This therapy was based on a dubious account
of the operations
of memory,
whereby traumatic events cause instant
amnesia («repression,» in a misuse
of that Freudian term).
There's the matter
of legal ethics,
whereby a sleepwalker who killed his father - in - law was acquitted
of wrongdoing; the irony
of sleeping pills whose effectiveness stems from their inducing short - term
amnesia, thus helping you forget how much you actually tossed and turned all night; or the inventor
of a highly successful treatment for sleep apnea, now patiently waiting for the Westernization
of China to manifest itself in a king's ransom
of obesity - related sleep disorders.