Ever Dream This Man?

[jws1970]

This is very interesting. People all across the world have dreamed of this man. I have no concrete memory of a specific dream in which I can place him, but he does look vaguely familiar. There is a website devoted to the phenomenon with more sketches and descriptions of the dreams. Anyone?

http://www.thisman.org/

[Ruth]

Nope, not me.

[Brittany]

Nope. Gives me a creepy feeling.

[Spaced]

Never seen him but definitely evokes strange feelings. Love the unibrow though.

[BrownEye]

Alfred E Neuman?

[jws1970]

I find it likely that he is a thought form manifesting archetypal behavior. One would have to study the details of the encounters in depth to determine which archetype(s).

[Zachary]

there is something very vaguely familiar about that image, and yes it does give off a creepy feel.

[reeay]

hmmm... unless I see a formal study/data thru some kind of scientific study, I am not convinced of the validity of this story. The thing with facial recognition is, we humans have a tendency to make errors in recognizing faces. If this 'psychiatrist' showed the picture to his/her clients, you're already priming them to try to recall something that they (think) they saw in a dream. Memory could be such a faulty thing. You prime a person using an ambiguous face like that and you will get confirmation of 'sightings'.

So for now, I call BS.

[zenmaster]

Yes, we humans have a tendency to fill in the blanks when faced with interpreting any ambiguous image (or vague notion). We are wired to want to make some type of connection, regardless of actual experience. Cues are provided, and of course the blanks tend to get filled in with the most tenuous connections imaginable from what is pressing from suggestion (and personal bias, what one wants to see, hopes, fears, etc).

[reeay]

What could be causing this? The site advances several theories, but my favorite is the "dream surfer" theory:

According to this theory this man is a real person, who can enter people's dreams by means of specific psychological skills. Some believe that in real life this man looks like the man in the dreams. Others think that the man in the dreams looks completely different from his real life counterpart. Some people seem to believe that behind this man there is a mental conditioning plan developed by a major corporation.

In fact, it turns out that this theory is the closest to the truth. This website is actually the creation of a sociologist and marketer named Andrea Natella. He runs a company called Guerriglia Marketing which stages "subversive hoaxes" and creates weird art projects that are mostly about pornography, politics, and advertising.

I think ThisMan.org has to be Natella's greatest masterwork. It doesn't smack of artsy pseudo-intellectual "politics" like a lot of his other art does. It's just cheesy and a little bit scary. There really is something uncanny about the pictures of the man and the fake stories from people who claim to have met him. Sweet dreams!

http://io9.com/5388286/why-are-thousands...t-this-man

More information on this 'hoax' http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/this-man-e...m-this-man