Looking for: science and psychology of dreams

[Mayabird]

I was looking back over the weird dream thread and noticing how I seem to dominate it, so I tried to look up actual scientific and/or psychological information about dreams, how they occur, why they occur, what they might mean and so on. Unfortunately my little searches brought up so much weird crap that I'm not sure I want to continue looking on my own (I find something that looks kinda reasonable, but then it links to Yoga Spiritual Healing or some crap, and I just can't trust that).

So, I'm requesting info, preferably scientific, about dreams and dreaming. Anybody who brings up Freudian crap will get...umm...just leave out phallic symbolism and crap, okay? You know what I'm talking about.

Thanks.

[Stofsk]

So, I'm requesting info, preferably scientific, about dreams and dreaming. Anybody who brings up Freudian crap will get...umm...just leave out phallic symbolism and crap, okay? You know what I'm talking about.

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

My understanding of dreams is that they're random firings of neurons in your brain, which to me suggests they're only meaningful if you choose to interpret them that way. From what I recall of my high school psychology lessons, you dream alot during sleep but you only remember a few of the things you dream. You usually forget, so the weird ones or the unpleasant ones tend to stick out.

[Mayabird]

From what I recall of my high school psychology lessons, you dream alot during sleep but you only remember a few of the things you dream. You usually forget, so the weird ones or the unpleasant ones tend to stick out.

Now that makes a lot of sense. I know I don't have a perfect record of what I'm dreaming about, and weird stuff about cannibalistic cults, burning feet at gemstone shows, and Georgia turning into a savanna would stick out over boring random stuff.

I know that probably 99% of the dream interpretation stuff is crap, but couldn't it have some relation on what is on someone's mind a lot, which would be why it comes up in the random firings in the first place? For instance, my godfather-of-sorts was an avid bird watcher, and he had many, many dreams involving birds. I don't know how far one can take that, though.

[Stofsk]

From what I recall of my high school psychology lessons, you dream alot during sleep but you only remember a few of the things you dream. You usually forget, so the weird ones or the unpleasant ones tend to stick out.

Now that makes a lot of sense. I know I don't have a perfect record of what I'm dreaming about, and weird stuff about cannibalistic cults, burning feet at gemstone shows, and Georgia turning into a savanna would stick out over boring random stuff.

Dreams are interesting. I remember reading how time flows in the same way, so if you dream you're in a ten minute long car chase, it probably did take 10 minutes. Which says some interesting things about time and how we relate to it. (and how some people seem to have an 'internal' clock)

I know that probably 99% of the dream interpretation stuff is crap, but couldn't it have some relation on what is on someone's mind a lot, which would be why it comes up in the random firings in the first place? For instance, my godfather-of-sorts was an avid bird watcher, and he had many, many dreams involving birds. I don't know how far one can take that, though.

I suppose if certain things and events are on your mind then those neural pathways would be analogous to roads that are travelled regularly as opposed to roads off the beaten path. As such, even if the dream itself is random certain things keep cropping up - signs, symbols, places or people - and this is one of the ways you can recognise you're dreaming. You think of something specific and if you dream it your mind goes "Ah ha! I must be dreaming." At that point your dream becomes lucid and you can control what happens.

Your example about your godfather-of-sorts being an avid bird watcher and dreaming about birds isn't really coincidental. Simply put, he thinks about birds a lot, he's passionate about it - and so he dreams about birds.

[Mayabird]

Dreams are interesting. I remember reading how time flows in the same way, so if you dream you're in a ten minute long car chase, it probably did take 10 minutes. Which says some interesting things about time and how we relate to it. (and how some people seem to have an 'internal' clock)

Now that's just plain cool.

I suppose if certain things and events are on your mind then those neural pathways would be analogous to roads that are travelled regularly as opposed to roads off the beaten path. As such, even if the dream itself is random certain things keep cropping up - signs, symbols, places or people - and this is one of the ways you can recognise you're dreaming. You think of something specific and if you dream it your mind goes "Ah ha! I must be dreaming." At that point your dream becomes lucid and you can control what happens.

I'll have to try that with the recurring things in dreams. I don't normally notice such patterns, but I do remember one recurring dream where the second time, I recognized the bad door and made myself turn around and go the other way. Usually, though, I only recognize that I'm dreaming when really bizarre and bad stuff starts happening. When the hordes of zombies appear and I'm doomed, that's when it clicks.

Your example about your godfather-of-sorts being an avid bird watcher and dreaming about birds isn't really coincidental. Simply put, he thinks about birds a lot, he's passionate about it - and so he dreams about birds.

That's a better analogy. I didn't mean to imply that it was coincidental. I was thinking more statistically: If one thinks about X around Y% of the time, then X should come up in dreams about Y% of the time. Of course, that would also mean we dream about paying the bills, walking around the house, etc. a lot, but those would probably be the dreams we don't remember.


In case you were wondering and I haven't mentioned it before, he's my godfather-of-sorts because he filled that role, but it's just weird to call him a godfather when he was an atheist and being a godparent to an atheist. It just doesn't work. It's much like my cousins-of-sorts who are related to me via a gay marriage. Georgia doesn't recognize gay marriage, my one puny vote aside, so the exact legality of their family relationship to me is kinda fuzzy. Also, I stick them in a different class from my blood-relative cousins because they're much cooler people, but that's a different topic, as was this entire paragraph.

[Stofsk]

Dreams are interesting. I remember reading how time flows in the same way, so if you dream you're in a ten minute long car chase, it probably did take 10 minutes. Which says some interesting things about time and how we relate to it. (and how some people seem to have an 'internal' clock)

Now that's just plain cool.

It's been awhile since I've done high school psych - something like 7 years or more - but I remember a few of those things. That stood out to me enough that I remembered it, however, since I'm no psychologist there may be more to it than what I remember.

That's a better analogy. I didn't mean to imply that it was coincidental. I was thinking more statistically: If one thinks about X around Y% of the time, then X should come up in dreams about Y% of the time. Of course, that would also mean we dream about paying the bills, walking around the house, etc. a lot, but those would probably be the dreams we don't remember.

That's what I would think too.

*tangent*

Well even if you're both atheists doesn't mean that the term 'godfather' isn't applicable. Surrogate father fits but that confers onto it a more legal title than an emotional one.

[Hotfoot]

All I remember I've heard was something along the lines of it being a way to try and organize your short term memory into long term memory.

Personally, I don't dream often, or at least I don't remember it when I do. Maybe once a month I'll remember a dream, and it's usually involved with something that happened recently. Every once in a while, I will have an epic dream, a dream that feels like it lasts days, weeks, or even years. Sometimes they will be so vivid or so tied to real events that I have to question what actually happened from other people who were there.

[Batman]

Dreams are interesting. I remember reading how time flows in the same way, so if you dream you're in a ten minute long car chase, it probably did take 10 minutes. Which says some interesting things about time and how we relate to it. (and how some people seem to have an 'internal' clock)

Now that's just plain cool.

I'm not sure it's universal, though. REM sleep lasts only 90-120 minutes yet people repeatedly report having dreams that lasted (to them) for hours (I know I've had some of those). Maybe it's related to the internal clock (or absence thereof)?

That's a better analogy. I didn't mean to imply that it was coincidental. I was thinking more statistically: If one thinks about X around Y% of the time, then X should come up in dreams about Y% of the time. Of course, that would also mean we dream about paying the bills, walking around the house, etc. a lot, but those would probably be the dreams we don't remember.

Remember that you don't think about paying bills or walking around the house all that much, you just do it and then file it away, while something you've emotionally invested in you think about a lot and a lot more intesively (which can result in some really interesting dreams I can tell you). I don't think we simply forget about the trivial dreams but that there just aren't that many of them to begin with.