Chapters 4 & 9

Chapter 4: Questions for Discussion and Further Research

1.) Freud believes that "no" does not exist in dreams because dreams take in any element possible and anything can pretty much come out representing that element. If you hate someone, in your dreams, you may love them.  Anything can be twisted around but it all means something in the end.

2.) A word can have two meanings that are the opposites of one another because the meanings of words can change over time.

3.) I always thought the iceberg model was an interesting way of putting Freud's theories.  I do believe that it does justice to his theories because he believed that there was so much more to the mind that we could really see and learn about.  Only a very small amount of what people are thinking is consciousness, the rest is mostly unconsciousness. 

4.) Reaction formation is when a feeling is expressed, like hate, but the opposite feeling, love, is adopted.

5.) I would have to say that most people in the United States are dominated by their ids.  It seems it might be impossible not to be dominated by their ids because everything is almost always considered sexual now. You can refer anything back to sexuality if you try to.

6.) A cigar is only a cigar when it is not meant to be sexual.

Chapter 9: Questions for Discussion and Further Research

1.) Metaphor: based on analogy and similarity - talking about one thing in terms of another

Simile: based on analogy but more with comparison

Metonymy: associating things with other things

Synecdoche: a form of metonymy in which a part is used to stand for the whole

2.) I believe that our conceptual system is fundamentally metaphoric because people never say what they mean anymore, whether it's because they're afraid of expressing themselves or some other reason.  People constantly use metaphors to try and explain how they're really feeling. 

3.) Just like I said before, people use metaphors to cover up how they really may be feeling, maybe by putting it in a more gentle way.

4.) A concept is a general notion or idea and concepts affect our behavior because they "structure what we perceive" and they help to define what happens to us every day.

5.) Depending on the person looking at the snake, they can think different things.  Nobody thinks the same way and has the same ideas when they see a snake.

6.) "Metaphors shape our notions about what we can expect, so they play a much more important part in our lives than we might imagine." Couch potato - lazy person