Thread: The Meaning in dreams?

I am doing a research paper on the meaning of dreams. I strongly believe that dreams do have meaning. I believe they can be therapeutic and can reveal things about people that would not be realized in any other state of awareness.

I am running into a problem, though. Most everything I've looked up had to do with physiological studies of the brain- and why dreams would have limited or even no meaning at all.

I mean... dreaming isn't a clear phenomenon that can be studied in solely physical ways. It just seems like... scientists study every physical aspect of the brain and think they know everything there is to know about dreaming. I read in an article by Robert Wilkerson that there's kind of a "brain-mind" split and that the mind can't be physically studied like the brain.

I wanted to know if anyone possibly knew any resources that could refute some of the scientific statements made by these people, pertaining to dreams' meanings. I'm not trying to say that they're wrong about their research- all I'm saying is, there's more to dreaming than the physical aspects of the brain. I know that when it comes to dreaming, opinions are what we have to rely on. I'm not saying that's a bad thing- I think it's a great thing, because we can all hypothesize and come up with a million new theories, and never be completely right or wrong.

So basically, I guess I'm asking.... what are the known facts about dreams? What can we safely assume is true, and what aspects of dreaming are completely left to our own opinions?

Thanks!!

If you haven't already read it, I highly suggest reading "Exploring the world of Lucid Dreaming" by Stephen LaBerge. Its basically the bible of lucid dreaming. It has techniques, uses, physiological research, as well as what you're looking for. Certainly worth a look.

Sorry, I don't have any information that would state that dreams are into meaningless. But.. It makes sense that they are, which is why many people do not remember them. Oh sure there are dreams where there are important things to you, but that is only because you may be stressed out and it permeates into your dream world. Lucid Dreaming gives dreams real substantial meaning In my opinion.

Originally posted by TrumpetNerd
I am doing a research paper on the meaning of dreams. I strongly believe that dreams do have meaning. I believe they can be therapeutic and can reveal things about people that would not be realized in any other state of awareness.

I am running into a problem, though. Most everything I've looked up had to do with physiological studies of the brain- and why dreams would have limited or even no meaning at all.

I mean... dreaming isn't a clear phenomenon that can be studied in solely physical ways. It just seems like... scientists study every physical aspect of the brain and think they know everything there is to know about dreaming. I read in an article by Robert Wilkerson that there's kind of a \"brain-mind\" split and that the mind can't be physically studied like the brain.

I wanted to know if anyone possibly knew any resources that could refute some of the scientific statements made by these people, pertaining to dreams' meanings. I'm not trying to say that they're wrong about their research- all I'm saying is, there's more to dreaming than the physical aspects of the brain. I know that when it comes to dreaming, opinions are what we have to rely on. I'm not saying that's a bad thing- I think it's a great thing, because we can all hypothesize and come up with a million new theories, and never be completely right or wrong.

So basically, I guess I'm asking.... what are the known facts about dreams? What can we safely assume is true, and what aspects of dreaming are completely left to our own opinions?

Thanks!!

I just posted something elsewhere that seems also to apply here:

Originally posted by Belisarius
I had the concept of dreams as being a string of unstable, disconnected perception that our minds try to understand by impressing our a priori conceptions upon it. We dream of something entirely senseless, and then turn it into a familiar object. That is why dreams are usually in familiar places, with familiar people. We aren't equipped to make sense of dreams so we use our conceptions from waking hours and try to fit them onto the senseless flow of dream perception.

So then the interpretation of dreams can be thought of as finding out why your mind applies these a priori conceptions to the somewhat random flow of raw dream.

I know where you get this hypothesis from. Scientific Researchers, who are geared only for Quantitative Analysis and are not in the least equiped for Qualitative or Aesthetic Analysis suppose that Dreams are random firings of Nerve Cells. They suppose this because the can count firings of brain cells. They ignore Meaning because they cannot Quantify Meaning.

That is how nearsighted and myoptic Science is.

We KNOW Dreams have meaning.

Simply look at the Dreams of our New Japanese Friend in the Dream Interpretation Section and then try to convince us that Dreams are not Coherently Meaningful.

Now, you may have disordered Dreams, but this is because you have not yet established any progress in integrating your waking self into your Dream Self. Your Dreams seem disordered only because your Memory of what had happened was faulty and misfiring. With some experience in Dreaming, your Dreams can become just as Coherent as those of our Japanese Friend and many of our other Dreamers who would never suspect their Dreams of originating in random nerve end discharges.

The Scientific Community is simply incapable of examining all of the Uncontrolled Variables involved with discerning Qualitative and Aesthetic Meaning. There Reaction to this Inability is to deny Meaning alltogether. If they can't bean-count it then it follows that it does not exist.

Wow... thanks for all the replies!

I guess that's just the really good thing about dreaming- everyone can have their own opinions about it.

I don't think all dreams have meaning. Stephen LaBerge likens the dream to a poem. If you were forced to write six or seven poems every night of your life, not every one of them would be a masterpiece, not every one of them would have meaning. In fact, you'd expect most of them to be rather meaningless and lacking profound insight into your life.

I believe dreams have two main functions. One is so your brain can sort through all the information it's picked up during the day. Your brain is constantly bombarded by new sensory input and new information, and it needs some time to sit down and figure it all out. For example, if I memorize something before going to sleep, I find that upon awakening I can usually recall it pretty accurately, more so than I would have if I hadn't gotten any sleep at all.

The second function is to run a simulation of reality so that you can test and refine your behaviors. In a simulation you are in no danger of the consequences you so often experience in the physical world, so it is beneficial from an evolutionary standpoint to take advantage of the inactive time spent sleeping (necessary because warm-blooded animals such as ourselves expend a lot of energy while awake) running such simulations. We are able to learn from our expected reactions to behaviors that we test out, which helps us in our waking lives to avoid things which might threaten our survival.

But sometimes in putting all this information together, and combining it with our perceived notions of how the world works, our brains hit upon amazing insights and construct a story that sheds a lot of light on the problems in our lives and how to solve them. Just the other week I had a dream (you can read it in my journal) with a long and coherent plot structure, involving my escape from a ship of apathetic isolated individuals to a utopia where everybody accepts each other and shares what they have to offer. I pondered this dream for several days before I hit upon what I believe it to really mean. The ship represents my life as it is now. I am isolating myself from others and this is causing me great distress; I am not giving what I have to offer to other people and as a result they are not doing the same for me. The man who I killed because he was trying to stop my escape from the ship represents my fears and my anxieties about others which cause me to be so introverted and isolated. The utopia that I went to represents my vision of a future life in which I am more open and accepting of others, and they act the same for me. It was quite a deep and brilliant piece of fiction if I may say so myself.

But such dreams are in the extreme minority. For example, the other night I dreamt I was eating candy in my bed, and it fell beneath the bed. I was quite distressed at this, and in my anger dropped the rest of my candy. I got down on the floor to search for the candy, and discovered it was too dirty and dusty to eat. If somebody can explain any kind of profound meaning for that dream, I'd be quite impressed.