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mysteries |
Dream Science 1 |
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Are you reading this sentence or dreaming that you are? It was a lovely morning when I awoke. I got up, washed and changed, had breakfast and waited for the school bus. I was chatting to friends when there was a bang, and I woke up. I got up, washed, changed, had breakfast, caught the bus and arrived at school. During registration, a boy through a book, which hit me on the head, and I woke up. This time I got up, washed, got to school, had my lessons and was having break when I asked a girl to pinch me - to see if I was dreaming - when my mother woke me up. I rushed to get ready for school, told my friends at school all that had happened, and everything went fine until dinner time, when the school fire alarm went off. There was a panic. Someone stumbled over me and I hurt my leg. I awoke in bed - it was dark and the clock showed 2am. Was I asleep? It was not until bedtime the next night that I really knew that I was awake. Welcome to the world of dreams. That nightmarish scenario is an example of the fortunately rare phenomenon of multiple false awakenings. The accuracy, detail and vividness of the dream imagery is such that the conviction of having woken is complete. The paradoxical illusion of having woken is one of many different types of dream experience. But what exactly is a dream? Dreams are particularly associated with a stage of sleep called Rapid Eye Movement (REM) sleep, which occurs every 90 minutes or so after the onset of sleep. Dreams, although linked with REM, may not be central to its primary function - whatever that is. A multitude of theories reinforce the fact that we do not know why we dream or why we have REM sleep. But we o know that dreams have enormous potential and may bear messages from a deeper, more knowledgeable pert of ourselves. Talking To God. The ancients were fascinated by dreams. The earliest civilizations wrote about them and developed the method of dream-incubation. The dreamer would, after various cleansing rituals, sleep in a special temple in order to enhance the production of a significant communication from the gods. The resulting dream was then interpreted by experts. The Greeks and Romans established a common-sense approach to understanding the meaning of dreams. Symbolism was thoroughly comprehended, including that of a sexual nature. Interpreting Dreams. In the Middle Ages, interest in dreams was condemned as sorcery, so a great stultifying hiatus halted any further thinking on the topic until the last century, when several writers came up with observations and theories. Sigmund Freud 'discovered' the unconscious and believed that the 'weirdness' of dreams was caused by one part of the unconscious mind trying to hide direct sexual thoughts from the delicate sensibilities of the conscious mind. Carl Jung and others disagreed with that strange concept, and thought instead that dreams revealed many other much more positive aspects of our inner self. The latest approach, by David Melbourne and Keith Hearne, is more like the Roman technique, but brings in a systematic cross-referencing system. This highlights consistent links and reveals the underlying dream theme. The technique also recognizes that everyone has their own individual associations to elements within a dream. Essentially, it seems that dreams reflect conscious and unconscious thoughts, presenting them in the visual language of symbolism but operating within the inherent limitations created by the different stages of sleep. Wired Up. In the sleep lab, the different stages of sleep can be scientifically monitored. The subject is 'wired up' by attaching electrodes - using glue or tape - to the scalp, face and body. Measures are made principally of brain waves, eye movements and muscle activity. Heart rate and breathing rate may also be recorded. The measurements are displayed simultaneously on a polygraphic chart or on a computer screen. each page of the record is 'scored' so that the sequence and duration of each of the sleep stages can be represented an graphical form. Telepathic Dreams. It was thought at one time that REM sleep - and, possibly, dreaming - was essential. Subjects deprived of REM sleep showed a deterioration in health in the sort term. However, it became evident that certain drugs, including some antidepressants, completely suppressed REM sleep without causing any ill effects in the long term. Inevitably, when computers came along, some people saw an analogy between brain processing and dreaming. Others saw dreams as by-products of an information sorting operation. However, the fact that REM sleep is not absolutely necessary leaves such theories high and dry. Since ancient times, some dreams have reportedly contained telepathic or premonitory information. While recent behaviouristic psychology could not countenance such notions, a less censorious attitude is emerging. Some brave researchers have even conducted sleep-lab experiments into dream-telepathy and precognition. A series of experiments by Montague Ullman and others, for instance, provided evidence to support the idea that current and future information can be received in dreams, using no known sensory channels. Much of the modern research into dreams focuses on the 'lucid' variety, where the dreamer becomes fully aware of being in a dream and can then control the dreams scenery and events. After reading Celia Green's Lucid Dreams in 1975, Keith devised a method whereby sleeping subjects could send him signals by making coded eye-movements. Lucid Dreams. Among his many original findings, Keith discovered that lucid dreams are genuine dreams happening in REM sleep. He also established that dreams operate in real-time rather than being 'over in a flash'. Lucid dreaming has enormous creative potential. The dream state has, after all, given rise to many works of art and science. Many composers have transcribed music heard in dreams, and writers have formulated stories in that state. For example, the concept of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde came to Robert Louis Stevenson within a dream. The chemist Frederich Kekule suddenly realized the ring structure of the benzene molecule after a dream in which dancing atoms transformed themselves into a snake with its tail in its mouth. And Dmitry Mendeleyev first saw the periodic table of elements in a dream he had in 1969. Otto Loewi win Nobel prize for his discovery of the chemical nature of nervous transmission, after an experiment was suggested to him in a dream. Elias Howe perfected the sewing machine after he had a dream of being threatened by Indians who held spears that had a hole near the point. There are, of course, countless other examples. The ancients were aware of 'prodromic' dreams, which gave forewarning of an individual's imminent illness. These dreams were perhaps based on the unconscious detection of early physical symptoms of the illness. In the future, illness could be diagnosed early and the powerful effect of the unconscious interaction between mind and body could be utilized to treat illness in the lucid dream state. |
Sources: The X Factor By: Dr Keith Hearne |