Thread: An idea for having Lucid Dreams the scientific way

Already been attempted: http://www.dreamviews.com/community/...ad.php?t=80074

Granted, this was one person, it wouldn't be unreasonable to try it out yourself to see if I H8 Reality made errors somewhere.

I cannot accurately comment on the validity of this claim; however, I can point you to an article from which this hypothesis is proclaimed: Here.

Apparently, Voss et al. (2009) have shown that lucid dreaming is associated with EEG activation different to non-lucid dreaming and waking consciousness. It is said to lay between the two aforementioned states, where there is 40hz more power in 'the frontal regions' than in non-lucid dreams. This may explain why lucidity is often lost to non-lucidity or waking consciousness.

Wehrle et al. (2005; 2007) found that in lucid dreams frontal areas were highly activated compared to non-lucid dreams, but that this also included higher activation in temporal and occipital sites too.

Thus, as of now, it would appear to be unclear which specific areas elicit lucidity - indeed, correlation does not imply causation. However, such results do, at least, indicate which areas are involved in some fashion.

Hurr, even if we pinpointed a "lucidity center," that "lights up" whenever you are lucid, it doesn't mean that stimulating it will produce lucidity. That's like saying stimulating your occipital lobe will cause you to see, or stimulating your Brocha's area will cause you to speak. But that's not how the brain works. There's more involved, here. I'll describe speaking to illustrate my point. First, you must already be thinking about something (frontal lobe), then you think about what you're going to say (frontal lobe, Wernicke's area, Broca's area), the words you'll use (Wernicke's), and whether or not you're really going to say it (frontal lobe, and if you choose to speak, thalamus, then cerebellum and Broca's).

And what I described is a general outline of speech. If you stimulated those spots in the brain, even in order, I doubt you'd end up with speech, simply because the conscious mind wouldn't know why it was being stimulated. You'd end up hallucinating (hearing voices, most likely) and maybe babbling a nonsense syllable or two, as your mind tried making sense of the spontaneous stimulation.

If getting someone to utter anything via brain stimulation is that difficult, think how implausible it is to stimulate someone into speaking a specific sentence!

Similarly, think of how hard it would be to stimulate someone into thinking a specific thought! There's a web it has to go through, highly coordinated, spread over parts in the entire cerebrum, and the specific path (though the term "path" is misleading. It's more like a series of paths running simultaneously, and multiple sets of paths can lead to the same spot.) to a specific thought is different, specialized in each person.

Even if you stimulated their "center of awareness," they wouldn't have an idea as to why they're feeling enlightened/aware, so, much like a drug trip, they'd hallucinate a reason.

And thank evolution for that! Thank evolution for this complexity, this security system. I'd find it highly, incredibly unnerving if we were ever to find a way to electronically, instantly induce specific thoughts.

Originally Posted by Abra

Hurr, even if we pinpointed a "lucidity center," that "lights up" whenever you are lucid, it doesn't mean that stimulating it will produce lucidity. That's like saying stimulating your occipital lobe will cause you to see, or stimulating your Brocha's area will cause you to speak. But that's not how the brain works. There's more involved, here. I'll describe speaking to illustrate my point. First, you must already be thinking about something (frontal lobe), then you think about what you're going to say (frontal lobe, Wernicke's area, Broca's area), the words you'll use (Wernicke's), and whether or not you're really going to say it (frontal lobe, and if you choose to speak, thalamus, then cerebellum and Broca's).

And what I described is a general outline of speech. If you stimulated those spots in the brain, even in order, I doubt you'd end up with speech, simply because the conscious mind wouldn't know why it was being stimulated. You'd end up hallucinating (hearing voices, most likely) and maybe babbling a nonsense syllable or two, as your mind tried making sense of the spontaneous stimulation.

If getting someone to utter anything via brain stimulation is that difficult, think how implausible it is to stimulate someone into speaking a specific sentence!

Similarly, think of how hard it would be to stimulate someone into thinking a specific thought! There's a web it has to go through, highly coordinated, spread over parts in the entire cerebrum, and the specific path (though the term "path" is misleading. It's more like a series of paths running simultaneously, and multiple sets of paths can lead to the same spot.) to a specific thought is different, specialized in each person.

Even if you stimulated their "center of awareness," they wouldn't have an idea as to why they're feeling enlightened/aware, so, much like a drug trip, they'd hallucinate a reason.

And thank evolution for that! Thank evolution for this complexity, this security system. I'd find it highly, incredibly unnerving if we were ever to find a way to electronically, instantly induce specific thoughts.

Stimulating my occipital lobe might not immediately cause me to see, but it would certainly make it a little easier to analyze the impulses on my optic nerve, no?

Originally Posted by Abra

Hurr, even if we pinpointed a "lucidity center," that "lights up" whenever you are lucid, it doesn't mean that stimulating it will produce lucidity. That's like saying stimulating your occipital lobe will cause you to see, or stimulating your Brocha's area will cause you to speak. But that's not how the brain works. There's more involved, here. I'll describe speaking to illustrate my point. First, you must already be thinking about something (frontal lobe), then you think about what you're going to say (frontal lobe, Wernicke's area, Broca's area), the words you'll use (Wernicke's), and whether or not you're really going to say it (frontal lobe, and if you choose to speak, thalamus, then cerebellum and Broca's).

And what I described is a general outline of speech. If you stimulated those spots in the brain, even in order, I doubt you'd end up with speech, simply because the conscious mind wouldn't know why it was being stimulated. You'd end up hallucinating (hearing voices, most likely) and maybe babbling a nonsense syllable or two, as your mind tried making sense of the spontaneous stimulation.

If getting someone to utter anything via brain stimulation is that difficult, think how implausible it is to stimulate someone into speaking a specific sentence!

Similarly, think of how hard it would be to stimulate someone into thinking a specific thought! There's a web it has to go through, highly coordinated, spread over parts in the entire cerebrum, and the specific path (though the term "path" is misleading. It's more like a series of paths running simultaneously, and multiple sets of paths can lead to the same spot.) to a specific thought is different, specialized in each person.

Even if you stimulated their "center of awareness," they wouldn't have an idea as to why they're feeling enlightened/aware, so, much like a drug trip, they'd hallucinate a reason.

And thank evolution for that! Thank evolution for this complexity, this security system. I'd find it highly, incredibly unnerving if we were ever to find a way to electronically, instantly induce specific thoughts.

This is true, however we already can influence specifics. They've shown in a lab setting that by hooking up electrodes to the brains of bugs and stimulating certain areas, they can 'remote control' the bugs and make them go left or right, up or down, but pushing a few keys at a computer.

Originally Posted by ExoByte

This is true, however we already can influence specifics. They've shown in a lab setting that by hooking up electrodes to the brains of bugs and stimulating certain areas, they can 'remote control' the bugs and make them go left or right, up or down, but pushing a few keys at a computer.

Wouldn't they be stimulating something akin to a primitive cerebellum? So what they're doing is knee-jerking their way into specifics?

I guess we could make someone say something by that method, much more easily than the method I outlined. . . But it wouldn't be a cognitive change.

Yeah, stimulating visual areas results in the subject perceiving random streaks of colour etc.

Originally Posted by Quark

Yeah, stimulating visual areas results in the subject perceiving random streaks of colour etc.

If my visual area is not working, I probably won't see anything. If you get current flowing, and the area activates, I am able to see again.

If my logical area is not working due to sleep shutdown, I will likely be irrational and not realize inconsistencies in the dream around me. If the logical areas are stimulated and begin working again, then doesn't it follow that using logic becomes possible again?