DREAMS & DREAMING II

[DrmDoc]

17 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

Well, all right. Then I'm limited and selfish, because I'm not volunteering to turn my psyche inside-out for a potential understanding of the universe. I don't see how that's going to be accomplished through dream content, but I'll be interested to learn the results. Meanwhile, if the aliens make contact, I'm happy to mash some potatoes.

Although dream content regards our psychology, not all dreams are about the deep dark recesses of the unconscious.  One may have a dream that advances our society and insight without harm to one's psyche.  My reference to a universe of potential insight isn't about aliens but rather about the infinite nature of that potential insight.

[Peterkin]

I don't believe anything human can be infinite. I think we have limits, both individually and speficially, just as bees and rhesus monkeys have theirs. We don't know where those limits are, exactly, as regards outward reach, but we've had intimations in the last century or so, that we may be within touching distance of the wall. I'm at peace with that; would never have expected anything else, but a lot of people will never accept it. That's okay, too; it never hurts to try to extends one's capabilities... well, sometimes it does hurt, but that's a different discussion.

What I have a problem here is:

3 hours ago, DrmDoc said:

My reference to a universe of potential insight isn't about aliens but rather about the infinite nature of that potential insight.

What does that mean in practical terms? Insight into what, exactly? Which part or aspect of the universe? I mean, it's big, and mostly alien, so how is a dream - composed of remixed images from a single life experience, in one oblivious human's head going to interact with the universe? I guess I just don't get the application, even before questioning the methodology.

[DrmDoc]

22 hours ago, Peterkin said:

I don't believe anything human can be infinite. I think we have limits, both individually and speficially, just as bees and rhesus monkeys have theirs. We don't know where those limits are, exactly, as regards outward reach, but we've had intimations in the last century or so, that we may be within touching distance of the wall. I'm at peace with that; would never have expected anything else, but a lot of people will never accept it. That's okay, too; it never hurts to try to extends one's capabilities... well, sometimes it does hurt, but that's a different discussion.

Agreed, humans are finite but I can't agree that the potential insight available to humans is also finite.  If I did, I'd be like that idiot Lord Kelvin who proclaimed around the turn of last century "That there's nothing new to be discovered in physics."  Obviously, Kelvin was wrong.  The trove of insight available to humans may only be limited by human imagination, which has frequently proven to be boundless.

22 hours ago, Peterkin said:

What does that mean in practical terms? Insight into what, exactly? Which part or aspect of the universe? I mean, it's big, and mostly alien, so how is a dream - composed of remixed images from a single life experience, in one oblivious human's head going to interact with the universe? I guess I just don't get the application, even before questioning the methodology.

Again, with clarity, my use of "universe" in my phrasing was not a reference to aliens or the universe itself.  My phrasing of "universe" was as a "metaphor" for how I view the vast or expansive nature of the potential insight I believe would be available to us through the focus of our unconscious eye.   

Edited November 7, 2022 by DrmDoc

[Peterkin]

1 hour ago, DrmDoc said:

My phrasing of "universe" was as a "metaphor" for how I view the vast or expansive nature of the potential insight I believe would be available to us through the focus of our unconscious eye. 

Again I ask: into what? Not the actual universe; more than the human mind.... What does the metaphor represent?

Where is this vastness you want to look into? What is it you want to explore?

[DrmDoc]

19 hours ago, Peterkin said:

Again I ask: into what? Not the actual universe; more than the human mind.... What does the metaphor represent?

Where is this vastness you want to look into? What is it you want to explore?

That metaphor references everything humanity does not yet know, which is limitless in my opinion.  My specific interest isn't as much about exploration as it is about enhancing what I already know.

[Peterkin]

3 hours ago, DrmDoc said:

My specific interest isn't as much about exploration as it is about enhancing what I already know.

 So what you're trying to accomplish by consciously accessing your own dreams is to find out what-all you already know, but forgot that you knew?

Okay. I guess that's no different form the therapeutic use of hypnosis. 

Whatever we don't know about the universe will have to wait on the universe to reveal. 

[DrmDoc]

1 hour ago, Peterkin said:

 So what you're trying to accomplish by consciously accessing your own dreams is to find out what-all you already know, but forgot that you knew?

No, I'm not accessing my dreams to find what I may already know or have forgotten.  My goal is to expound on what I already know about mind, consciousness, the unconscious, and brain function. My study of dreams--not just my own--and the dreaming brain are one means among several that I have chosen to reach that goal.  In my attempt to reach that goal, I have become convinced that our unconscious may have access to an immense amount of sensory afference (experience data), which could provide immeasurable insight that has escape our conscious awareness.  The only way we may consciously access that insight--what we know and are capable of knowing--is through a better understanding of how this insight manifests through dreaming and dream content.    

1 hour ago, Peterkin said:

Okay. I guess that's no different form the therapeutic use of hypnosis.

I don't particularly endorse hypnosis, I think it is more harmful than helpful.  However, there's considerble evidence supporting its theurapeutic benefit and there are some who are believed by many to have gained access to considerable amounts of insight, which they could not possibly know or gain otherwise ( See Edgar Cayce).  I'm still on the fence about that last bit.

Edited November 9, 2022 by DrmDoc

[Peterkin]

2 hours ago, DrmDoc said:

.  My goal is to expound on what I already know about mind, consciousness, the unconscious, and brain function.

I wish you success in your endeavour.

[DrmDoc]

Greetings All,

If you’re familiar with my postings in this Psychology Forum under MIND & CONSCIOUSNESS, you may understand my perspective on the precarious nature of our mental stability.  Therefore, I urge that you not become too obsessed with your dream experiences as that may askew your perspective on experiences of real consequence to your life and wellbeing.

Dreams & Meaning continued—In prior comments, I describe dreaming as our brain’s interpretive response to the sensory stimuli it perceives as we sleep.  That stimuli focuses our unconscious perception in ways that can produce a miriad of dream experience.  Also, in previous comments, I further described our dream content as interpretations of mental affects.  However, that last description is imprecise.

A more precise description of what our dream content interprets is suggest by our brain’s interpretive processes.  Those processes likely involve a comparison of sensory afference (input) with memory data.  Essentially, our brain assesses our current sensory experiences by comparing those experiences with its library of similar past experiences.  From this perspective, dream content is a comparative assessment of the unconscious impact of our sensory experiences in sleep.

I may have further to discuss on this topic. I welcome your comments and continued interest.

Edited November 14, 2022 by DrmDoc

[iNow]

58 minutes ago, DrmDoc said:

A more precise description of what our dream content interprets is suggest by our brain’s interpretive processes.  Those processes likely involve a comparison of sensory afference (input) with memory data.  Essentially, our brain assesses our current sensory experiences by comparing those experiences with its library of similar past experiences. 

Does this differ in any meaningful way(s) from how we experience existence while awake? 

Life could be a dream, sweetheart… 🎶 🎵 🎶 

[DrmDoc]

22 minutes ago, iNow said:

Does this differ in any meaningful way(s) from how we experience existence while awake? 

Life could be a dream, sweetheart… 🎶 🎵 🎶 

Excellent question! The only meaningful difference is the purely mental state of our existence when we are dreaming.  When we are awake and aware, physical reality and material concerns dominate our brain's cognitive focus.  When we're dreaming, our cognitive focus isn't as limited by physical experience as it is when we are awake.

[iNow]

54 minutes ago, DrmDoc said:

When we're dreaming, our cognitive focus isn't as limited by physical experience as it is when we are awake.

That’s helpful. Most stimulus comes from within while asleep, whereas a higher percentage of stimulus comes from without whilst awake.

Same story telling / memory referencing neural architecture stitches those various stimuli into narratives though, I presume. 

Edited November 15, 2022 by iNow

[DrmDoc]

16 hours ago, iNow said:

That’s helpful. Most stimulus comes from within while asleep, whereas a higher percentage of stimulus comes from without whilst awake.

Same story telling / memory referencing neural architecture stitches those various stimuli into narratives though, I presume. 

There is this generally accepted perspective that the stimulus inspiring dream content emerges either wholely or partly from within the brain itself.  My study and view of brain function suggests that this generally accepted perspective isn't entirely accurate.  The view we should keep in mind is that dreaming and dream content are reactions to stimuli, which means that they are the efferent (output) product of some afferent (input) influence.

There's no doubt in my mind that dream content emerges from afferent influences that arrive in the brain through the thalamus via our body's sensory array.  We know that the thalamus is where all sensory data, other than olfactory, arrIves in the brain before reaching upper brain regions.  We also know from comparative animals studies that these upper regions remain inactive without a neural connection to the thalamus.  This neural configuration confirms the hierarchal dependency of upper brain function on the functional nature of our thalamus.

As the core and most primal aspect of brain structure, the thalamus is where our reflecsive and instinctive behaviors originate.  The thalamus doesn't necessarily engage a thought process as it does not appear to store the experience memories essential to that process.  Other than preprogrammed, reflecsive memory, the thalamus relies on the memory store and processes of upper brain regions to attenuate and refine our behaviroal responses--which are the qualities those regions add to our dream content. 

Nevertheless, there are no behaviroal responses without our brain's reception of stimuli, which infers that there's no dreaming without our thalamic reaction to sensory stimuli.  Given this view, it's more likely that all dreams emerge as a response to sensory stimuli in sleep that affects the thalamus--stimuli that is externally rather than internally generated.

[iNow]

I don’t know enough to comment one way or the other but that idea of dreams also being a response to external stimuli does push back against my priors.

It also gets fuzzy when trying to determine whether gut bacteria and viruses etc should get classified as internal or external, but it’s clear they too play a role in the functioning of our minds (asleep or awake).

The other stuff rings quite true for me, though. One of my professors used to say that all roads lead through thalamus.

[DrmDoc]

11 hours ago, iNow said:

I don’t know enough to comment one way or the other but that idea of dreams also being a response to external stimuli does push back against my priors.

It also gets fuzzy when trying to determine whether gut bacteria and viruses etc should get classified as internal or external, but it’s clear they too play a role in the functioning of our minds (asleep or awake).

The other stuff rings quite true for me, though. One of my professors used to say that all roads lead through thalamus.

It's true and I agree, these internal aspects and influences of the body do indeed affect brain function.  I agree that organisms and diseases that impair or influence brain function can and do affect the quality and content of our dreams.  However, IMO, these are all influences caused by factors that must somehow enter or influence the sensory systems afferently attached to the thalamus to stimulate dreaming--factors external to the brain itself.  

However, you've raised a compelling perspective, which I will further consider.

 

[DrmDoc]

Greetings All,

As an epilogue of sorts to this discussion, I want to clarify an assertion I've made regarding our dreams interpreting the stimuli our brain experiences in sleep.  I've asserted that our dreams are essentially interpretations of stimuli.  As I now consider, that assertion isn't entirely accurate.  More precisely, our dream experiences are comparative assessments of how we are mentally influenced or impacted by that stimuli.  As responses to the stimuli our brain experiences in sleep, our dreams reveal their source stimulus through imagery that interpret how we are mentally affected by that stimulus.  

To those who have shared their insight here, my sincere thanks.  

[geordief]

46 minutes ago, DrmDoc said:

Greetings All,

As an epilogue of sorts to this discussion, I want to clarify an assertion I've made regarding our dreams interpreting the stimuli our brain experiences in sleep.  I've asserted that our dreams are essentially interpretations of stimuli.  As I now consider, that assertion isn't entirely accurate.  More precisely, our dream experiences are comparative assessments of how we are mentally influenced or impacted by that stimuli.  As responses to the stimuli our brain experiences in sleep, our dreams reveal their source stimulus through imagery that interpret how we are mentally affected by that stimulus.  

To those who have shared their insight here, my sincere thanks.  

You think dreams are more a response to stimuli that  actually  occur  during the time we are asleep than a response to stimuli that have occured during the waking hours?

 

What kind of stimuli occur when we are asleep?(I have not gone back through the thread;perhaps you have already explained this there?)

[Lorentz Jr]

42 minutes ago, geordief said:

You think dreams are more a response to stimuli that  actually  occur  during the time we are asleep than a response to stimuli that have occured during the waking hours?

Depth psychologists tell us that most dreams have meaning on two or more levels simultaneously. Looking back on recurrent dreams I had during my younger years, they obviously represented my unconscious thoughts about important themes in my life at the time, and some individual dreams were just as obviously based at least in part on events of the previous day.

The only examples of dreams representing responses to immediate stimuli while the dreamer is sleeping that I can think of would be this and this. And even those dreams obviously have additional significance to the dreamer at one or more deeper level(s). 😉

Edited December 21, 2022 by Lorentz Jr

[geordief]

@DrmDoc sorry and disregard my last post.I see my question was answered from the outset of the thread.

 

It is a pretty dense (and oldish)  thread and so I may not plough through it just yet.

Maybe you are finished with it anyway?

10 hours ago, Lorentz Jr said:

The only examples of dreams representing responses to immediate stimuli while the dreamer is sleeping that I can think would  be this and this. 

Very good  😀

Edited December 21, 2022 by geordief

[DrmDoc]

18 hours ago, geordief said:

You think dreams are more a response to stimuli that  actually  occur  during the time we are asleep than a response to stimuli that have occured during the waking hours?

 

What kind of stimuli occur when we are asleep?(I have not gone back through the thread;perhaps you have already explained this there?)

In earlier discussions, I said that dreaming emerges as an effect of our brain's glymphatic processes in sleep that more efficiently remove consciousness suppressing chemistry (cellular waste, melatonin, etc.) from our brain.  As this chemistry deminishes, our sleeping brain becomes more sensitive and responsive to sensory afference, which is sensory stimulus external to the brain itself.  A contributor to this discussion, for example, described how sleeping with uncovered feet led to their dream about standing in water.  What happen during our wakeful life experiences influences our thoughts and those thoughts ultimately affect our sleep environment, position, and habits.  As our sleeping brain arouses and becomes increasingly sensitive to external stimuli, it becomes more responsive to the sensory effects of our sleep environment, position, and habits, as well as, those effects that ultimately impact the restful nature of sleep.

18 hours ago, Lorentz Jr said:

Depth psychologists tell us that most dreams have meaning on two or more levels simultaneously. Looking back on recurrent dreams I had during my younger years, they obviously represented my unconscious thoughts about important themes in my life at the time, and some individual dreams were just as obviously based at least in part on events of the previous day.

The only examples of dreams representing responses to immediate stimuli while the dreamer is sleeping that I can think of would be this and this. And even those dreams obviously have additional significance to the dreamer at one or more deeper level(s). 😉

I agree, our dreams are about more than how a stimulus influences our dream content, they're also about why that stimulus has had that affect.  As I have posted earlier, the aroma of a freshly baked apple pie may arouse our memories of an earlier time in our lives but it is those memories that explain why that pie aroma has had that effect. 

The meaning dream content conveys is indeed multilayered. Those layers are specific and aptly suggested by how I assess houses when they appear in dream content--they define both mental and social structures.

[DrmDoc]

Hello All,

It has been a while since I last added content to this discussion, so I thought I would add a bit more based on my evolving perspective of the dreaming brain. Remember these initials, E.I.A.I, as they will assist your better understanding of dreams, their content, and the dreaming brain.  Somewhere in my most recent ciscussion of brain funtion, I said the primary imperative of that function is homeostasis, which describes our brain's efforts to maintain its metabolic balance against the destablizing affects of our sensory experiences. Dreaming is one of those efforts our brain engages in sleep to stabilize its metabolic balance.

Dreaming is how our sleeping brain response to the resonant destabilizing affects of our life experiences.  Our dreams are Efferent Interpretations of the Afferent Impact an experience has had on our mental sense of self. In perhaps a break with how most mind scientists understand dream content, our dreams interpret effects rather than the causes of those effects.  It's analogous to interpreting a pain rather than the cause of that pain.  Rather than emerging from our direct experiences in sleep, dreams emerge from the resonant mental/emotional impact of those life experiences that persist amid the sleep state.  

If you have interest, I welcome yout thoughts.

 

[iNow]

9 minutes ago, DrmDoc said:

our dreams interpret effects rather than the causes of those effects.  It's analogous to interpreting a pain rather than the cause of that pain.  Rather than emerging from our direct experiences in sleep, dreams emerge from the resonant mental/emotional impact of those life experiences that persist amid the sleep state.  

I’m perfectly okay accepting this premise, but am not quite clear how it’s in any way different from how the brain operates when we’re awake and aware. Those interpretations too are all of effects and signals, are they not?

Basically, by my way of thinking, even “direct” experiences are themselves also indirect when considered through the lens of perception and how our minds make sense of each moment.

Hope you’re well and have enjoyed the holiday season. 

[DrmDoc]

21 hours ago, iNow said:

I’m perfectly okay accepting this premise, but am not quite clear how it’s in any way different from how the brain operates when we’re awake and aware. Those interpretations too are all of effects and signals, are they not?

Basically, by my way of thinking, even “direct” experiences are themselves also indirect when considered through the lens of perception and how our minds make sense of each moment.

Hope you’re well and have enjoyed the holiday season. 

Pardon this delayed reply but there are few whose perspective I enjoy reading and pondering as much as I do yours.  Indeed, there's a distinction between the brain responses that dreaming suggest and the responses of the awake and aware brain.  The conscious brain interprets the nature of its experiences by the physical/material impact of those experiences; e.g., cold is cold, light is light, and dark is dark, etc.  Conversely, the dreaming brain--through comparative imagery and experiences--interprets the residual mental/emotional impact of its experiences; e.g., cold, light, and dark describe mental/emotional effects. 

As some may already know, our brain responses while conscious are a counterbalances to the imbalance caused by experiences that directly emerge from and impact the sensory array of our body physical.  Amid the dreaming state, our brain responses are a counterbalance to the persistent neural effects of those experiences. Perhaps the most apt analogy is that life experience causes a type of neural-tinnitus within the brain and dreaming is our brain's effort to quell that malody by, in someway, quantifying its nature. 

My perspective is that our sense of self emerges from the thalamus and how it is impacted by its neural connections and exchanges.  In that perspective, our physical/material sense of self emerges from our thalamus' afferent neural connections, while our mental/emotional sense of self emerge from its efferent neural connections. In my model of brain function, dreaming comprises our thalamus' efferent neural connections and exchanges.

I am very well and in good spirit this holiday season.  Thanks so much for asking and I wish you the same.

[iNow]

No pardon needed and thanks for the reply.

I’m getting slightly hung up on how a mental emotional sense of self is supposed to differ from a physical material sense.

My first impression is that both types of self rely on the same underlying neurobiology and processes, but believe maybe you’re implying a relevant distinction between those events happening in the thalamus while awake versus those happening elsewhere in other brain regions while asleep. 

Is that reasonably well aligned with your thinking, or totally off base? Paths through thalamus triggered by outside stimuli (tactile, smell, sight, sound, etc.) whilst awake, whereas dreams whilst sleeping more involve activity along paths in non-thalamus regions… and these are triggered instead as part of a systematic attempt to return to homeostasis during the pruning/reinforcing of those synaptic paths?

Apologies if my language or terms here are remedial or misplaced. It’s been many years since any formal training in this space and I admittedly might be trying to shoehorn what you’re saying into my old outdated models of how the brain behaves.

[DrmDoc]

9 hours ago, iNow said:

No pardon needed and thanks for the reply.

I’m getting slightly hung up on how a mental emotional sense of self is supposed to differ from a physical material sense.

My first impression is that both types of self rely on the same underlying neurobiology and processes, but believe maybe you’re implying a relevant distinction between those events happening in the thalamus while awake versus those happening elsewhere in other brain regions while asleep. 

Is that reasonably well aligned with your thinking, or totally off base? Paths through thalamus triggered by outside stimuli (tactile, smell, sight, sound, etc.) whilst awake, whereas dreams whilst sleeping more involve activity along paths in non-thalamus regions… and these are triggered instead as part of a systematic attempt to return to homeostasis during the pruning/reinforcing of those synaptic paths?

Apologies if my language or terms here are remedial or misplaced. It’s been many years since any formal training in this space and I admittedly might be trying to shoehorn what you’re saying into my old outdated models of how the brain behaves.

I think you're quite close to my thoughts on this.  Both types do rely on the same neurobiology, but there's a difference I perceive in the process.  To begin, as you know, the interpretive aspects of brain function is an efferent process (top-down), which infers processes that do not engage without afferent stimuli (bottom-up). The top-down processes of brain function emerge from the upper regions of the brain beyond the thalamus, while the bottom-up processes emerge through and from the thalamus.  The difference between the responses of the awake and dreaming brain resides in whether the brain's top-down processes are a response to the stimuli that emerge solely from thalamus or the stimuli that traverse the thalamus from its external neural connections.

Other than olfactory, as you know, all sensory input must traverse the thalamus before entering the upper regions of our central nervous system.  When we are awake and aware, the responses of our upper brain regions are focused on stimuli traversing the thalamus as that stimuli may have a real physical/material impact on our wellbeing and sense of self.  Accordingly, stimili traversing those neural pathways through the thalamus' external neural connections are perceived and interpreted according to their literal impact.

Conversely, stimuli that emerge solely from the thalamus without a continuous neural link to that stimuli's external physical/material sources initiate a different efferent response from upper brain region. This type of stimuli is what I have termed in other discussions as the "resonant" neural affect of our life experiences.  It's like that ringing in our ears that we continue to hear long after the band has stopped playing.  Our thalamus continuously resonate from the affects or impact of our life experiences.  As that resonance enters the upper reponse centers of our brain amid the sleep state, it is as ill defined as that ringing in our ear without a sound source. Yet, as this resonance has a homeostasis destablizing affect, our brain responses in sleep (dreaming) emerge as a counterbalance to that persistent neural noise.  As a counterbalance, our sleeping brain has to generate a equivalent neural frequency (dreams) sufficient to cancel the impact of that persistent neural affect emerging from the thalamus amid the sleep state.  Dreaming is an equivalency process our brain engages amid sleep to match and, thereby, quell the neural resonance persisting in the thalamus from the affects life experience. 

When we are awake and aware, this equivalency process involves matching and engaging an appropriate response to external stimuli, which primarily involves physical, material and literal responses.  When we're dreaming, that process involves matching and engaging responses to soothe the thalamus rather than address some direct physical/material stimili.  In a sense, dreaming addresses something the brain perceives as indirect or abstract--the operants of mind and emotion.  I welcome your continued interest and insightful perspective.