Are Lucid dreams just normal dreams?

How can you disprove this argument:

'Professor Norman Malcolm goes on to say that the only criterion of the truth of a statement that someone has had a certain dream is the dreamer saying so. Malcolm further describes lucid dreaming as absurd and impossible, recalling as an example, "I dreamt that I realised I was dreaming, dreamt that I was affecting the course of my dream, and then dreamt that I woke myself up by telling myself to wake up."

I don't think it's true myself, but it is a possibility.

I don't see the problem, he described a very normal thing there..

How can you disprove this argument?

That's exactly the question I've been asking myself ever since I saw this quote last year. :)

I was going to rant hardcore on this guy at first, but then I noticed that he was born long before Stephen LaBerge himself, so he can be excused. :cheeky:

Anyway, it seems absurd to me to claim that lucid dreams are "dreams where you dream of being lucid", because anyone who has experienced a real lucid dream can agree that they can feel just as real as waking life, and that you can be fully aware of the fact that you are in a dream.
Saying that this is "just a dream about being lucid" is like saying that happiness is "just the feeling of happiness and not real happiness".
If you can tell yourself that you are in a dream, wake yourself up on command, and even record voluntary eye signals from a lucid dream then you are obviously aware of the dreamstate.

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Originally Posted by Laurelindo

because anyone who has experienced a real lucid dream can agree that they can feel just as real as waking life, and that you can be fully aware of the fact that you are in a dream.

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Just because something feels real doesn't mean it is real though. You have a memory of being fully aware, but it is just that, a memory. Same applies with telling yourself you are in a dream and waking up on command. The voluntary eye signals could disprove it, but for the skeptics, there not been enough conclusive tests :chuckle:

Interesting theory, but you could say that about being awake, you are just imagining that you are walking and being social, you are just daydreaming the choices that you make, his argument is one directional and therefore invalid.

As Laurelindo has said. There have been experiments that have proven that it is possible to have conscious awareness in your dreams. Laberge's experiment with lucid dreamers moving their eyes in a way that was discussed earlier during sleep shows that the dreamers were indeed conscious that they were dreaming and had memory waking life. Not only that but if you were to ask any good lucid dreamer then they will say that their lucid dreams feel exactly like being awake in the real world except that they know that they are actually in a dream world of their own creation. This Professor simply has not experienced a real lucid dream.

Hi I'm new, but I just wanted to add what I thought when initially reading the title to this thread because although it's not completely related to what you are talking about, it is still a very interesting point to think about.

Perhaps lucid dreams, although not entirely natural, are in fact what nature intended 'normal dreams' to be.

Suppose that perhaps the reason for us not having lucid dreams all of time is due to our lack of awareness in waking life (I have been reading up about ADA) and habitual nature that modern society has imposed upon us. Eg. Working day after the other and then weekend. Rinse and repeat.

Perhaps being unaware of dreaming is an unnatural thing and our ancestors in caves were very aware in their dreams, as life in that time demanded it. Who is to say that animals don't have lucid dreams all the time.

Just an interesting point to think about.

It is an opinion... but then, couldn't we be dreaming of waking life also? No one has been able to prove scientifically what lies beyond death other than termination of "life" What if death is just waking up from an even higher state of awakening (Let's say, the average dream time from that life is 80-90 years, ending sooner or later depending on life events) What if reincarnation is just going back to sleep? Time between incarnations might be waking time for a different lifetime...

Oh, apart from the study by Laberge there have been replications and MRI scans to lucid dreamers, showing that while lucid you are dreaming in a different way than a normal dream. A lucid dream has been proven in different ways, so while it may sound illogical to some there is enough evidence about it being real that it would be a futile effort to try using simple logic to discredit it, you would need to disprove the experiments and current data.

IMO to say that a lucid dream can be as real as waking life is not prove enough, it just happens with normal dreams as well. A skeptic could say that LaBerge's experiments don't prove anything because the subjects were incubating a normal dream in which they made the pre-determined eye movement.

But as Hukif said there is more recent studies that proved with MRI that your brain waves/activity while lucid dreaming is unique, different from normal dreaming and different from waking, but rather something in between.
Lucid Dreaming: A State of Consciousness with Features of Both Waking and Non-Lucid Dreaming
I've read that Ursula Voss, the scientist in charge of that study, did not believe in lucid dreaming at all and was rather pissed off when was assigned to study it, as she thought it was a waste of time, but had to acknowledge it is real. Actually, some might say her prejudices led her to call lucid dreaming "a hybrid state" rather than a unique state of consciousness.

Oh, and a few months ago, some scientists got to successfully induce lucid dreams on a few subjects by forcing brainwaves similar to the ones found in that other study, using a technology called tACS, aka Brain Zap.
Induction of self awareness in dreams through frontal low current stimulation of gamma activity : Nature Neuroscience : Nature Publishing Group

So if those studies do not prove lucid dreaming to be real for someone, then probably nothing will.

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Originally Posted by Barry

How can you disprove this argument:

'Professor Norman Malcolm goes on to say that the only criterion of the truth of a statement that someone has had a certain dream is the dreamer saying so. Malcolm further describes lucid dreaming as absurd and impossible, recalling as an example, "I dreamt that I realised I was dreaming, dreamt that I was affecting the course of my dream, and then dreamt that I woke myself up by telling myself to wake up."

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Given that this quote was likely made before lucid dreaming was shown scientifically to exist (it looks like Malcom died in 1990), I don't think it is too terribly valid. That said:

There is some validity in the whole memory is unreliable department, and we all have probably dreamed we were lucid without ever actually being lucid more than once (probably more often than we'd like to admit). I have also noted a tendency among dreamers to err on the lucid side when trying to decide if a particular dream was lucid; and this is not a good idea, because you might wind up in a rut of always dreaming that you are lucid, and never coming to experience the real thing (I've seen this happen several times).

Ultimately, the only way you can be sure you were lucid is to be honest with yourself -- the memory of a LD is just like the memory of any powerful waking-life experience, so if your memory is vague, fading fast, or dream-like, then you very well could have just been dreaming that you were lucid. It's not as tricky as it sounds, given how powerful the memory of an actual lucid can be, but it is important, because people trying to become lucid will come to accept anything that resembles lucidity as lucidity, and then risk never finding out what it really is.

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Originally Posted by Sageous

There is some validity in the whole memory is unreliable department, and we all have probably dreamed we were lucid without ever actually being lucid more than once (probably more often than we'd like to admit). I have also noted a tendency among dreamers to err on the lucid side when trying to decide if a particular dream was lucid; and this is not a good idea, because you might wind up in a rut of always dreaming that you are lucid, and never coming to experience the real thing (I've seen this happen several times).

Ultimately, the only way you can be sure you were lucid is to be honest with yourself -- the memory of a LD is just like the memory of any powerful waking-life experience, so if your memory is vague, fading fast, or dream-like, then you very well could have just been dreaming that you were lucid. It's not as tricky as it sounds, given how powerful the memory of an actual lucid can be, but it is important, because people trying to become lucid will come to accept anything that resembles lucidity as lucidity, and then risk never finding out what it really is.

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Going by that, I've only had 3 lucid dreams. But really there is no way of knowing whether you had a lucid or just dreamt about being lucid.

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Originally Posted by Barry

Going by that, I've only had 3 lucid dreams.

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I think it is better to be sure that you had three, based on the quality of the memory, than it is to convince yourself you had 9 because you have some vague memory of knowing that you are dreaming. LD'ing is not about quantity, but quality, and if you work toward really experiencing the state without concern for how many LD's you might have on the way, I think you will ultimately find yourself in a better, more lucid, place.

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But really there is no way of knowing whether you had a lucid or just dreamt about being lucid

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I don't believe that is true. If you are honest with yourself, and you come to understand that you will remember your LD's as actual waking-life memories, you will eventually have no trouble knowing whether or not you were lucid.

I don't have time right now, but I started a thread some time ago that talked about this stuff (and got me into some trouble with the "If you think you were lucid, then you were lucid" crowd) called a Treatise on Proof; you might want to check it out.

I have heard you say this before Sageous, and I completely disagree that lucid dream memories are as powerful as waking. I have had a few times where I had a super awesome and aware lucid, wrote it down and went back to sleep. Woken up and not remembered it. Dug through memory and gotten nothing. Then looking back on my notes, remembered it. I believe others have had similar experiences.

I do however agree that some dreams are dreams about lucid and that that makes it difficult to remember, another thing is if you lose lucidity, it can be harder to remember.

And I agree that you can know if you had a lucid or a "fake lucid". When you are "present" in a dream, you know it. I am present in like 90% of non lucids and 99% of lucids, and this comes easier if you have higher recall.

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Originally Posted by Barry

Going by that, I've only had 3 lucid dreams. But really there is no way of knowing whether you had a lucid or just dreamt about being lucid.

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Most people think that as long as you told yourself "I'm dreaming" while in a dream, you are having a lucid dream, and acknowledge different levels of lucidity: from low level lucids where you knew it was a dream but your behavior is more like in a ND, to the full-fledged lucids when you fully understand everything is a dream and behave accordingly and your memory of the dream is just as WL memories. According to this you do not dream of being lucid, because dreaming of being lucid is technically having a LD.
But other people like Sageous, believe it is possible to have a ND about being lucid aka a "false lucid".
This is a sensitive matter for some, but if I have to be honest I tend to agree more with the first opinion, lucidity is a spectrum including "false lucids", even if only because that makes things easier and keeps me motivated :rolleyes: But I confess that from time to time I feel like Sageous is probably right :chuckle:
We might have to wait til we have affordable, reliable, confortable-enough-to-sleep-with EEGs to have a clear answer to what "false lucids" really are.

EDIT: I'm on my phone while doing other things, so I missed a couple of post while putting my post together. I'll review that thread you linked Sageous, thanks!

Anyone who has had a lucid dream just laughs at the suggestion they are regular dreams, the science notwithstanding. Those who have never had one might think that, simply out of ignorance. The difference to me is basically dreaming vs alternate reality. Anyway, someone could assert reality does not exist and you are just dreaming reality. How do you disprove that? And in the end, does it really matter?

Professor Malcolm is silly, and obviously had never had a lucid dream. IMO lucid dreams are "normal" dreams, the difference is you become aware within them. That's what differentiates them, your awareness. Once you become aware its a dream and "wake up" within the dream it becomes realistic and different feeling then non lucid dreams.

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Originally Posted by Rothgar

Anyone who has had a lucid dream just laughs at the suggestion they are regular dreams, the science notwithstanding. Those who have never had one might think that, simply out of ignorance. The difference to me is basically dreaming vs alternate reality. Anyway, someone could assert reality does not exist and you are just dreaming reality. How do you disprove that? And in the end, does it really matter?

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Here, here! This discussion made me think of this except from The Matrix:

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Being the One is just like being in love. No one can tell you you're in love, you just know it. Through and through. Balls to bones.

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when you have a *real* lucid, you just know.

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Originally Posted by Rothgar

Anyone who has had a lucid dream just laughs at the suggestion they are regular dreams, the science notwithstanding. Those who have never had one might think that, simply out of ignorance. The difference to me is basically dreaming vs alternate reality. Anyway, someone could assert reality does not exist and you are just dreaming reality. How do you disprove that? And in the end, does it really matter?

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I think the only thing that matters is your own experience.
If you feel that you become lucid, and that you understand that you are dreaming and use the dream to improve your waking life, then I would call that a lucid dream.
And waking life could probably be considered a dream as well, since it is constructed by our brain the same way as dreams.

It quite depends on quality of lucid dream. There are lucid dreams in which we are conscious as if we were in reality and there are lucid dreams from which recalling your doubting if you were the dreamer inside dream or whether it was real experience.

From personal experience with WILDs n' friends i can say that Malcolm's theory is not quite true :D
I'il give example for that:
*NOT INTENTIONAL DEILD ATTEMPT*
- Sleeping and having regular non-lucid dream
- Peacefully woken up from sound of message that my cellphone got
- I decide to remain motionless and keep eyes shut
- I'm listening to tinnitus aswell
- Suddenly i hear sound of something similar to wind
- I noticed that i can partially see my room thru blanket
- I'm attempting to get up out of bed
- My body is getting up on it's own slowly OOBE Style :D
- I've gotten up
- ...And so the story goes on...
When i woke up i recalled that experience same way i would recall something that happend irl.
No gap in consciousness would rather disprove lucid dreamins being mere dreams of being lucid :yeah

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Originally Posted by Barry

How can you disprove this argument:

Professor Norman Malcolm goes on to say that the only criterion of the truth of a statement that someone has had a certain life is the person saying so. Malcolm further describes reality as absurd and impossible, recalling as an example, "I became aware that I realised I was living, became aware that I was affecting the course of my life, and then became aware that I woke myself up by telling myself to wake up.

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Fixed.

On a more serious note; while you're lucid dreaming you are aware, the same way you are or even more so than while awake. If you are just dreaming about being lucid than you don't have the same awareness, you just think you're in control without your conscious self actually controlling anything.

A normal dream is like you are looking through yourself from far away. In a lucid dreaming you are completely present within yourself like you are during waking moments.

Of course there's no way for an outsider to see that (maybe it shows up in a brain scan) but I counter with this: what would disproving this pointless argument obtain other than more pointlessness?

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Originally Posted by Memm

Of course there's no way for an outsider to see that (maybe it shows up in a brain scan)

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Maybe? Please guys, if you are serious about how to prove lucid dreaming (well, if you are serious about lucid dreaming at all) you should check those links in my post back there. They show lucid dreaming is scientifically proven beyond any kind of doubt.

EDIT: I'm adding here a link to a brief interview with Dr. Ursula Voss that I just found. Here she acknowledges her past skepticism toward LDing and how now it is a scientifically proven fact.
http://www.lucidsage.com/interview-w...sula-voss-phd/

Well obviously something will show up in a brain scan but until we have the technology to map the entire consciousness all we really have is parts of the brain lighting up that we think are relevant.

That's a far cry from being able to measure what a person is really experiencing.

Clearly LDing is real, but then you better go and define reality while you're at it. =]

reality - WordReference.com Dictionary of English