Thread: Is it true? (About Dream time)

Yes it's true. Time in a dream can feel like years for some people even if you're in that dream for two hours in real life.

Stephen LaBerge claims it's a memory trick. It's like having the memory of years jammed into your brain in a couple of minutes. It feels like it went on forever, when in reality you only experienced short moment. Of course this is what he says, I cannot testify to any of this.

I believe that if we can manipulate everything else in our dreams, why not time? I'd venture to guess that since time is sort of an abstract idea it is one of the most difficult aspects to control. If you decide you want to skip ahead four years in your dream, how do you know you're not just simply changing the scene? And even if you somehow recognize that moving forward in time is really what you're doing, then is that not in itself simply changing the scene - since you're in a dream and not "real time?"

I would say that time can be manipulated but at least 98% of the time it is controlled by our "minds" and not "us." I guess this idea of time travel is only experienced if we dream the entire interval and not skip around. This is all completely detached from the fact that no matter what kind of time interval we experience, it is only mere moments of real time.

I'm pretty sure that none of that meant anything. You're going to probably want to keep it locked in here...and don't stare at it for too long.

Originally Posted by TimeStopper

Stephen LaBerge claims it's a memory trick. It's like having the memory of years jammed into your brain in a couple of minutes. It feels like it went on forever, when in reality you only experienced short moment. Of course this is what he says, I cannot testify to any of this.

I have to agree with LaBerge on this one. While time is not a constant, your brains processing power over a certain amount of time certainly is. Our brains are machines (note: brain and soul are separate)...biological in nature, but still machines. To actually experience a weeks worth of life in an hour or so (of real time) would require your brain to accelerate its processing abilities far past what it is actually capable of. That is, to actually slow time down by 1/2, you would have to double the speed at which your brain thinks. It just doesn't seem very plausible from a scientific standpoint. Sadly, because of the abstract nature of dreams, it's impossible to prove either way.

LaBerge conducted an experiment in which test subjects indicated their estimation of 10 second time intervals using eye movements during a lucid dream. Their estimations were shown to be very accurate compared to real time.

That is, to actually slow time down by 1/2, you would have to double the speed at which your brain thinks.

The brain actually IS able to process the sensory input at double speed (for example risky situations, there were experiments performed, the subjects were able to read subliminal messages they would not consciously notice when not jumping off a cliff). Dreams are still real-time though.

Originally Posted by Mertruve

Dreams are still real-time though.

In my experience, this has only been true for lucids. I've had normal dreams that seemed to last for days.

Originally Posted by Widowmaker

It just doesn't seem very plausible from a scientific standpoint. Sadly, because of the subjective nature of dreams, it's impossible to prove either way.

Fixed to what you probably meant.

I've read somewhere that a man claimed to have lived one hundred years in a dream, and was tested on a polygraph which said he was telling the truth, but they're not that accurate.

Originally Posted by TimeStopper

Stephen LaBerge claims it's a memory trick. It's like having the memory of years jammed into your brain in a couple of minutes. It feels like it went on forever, when in reality you only experienced short moment. Of course this is what he says, I cannot testify to any of this.

True. Your dreams tend to cut out the boring bits. So you may think you've walked 2 miles to the shops, but you've actually just appeared at the shop and think you remember walking there. Its a trick of the mind.
Laberge scientifically proved that dream time was the same as realtime.
I think he got lucid dreamers to move their eyes as they counted down the seconds. In the real world laberge was counting the same eye movements.

I have an inkling that the same guys who claim to be able to stretch time are the same who claim to be naturals who dream 17 times a night without even thinking about it. If you get my drift.

I think dream time is just as subjective as everything else. when you focus on time, as the subjects in LaBerges experiments did, time was accurate, on the other hand if you don't pay attention to it it will have all sorts of weird things.

Originally Posted by Mertruve

The brain actually IS able to process the sensory input at double speed (for example risky situations, there were experiments performed, the subjects were able to read subliminal messages they would not consciously notice when not jumping off a cliff). Dreams are still real-time though.

I actually read the opposite.

Its known that time seems to slow down for people in physical danger. Scientists dropped people off a scaffold and tried to get them to read numbers of a wrist counter on the way down.

The numbers pulsed too quickly for a normal person at rest to catch.
However if time dilated, they should have been able to catch at least some of the numbers. The fact was, they didn't.

Theoretically what happens is that part of your brain kind of shut down so that all of your focus is in abilities which can assist in self preservation.
Because of this there is a change in perception, but thats all it is.
Often, survivors of disasters can't remember how they escaped. Sometimes they can't even get basic facts right. They have an idea in their head of what happened, and will defend it thoroughly, but the memories are
self fabricated to fill the gap created by their change in perception.

For example a woman survivor of a plane crash swore blind that the plane was the right way up when she escaped. In actually fact the plane had flipped over and she had crawled out on the ceiling with chairs and bodies hanging over her. It was only when rescuers actually showed her the plane that she accepted the truth.

Theres no doubt that similar events happen whilst we dream.
Which is no doubt why dreams often seem longer than they are.

Originally Posted by yuriythebest

I think dream time is just as subjective as everything else. when you focus on time, as the subjects in LaBerges experiments did, time was accurate, on the other hand if you don't pay attention to it it will have all sorts of weird things.

Thats true of anything.
If you're doing a boring job an hour can feel like forever.
If you're having fun playing a video game an hour flies by.

At the end of the day, an hour is just an hour.

how can somone make it feel longer?

Originally Posted by omgsh

how can somone make it feel longer?

counting the minutes until you get to go home i would think.

I have an inkling that the same guys who claim to be able to stretch time are the same who claim to be naturals who dream 17 times a night without even thinking about it. If you get my drift.

Or they just woke up once and thought "oh dude, this dream was, like, TOTALLY 100 years long... I've got to tell my friends!" XD

The fact was, they didn't.

I've read about the same experiment you mentioned, but in my version they did O_o

Hold on now.
So you, Mertruve, and you, moonshine, are trusting the words of scientists who dropped people off of a scaffold?

Dreams can convey a sense of many years passing the same way that movies can convey a sense of many years passing. The important point here is that they don't actually, objectively take that much time to elapse; rather, as some people have hinted at, the effect is probably caused by various memory tricks. For example, if you lay down for a half-hour nap and have a dream where you drive to work to start your shift, do some stuff, and then drive home in the dream, you may infer that the dream appeared to last an entire 8-hour shift - however, you wouldn't have actually experienced most of that 8 hours.

Originally Posted by moonshine

Scientists dropped people off a scaffold and tried to get them to read numbers of a wrist counter on the way down.

The numbers pulsed too quickly for a normal person at rest to catch.
However if time dilated, they should have been able to catch at least some of the numbers. The fact was, they didn't.

That sounds like a wild experiment. Do you have any more details about it? Authors, perhaps?