Thread: Shared-Dreaming Debate of 2015

Originally Posted by The Cusp

if you prefer to let computers do your thinking for you, I guess you'll just have to wait until somebody invents a shared dreaming machine.

No if the computer was doing the 'thinking' (creation/ rendering) then it would be a simulation that is available now, you go online let your brain scan the simulated environment with your eyes as your companions / opponents do the same, a shared virtual world that is rendered entirely by the computer.

To be a shared dreaming machine, it would require that one or more brains create the material that is being scanned (and or integrated) by the computer and then rebroadcast to the sharing dreamers. The computer would merely be the conduit for the shared dream, much as your purely imaginary conduits, except real, where every dreamer would experience pretty much the exact same brain/brains created content in real time or near time. No doubt with the ability to replay the dream content latter, rather then demonstrate its ability via morning pillow marks.

I think that shared dreaming isn't real in the sense of two people being 'in' the same dream. I think that's a semantic misunderstanding. A dream isn't a place that you go, or something that your being is more than a tiny bit inside of. A dream can be shared in much the same sense that a movie is shared, which is superficial and external to the real sharing. What is shared is the mental and emotional state that spawns the dream, so to speak. It is like being the other person for a moment. What makes this remarkable in a dream, is the dream often draws its imagery from future events, or expresses things about the other person that could not have been guessed through external means, which you can see objectively if you first encounter the person the day after the dream. This shows that there is real internal sharing somehow, that it is not some kind of extrapolation or projection, hence our interest in it.

Usually you don't want these kinds of experiences in situations where you're in a position to prove it to yourself objectively though. You'd rather also have good external communication with the people you're close to that way, in which case there is no way to prove to yourself that anything supernatural is going on. (By supernatural I don't mean that the experience is above nature, I mean that it is outside what we currently understand about nature.) So it takes a special set of circumstances to prove that it is real objectively. But I think it is possible. Although it is true that people haven't been proving this in clinical-trial-like settings, neither have people been doing those experiments and finding nothing. Nobody with enough experience and understanding of what to look for has been doing those kinds of experiments in an academic setting at all. This shouldn't be surprising if you realize how much research is dominated by corporate interests, or corrupt resume-building schemes where in order to do a study and write a paper several other more senior people have to be willing to buy into your idea and put their names on it. Between just those two dynamics, almost nothing in this subject area is investigated by 'experts' at all. I'd still try it if I could find an opportunity though. It is true that there were a lot more PSI related studies many decades ago, back when LSD was new and people were more progressively optimistic, but I think those studies were naive, people didn't have enough understanding of what real phenomena they might figure out how to test for. I doubt that anyone is going to have any success getting randomly selected students or psychic 1-900 con artists to do things like mentally transfer pass codes to each other, telepathy such as people actually experience just isn't like that.

I'm not trying to make a particular point to any particular person, these are just some of my thoughts on the subject.

While lucid dreamers try to go cave man with their favorite anime girl
Meanwhile back in JAPAN:



background stuff and original dream video of some japanese genius dreaming about solving equations



how japanese machine learns to read brain with images



Update on Japanese progress

Originally Posted by cooleymd

While lucid dreamers try to go cave man with their favorite anime girl

Speak for your self man, you can't put all lucid dreamers in one category.

^^ Seriously.

I'm pretty sure I've never gone caveman on any DC in a dream, ever. We're not all like that. Cooleymind, and I'm not sure what this has to do with shared dreaming.

Originally Posted by Sageous

I'm not sure what this has to do with shared dreaming.

Did you watch any of those videos. Many seem to think that science is doing nothing while their antecdotal dreams are the real advancement in dream science. If you had watched the videos you would have seen that using EEG and FMRI, machines now exist in both Japan and also here in central California, where computers are taught to recognize what brains are seeing and then record dreams.

Seems to me their progress is relevant.

One of the actual uses of the machines will be to read minds, so perhaps its more related to telepathy at the moment than shared dreams, but this is the type of equipment that would be needed for shared dreams.

Eventually this technology will be a great lie detector.

They can strap me into it and ask If I have really had 100101 lucid dreams and when I say yes, and it detects partial truth, I'll have to admit that is in binary

When they ask so really only 37 lucid dreams the device will know I'm telling the truth tho

eventually it will be good for shared dreaming, if a totalitarian government hasn't used the devices to stomp out all dissent that is.

Originally Posted by flowofmysoul

Speak for your self man, you can't put all lucid dreamers in one category.

And what category that'd be?

He meant that while people play in their lucid dreams, scientists in Japan are building machines that try to record what's happening inside your head.

I think it's unfair though, to compare the common folks with scientists. Obviously we're not doing that, we don't work in that department. For anyone but scientists that study the brain, all we have is ourselves and our brains and the possibility that that is enough.

Originally Posted by Occipitalred

And what category that'd be?

Tho I work as a computer programmer I lump myself into the Biochemist/Molecular Biologist category as most of my many years of college are in that field.

I think that science is relevant as my position is clearly that shared dreaming as I define it (same dream, same time, from brain to brain via a conduit) doesn't exist YET!

So these dream machines seem relevant to me.

If shared dreaming is defined some other way then I don't think it means much. For instance I had a dream about Kiira Korpi before I ever met her, if you dreamed of her too is that a shared dream. Is it a premonitory dream? Guess if I go to her next ice stating competition but we end up at a construction site and then take a train ride across Russia, it will have been, but until then I'll remain on the fence. Interestingly I didn't even know who she was when I had the dream, but maybe I had seen her on the web or news and just didn't remember.

I'm not one of those people who has a weird dream, and then thinks my dreams can't be weird there must be something wrong with the world and everyone else in the world. NO, I'm pretty sure that dreams are weird and people who want to infer great meaning and purpose from every stray thought they can remember while sleeping are the ones far beyond the help of science.

Originally Posted by cooleymd

People who want to infer great meaning and purpose from every stray thought they can remember while sleeping are the ones far beyond the help of science.

I am curious, what are the negative consequences of wanting to infer great meaning and purpose from every stray thought they can remember while sleeping? Why would they need help out of this behavior?

If shared dreaming is defined some other way then I don't think it means much. For instance I had a dream about Kiira Korpi before I ever met her, if you dreamed of her too is that a shared dream. Is it a premonitory dream?

What someone said earlier is that having the exact same dream from a different perspective in another timeperiod is a shared dream. Not anything else that you are implying here. It's not even a weird idea to consider that time is non-linear in the experiences outside of waking experience. Please dont miss the point.

Originally Posted by Occipitalred

I am curious, what are the negative consequences of wanting to infer great meaning and purpose from every stray thought they can remember while sleeping? Why would they need help out of this behavior?

I believe that dreams help us integrate our memories and serve as a threat simulator. Teaching us different possible responses to situations. But to believe that they are actually filled with importance and meaning in their own right seems a bit much. Is my last dream this morning, of overhearing a coworker talking about me in a meeting and then me yelling into the meeting you F..... B..... is supposed to be some sort of subconscious breakthrough. In the dream I immediately begin dreaming that I better go report what they said about me before they report what I just yelled into the meeting, clearly the threat simulator in action, adapting itself to poor office politics and the inherent threats therein.

If you truly believe that everything in dreams has meaning, yes you probably need help. Sometimes a dream is just a dream, and often we don't remember enough to know what the brain was doing with the information it was processing, and the possibility definitely exists that those aren't tonight's winning lottery numbers but just random thoughts.

DThoughts:

If people had exactly the same dream at different times I suppose it would be a shared dream, but I still think it would require a brain scanner, brain recorder, and playback to actually occur.

I guess so, cooleymd. It probably is wrong for people to absolutely believe that everything they dream about has a hidden meaning and to give it a lot of importance. I can think of a few times where these things could be bad. I once had a stalker girl who had all the signs of being a psychopath who analyzed my dreams using online dream dictionaries and making links to how it meant I loved her. I can't imagine myself being so dimwitted as to fall for that, but I would feel sorry for anyone who would, and indeed, they would need more help than science can spare! But I don't think there's anything wrong with looking at your dreams and seeing if there is anything that clicks in your mind and if there is anything constructive you can take from them. Anyways, I digress.

I just noticed your signature, and it makes me laugh.

Originally Posted by Occipitalred

I just noticed your signature, and it makes me laugh.

yea my caveman reference was a paraphrase of some other dream view member from the other day and it may have been meant humerously

But given Sageous reply, if I ever form an oppressive government and get my hands on the dream/mind reader, I'll have to question him thoroughly on his DC interactions. I know I don't treat DC very well, lucid or not

I don't doubt that Sageous is honest when he says he does not disrespect his DCs. I personally don't remember harassing anyone lucid or not. But we digress! Is telepathy possible? And is it easier in dreams?

Originally Posted by cooleymd

yea my caveman reference was a paraphrase of some other dream view member from the other day and it may have been meant humerously

But given Sageous reply, if I ever form an oppressive government and get my hands on the dream/mind reader, I'll have to question him thoroughly on his DC interactions. I know I don't treat DC very well, lucid or not

Nice.

I won't defend myself, Cooleymd, because I know my own mind, I see no reason to lie on a web forum, and it would have nothing to do with shared dreaming. I'm not sure it is a great idea to draw such sweeping conclusions about someone you've never met. We are not all alike.

Okay, maybe that will be the last personal attack (we can hope, anyway); anyone want to take on Occipitalred's questions?

Sageous is good enough his DCs would not freak out and start fighting him, so why would he NEED to go caveman?

This brings an on topic thought to mind. Do we really trust most lucid dreamers not to loose their sanity/focus and 'go cave man on us?

I believe that if I really have experienced astral beings, I unfortunately have tried to sex them up when they were not interested many dozen times. No cave man stuff, more just the humping puppy routine. That could be an awkward aspect of shared dreaming.

Originally Posted by Sageous

^^ Seriously.

I'm pretty sure I've never gone caveman on any DC in a dream, ever. We're not all like that. Cooleymind, and I'm not sure what this has to do with shared dreaming.

It has a lot to do with shared dreaming and especially with this thread.

As far as I know, I saw similar progress in UE/US on how they monitor images that people see. They were able to transmit what you see in your mind to a monitor, resolution was so low that you could distinguish only basic symbols like '+' 'O' 'X' and etc.. But this is only a beginning.

As soon as this technology advances and they will be able to see a detailed image, then they will be able to see all our dreams. If they can see all our dreams, two people can be connected to such device and prove that shared dreaming does exist.

Originally Posted by Occipitalred

And what category that'd be?

He meant that while people play in their lucid dreams, scientists in Japan are building machines that try to record what's happening inside your head.

I think it's unfair though, to compare the common folks with scientists. Obviously we're not doing that, we don't work in that department. For anyone but scientists that study the brain, all we have is ourselves and our brains and the possibility that that is enough.

Not everybody is going to cave man playing with favorite anime girl. There were times when all I wanted from lucid dream was fun, because options were unlimited. When I started lucid dreaming, to me it looked like a lot of fun and only fun, nothing else. Later when all dreams started to be lucid, I had so much time to waste there, 4 years later I understood there is much more then only fun. Since then I did try and study many things, including solving equations..

And I know few people from DV who are doing the same, that's why I said don't put us all in the same category.

Sometimes common folks have more knowledge of beyond dreaming stuff then most scientist

Originally Posted by sivason

This brings an on topic thought to mind. Do we really trust most lucid dreamers not to loose their sanity/focus and 'go cave man on us?

Even if you trust a shared dreaming partner, subconscious mind might bring up some surprises. For example, something basic can turn over into a nightmare for your partner, even if none of you are intending to share a dream that night. You do share a dream few times and want it or not, you are somehow connected now.

Something funny and sometimes scary happens to us from time to time. One of us is watching an intense movie, of course other parties does not know about it. Such movie will provoke certain images, certain thoughts in your mind and when your partners are going to sleep, they catch up on those thoughts, images and events.

A horror movie might cause a nightmare to your partner on exactly same theme that you saw in a movie. A comedy can cause some funny dreams to him/her. And movies on fundamental questions of humanity can cause some interesting shared dream experience and discussions.

Now add your daily life here, your daily events and emotions, your thoughts... any of those can become dreams for your partner. And they are not going to see that emotion, experience, thought as an imagine. They will feel it completely, most probably more intense then you did.

Originally Posted by sivason

No offense intend towards Zoth

Quick remark: I probably speak for several people here when I say that no one (especially not you ) needs to make these disclaimers. My ideas/positions/perspectives are in a box, they aren't myself. In this and every single discussion, whenever someone proves me wrong/challenges my input/criticizes my approach, it's my privilege and pleasure to update the box, taking out older stuff in favor of more correct/better information that fits the model of reality.

On the topic of "No experiment can ever prove shared dreaming." brought by Sivason

While at some point I agree with you Sivason, and even with several remarks made by The Cusp, I can't help but think that's not the case for everything.
Let's analyse the scientific study of lucid dreaming: if you look throughout story, many individuals tried to achieve understanding about the event itself and the process that leads someone to be aware that they are dreaming. It seemed clear from the beginning that subjective reports were all there was. But then, due reports and reports, eventually people managed to understand some characteristic that allowed the observation of a phenomenon that seemed impossible: communication between dreamer and non-dreamer.
You say that we can't prove shared dreaming, but we can certainly "disprove" it (when I say disprove, I'd say have a very high degree of certainty that it isn't happening): this reminds me of a study that showed that even if consciousness/dreams had some external subtract that doesn't show up in the brain, the events would stick to memory themselves. This allowed an experience to be made regarding ESP.
(You can read about the ESP experience in here)

In my point of view, then even if you can't ever confirm the null-hypothesis, you can certainly ignore self-report, which are extremely subjective, and go to other ways (like neuroimaging) to prove/disprove what those people were experiencing.

In the topic of "the experience in and out of itself" by flowofmysoul

2. What would make you change your mind regarding the existence of shared dreams? What would convince you that they aren't possible/real?
2. Lack of success. More and more lack of success.

It's important to understand shared dreams do not occur in a shared dream space.

The contradictions start here: in one side, we may have people that believe shared dreaming occurs in the same plane for both dreamers, in the other, The Cusp says they do not. Right here, a massive discrepancy that despite different interpretations, is already a clue on how we can analyse dream reports, and develop a science of shared dreaming.
According to flowofmysoul, his lack of success seems (I'm assuming because he didn't mention anything else) would be the only thing that would convince him to be wrong: the argument speaks for itself.

Regarding the Cusp finding about a shared dream here on DV

Sounds far fetched, yet it had the key markers I look for in any shared dream account, which is archetypal differences. In the father's dream, they went into a Denny's, in the son's dream they went to a Wendy's. That was the only big difference. Different yet kind of the same. You see that kind of thing in almost all shred dream accounts where you can track down both versions, and there's just no way everyone would "make up" that kind of odd detail. Hell, most people don't even understand those types of differences even after I try to explain it, so how could they possibly make it up?

Really? How about the woman that knew how to speak german (I think it was german) without anyone else teaching her? How do you explain that? It's impossible right? Turns out, nope, there was a very simple reason why she could understand/speak it.
My point is: you're picking evidence and then interpreting based on your own experiences. Not to devalue that, but wouldn't it make much more sense to gather 100 shared dreaming reports and see how they differ/are similar? Don't take this personally, but you're a onironaut with tons of experience: are you saying that confirmation bias is not relevant in these kinds of reports?
This also goes to flowmysoul by the way: I've yet to see attempts at proving yourselves wrong, which is the mark of a skeptic. That's fine if you're not looking to do so, but like I said:

there’s a line between going from what we know, assuming X or Y, and explore the unknown, AND using arguments/theories that have zero predictive value to build up evidence for the unknown and because of that CANNOT be proven wrong.

If you're only trying to prove yourself right, you're automatically classified as biased. How about we all try to evaluate information and try to make some model that would allow us to rule out dreams that seem but are not SD and true SD dreams?
I might seem way too assertive, but honestly, throughout all these decades, still not a single experiment managed to produce some unmistakable results towards shared dreaming? If experienced SDers tell us the characteristics of SD, even we in this thread are capable of thinking of a model that would work at least to INDICATE that there's an actual transmission of information. If it's impossible, then this largely disproves shared dreaming, as in the same manner as that ESP study indicated above did. Is this asking too much Sageous (I'm talking to you since you're the one who made the thread ^^)? I'd say it worked out pretty well for lucid dreaming.

It's been awhile since I've last delved into the theory behind shared dreaming, but I've been doing some light research into physical processes which could account for sync-ups which were not explicitly induced. I stumbled upon a few lesser known properties, effects, and triggers of mirror neurons. For the sake of time I'll assume you all know the basics of what mirror neurons are and/or can use Google. And to help you shortcut some research: apparently visual stimulus isn't necessary for all types of mirror neurons to trigger. Thus, it's not unreasonable to think folks who regularly chat over the phone or via skype are susceptible to the mental effects of these neurons--which could potentially result in shared dreaming experiences arising without explicit induction.

This right here is great, helpful information (regardless of right or wrong) because it gives us something to work with. Besides, if we have/had a clear definition that everyone in this thread agreed (by the way, what are your definitions flowofmysoul/The Cusp?), we could advance discussion I believe. Or not 0o

What is shared is the mental and emotional state that spawns the dream, so to speak. It is like being the other person for a moment. What makes this remarkable in a dream, is the dream often draws its imagery from future events (???), or expresses things about the other person that could not have been guessed through external means, which you can see objectively if you first encounter the person the day after the dream. This shows that there is real internal sharing somehow, that it is not some kind of extrapolation or projection, hence our interest in it.

What else in your opinion could be the interpretation of said observations?

Nobody with enough experience and understanding of what to look for has been doing those kinds of experiments in an academic setting at all. This shouldn't be surprising if you realize how much research is dominated by corporate interests, or corrupt resume-building schemes where in order to do a study and write a paper several other more senior people have to be willing to buy into your idea and put their names on it. Between just those two dynamics, almost nothing in this subject area is investigated by 'experts' at all.

You know this is a pretty common argument for proponents of physic phenomenons: actually, we know that loads and loads of studies are published with negative findings. How do you respond to the data? Can you point flaws of these studies to us? What expertise do you think it's needed?
Oh and once again, comments on the ESP study mentioned above?

Originally Posted by Zoth

what are your definitions flowofmysoul

I don't want to give a wrong definition when I do not have a stable theory on how this all exactly looks like. I have few theories, but before making any definitions I want to learn more. For now I use 'shared dreaming' so it can be understood.
You can't say that 'playing football' is the definition of life, right? Same way you can't say shared dreaming is the definition of what is happening here. One fact that events of the person who is not sleeping can be picked up by a person who is sleeping at that same exact moment, already explains a lot. Some people might say "but some scientist are saying that some parts of our brain might fall asleep while we are awake" and etc.. pointing towards the idea that these sleeping parts might be the place of contact. I don't think it is so, there are few reasons for that, let me know if you wanna know them.

Originally Posted by Zoth

I've yet to see attempts at proving yourselves wrong

I cannot share all studies and events that I am or was in. But I can say that I did couple of experiments. One of the main reasons for that was to prove that we are wrong. Here are some numbers of the amount of visitors.
3eHE2DS.jpg
These are all people from internet whom I never saw, met, talked or read about. And I got really great results from this experiment, instead of proving I am wrong, I once again proved that I am right. I've got tons of data that I am still learning and making some advancements from.
I am trying to prove my self wrong every day. I am trying to connect my recall to what happened to me recently or happened in past, trying to explain every successful shared dream by looking at my past memories, experience, thoughts and trying to understand if my subconscious mind could anyhow trigger some certain images in that dream.

I can explain many of my lucid dream fragments by information of my past memories/thoughts/worries/emotions. Some of the Information that I got from someone in a shared dream or information that someone got from me is unexplainable.

Originally Posted by flowofmysoul

Originally Posted by Sageous :
^^ Seriously.

I'm pretty sure I've never gone caveman on any DC in a dream, ever. We're not all like that. Cooleymind, and I'm not sure what this has to do with shared dreaming.

It has a lot to do with shared dreaming and especially with this thread.

The videos may have a lot to do with SD, but a judgment that I was probably lying or forgetting about "going caveman" on DC's did not; that is all I was referencing.

Originally Posted by Sageous

The videos may have a lot to do with SD, but cooleymd's judgment that I was probably lying or forgetting about "going caveman" on DC's did not; that is all I was referencing.

Ah ok.

Zoth: There aren't loads and loads of studies on paranormal phenomena such as I've suggested exit. I doubt you can find a single one. Unfortunately I didn't see the ESP study you refer to, but I'll look back through posts if I get time later when I'm not typing on my phone. Scientific studies typically depend on being able to isolate causes and effects in time. This is very difficult to do in a controlled way in relation to ESP or telepathy. For instance, suppose you were to flip a coin 100 times while viewing the result, and I'm supposed to read your mind to determine the result. How can I distinguish the result you are viewing right now from the result you viewed a minute ago or the result you will view in a minute? It all feels the same. Also, the sensitive part of me doesn't care about coin flips and can't be made to care. We need a real topic that it cares about, and that has enough emotionally unique aspects to avoid confusion between different trials. Worse, someone else needs to care too, in my experience it usually only works where there is an intersection of two people's minds. Situations like that come up fairly often in the course of living, but it would be harder to set up a study that way, and you need to know what the difficulties are before you can try.

I only have another ten minutes, so here's the best I can do right now. Ask yourself something that you care deeply and personally about, a major answer you seek in life. I'll see what I dream tonight and write it down send it to you. If this works, the dream will be a metaphorical attempt towards an answer, and the images in the dream will be taken partially from your thought or life in a way that you recognize as significant. Not proof, but suggestive enough that you personally can't just blow it off as a coincidence or some other kind of fallacy. A requirement is that you have to be open to someone or something that's not you being in your personal mental space, or else it won't work. I also don't know if I can still do this, because I haven't tried for over a year and it went badly the last time. Kind of a weird proposal I know, but it is the most direct approach I can think of. We could argue for a long time about things that I claim to have experienced and verified which are outside of your experience and not get very far. If you decide to do this, make a note of your dreams tonight also. I'll tell you mine first so you know your statement doesn't influence mine. Tell me if I should post it or send a private message.

Originally Posted by flowofmysoul

It has a lot to do with shared dreaming and especially with this thread...As soon as this technology advances and they will be able to see a detailed image, then they will be able to see all our dreams. If they can see all our dreams, two people can be connected to such device and prove that shared dreaming does exist.

I was thinking of the technology as being what would become the conduit for shared dreaming to exist (in the future). But I suppose that would require the ability to place images in the mind as well, whereas to do as you suggest and just read two dreams to see they are the same would be easier with nearly existent tech. I wonder how much similarity you will want to claim it was a shared dream tho.

I would want at least location, symbols, shapes, characters and flow to be pretty similar (as obviously they would be if the computer connecting two dreamers was inserting the stuff from one mind to the other in real/near time)