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10 Interesting Dream Facts.

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  • goldenryan
    coy member
    • Jul 13, 2007
    • 1467

    10 Interesting Dream Facts.

    10. Blind People Dream
    People who become blind after birth can see images in their dreams. People who are born blind do not see any images, but have dreams equally vivid involving their other senses of sound, smell, touch and emotion. It is hard for a seeing person to imagine, but the body’s need for sleep is so strong that it is able to handle virtually all physical situations to make it happen.

    9. You Forget 90% of your Dreams
    Within 5 minutes of waking, half of your dream if forgotten. Within 10, 90% is gone. The famous poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, woke one morning having had a fantastic dream (likely opium induced) – he put pen to paper and began to describe his “vision in a dream” in what has become one of English’s most famous poems: Kubla Khan. Part way through (54 lines in fact) he was interrupted by a “Person from Porlock“. Coleridge returned to his poem but could not remember the rest of his dream. The poem was never completed.

    In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
    A stately pleasure-dome decree:
    Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
    Through caverns measureless to man
    Down to a sunless sea.
    ...
    Curiously, Robert Louis Stevenson came up with the story of Doctor Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde whilst he was dreaming. Wikipedia has more on that here. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein was also the brainchild of a dream.

    8. Everybody Dreams

    Every human being dreams (except in cases of extreme psychological disorder) but men and women have different dreams and different physical reactions. Men tend to dream more about other men, while women tend to dream equally about men and women. In addition, both men and women experience sexually related physical reactions to their dreams regardless of whether the dream is sexual in nature; males experience erections and females experience increased vag!nal blood flow.

    7. Dreams Prevent Psychosis
    In a recent sleep study, students who were awakened at the beginning of each dream, but still allowed their 8 hours of sleep, all experienced difficulty in concentration, irritability, hallucinations, and signs of psychosis after only 3 days. When finally allowed their REM sleep the student’s brains made up for lost time by greatly increasing the percentage of sleep spent in the REM stage.

    6. We Only Dream of What We Know
    Our dreams are frequently full of strangers who play out certain parts – did you know that your mind is not inventing those faces – they are real faces of real people that you have seen during your life but may not know or remember? The evil killer in your latest dream may be the guy who pumped petrol in to your Dad’s car when you were just a little kid. We have all seen hundreds of thousands of faces through our lives, so we have an endless supply of characters for our brain to utilize during our dreams.

    5. Not Everyone Dreams in Color
    A full 12% of sighted people dream exclusively in black and white. The remaining number dream in full color. People also tend to have common themes in dreams, which are situations relating to school, being chased, running slowly/in place, sexual experiences, falling, arriving too late, a person now alive being dead, teeth falling out, flying, failing an examination, or a car accident. It is unknown whether the impact of a dream relating to violence or death is more emotionally charged for a person who dreams in color than one who dreams in black and white.

    4. Dreams are not about what they are about

    If you dream about some particular subject it is not often that the dream is about that. Dreams speak in a deeply symbolic language. The unconscious mind tries to compare your dream to something else, which is similar. Its like writing a poem and saying that a group of ants were like machines that never stop. But you would never compare something to itself, for example: “That beautiful sunset was like a beautiful sunset”. So whatever symbol your dream picks on it is most unlikely to be a symbol for itself.

    3. Quitters have more vivid dreams
    People who have smoked cigarettes for a long time who stop, have reported much more vivid dreams than they would normally experience. Additionally, according to the Journal of Abnormal Psychology: “Among 293 smokers abstinent for between 1 and 4 weeks, 33% reported having at least 1 dream about smoking. In most dreams, subjects caught themselves smoking and felt strong negative emotions, such as panic and guilt. Dreams about smoking were the result of tobacco withdrawal, as 97% of subjects did not have them while smoking, and their occurrence was significantly related to the duration of abstinence. They were rated as more vivid than the usual dreams and were as common as most major tobacco withdrawal symptoms.”

    2. External Stimuli Invade our Dreams
    This is called Dream Incorporation and it is the experience that most of us have had where a sound from reality is heard in our dream and incorporated in some way. A similar (though less external) example would be when you are physically thirsty and your mind incorporates that feeling in to your dream. My own experience of this includes repeatedly drinking a large glass of water in the dream which satisfies me, only to find the thirst returning shortly after – this thirst… drink… thirst… loop often recurs until I wake up and have a real drink. The famous painting above (Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening) by Salvador Dali, depicts this concept.

    1. You are paralyzed while you sleep
    Believe it or not, your body is virtually paralyzed during your sleep – most likely to prevent your body from acting out aspects of your dreams. According to the Wikipedia article on dreaming, “Glands begin to secrete a hormone that helps induce sleep and neurons send signals to the spinal cord which cause the body to relax and later become essentially paralyzed.”

    Bonus: Extra Facts
    1. When you are snoring, you are not dreaming.
    2. Toddlers do not dream about themselves until around the age of 3. From the same age, children typically have many more nightmares than adults do until age 7 or 8.
    3. If you are awakened out of REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep, you are more likely to remember your dream in a more vivid way than you would if you woke from a full night sleep.
  • vulcan2074
    Live Long and Prosper
    • Mar 23, 2008
    • 7817

    #2
    Very interesting. I've always been fascinated with dreams
    Sammy

    Comment

    • Brazoo
      Permanent Member
      • Feb 14, 2009
      • 4767

      #3
      Very interesting, but out of curiosity how could anyone know or prove these points:

      6. We Only Dream of What We Know (it seems unlikely that anyone could prove that either way)
      5. Not Everyone Dreams in Color (they could only be remembering dreams in b&w or colour)
      4. Dreams are not about what they are about (I know the phycological theory, but seems rather speculative)

      extra fact 2. Toddlers do not dream about themselves until around the age of 3 (this one just seems crazy to me - I would love to know how someone tested this)

      Please don't take offense to my questions - I really like the info you posted, I just can't figure out how the information of some of these statements could possible be gathered.

      Comment

      • Mikey
        Verbose Member
        • Aug 9, 2001
        • 47258

        #4
        True story ......

        Once I dreamed I was driving a car to the top of a fog covered mountain.

        I got to the top and I seen my brother standing there.

        He walked over and said to me, "tell everyone i'm ok and I like it here"

        That morning I was awakened early with news my brother had died of a heart attack earlier that night.

        To this day I still wonder if my dream was just a dream

        Comment

        • toys2cool
          Ultimate Mego Warrior
          • Nov 27, 2006
          • 28605

          #5
          Originally posted by type1kirk
          True story ......

          Once I dreamed I was driving a car to the top of a fog covered mountain.

          I got to the top and I seen my brother standing there.

          He walked over and said to me, "tell everyone i'm ok and I like it here"

          That morning I was awakened early with news my brother had died of a heart attack earlier that night.

          To this day I still wonder if my dream was just a dream
          I believe that the dead can communicate thru dreams, I had a similar one with my grandmother telling me to tell my mom and uncle that she was ok, I found out my uncle was really depressed and was going to visit her at the cemetery asking her stuff
          "Time to nut up or shut up" -Tallahassee

          http://ultimatewarriorcollection.webs.com/
          My stuff on facebook Incompatible Browser | Facebook

          Comment

          • starsky
            veteran member
            • Aug 26, 2007
            • 6207

            #6
            very interesting read! never knew.

            Comment

            • SlipperyLilSuckers
              MeGoing
              • May 14, 2003
              • 9031

              #7
              It's certainly very interesting.

              Comment

              • ctc
                Fear the monkeybat!
                • Aug 16, 2001
                • 11183

                #8
                >I believe that the dead can communicate thru dreams,

                My grandmother used to say: "dream of the dead, hear from the living;" but she'd never explain what happened if you dream of the living....

                >6. We Only Dream of What We Know (it seems unlikely that anyone could prove that either way)

                Well.... this ties in with another theory; that you can't cognate something that you have no experience of. Makes sense if you think about it: we understand things in terms of what we already know, and accordingly we relate to them based on established cognitive sets. New ideas are made by combining stuff you know in different ways. So it makes sense that you can't dream something ytou don't know 'cos you don't know it.

                >5. Not Everyone Dreams in Color (they could only be remembering dreams in b&w or colour)

                Maybe; but it'd be weird if the brain had some extra filter that would do that. Not IMPOSSIBLE, but weird.

                >4. Dreams are not about what they are about (I know the phycological theory, but seems rather speculative)

                I think an addendum that's needed here is that a lot of the times dreams aren't about ANYTHING. They're the brain sorting through stuff, and a lot if it is random images and feelings. Sometimes there'll be a recurring notion that's there 'cos of a strong imprint made while awake; sometimes meaning is ascribed consciously later on.

                Don C.

                Comment

                • Brazoo
                  Permanent Member
                  • Feb 14, 2009
                  • 4767

                  #9
                  Originally posted by ctc
                  >I believe that the dead can communicate thru dreams,

                  My grandmother used to say: "dream of the dead, hear from the living;" but she'd never explain what happened if you dream of the living....
                  Wow - Is that an old saying? She sounds like she was a very interesting woman!

                  Originally posted by ctc
                  >6. We Only Dream of What We Know (it seems unlikely that anyone could prove that either way)

                  Well.... this ties in with another theory; that you can't cognate something that you have no experience of. Makes sense if you think about it: we understand things in terms of what we already know, and accordingly we relate to them based on established cognitive sets. New ideas are made by combining stuff you know in different ways. So it makes sense that you can't dream something ytou don't know 'cos you don't know it.
                  Yeah, it makes sense, I just can't see how you could prove or disprove that either way - it seems more like a philosophical theory than a scientific one.

                  Originally posted by ctc
                  >5. Not Everyone Dreams in Color (they could only be remembering dreams in b&w or colour)

                  Maybe; but it'd be weird if the brain had some extra filter that would do that. Not IMPOSSIBLE, but weird.
                  From what I understand (someone please correct me if I'm wrong) our eyes detect the wavelengths for our brain to interpret as colour - so it would be interesting to know if this data could have been collected by monitoring brain activity or just using peoples recollections.

                  Originally posted by ctc
                  >4. Dreams are not about what they are about (I know the phycological theory, but seems rather speculative)

                  I think an addendum that's needed here is that a lot of the times dreams aren't about ANYTHING. They're the brain sorting through stuff, and a lot if it is random images and feelings. Sometimes there'll be a recurring notion that's there 'cos of a strong imprint made while awake; sometimes meaning is ascribed consciously later on.
                  Don C.
                  I think that's a good point. I think our conscious minds are hard wired to attribute meaning, narrative and patterns from abstractions - For instance, someone shows you a picture of an empty plate and then a picture of a man's face with a blank expression, normally people will make a connection between the plate and the man - they'll interpret that the man looks hungry.

                  As I understand it, the older physiological theory that dreams were your subconscious mind trying to tell something to your conscious mind in riddles is widely dismissed now.

                  Comment

                  • ctc
                    Fear the monkeybat!
                    • Aug 16, 2001
                    • 11183

                    #10
                    >Is that an old saying? She sounds like she was a very interesting woman!

                    Apparently it is. My grandparents were VERY old school Scots. (Think "Braveheart.") They were very superstitious as well. (Supposedly witchcraft runs in the family: my grandma was born with a caul they say....) THey knew a lot of legends, myths, stories. (My grandfather could tell you stuff that'd curl your hair.)

                    >it seems more like a philosophical theory than a scientific one.

                    It has scientific merit. It's been a while, so I don't rememebr the name of the principle but it ties in to how we process info. Humans work off of precedent a lot; which is why it's so easy to fool people if you know the tricks. (You just gotta push the right buttons.)

                    >it would be interesting to know if this data could have been collected by monitoring brain activity

                    I think you'd have to splice the optic nerve to intercept the signals.... which I don't think they've done. It MIGHT be possible nowadays to scan the visual cortex.... my info is about 10 years old.

                    >the older physiological theory that dreams were your subconscious mind trying to tell something to your conscious mind in riddles is widely dismissed now.

                    Not ENTIRELY; since recurring themes can have meaning, but it's generally considered that most of your dreams are random images.

                    Don C.

                    Comment

                    • Adam West
                      Museum CPA
                      • Apr 14, 2003
                      • 6822

                      #11
                      Paralyzed when asleep isn't completely true.

                      I have had dreams of kicking a soccer ball or for some reason being in a fight where I am kicking someone to defend myself only to wake up finding myself kicking at the bed.

                      By this time, my wife is usually awake asking why I am kicking her.
                      "The farther we go, the more the ultimate explanation recedes from us, and all we have left is faith."
                      ~Vaclav Hlavaty

                      Comment

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