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January 13, 1953. THE BASIC DREAM. Géza Róheim, Ph.D.
Dr. Róheim discussed some objections to the death instinct which, to be valid, would need to apply to all living beings, not only to humans. Another objection lies in recent work demonstrating the essential immortality of unicellular organisms, having implications with possible reference to the human species. He also expressed the belief that orality is essentially object-libidinous rather than autoerotic. He postulated the concept of a basic dream, which originates in anxiety: a part of the dreamer observes what another part is doing in symbolic form. This second part is falling, going into a cellar, or pool, or hole, etc. Biological factors determine the periodicity of sleep; withdrawal of cathexis from the environment (sleep) produces anxiety, the world having been destroyed by that withdrawal process. The dream then rebuilds the world, using historical and symbolic elements as the schizophrenic does. The basic