brain state during dreams

[gib65]

I guess this falls under the category of philosophy so I'm posting it here (sorry to the mods if this is inappropriate).

 

I had a thought the other day:

 

During our dreams, we can perceive ourselves in situations that are bizzare and fantastic yet think nothing of it. I once had a dream that there was a camel in my living room and I shrugged my shoulders about it as though that was normal. The brain must release some kind of chemical when we're sleeping that subdues the parts of our brains associated with shock and surprise so that they are inactive. If this is so, it means that our brains are capable of being in a state in which they can witness amazing and extraordinary things and not recognize that they are indeed amazing and extraordinary. If this is so, what if dreams were not the only time the brain could be in this state. What if amazing and extraordinary things were happening all around us all the time, and the brain naturally blocks them out. What if we are constantly in the midst of natural laws being violated but our brain are in such a state that they brush them off without realizing what we just saw?

 

This is just something to think about. I don't really believe in this, but it is interesting to contemplate anyway. What do others think?

[The Peon]

My belief is that dreams are ways for your mind to "imprint" ideas, experiences and every single piece of "data" your mind might have perceived as important during the day in a story telling way. Consciously, you have no idea what to make of the stories, That camel in your living room might be your brains way of recording the entire experience you might have had meeting a girl that day. Your brain records it this way so that when you attempt to access that memory, you have extra pathways in your nuerons to access that memory and experience. I believe that to be the main function of dreaming. A simple way for the brain to imprint and store knowledge in a regenerative fashion, and "clear the slate" for the next days learning and experiences.

 

As for the brain blocking things out that you may have witnessed, that actually does occur, especially during traumatic experiences. The funny thing is, the brain also imprints permanently many details of such experiences as well as block them out.

 

Animals dream as well, and thus I would not draw the conclusion that we can see extraordinary things and forget them until we dream. My dog barks often when he dreams, and I would expect no less. Does he dream of seeing a T-Rex and only musters the courage to bark at it when dreaming? Or does he go on a "hunting trip" in his mind as a way of patternizing his existence? I would guess the latter.

 

If you want to hear crazy.. I used to believe dreaming was a way to access other dimensions and universes, sort of like a mental wormhole. But that is clearly science fiction in my opinion and I no longer believe that.

[LucidDreamer]

I use to believe that the main purpose of dreams was to reorganize memories from the day, but I have been paying attention to my dreams lately and I have found that some of my dreams have nothing at all to do with anything that I did that day. I am starting to believe that dreams might have another purpose. I think that dreams may be a way for the brain to recalibrate itself and reestablish an equilibrium of neurotransmitters. The stimuli of the dreams are just a form of standard to guide the process.

 

To answer your question, during dreams the brain shuts down parts of itself in order to facilitate its maintenance. Perhaps one the parts that it shuts down is important for recognizing events that are extraordinary or out of place. This is important for sleep because those types of images would likely trigger an alarm state that would wake us. Of course, you could be right when you say that this is caused by the release or regulation of a specific neurotransmitter or chemical.

 

I'm not sure what I think of your idea about our brains purposely hiding the truth from us. What would be its reason for doing this? Of course, our brain fools us all the time though. It takes upside down images and makes us think they are right side up, it makes us believe that we are an individual unit when we are really a colony of cells, etc.

[Royston]

That camel in your living room might be your brains way of recording the entire experience you might have had meeting a girl that day.

 

That dribble coming from your chin it's so ...so becoming

 

I think dreams are a collection of random thoughts, scenes and memories put into a narrative so they piece together and make sense, just as you try and make sense of reality when you're awake.

 

Obviously as dreams are in your head, the events are much more random as they don't follow an external system. This makes the brain put it into some kind of order and why dreams are so randomn but realistic.

 

I can't be sure of your premise...but if there are strange events happening around us that we're not aware of, we all seem to be doing ok...despite that emu, that insists on urinating on my sofa.

[ThatOneIdea]

Yes, darn that emu! Anyway, I too believe dreams are just our minds making sense of random thoughts, fears, or desires we think about while we sleep. Of course, dreams are also affected by obsessive thoughts and/or feelings we have. Such as if someone is severely depressed, they might have a dream of a suicidal nature... Dreams can also be affected by important memories or just, anything of any important nature. I'm not saying that I know exactly what I'm talking about, but these are just some of my opinions.

[insane_alien]

i always thought dreaming was your mind taking a "mental dump". chucking all the useless stuff and filing away all the good stuff that you experienced during the day.

i have simple dreams, like when i'm a ghostbuster.

[Phi for All]

This is just something to think about. I don't really believe in this, but it is interesting to contemplate anyway. What do others think?

I'm taking this from the OP to mean, "What do others think of MY theory?" not "What do others think dreams are all about?"

 

In What the Bleep Do We Know? they brought up historical references (I don't have them) that suggest when Christopher Columbus sailed up to islands who's natives had never seen a European caravel sailing ship before, they simply didn't see it. They knew something was out there coming closer but their brains couldn't make sense of what they saw and therefore showed them nothing visually. It wasn't until they could see men on board that a frame of reference became available and they were able to "see" the ships that carried them.

 

Perhaps we see amazing things all the time and feel premonition-like feelings, but have no logical frame of reference and therefore dismiss it as irrelevant. This could account for many supernatural experiences and feelings.

[Royston]

Perhaps we see amazing things all the time and feel premonition-like feelings' date=' but have no logical frame of reference and therefore dismiss it as irrelevant. This could account for many supernatural experiences and feelings.[/quote']

 

I wonder if this has any relevance as to why a high percentage of young children hallucinate, as they learn more about the world around them there's almost a conditioning of reality that makes them less open to suggestion. If the natives had the concept of large ships explained to them, then I should imagine they would see them with no problem at all.

 

I'm still under the ascertain that this is simply a matter of the mind, otherwise we wouldn't function correctly. If people are 'open' to believe in the paranormal then they're much more likely to experience 'spooky' phenomena.

[YT2095]

a Hypothesis of mine is that in order to stay in one place (bed) without input of any sort, we`de rapidly become bored out of our skulls!

we "day dream" during class or on long car trips when ther`s little mental input.

and so I recon we dream as a way to keep ourselves in this sleep state without getting bored so our bodies can fix up and re-generate.

we undergo sensory deprivation during this time, so what a better opportunity than to dream un-hindered?

 

just a thought

[gib65]

That sounds pretty plausible, YT2095. Snail's hypothesis could also be plausible if he could back up his statement:

 

a high percentage of young children hallucinate.

[Royston]

It was actually just something I heard, so apologies for being so bold. However I found a website 'The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry' that covers that normal children hallucinate, unfortunately you have to pay for the full journal, which I'm not prepared to do for the sake of my credibility. I've just been posting a load of tosh recently. Excuse me while I bang my head against the wall until I hallucinate.

[BobbyJoeCool]

When you dream, you go through 4 stages, and then REM sleep in about 90 minutes (which is why 90 minutes of sleep is better than 120). In stage one, you are only really half alseep (you can appear awake when you're in this stage). Your brain waves change as you go from stage to stage. Basically, from awake through stage four, your brain waves become less powerful. The alpha waves when you're awake indicate a quite active brain whereas the delta waves while in stage 4 are, while still active, much less active brain.

 

As you hit different stages of sleep, different parts of your brain "turn off." The entire time you're asleep, you're still at least sub-consciously aware of the environment around you. This is why you don't often roll out of bed, or smother the person your sleeping next to (unless you're intoxicated). Also, the whole time you're asleep, the part of your brain that recognizes someone saying your name is still there. If someone says your name, you process this and your brain wakes you up.

 

But for instance, I don't remember which stage it was, but I think it was in stage 4, where your non-vital motor functions shut down. In REM sleep, you get the same activity in your brain you do as you're awake, except your brain has essentially cut off the central and peripheral nervous systems (only keeping life support functions like heartbeat and breathing). The neurons in your brain are still firing just as much as when you're awake. It's just that it's firing with little input... So, random memories surface (some you may not even remember, but are still stored). and the "dreams" are your brain attempting to make sence of all the psudo-random firing in your brain. Which is why, many times, dreams seem disjointed and complelty random. Although, sometimes, your brain can actually put things together to seem non-random.

 

And, the reason most people experience things in their dreams that have something to do with something that happened to them recently (ie: have a test comming up, so they dream about it), is that those thoughts/feelings are on the surface, and easier to get to (so the "random" firing is more likely to hit it...).

 

As for daydreaming... when you start to daydream, think back... Think backwards on how you go to thinking about whatever it is you were thinking about. Usually, it's you see, hear, taste, feel, or especially smell something that reminds you of something else with leads you to think about something else and so on... kindof like a converstaion about "nothing" can go from one thing to something entirely different.

 

If you mean the type of daydream where you're completely distracted (like when you're having problems) and you're trying to figure out how to get through them... It's more important to you at the time than whatever you're trying to pay attention to (like my Calculus teacher). So, you think about it instead of what you "should" be, because it's more pertinant to you.

 

Anyway (I don't swear by this 100%, but probably 95%), I hope this helps. I "stole" most of this out of my various psychology classes I've taken.

[gib65]

I heard a theory one time that when the brain is in a dream state, it fires signals back to the primary sensory areas. That is, the normal path signals take when they are processed in the primary sensory areas and go to higher processing areas is reversed. Therefore, you get a truly vivid experience that can be as wild and random as your imagination will allow, because, really, it is literally coming from your imagination. Is there any truth to this?

[BobbyJoeCool]

I heard a theory one time that when the brain is in a dream state, it fires signals back to the primary sensory areas. That is, the normal path signals take when they are processed in the primary sensory areas and go to higher processing areas is reversed. Therefore, you get a truly vivid experience that can be as wild and random as your imagination will allow, because, really, it is literally coming from your imagination. Is there any truth to this?

 

Your brain is active, as if you are awake. Your brain is sending signals to different sensory parts of your brain, but not the motor part of your brain (hence why when you're running in your dream, you aren't running here in the real world). You are getting signals from the Thalmus (sensory switchboard) that are not coming from your sensory neurons (ie your sences). Your brain prosesses these signals, and transmutates it into a psudo-coherent "story" in which you are an interactive part (although, most of the time, you really have no control over what you do). But, your brain is, in essence, disconected from the motor neurons which would allow you to actually move. So, in a dream, you pick something up... your brain is sending the same signal to your arm (so you think your arm is moving), but the signal gets cut off, and doesn't actually get there... but since your "sences" in a dream don't come from your sensory neurons, you don't know the difference.

 

But, YT, although his is a little oversimplified, pretty much has it. day dreams and night dreams are somewhat different (because you don't interact with your daydreams), it's the same concept... random memories, smells, tases, etc. surface, and your brain tried to make sence of it...