche Wissenschaft. Denn auch nur eine einzige
fektion statthaben und da findet sie notwendig statt. Das Abgehobene ist verstiindnisvolle Beobachtung des Seelenlebens eines Neurotikers, eine ein-
auf das !eh bezogen, und das !eh ais Poi ist in Funktion und ist für sich da . zige Traumanalyse, mufl ihm die unerschütterliche Überzeugung aufdriin-
Nur dann kann eine Reflexion statthaben. [... ] Offenbar ist all das auch gen, dafl die kompliziertesten und korrektesten Denkvorgiinge, denen man
wichtig für die Lehre vom innersten Bewufltsein. Ist überhaupt ein man- doch den Namen psychischer Vorgiinge nicht versagen wird, vorfallen kon-
41
nigfaltiger Bewufltseinsstrom da mit Abgehobenheiten, so ist auch sein Ich nen, ohne das Bewufltsein der Person zu erregen .
wach, d.i., es ist mit da als Abgehobenheit in bestiindiger Funktion als
Identitiitspol der Affektionen und Aktionen, für sich selbst vorgegeben und
in jederzeit mogiicher Reflexion gegeben 38 .
Vielmehr ist sehr wohi denkbar ein stummes und Ieeres Leben, ein traum-
loser, leerer Schlaf sozusagen ais ein Leben, das zwar auch diese notwendige
Struktur hatte und inneriich passiv-wahrnehmungsmiiflig erschien, aber
ohne jede Abhebung, daher ohne jede Icherfassung, ohne jedes Spiel van
Einzelaffektionen und Akten, so dafl das Ich sozusagen keinen Auftritt
hatte und schlafendes !eh, blofle Potentionalitiit für die Ego cogitos war. Die
Mogiichkeit eintretender Abhebungen durch Modifikation des Lebens be-
steht immerfort, und damit die Moglichkeit des Erwachens 39 .
Und wiire das Leben ein »eintOniges« Dasein, etwa ein Ton in immer
gieichformigem, unterschiedsiosem Veriauf, so konnte ich nicht zurück.
Das ist sogar sehr bedeutsam. Wiire der »Anfang« des Lebens, die An-
fangsperiode eine endiose Eintonigkeit, so wiire es eine Periode undurch-
brechbaren Vergessens 40 .
Thus, dreamless sleep seems to present us with an unbroken
stream of experiencing, but a stream that excludes recollection and
reflection, for which reason it afterwards always appears as if no-
thing took place. In such a case we are confronted with a type of
self-awareness even more fundamental and anonymous than the
pre-reflective kind, since the decisive if not to say defining feature of
pre-reflective self-awareness is that it allows of reflection.
To conclude: perhaps it is after all possible to reconcile self-awa-
reness and sleep, and in that way rescue the conception of subjecti-
vity that I presented at the outset. Since it would be a mistake, how-
ever, to ignore the tentative character of both my presentation and
my suggestions, as well as the fact that there are empirical chal-

37. Husserl, XI, op. cit., 167; Husserl E., Zur Phiinomenologie der Intersubjektivitiit II,
Husserliana XIV, Den Haag, Martinus Nijhoff, 1973, 156.
38. Husserl, XIV, op. cit., 53-54.
39. Husserl, XI, op. cit., 380.
40. Husserl, XI, op. cit., 424. 41. Freud S., Gesammelte Werke II-III, S. Fischer, 1942, p. 617.

150 151