Dreams and Dreaming

[DrmDoc]

Is dreaming a type of imagined experience or is it something more substantial? If dreaming is anything more than imagination, could dreams truly be substantially meaningful or relevant experiences? As wanderings of an idle mind, what we imagine is meaningful to us on some level. Although frequently not time well spend, our imagination could be a source of insight, innovation, and stress relief. Einstein, whose "thought experiments" produced extraordinary insights, is a great example of meaningful and relevant imagination. However, evidence in brain study suggests that dreaming is likely not imagination.

 

Imagination is a consciously directed activity of a wakeful brain, whereas, dreaming appears to be the random and directionless activity of a sleeping brain. Although it occurs amid sleep, dreaming isn't sleep. EEG and PET studies of the dreaming brain suggest that it is as active as a waking brain. Because dreaming involves a brain as active as one that is consciously awake and aware, dreaming could be categorized as an altered state of consciousness amid the sleep process. However, there is evidence suggesting that dreaming is more than the hippie trip of an idle mind amid sleep. Rather than random and directionless, dreams are perhaps more meaningful, relevant, and directional than a majority of us may perceive given how little many of us care to know about their exact origin and nature. This is not the stuff of Freud or Jung, who both missed the mark considerably. If you have interest, I welcome your thoughts.

Edited September 9, 2010 by DrmDoc

[Nivetha]

i need to know a lot about dream.... what is a dream?how does it occur?what is its reason?

[DrmDoc]

i need to know a lot about dream....what is a dream?

Relative to the sleep process, a dream is the memory of perceptual experiences amid the sleep process. Dreams are how our conscious, waking-state brain interprets the influences our sleeping brain experiences when it becomes aroused to nearly wakeful levels of activity during sleep.

 

how does it occur?

Dreaming occurs when our sleeping brain becomes active, after its deepest stage of sleep, upon the onset of a state of released muscle tone called atonia. When our brain become active in this state, it is essentially wakeful and it begins to do what it was evolved to do and that is to perceive, process, and respond to detectible levels of external and internal sensory or neural information or stimuli. The memories of experience during sleep that we recall as dream upon waking begins to form during the arousal process as our conscious brain reinstate its full sensory link to physical/material reality via our physical sensory systems. That incoming physical/material sensory information stimulates those areas of the brain associated with memory, which leads to an integration of the purely mental experience of dream-sleep with physical/material experience. That integration is what gives our dreams the form and substance that enables our memory of them, which is like converting a liquid into a solid.

 

what is its reason?

The reason why we dream is a product of brain evolution. Sleep was likely first adapted as a means to conserved energy during periods of inactivity and rest. As those periods began to lengthen, our animal ancestors evolved a way to sustain the viability of more vital physical systems by reducing energy to systems not in use, which was muscle-readiness. Upon the release of muscle-readiness (atonia) amid sleep, physical systems such as the brain, heart, and lungs experience an uptake in energy devotion and usage. This uptake of energy by the brain amid sleep causes the arousal in the brain that awakens the perceptual processes that inspire our dreams. This process is akin to a smoldering ember that is reignited by a blast of air. With dreams, the smoldering embers of our thought processes are reignited during sleep by the blast of energy uptake amid sleep at the onset of atonia. The persistent affects of our aroused thought processes during sleep are given shape and substance by our awakening brain and become the dream experiences we remember upon our arousal to consciousness. I hope this helps.

Edited April 13, 2011 by DrmDoc

[Doc. Josh]

Dreams could possibly be the true subconscience of ones own thoughts, just in "story" mode. And maybe if we learned to listen more than we speak then we might learn great things from our dreams, Or possibly even learn faster.

[random]

Actually dreaming is a form of psychosis though it's not considered psychotic because we are able to differentiate between what is real and imagined. That's not to say it is not a highly creative state, More than one person has been able to solve all the worlds problems in a be it medical or drug induced psychosis. It Seems your brain during sleep or psychosis goes into overdrive and you think faster but you can only cling to and remember a few fleeting thoughts the rest are dismissed You only remember the 1 just before you wake.

 

Numerous studies have been done on tapping into the subconcious the problem is it is very difficult to control the information because you must enter a sleep like or trance like state, This is the same reason information retrieved through hypnosis is taken with a grain of salt, quite often the recalled memories are false memories created by the brain because of the situation.

 

However if a person designs a new invention and say's "it came to me in my sleep" well there is a prime example of increased creativity while dreaming. Trying to develop the ability to switch from this "dream" state to awake state is delicate grounds I have heard of some sleep cycle a chap developed basically involving what we would consider sleep deprivation however the theory is the body adapts (hog wash) More than 1 person lapsed into psychosis from the lack of sleep although upon recuperation alot of them had gained an increased insight ( common with brief reactive psychosis) similar to a person who achieves a spiritual awakening.

 

So I would say yes you can very much tap into increased creativity while asleep but playing around with stimulants and sleep deprivation in order to " dream at will" is likely gonna cause a whole lot of problems. years of meditation may give you the same effect as well.

[thinker_jeff]

The characteristic of dreaming has not been a scientific subject yet, despite of what the famous scholars said.

 

The first reason is that we cannot get empirical data about dreaming content. Scientifically, all of the empirical data have to be repeatable by independent researchers. How can you repeat the same dream like that?

The sencond, we have no theoretical reference about the awaking brain by which we can understand how scientifically brain activitis relate to human mind. How can we understand the dreaming brain without a theory of brain activitis?

 

 

 

[SMF]

There is a lot of opinions here regarding dreaming sleep. Yes it is sleep. For some science, here is a link to a simple Google Scholar search.

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?start=0&q=sleep+dream+brain+function&hl=en&as_sdt=0,5

SM

[zapatos]

I don't yet understand this very well, but it seems it is not uncommon for people who lose their vision to hallucinate. It seems that the brain expects visual input to process, and if it doesn't get that visual data it makes something up.

 

I'm wondering if the process of dreaming is any way related. The brain receives data all day long and then that input is suddenly shut off. Is it possible the brain is inventing data in a similar fashion to the way it is invented for people who have lost their vision?

[thinker_jeff]

There is a lot of opinions here regarding dreaming sleep. Yes it is sleep. For some science, here is a link to a simple Google Scholar search.

 

SM, I am talking about the characteristic of dreaming, which OP called imagination or meaningful experience. I don't see any scientific results about dreaming content from the search.

[SMF]

Jeff, I don't think that there has ever been any scientific analysis of dream content that reliably related it to any purposeful thought process, but I wouldn't mind being proven wrong. I do think that all the creativity and meaningful content relative to dreams has been generated by awake minds in retrospect. At least, this is what I gleaned from a conversation with a sleep researcher sometime back. I do know that there is a lot of speculation about this topic, but speculation alone is not science. Just go back to the Google Scholar search and start playing with the search terms, maybe there is something really interesting in the scientific literature. SM

[DrmDoc]

Dreams could possibly be the true subconscience of ones own thoughts, just in "story" mode. And maybe if we learned to listen more than we speak then we might learn great things from our dreams, Or possibly even learn faster.

Dreaming is a product of the unconscious rather than a subconscious. Further, as a state of mentation, the subconscious does not exist. The normal and undamaged brain produces two states of brain function suggestive of mentation: conscious and unconscious. Conscious describes the normal state of brain function when we are actively and outwardly engaged in directed wakeful behaviors. The unconscious state of mentation is suggested by the activations in the brain amid REM (rapid eye movement) sleep and the reports of perceptual experiences associated with the observed REM. Unconscious is the preferred description of the REM state because its associated perceptual experiences occur without outwardly visible behaviors, other than REM, that we can associate with conscious or waking-state mentation. Subconscious merely describes either an influence or product of mentation rather than a state of mentation or brain function.

 

Actually dreaming is a form of psychosis though it's not considered psychotic because we are able to differentiate between what is real and imagined. That's not to say it is not a highly creative state, More than one person has been able to solve all the worlds problems in a be it medical or drug induced psychosis. It Seems your brain during sleep or psychosis goes into overdrive and you think faster but you can only cling to and remember a few fleeting thoughts the rest are dismissed You only remember the 1 just before you wake.

Although the random and surreal nature of dreams gives them the appearance of psychosis, that view is merely evidence of the limit level of insight that most individuals, including psychiatrist and cognitive scientist, have about the neurological nature of the dream state and dream production.

 

Numerous studies have been done on tapping into the subconcious the problem is it is very difficult to control the information because you must enter a sleep like or trance like state, This is the same reason information retrieved through hypnosis is taken with a grain of salt, quite often the recalled memories are false memories created by the brain because of the situation.

Although it occurs during a stage of the sleep process, EEG and PET studies of dreaming suggest that it is neither sleep nor a trance-like state. Also, our ability to distinguish an experience as a dream when we awake is a product of the arousing sensory processing functions of our brain as it arouses to consciousness from the sleep state.

Dreaming is also not akin to hypnosis, which is an effect of a conscious mind. Dreaming is an effect of unconscious activationsmeaning activations without a direct external or consciously directed cause or influencein the brain amid the sleep process. In addition, the dream memories we recall upon waking from sleep are not false; they are a true reflection of what we believe we experienced amid sleep. The distinction is that these memories form during our arousal from sleep as a result of how our brain evolved memory. In a nutshell, memory evolved as an advantage of true physical/material experience. Because dreaming occurs during a partial sensory disconnect from true physical/material experience, certain brain areas associated with memory formation do not become active amid dreaming. Our memories of having dream forms during arousal form sleep as those brain areas associated memory and physical experience awaken. Our dream memories fade quickly because their experience is not concurrent with the real physical/material sensory experiences that promote memory.

 

So I would say yes you can very much tap into increased creativity while asleep but playing around with stimulants and sleep deprivation in order to " dream at will" is likely gonna cause a whole lot of problems. years of meditation may give you the same effect as well.

Although dreams have been referenced as a source of profound insight throughout recorded human history, the neural evidence suggestive of how the brain evolved to dream further suggests that creativity and insight is not the purpose of or reason why we dream.

 

The characteristic of dreaming has not been a scientific subject yet, despite of what the famous scholars said.

The first reason is that we cannot get empirical data about dreaming content. Scientifically, all of the empirical data have to be repeatable by independent researchers. How can you repeat the same dream like that?

Have you visited this site, which is devoted to quantitative sources of dream study: http://psych.ucsc.edu/dreams/

 

The sencond, we have no theoretical reference about the awaking brain by which we can understand how scientifically brain activitis relate to human mind. How can we understand the dreaming brain without a theory of brain activitis? SM, I am talking about the characteristic of dreaming, which OP called imagination or meaningful experience. I don't see any scientific results about dreaming content from the search.

There are theories but none that are cogent. The reason, as I perceive, is that these theories have little to no basis in how the human brain evolved to produce mind function. Mind, as I learned while researching for a book I wrote about the dreaming brain, is the environment of cognitive activity within the brain that arises from brain function. A mind is quantified as existent in a brain, as I also learned, by a brain's functional ability to integrate divergent sources of sensory information through a process that produces behaviors independent of instinct.

 

Essentially, a mind enables proactive over and above reactive behaviors. The human brain gained this capacity during its thalamic stage of evolution. The thalamus, with its right and left hemispheric configuration, inspired cortical development. Its evolution gave our animal ancestor the rudiments of mind and the ability to override their instincts.

 

I don't yet understand this very well, but it seems it is not uncommon for people who lose their vision to hallucinate. It seems that the brain expects visual input to process, and if it doesn't get that visual data it makes something up. I'm wondering if the process of dreaming is any way related. The brain receives data all day long and then that input is suddenly shut off. Is it possible the brain is inventing data in a similar fashion to the way it is invented for people who have lost their vision?

Dreaming isn't a product of hallucination or imagination and dreams are not products of creative brain processes. Dreaming is an interpretive brain process. During the early stages of sleep, our brain enters increasingly lower stages of activation until the onset of atonia when it arouses to wakeful levels of activation. The effect of this, as I described in prior comments, is akin to the smoldering embers of a fire that reignites after a burst of air. Lowering stages of brain activation amid sleep doesn't suggest total deactivation but do suggest a continuation or persistence of brain processes. Among those processes are those associated with perceiving, interpreting, and responding to sensory or neural stimulation. At the onset of dream-sleep, those processes intensify as though flames aroused from embers. As we awake from sleep and our brain arouses to consciousness, the persistent affects of those inflamed thought processes amid dreaming are given shape and substance by their integration with physical/material sensory information resulting from the arousal in the brain associated with its increased sensitivity to tactile and aural sensory information arriving from our arousing array of physical senses.

There is a lot of opinions here regarding dreaming sleep. Yes it is sleep. For some science, here is a link to a simple Google Scholar search.

Actually, it is not sleep; it is a condition of increased brain activation, suggestive of arousal, that occurs amid the sleep process.

 

I do think that all the creativity and meaningful content relative to dreams has been generated by awake minds in retrospect. At least, this is what I gleaned from a conversation with a sleep researcher sometime back. I do know that there is a lot of speculation about this topic, but speculation alone is not science.

The content of dreams are indeed meaningful because they are interpretations of experience, albeit a purely mental experience. The incongruent and surreal nature of dreams merely gives them the appearance of irrationality and irrelevance to waking-state experience. That appearance is caused by the conscious way we perceive and interpret experience, which is a linear/literal process. Dreaming, like conscious thought processes, is a non-linear/non-literal process. Like thought, our dreams move quickly from subject to subject and envelop concepts and perceptions of experience. Although we may experience physically and materially descriptive dreams, they are experiences that occur entirely within a mental context. As such, the meaning dream imagery conveys is mental; e.g., imagery of pizza is descriptive of a mental food, dream houses describe mental structures, and running in dreams suggests a mental effort to avoid or arrive at some mental eventuality. When we evaluate our dream experiences in their proper mental context, their meaning and relevance becomes clearer and can be more cogently associated with our conscious cognitive experience.

 

 

 

Edited April 13, 2011 by DrmDoc

[random]

It's all theory we don't KNOW for certain we just hypothesize Since this is a science forum I will stand by my statement medical professionals concur with that dreaming is indeed a form of psychosis it is not a close minded view by the medical profession it is the closest and soundest theory we have. However keep posting please I am viewing with an open mind. You make some sound arguments.

 

sorry I meant logical arguments. It's still theory. I love theory. We would never get anywhere if everyone agreed.

[SMF]

DrmDoc:

 

Science is a process whereby unexplained phenomena are studied by making logical hypotheses for explanatory mechanisms and then test them by making observations under varying conditions. This process is worthless if the results are not published in a form that allows others to replicate your observations and do more research to advance the knowledge. You are making assertions regarding a phenomenon without providing any scientific basis. Just because your ideas seem to make sense doesn’t mean that they have any relationship to reality. I could claim that dreaming is just an epiphenomenon of housekeeping and data processing organizational functions required for our complex biological computer brain to keep track of reality, and this has just as much validity as what you are saying because I also have no data to support this. So far, what you are asserting is all just opinion, not science, and without the science part there is no way for anyone to evaluate what you say and no way for knowledge to progress. You are just offering your opinion on a website dedicated to science.

 

One of the truths regarding the scientific investigation of brain function that was established many years ago with the abandonment of, for example, Phrenology, was that trying to infer interior mechanisms of the brain on the basis of simple observations of the output of the brain is not at all productive and very, very rarely accurate. What you say may or may not have some relationship to reality, but you have provided no rigorous way to evaluate it. If you have some replicable evidence, publish it and tell us about it. If you wish to just express your opinions, find a dream opinion site to have fun with.

 

SM

 

 

[DrmDoc]

It's all theory we don't KNOW for certain we just hypothesize Since this is a science forum I will stand by my statement medical professionals concur with that dreaming is indeed a form of psychosis it is not a close minded view by the medical profession it is the closest and soundest theory we have. However keep posting please I am viewing with an open mind. You make some sound arguments.

 

sorry I meant logical arguments. It's still theory. I love theory. We would never get anywhere if everyone agreed.

Indeed, some cognitive professionals do consider dreaming a form of psychosis. Whether that assessment is valid is dependent on how those professionals define psychosis and whether dream content actually supports that definition. What convinces you, based on those professional assessments, that dreaming evidences psychosis?

 

DrmDoc:

 

Science is a process whereby unexplained phenomena are studied by making logical hypotheses for explanatory mechanisms and then test them by making observations under varying conditions. This process is worthless if the results are not published in a form that allows others to replicate your observations and do more research to advance the knowledge. You are making assertions regarding a phenomenon without providing any scientific basis. Just because your ideas seem to make sense doesn't mean that they have any relationship to reality. I could claim that dreaming is just an epiphenomenon of housekeeping and data processing organizational functions required for our complex biological computer brain to keep track of reality, and this has just as much validity as what you are saying because I also have no data to support this. So far, what you are asserting is all just opinion, not science, and without the science part there is no way for anyone to evaluate what you say and no way for knowledge to progress. You are just offering your opinion on a website dedicated to science.

 

One of the truths regarding the scientific investigation of brain function that was established many years ago with the abandonment of, for example, Phrenology, was that trying to infer interior mechanisms of the brain on the basis of simple observations of the output of the brain is not at all productive and very, very rarely accurate. What you say may or may not have some relationship to reality, but you have provided no rigorous way to evaluate it. If you have some replicable evidence, publish it and tell us about it. If you wish to just express your opinions, find a dream opinion site to have fun with.

 

SM

 

Ok, then let us proceed to the peer reviewed science. Which assertions do you consider to be merely opinion and lacking in a scientific basis?

Edited April 14, 2011 by DrmDoc

[thinker_jeff]

Have you visited this site, which is devoted to quantitative sources of dream study: http://psych.ucsc.edu/dreams/

 

 

Sorry, that is a disqualified source, which has the paper not being peer reviewed and no empirical data to be tested.

[SMF]

Here are a few things I would like citations for. You say-

 

Although it occurs amid sleep, dreaming isn't sleep. EEG and PET studies of the dreaming brain suggest that it is as active as a waking brain. Because dreaming involves a brain as active as one that is consciously awake and aware, dreaming could be categorized as an altered state of consciousness amid the sleep process.

 

Just because the brain is as active during dreaming sleep as it is in a waking brain does not, by itself, indicate that dreams are not an integral component of sleep. Please justify your assertion with citations. I am not asking for research on brain activity, but for a scientific paper where these data are analyzed and the dreaming activity was declared not a component of sleep.

 

Relative to the sleep process, a dream is the memory of perceptual experiences amid the sleep process.

 

This statement is very unclear, but it seems to say that dream images are memories. I would be very interested in seeing some published data.

 

Dreaming is an interpretive brain process.

 

By what method was this established what is being interpreted, and who did the work?

 

When we evaluate our dream experiences in their proper mental context, their meaning and relevance becomes clearer and can be more cogently associated with our conscious cognitive experience.

 

What is the proper mental context, what was the clear meaning and relevance that was discovered, and where is it published?

 

Also please elaborate on the "thalamic stage of evolution." Who coined this term? SM

Edited April 14, 2011 by SMF

[DrmDoc]

Sorry, that is a disqualified source, which has the paper not being peer reviewed and no empirical data to be tested.

Either you misuderstood or, perhaps, my reply wasn't clear. That particular site was portal where you may find links to quantitative, peer reviewed dream studies on the Web. That site was one of several that occurred to me as a reply to your comments. Here is another:

 

http://www.asdreams.org/

 

Regarding the "...characteristic of dreaming has not been a scientific subject yet...", which I perceive as a reference to the functional study of the dreaming state, may I also suggest a Google Scholar search--Keyword: Dream state.

With just a little serious interest, you will find that there has been and continue to be numerous scientifically based studies dedicated to the serious investigation of dreams and the dream state in brain function. There are some here who claim to be scientist without respect for religion; however, science is the religion of the individual who takes the position of belief in a general scientific perspective without a serious independent investigation of that perspective, which was likely rendered by those who have not engaged in an earnest and concerted study of the subject.

 

My impression from the comments I've received is that most here have formed opinions based on their subjective experience or cursory study. Belief in a generalized perspective of dreams and dreaming without earnest study is faith and religion rather than science. As I have tried to convey, there isn't any assertion that I've made in my comments defining the nature of dreams and dreaming that is not supported by varifiable scientifically conducted and accepted neural evaluations of the dream state in brain function. Disagreement without clearly referencing what we find disagreable and why is merely agrumentative and an unproductive use of our words and time.

[thinker_jeff]

Regarding the "...characteristic of dreaming has not been a scientific subject yet...", which I perceive as a reference to the functional study of the dreaming state, may I also suggest a Google Scholar search--Keyword: Dream state.

With just a little serious interest, you will find that there has been and continue to be numerous scientifically based studies dedicated to the serious investigation of dreams and the dream state in brain function. There are some here who claim to be scientist without respect for religion; however, science is the religion of the individual who takes the position of belief in a general scientific perspective without a serious independent investigation of that perspective, which was likely rendered by those who have not engaged in an earnest and concerted study of the subject.

 

You have the reasoning backward. I don't need to convince you that no qualified research can be found regarding to scientific characteristic of dreaming. Just like if I said there is no perpetual motion machine, I don't need to search for one.

If you think there are qualified papers supported your claim, please give me a direct link - one is enough.

[DrmDoc]

Just because the brain is as active during dreaming sleep as it is in a waking brain does not' date=' by itself, indicate that dreams are not an integral component of sleep. Please justify your assertion with citations. I am not asking for research on brain activity, but for a scientific paper where these data are analyzed and the dreaming activity was declared not a component of sleep.[/quote']

If you will review my comments, you will find that I did not say "dreams are not an integral component of sleep." What I did say is that "dreaming involves a brain as active as one that is consciously awake and aware" and because of that activity "dreaming could be categorized as an altered state of consciousness amid the sleep process." How you construed my comments to suggest that dreaming was not a component of sleep is curious since I clearly referenced the state as occurring "amid the sleep process", meaning within or during the sleep process. However, I did say that dreaming was not sleep, meaning—as I'm sure you understood given your restriction on functional evidence—that the dreaming brain, during that functional state, behaves like a brain that is not sleeping. Since I made no declaration of dreaming a not being a component of sleep, there is no research to provide.

This statement is very unclear, but it seems to say that dream images are memories. I would be very interested in seeing some published data.

Although I believe this perspective was more clearly conveyed in earlier comments, what I essentially tried to convey is that dreams are the memories we have after waking from sleep of perceptual experiences we perceive as having occurred while we were sleeping. Although there are papers associating dreaming with memory consolidation, those are not what I believe you are requesting. Your request seems to regard dream images as memories themselves, which is not the perspective I was conveying or supporting. The images we recall as dreams are not themselves memories but are rather interpretations of perceptual experiences believed to have occurred during the sleep process. Therefore, there are no papers to provide on your request unless your interest is memory consolidation and dreaming. However, here's one:

 

http://www.sciencedi...9906831af9c5839

 

By what method was this established what is being interpreted, and who did the work?

It's called the Activation-Synthesis Hypothesis and was first postulated by J. Allen Hobson back in 1977. Based on experiments he preformed, Hobson observed activations in the pontine brainstem (PGO spikes) that stimulated higher midbrain and forebrain structures and the synthesis and interpretation of these internally generated neural signals. Here is a link to his earliest work:

http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/abstract/134/12/1335

 

And more recent links referencing his work: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1978372/

 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19750916

 

http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/abstract/138/7/904

 

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6WD0-4D6YVM1-9&_user=10&_coverDate=06%2F30%2F1992&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=gateway&_origin=gateway&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1718718956&_rerunOrigin=scholar.google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=82814b654c33e316dd1c7eb287c37ffc&searchtype=a

 

http://74.125.155.132/scholar?q=cache:sq216n-9NYwJ:scholar.google.com/+activation-synthesis&hl=en&as_sdt=0,39

 

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6WD0-45NJR99-D&_user=10&_coverDate=09%2F30%2F1995&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=gateway&_origin=gateway&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1718722004&_rerunOrigin=scholar.google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=eda912de8d514520283fcf01b28f2dde&searchtype=a

 

Although I provide these link as an example of the available science, I do disagree with some aspects of Hobson's theories as it pertains to the specific role of those PGO spikes.

 

 

What is the proper mental context, what was the clear meaning and relevance that was discovered, and where is it published?

My statement here regards what the functional science in total suggests about the nature of dreaming rather than a specifically published work. Hobson's work alone suggests that dreams are a result of internally generated synthesized neural signals. My comments are based on similar works that frame the dream state as a construct of the mind. So, do you really require a specific paper to tell you that your dreams occur within your mind and, therefore, should be characterized as mental expressions? I don't think I need to provide proof that dreams are mental experiences that occur in a mental context when that has been clearly establish by the entirety of human experience. So, I won't waste your time or mine.

 

Also please elaborate on the "thalamic stage of evolution." Who coined this term?

The most well known theory of brain evolution is The Triune Brain Theory, which makes no specific reference to a thalamic stage of evolution. The "thalamic stage etc" was not a coining of term but rather a descriptive reference to the evolutional emergence of an important brain structure. To clarify, my reference to the thalamus simply stated that ancestral animals appear to have gained the rudiments of mind function when the thalamus emerged in their brain structure. As I stated, that perspective was based on what I learned from the research I gathered and reviewed for a book I wrote about the dreaming brain. That research involved cross-species analysis of decorticate, decerebrate, brain injury, and abnormal brain development studies that suggested the evolutional hierarchy of the brain. Those studies showed that the thalamus is positioned atop other brainstem structures that decrease in functional sophistication contiguously from thalamic base to the spinal brain, which conversely suggest the contiguous evolution of our central nervous system from its most primitive to its most recent structures. The thalamus likely gave ancestral animals the rudiments of mind because it was likely the first and remains the primary structure in the contemporary brain where sensory integration occurs.

 

Among the research I gathered and considered:

http://www.ncbi.nlm....0?dopt=Citation

http://www.jneurosci...869.full?ck=nck

http://www.ncbi.nlm....5?dopt=Citation

http://www.ncbi.nlm....4?dopt=Abstract

http://www.nal.usda....elfare/Rose.pdf

http://www.ncbi.nlm....0?dopt=Abstract

http://onlinelibrary...370411/abstract

 

Also Inclusive of but not limited to:

 

Siegel A, Brutus M: Neurosubstrates of aggression and rage in the cat. In A.N. Epstein & A.R. Morrison (Eds.): Progress in psychobiology and physiological psychology (pp 135-233), San Diego, 1990, Academic. (citation-hypothalamus)

Whishaw, IQ: The decorticate rat. In B. Kolb & R.C. Tees (Eds.): The cerebral cortex of the rat, Cambridge, 1990: MIT Press. (anticipatory)

 

Overmier JB, Hollis KL: Fish in the tank: Learning, memory, and integrated behaviour. In R.P. Kesner & D.S. Olton (Eds.): Neurobiology of comparative cognition (pp 205-236), Hillsdale, 1990: Lawrence Erlbaum. (anticipatory)

 

Gallistel CR: The organization of action: a new synthesis, Hillsdale, 1980: Lawrence, Elbaum (anticipatory fish)

 

Rose JD: The Neurobehavioral Nature of Fishes and the Question of Awareness and Pain. Reviews In Fisheries Science, 2002; 10(1):1-38. (anticipatory fish)

 

Miceli MO, Malsbury CW: Sagittal knife cuts in the near and far lateral preoptic area-hypothalamus disrupt maternal behaviour in female hamsters. Physiol Behav., 1982; 28(5):856-67. (anticipatory habituation hamster/hypothalamus)

 

Oakely DA: Performance of decorticated rats in a two-choice visual discrimination apparatus. Behav Brain Res., 1981; 3(1):55-69. (decorticate rat)

 

Moore JW, Yeo CH, Oakley DA, Russell IS: Conditioned inhibition of the nictitating membrane response in decorticate rabbits. Behav Brain Res., 1980; 1(5):397-409.

Büchel C, Dolan RJ, Armony JL, Friston KJ: Amygdala-Hippocampal Involvement in Human Aversive Trace Conditioning Revealed through Event-Related Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging. The Journal of Neuroscience, 1991; 19(24):10869-10876.

 

Dr. William H. Moorcroft: Heightened arousal in the 2-week-old rat: the importance of starvation. Developmental Psychobiology,14(3):187 – 199, "?" (hyperactivity)

Numan M, Morrell JI, Pfaff DW: Anatomical identification of neurons in selected brain regions associated with maternal behavior deficits induced by knife cuts of the lateral hypothalamus in rats. The Journal of Comparative Neurology, 237(4):552 – 564, 1985. (hypothalamus)

 

Villablanca JR: Counterpointing the functional role of the forebrain and of the brainstem in the control of the sleep-waking system. J Sleep Res., 2004; 13(3):179-208. (mesencephalon transaction)

 

Shewmon DA, Holmes GL, Byrne PA: Consciousness in congenitally decorticate children: developmental vegetative state as self-fulfilling prophecy. Dev Med Child Neurol., 1990; 41(6):364-74.

 

Sutherland RJ, McDonald RJ, Hill CR, Rudy JW: Damage to the hippocampal formation in rats selectively impairs the ability to learn cue relationships. Behav Neural Biol., 52(3):331-56, 1989. Erratum in: Behav Neural Biol., 1990; 54(2):211-2. (hippocampus)

 

Skinner DM, Martin GM, Harley C, Kolb B, Pridgar A, Bechara A, van der Kooy D: Acquisition of conditional discriminations in hippocampal lesioned and decorticated rats: evidence for learning that is separate from both simple classical conditioning and configural learning. Behav Neurosci., 1994; 108(5):911-26. (hippocampus lesions)

 

Whishaw IQ, Kolb B: Decortication abolishes place but not cue learning in rats.

 

Behav Brain Res., 1984; 11(2):123-34. (hippocampectomy)

 

Jouvet M, Jouvet D: A Study of the Neurophysiological Mechanisms of Dreaming. Electroenceph Clin Neurophysiol., Suppl. 24 (1963).

 

Jouvet M: Neurophysiology of the States of Sleep. Physiological Reviews, 1967; 47(2):117-177.

 

Jouvet M, Jouvet D: A Study of the Neurophysiological Mechanisms of Dreaming. Electroenceph Clin Neurophysiol., Suppl. 24 (1963). (Pontine transaction)

 

Dement W, Kleitman N: The relation of eye movements during sleep to dream activity: an objective method for the study of dreaming. J Exp Psychol., 1957; 53:339-346.

 

Aserinsky E, Kleitman N: Regularly occurring periods of eye motility, and concomitant phenomena, during sleep. Science, 1953; 118:273-274.

 

Sherrington SC: Decerebrate Rigidity and Reflex Co-ordination of Movements. Journal of Physiology, 1898; 22: 319-332.

 

Jouvet M, Michel F, Courjon J: Sur un stade d'activité é]ectrique cérébrale rapide au cours du sommeil physio]ogique. CR Soc Biol., 1959; 153:1024-1028.

 

Bard P: A diencephalic mechanism for the expression of rage with special reference to the sympathetic nervous system. Am J Physiol., 1928; 84:490-515.

 

Cannon WB, and Britton SW: Studies on the conditions of activity in endocrine glands. XV. Pseudoaffective medulliadrenal secretion. Am J Physiol., 1925; 72: 283-294.

 

Grill HJ, Norgren R: Neurological tests and behavioral deficits in chronic thalamic and chronic decerebrate rats. Brain Res., 1978; 143(2):299-312.

 

Tyler KL, Malessa R: The Goltz–Ferrier debates and the triumph of cerebral localizationalist theory. Neurology, 2000; 55:1015-1024. (Grill & Ferrier)

 

Scoville WB, Milner B: Loss of recent memory after bilateral hippocampal lesions. J Neuropsychiatry Clin Neurosci., 1957; 12(1):103-13.

 

 

The links and articles I provided, in addition to more recent research, are just a small sampling of the publications I reviewed in preparation for my book and in support of my perspective. As I learned, understanding dreams isn't necessarily about their content but is rather more about a confluence of diverse research suggestive of the various neurolgical components of dreaming.

 

 

 

Edited April 15, 2011 by DrmDoc

[DrmDoc]

You have the reasoning backward. I don't need to convince you that no qualified research can be found regarding to scientific characteristic of dreaming. Just like if I said there is no perpetual motion machine, I don't need to search for one.

If you think there are qualified papers supported your claim, please give me a direct link - one is enough.

Fine. Here are several links among hundreds more to the quantitative dream state studies that, according to your comments, did not exist:

 

http://www.springerlink.com/content/g253350226366857/

http://www.neurology.org/content/65/7/1010.short

http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/summary/11/5/519

http://journals.lww.com/jonmd/Abstract/1987/04000/Do_Dreams_Reflect_a_Biological_State_.2.aspx

http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=5006964

http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/missing?orig=%2fsmpp%2fcontent%7edb%3dall%7econtent%3da793424000&triedmissing=true

http://www.sciencedi...ca&searchtype=a

http://www.springerl...446x7678k16738/

http://www.sciencedi...5d&searchtype=a

http://www.nature.co...abs/nrn915.html

http://www.springerl...56g5u8w26528rt/

 

Although I did not review the content of these in detail, these links are provided as evidence of the continuing quantitative investigation of dreams and the dream state that can be found on the Web with just a cursory Google Scholar search for those who have serious interest. Keywords: quantitative dream state.

Edited April 15, 2011 by DrmDoc

[thinker_jeff]

Although I did not review the content of these in detail, these links are provided as evidence of the continuing quantitative investigation of dreams and the dream state that can be found on the Web with just a cursory Google Scholar search for those who have serious interest. Keywords: quantitative dream state.

 

If you haven't read these in detail, you shouldn't ask me to read anyway. Do you think that your time is more valuable than mine?

I can read the qualified research papers in full text for discussion, same as what I did for SM in another topic. However, if I felt someone not scientifically serious in discussion, I wouldn't spend my time for that.

[DrmDoc]

If you haven't read these in detail, you shouldn't ask me to read anyway. Do you think that your time is more valuable than mine?

I can read the qualified research papers in full text for discussion, same as what I did for SM in another topic. However, if I felt someone not scientifically serious in discussion, I wouldn't spend my time for that.

 

The tenor of this line of discussion is clearly argumentative and a waste of our time. Your original comments regarded no evidence of scientific studies of dreaming. Although I did not review each link in detail, I did review each for their relevancy to some quantitative scientific study of dreams and dreaming and they are indeed evidence. You have only to say whether they are or are not after a similar review and nothing more. Although you may choose not to do what I have done, which was a overview for relevancy to some quantitative scientific content in response to your comments, these link stand in contradiction to your position and general knowledge on this particular aspect of this subject.

Edited April 15, 2011 by DrmDoc

[thinker_jeff]

The tenor of this line of discussion is clearly argumentative and a waste of our time.

If you said that your answer is in a huge libray, it would be a waste of time for sure.

 

Your original comments regarded no evidence of scientific studies of dreaming.

That was not what I said. My comment was no qualified scientific studies for characteristic of dreaming which explains if dream is imagination or meaningful experience.

[DrmDoc]

If you said that your answer is in a huge libray, it would be a waste of time for sure.

It is a waste of my time when I obtain and review requested evidence in a discussion and that evidence is rejected out-of-hand without the slightest courtesy of a similar review.

 

That was not what I said. My comment was no qualified scientific studies for characteristic of dreaming which explains if dream is imagination or meaningful experience.

OK. So that there will be no excuses on your part or unqualified evidence provided on my part, what do you consider "qualified scientific studies" and what do you mean by "characteristic" of dreaming?

[thinker_jeff]

OK. So that there will be no excuses on your part or unqualified evidence provided on my part, what do you consider "qualified scientific studies" and what do you mean by "characteristic" of dreaming?

 

The qualified scientific study is typically published in creditable scientific journals, such as Journals of Coginitive Neuroscience. It should be peer reviewed by creditable scientists in the field. And it can hold up against independent re-test.

The characteristic of dreaming defines if the dream is illogical imagination, or regular imagination, or meaningful combination of the experience, etc.