What theory of dreaming do YOU believe?

[Tavasion]

im in favor of the theory that says we dream becasue we are trying to sort out and process information from the previous day, and it just makes random stories. what about you?

[JamesLD]

i believed dreams are caused from a release of dmt in the brain while we sleep

[Arutad]

I think that dreams happen because we're still a bit conscious. Or rather subconscious, but what I mean is that there's still some mental activity in the brain, even though we cannot direct it. The brain is still thinking in an unruly way, and some of its sections don't work while sleep, so it cannot think coherently. And dreams appear brightly and as images due to a habit... We always see things in reality vividly, so we see them in dreams vividly, too, we see ourselves being the central character in reality, we see the same in dreams. The subconscious activity mimics what it can remember about consciousness. I could never understand the theory of sorting out information. It's sorted on-the-fly in an awaken state, or so it seems. You get your memories, thoughts, and feelings about a situation, and they don't change at all after you've slept a bit.

[SnakeCharmer]

I could never understand the theory of sorting out information. It's sorted on-the-fly in an awaken state, or so it seems. You get your memories, thoughts, and feelings about a situation, and they don't change at all after you've slept a bit. The contents themselves don't change (much) during the process, but brain stores some of them in long-term memory and also creates connections between the new 'data' and already existing knowledge. If you study something extensively, provided it's something conceptually new, it usually becomes much clearer after some quality sleep. I'm for the theory that dreams are 'simulations' our brain does to help this process. However, I'm not convinced that this is the only reason. There must be something else.

[Arutad]

The contents themselves don't change (much) during the process, but brain stores some of them in long-term memory and also creates connections between the new 'data' and already existing knowledge. Short-term memory lasts for a few minutes only, and what you remember after that doesn't generally change. There's no such threshold after sleep that makes a distinct difference. You may forget something in a week or a month, or you may forget details during a few hours, but no visible big change happens after sleep. That's why it's hard for me to believe that something happens to memories during sleep, even if it was true, then we'd be able to notice. If you study something extensively, provided it's something conceptually new, it usually becomes much clearer after some quality sleep. Not in my experience. When I study something new, I usually tend to forget the bigger part of the new information right away, and nothing becomes clearer than it was after sleeping...

[SnakeCharmer]

There are tons of research showing memory consolidation during sleep. Here's a figure from an article in Nature Neuroscience (unfortunately, I can't find the original paper from which it came). Shows how sleep affects skill-related memories with and without interference. There's also research showing that synapses become 'saturated' during the day and sleep is needed to repolarize them in order to able to memorize new things. But, as I said before, it's probably not the only reason why we dream. Not in my experience. When I study something new, I usually tend to forget the bigger part of the new information right away, and nothing becomes clearer than it was after sleeping... You're talking about memorizing information and I'm talking about learning concepts (and skills), those are two very different things.

[Arutad]

SnakeCharmer, that's interesting. I didn't know that there were studies that confirmed memory consolidation during sleep. If you happen to remember where you read about them, give me a link please You're talking about memorizing information and I'm talking about learning concepts (and skills), those are two very different things. What's so different? When you learn, you memorize. Give me an example, I don't know what you're talking about. If I, say, try to learn astrophysics or learn to dance, will it be different enough conceptually? Provided that I can do neither.

[SnakeCharmer]

SnakeCharmer, that's interesting. I didn't know that there were studies that confirmed memory consolidation during sleep. If you happen to remember where you read about them, give me a link please It's easy enough finding links to articles, but a lot of them of them require subscription. You should be able to access articles from most universities and libraries: http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/...0907-1085.html What's so different? When you learn, you memorize. Give me an example, I don't know what you're talking about. If I, say, try to learn astrophysics or learn to dance, will it be different enough conceptually? Provided that I can do neither. There are different types of knowledge (knowledge classification differs in different models): 1. declarative - "knowing that", compilation of all the facts you know (e.g. Washington D.C. is the capital of USA) 2. procedural - "how to", compilation of all skills and habits you have (riding a bike, tying your shoes...) 3. conceptual - "why", reflects understanding of declarative and procedural knowledge (explaining why procedures you use work or why facts are true). It's important that the answer makes sense to you, it doesn't need to be the general truth. In many models this is considered to be a part of declarative knowledge, but it's clear that you can memorize facts without understanding them (e.g. memorizing integration formulae without knowing how/when to use them or what integration really does). 3. episodic -" when and where" , often called autobiographical memory Learning to dance (learning specific dance moves) would be procedural knowledge. Learning astrophysics would require learning facts (for example physical constants) and concepts(understanding the consequences of physical laws and constant values). Relating models from cognitive psychology to neurobiology is something that hasn't come of age yet. That's why the true biological basis for different types of knowledge is not well understood, but it's assumed they are stored in a different way. There's also some research indicating that different stages of sleep help consolidation of different types of knowledge. There was a study where beeping sound was used to disturb sleeping subjects when they entered slow wave sleep. It didn't awaken them, but they slipped to a shallower sleep stage (according to EEG). These subjects performed worse on scene recall tests (I guess scene recall is declarative knowledge) than subjects that didn't get disturbed. REM sleep, on the other hand, might influence memory processing for other types of knowledge. I would say that there is a lot of contradicting data from studies of sleep and dreaming, but it's easy to see how sleep affects memories by depriving yourself of it for 3-4 days. Sorry for going off topic, I would like to hear other theories about dreaming.

[tranquilitybytrey]

our brains are actually the most active during sleep. it is the two parts of our brains that hibernate for the next day: the focus and the attention.

[Arutad]

ShakeCharmer, thank you for the links. It was very interesting to read about different types of memories, too, you write most interesting posts.

[Lëzen]

The theory that dreams were once evolutionarily necessary to prepare us for the dangers of life clicks with me very well. Hell, it's still necessary in that regard, if you think about it. Sure, the chances of us being chased by saber tooth tigers is quite low in this day and age, but dreaming has since adapted to incorporate modern dangers and such.

[Licity]

The theory that dreams were once evolutionarily necessary to prepare us for the dangers of life clicks with me very well. Hell, it's still necessary in that regard, if you think about it. Sure, the chances of us being chased by saber tooth tigers is quite low in this day and age, but dreaming has since adapted to incorporate modern dangers and such. I agree with this. There was a really good thread on this theory a few months ago...

[Posquant]

In a sense, everything about us today is evolutionary, since it survived ... so, OK. Interestigly, it does seem that the quality of dreams can evolve rapidly. Back in the 1950s and 1960s, early modern studies found that most people dreamed in black & white ... like their TVs. Now we tend to dream in color again. Cool. Brains are pretty supple units. Here's the story: http://www.switched.com/2008/10/20/d...or-our-dreams/ Maybe not all dreams are the same. For me, I some have very high resolution and detail, amazingly otherworldly and unfamiliar content. All kinds of strange but very realistic gadgets, vehicles, cities, etc. These, I think are channeled information from the multiverse, maybe some sort of quantum bi-location going on at some level. They started pretty suddenly, about five years ago. Before that, and sometimes now, my dreams are just vague, unclear, disjointed, and/or familiar. Those, with such low information content, I think it's just my brain having spasms. Maybe it's easier to guess what dreams are than to understand what normal waking conscious is. For dreams, I can just claim to be an elaborate FM receiver. But waking consciousness is a big mystery, the Holy Grail of neuroscience, the "hard problem" of just what is this plain old everyday conscious experience. This article is a good intro to the seemingly promising the quantum / fractal angle. http://www.dhushara.com/book/paps/co...tm#anchor95825 Have fun. PQ So external factors can directly affect / condition the apparatus.

[Posquant]

Snakecharmer, Hi. Below are another few links on quantum theory of mind. Bridging cognitive and biological levels is the hard problem, perhaps. But this seems like progress... King's approach is solid. It jives with what I've read elsewhere. Hameroff is working with famous physicist C. Pribram, so also in the "mainstream" at this edge of things .... http://www.dhushara.com/pdf/hard.pdf http://www.quantumconsciousness.org/ Peace, PQ