Insight: What Is It, Exactly?

In “What is the state-of-the-art on lucid dreaming? Recent advances and questions for future research”, Ursula Voss and Allan Hobson provide a detailed view of the features characterizing lucid dreaming and put forward four innovative hypotheses to explain why and how lucid dreaming occurs, as well as how lucid dream states are related to other states of consciousness. Their aim is to show that not only is there benefit to studying lucid dreaming in itself, as this would give us a deeper understanding of dream consciousness, but also that it is an important endeavor because of the kind of conscious state lucid dreaming is. To be sure, Voss and Hobson make important in-roads into the empirical study of lucid dreaming that ought to sprout new and exciting research in the area. As I will show, however, there remains much conceptual work to be done. In this commentary I tease out three aspects of Voss and Hobson’s view that would greatly benefit from philosophical consideration. First, I highlight the lingering confusion with what exactly insight is, and I point to how one might go about clarifying this notion. Second, I argue that our understanding of insight and meta-awareness in lucid dreaming could be greatly increased by looking at how these concepts are used and understood in relation to meditative states. Last, I explore the role of the body in lucid dreaming and argue that one’s bodily awareness in lucid dreams is far more multi-faceted than at it might at first seem.