30 October 2010 | NewScientist | 31

The psychoanalyst Mark Solms has contributed to the neuroscience of dreaming with research indicating that REM sleep and dreaming are dissociable, and that dreams are caused not by the REM mechanisms themselves but by basic motivational systems which are common to all mammals and which arguably form the core of emotion and emotional experience in human beings.

Programmes linking psychoanalysis and neuroscience were initiated by analysts 20 years ago, and the journal Neuropsychoanalysis was established in 1999 with an editorial board including leading neuroscientists, cognitive scientists and psychoanalysts. For the past 10 years there have been yearly conferences at which neuroscientists and psychoanalysts have presented research and discussed areas of overlapping interest (video proceedings and other information available at neuropsa.org.uk/npsa).

Psychoanalytic journals publish contributions involving psychoanalysts and neuroscientists. Leaders in neurophysiological research on depression have recently put forward an explicitly Freudian model in the Annals of General Psychiatry (vol 7, p 9). This year in Brain, neuroscientists Karl Friston and Robin Carhart-Harris undertake to “demonstrate consistencies between key Freudian ideas and recent perspectives on global brain function that have emerged in imaging and theoretical neuroscience” to show “construct validity” for Freudian concepts and enable “dialogue between psychoanalysts and neurobiologists” (vol 133, p 1265).

Such collaboration may, of course, contradict rather than confirm psychoanalytic hypotheses, but it is enough to falsify Bunge’s claim that psychoanalysis should be seen as

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For the recordn Due to an editing error, we cited Tamara Galloway’s paper in Environmental Health Perspective (DOI: 10.1289/ehp.1002367) as a source for the average exposure for BPA. In fact, this paper reports her team’s results for endocrine changes in men exposed to the chemical (23 October, p 26).n The toxic red mud that escaped a Hungarian mine contained calcium hydroxide, not oxide as we stated (16 October, p 6).n We placed New Orleans in entirely the wrong place in the map that accompanied our article on the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill (9 October, p 8). The city is actually on the Mississippi river and much closer to the coast.

pseudoscience. Or rather, it would be enough, if Bunge’s claim itself were subject to evidence, rather than abuse masquerading as philosophy. London, UK

From Allen EstersonRobert Bud attempts to justify the Psychoanalysis Exhibition at the Science Museum (2 October, p 22). It is clear from the publicity material, and presentations in association with the Institute of Psychoanalysis, that the exhibition is devoted to the promotion of Freud’s ideas and of psychoanalysis. It should not be a function of the Science Museum to take a blatantly partisan stance on a system of ideas and practice that has little in common with science, and which has been subjected to increasingly penetrating criticism since its inception.London, UK

Friction on footFrom Chris BagustWhile empirical research into the benefits of wearing socks over shoes to increase traction may have hitherto been lacking (Feedback, 9 October), the idea itself is not new. It was standard practice in British climbing circles in the 1950s for wet conditions, before the modern developments in boot-sole technology.

In his book In High Places, renowned mountaineer Dougal Haston related advice he received in Glencoe, UK, in 1957: “If you’ve

got a pair of old socks you can stick them over the gym-shoes”. And Joe Brown wrote, in his book The Hard Years, of north Wales in 1952: “…to make the slippery scramble up to the foot of the corner. We took our boots off and prepared to climb in socks.” Both climbs were completed successfully and two brilliant climbing careers followed.Bristol, UK

Tuned in

From Syed Raiyan Nuri RezaIn her article on boosting your brain’s performance, Helen Thomson mentions that learning to play a musical instrument can be beneficial (2 October, p 28).

Does that mean that part of the genius of great scientists such as Albert Einstein, Richard Feynman and William Herschel is owed to their love of music and ability to play instruments?

Perhaps I should play my flute before my mathematics exam – it could give me my badly needed A+ grade. But if it doesn’t work, at least I have an excuse for having fun on the eve of my exams.Tehran, Iran

Mental experienceFrom Ben HallerThe first paragraph of David Robson’s article on the brain’s inner dialogue contains the phrase: “up to 80 per cent of our mental experiences are verbal” (4 September, p 30). What does

this mean? Apart from the weasel words “up to” that make the statement almost completely content free, what is a “mental experience” and how are we counting them?

If a mental experience is a discrete percept apparent to my consciousness (the most obvious definition), then I would have to say that raw visual percepts – such as colour – outnumber other kinds of mental experience by orders of magnitude. Every second, I probably process more raw visual percepts than the number of words that go through my mind in an hour. This is not to diminish the importance of words; I enjoyed the rest of the article quite a bit. But this silly and vacuous statement should never have made it past the editor’s pen.Montreal, Canada

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