Dreams, Remembering, and Remembering Dreams: An Intentionalist, Direct Realist, Acquaintance Account

I present a generic version of intentionalism to show that intentionalism is motivated by and consistent with direct realism. I also present a theoretically neutral account of acquaintance as direct awareness. I apply intentionalism and an acquaintance view of memory to two questions. First, do dreams acquaint us with the objects, properties, persons, and events they represent? I argue that they don’t. When dreams represent events from your past, they don’t acquaint you with events, even if the events happened. Second, do memory experiences of dreams of events that really happened acquaint us with those events? I argue that they don’t. The memory experience of an event that you dreamed about can’t renew acquaintance, even if the event happened, because dreams don’t acquaint us with events. When you have a memory experience of having dreamed of an event that happened, it is a memory experience, but not a memory: it is a veridical confabulation.