A dream is a succession of images An image is an artifact, for example a two-dimensional picture, that has a similar appearance to some subject—usually a physical object or a person, sounds Sound is a travelling wave that is an oscillation of pressure transmitted through a solid, liquid, or gas, composed of frequencies within the range of hearing and of a level sufficiently strong to be heard, or the sensation stimulated in organs of hearing by such vibrations or emotions Emotion is the complex psychophysiological experience of an individual's state of mind as interacting with biochemical and environmental influences. In humans, emotion fundamentally involves "physiological arousal, expressive behaviors, and conscious experience". Emotion is associated with mood, temperament, personality and disposition, that the mind Mind is the aspect of intellect and consciousness experienced as combinations of thought, perception, memory, emotion, will and imagination, including all unconscious cognitive processes. The term is often used to refer, by implication, to the thought processes of reason. Mind manifests itself subjectively as a stream of consciousness experiences during sleep Sleep is a naturally recurring altered state of consciousness with relatively suspended sensory and motor activity, characterized by the inactivity of nearly all voluntary muscles. It is distinguished from quiet wakefulness by a decreased ability to react to stimuli, but it is more easily reversible than hibernation or coma. Sleep is a heightened.^[1] The content and purpose of dreams are not fully understood, though they have been a topic of speculation and interest throughout recorded history. The scientific study of dreams is known as oneirology Oneirology is the scientific study of dreams. Current research seeks correlations between dreaming and current knowledge about the functions of the brain, as well as understanding of how the brain works during dreaming as pertains to memory formation and mental disorders. The study of oneirology can be distinguished from dream analysis in that the.

The cultural meaning of dreaming

Throughout history, people have sought meaning in dreams Dream interpretation is the process of assigning meaning to dreams. In many of the ancient societies, such as Egypt and Greece, dreaming was considered a supernatural communication or a means of divine intervention, whose message could be unravelled by those with certain powers. In modern times, various schools of psychology have offered theories or divination through dreams Oneiromancy is a form of divination based upon dreams; it is a system of dream interpretation that uses dreams to predict the future.^[2] Dreams have been described physiologically Physiology is the science of the functioning of living systems. It is a subcategory of biology. In physiology, the scientific method is applied to determine how organisms, organ systems, organs, cells and biomolecules carry out the chemical or physical function that they have in a living system. The word physiology is from Ancient Greek: φύσις as a response to neural processes during sleep, psychologically Psychology is the scientific study of human or other animal mental functions and behaviors. In this field, a professional practitioner or researcher is called a psychologist. Psychologists are classified as social or behavioral scientists. Psychological research can be considered either basic or applied. Psychologists attempt to understand the as reflections of the subconscious The term subconscious is used in many different contexts and has no single or precise definition. This greatly limits its significance as a definition-bearing concept, and in consequence the word tends to be avoided in academic and scientific settings, and spiritually Spirituality can refer to an ultimate or immaterial reality; an inner path enabling a person to discover the essence of their being; or the “deepest values and meanings by which people live.” Spiritual practices, including meditation, prayer and contemplation, are intended to develop an individual's inner life; such practices often lead to an as messages from gods A pantheon is a set of all the gods of a particular polytheistic religion or mythology, the deceased, predictions of the future or from the Soul, for symbology is the language of the Soul. Many cultures practice dream incubation Incubation is the religious practice of sleeping in a sacred area with the intention of experiencing a divinely inspired dream or cure. Incubation was practised by members of the cult of Asclepius. Votive offerings found at his ritual centres at Epidaurus, Pergamum, and Rome detail the perceived effectiveness of the method. Incubation was adopted, with the intention of cultivating dreams that were prophetic A prophecy is the message that has been communicated to a prophet which the prophet then communicates to others. Such messages typically involve divine inspiration, interpretation, or revelation of events to come or contained messages from the divine Divinity and divine are broadly applied but loosely defined terms, used variously within different faiths and belief systems — and even by different individuals within a given faith — to refer to some transcendent or transcendental power, or its attributes or manifestations in the world. The root of the words is literally "godlike" (.

Judaism Judaism is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people. Judaism, originating in the Hebrew Bible and explored in later texts such as the Talmud, is considered by Jews to be the expression of the covenantal relationship God developed with the Children of Israel. According to traditional Rabbinic Judaism, God revealed has a traditional ceremony called Hatavat Halom – literally meaning "making the dream a good one." Through this rite disturbing dreams can be transformed to give a positive interpretation by a rabbi or a rabbinic court.^[3]

Neurobiology of dreaming

There is no universally agreed upon biological definition of dreaming. In 1952, Eugene Aserinsky Eugene Aserinsky was a graduate student at University of Chicago in 1953 when he discovered REM sleep. He made the discovery after hours spent studying the eyelids of sleeping subjects. His PhD adviser, Nathaniel Kleitman, and Aserinsky went on to demonstrate that this "rapid-eye movement" was correlated with dreaming and a general identified and defined rapid eye movement (REM) sleep Rapid Eye Movement sleep is a normal stage of sleep characterized by the rapid movement of the eyes. REM sleep is classified into two categories: tonic and phasic. It was identified and defined by Kleitman and Aserinsky in the early 1950s while working in the surgery of his PhD Doctor of Philosophy, abbreviated PhD or DPhil, for the Latin philosophiæ doctor, meaning "teacher in philosophy", is an advanced academic degree awarded by universities. In many English-speaking countries, the PhD is the highest degree one can earn and applies to graduates in a wide array of disciplines in the physical sciences, social advisor. Aserinsky noticed that the sleepers' eyes fluttered beneath their closed eyelids, later using a polygraph A polygraph is an instrument that measures and records several physiological indices such as blood pressure, pulse, respiration, breathing rhythms/ratios, and skin conductivity while the subject is asked and answers a series of questions, in the belief that deceptive answers will produce physiological responses that can be differentiated from machine to record their brainwaves Electroencephalography is the recording of electrical activity along the scalp produced by the firing of neurons within the brain. In clinical contexts, EEG refers to the recording of the brain's spontaneous electrical activity over a short period of time, usually 20–40 minutes, as recorded from multiple electrodes placed on the scalp. In during these periods. In one session, he awakened a subject who was wailing and crying out during REM and confirmed his suspicion that dreaming was occurring.^[4] In 1953, Aserinsky and his advisor published the ground-breaking study in Science Science is the academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and is considered one of the world's most prestigious scientific journals. The peer-reviewed journal, first published in 1880 is circulated weekly and has a print subscriber base of around 130,000. Because institutional subscriptions and online access serve.^[5]

Accumulated observation shows that dreams are strongly associated with REM sleep Rapid Eye Movement sleep is a normal stage of sleep characterized by the rapid movement of the eyes. REM sleep is classified into two categories: tonic and phasic. It was identified and defined by Nathaniel Kleitman and Eugene Aserinsky in the early 1950s, during which an electroencephalogram Electroencephalography is the recording of electrical activity along the scalp produced by the firing of neurons within the brain. In clinical contexts, EEG refers to the recording of the brain's spontaneous electrical activity over a short period of time, usually 20–40 minutes, as recorded from multiple electrodes placed on the scalp. In (EEG) shows brain activity to be most like wakefulness. Participant-nonremembered dreams during NREM sleep are normally more mundane in comparison.^[6] During a typical lifespan, a human spends a total of about six years dreaming^[7] (which is about two hours each night).^[8] Most dreams last only 5 to 20 minutes.^[7] It is unknown where in the brain dreams originate, if there is a single origin for dreams or if multiple portions of the brain are involved, or what the purpose of dreaming is for the body or mind.

During REM sleep, the release of the neurotransmitters norepinephrine, serotonin and histamine is completely suppressed.^[9][10][11] As a result, motor neurons In vertebrates, the term motor neuron classically applies to neurons located in the central nervous system (or CNS) that project their axons outside the CNS and directly or indirectly control muscles. The motor neuron is often associated with efferent neuron, primary neuron, or alpha motor neurons are not stimulated, a condition known as REM atonia Rapid Eye Movement sleep is a normal stage of sleep characterized by the rapid movement of the eyes. REM sleep is classified into two categories: tonic and phasic. It was identified and defined by Kleitman and Aserinsky in the early 1950s. This prevents dreams from resulting in dangerous movements of the body.

According to a report in the journal Neuron, rat brains show evidence of complex activity during sleep, including the activation in memory of long sequences of activity.^[12][13] Studies show that various species of mammals and birds experience REM during sleep,^[14] and follow the same series of sleeping states as humans.^[12]

Despite their power to bewilder, arouse, frighten or amuse, dreams are often ignored in mainstream models of cognitive psychology.^[15] As methods of introspection were replaced with more self-consciously objective methods in the social sciences in 1930s and 1940s, dream studies dropped out of the scientific literature. Dreams were neither directly observable by an experimenter nor were subjects' dream reports reliable, being prey to the familiar problems of distortion due to delayed recall, if they were recalled at all. According to Sigmund Freud Sigmund Freud , born Sigismund Schlomo Freud (6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939), was an Austrian neurologist who founded the psychoanalytic method of psychiatry. Freud is best known for his theories of the unconscious mind and the defense mechanism of repression, and for creating the clinical practice of psychoanalysis for treating psychopathology, dreams are more often forgotten entirely, perhaps due to their prohibited character. Altogether, these problems seemed to put them beyond the realm of science.

The discovery that dreams take place primarily during a distinctive electrophysiological state of sleep, rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, which can be identified by objective criteria, led to rebirth of interest in this phenomenon. When REM sleep episodes were timed for their duration and subjects woken to make reports before major editing or forgetting could take place, it was determined that subjects accurately matched the length of time they judged the dream narrative to be ongoing to the length of REM sleep that preceded the awakening. There is no "time dilation" effect; a five-minute dream takes roughly five minutes of real time to play out.^[16] This close correlation of REM sleep and dream experience was the basis of the first series of reports describing the nature of dreaming: that it is a regular nightly, rather than occasional, phenomenon, and a high-frequency activity within each sleep period occurring at predictable intervals of approximately every 60–90 minutes in all humans throughout the life span. REM sleep episodes and the dreams that accompany them lengthen progressively across the night, with the first episode being shortest, of approximately 10–12 minutes duration, and the second and third episodes increasing to 15–20 minutes. Dreams at the end of the night may last as long as 15 minutes, although these may be experienced as several distinct stories due to momentary arousals interrupting sleep as the night ends. Dream reports can be reported from normal subjects on 50% of the occasion when an awakening is made prior to the end of the first REM period. This rate of retrieval is increased to about 99% when awakenings are made from the last REM period of the night. This increase in the ability to recall appears to be related to intensification across the night in the vividness of dream imagery, colors and emotions.^{[citation needed]}

Activation synthesis theory

In 1976 J. Allan Hobson John Allan Hobson, M.D. is an American psychiatrist and dream researcher. He is known for his research on the Rapid eye movement sleep. He is Professor of Psychiatry, Emeritus, Harvard Medical School, and Professor, Department of Psychiatry, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Robert McCarley Robert W. McCarley, MD, is Chair and Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and the VA Boston Healthcare System. He is also Director of the Laboratory of Neuroscience located at the Brockton VA Medical Center and the McLean Hospital. McClarley is a prominent researcher in the field of sleep and dreaming as well as schizophrenia proposed a new theory that changed dream research, challenging the previously held Freudian Sigmund Freud , born Sigismund Schlomo Freud (6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939), was a Jewish Austrian neurologist who founded the psychoanalytic school of psychiatry. Freud is best known for his theories of the unconscious mind and the defense mechanism of repression, and for creating the clinical practice of psychoanalysis for treating view of dreams as subconscious dreamily wishes to be interpreted. Activation synthesis theory Activation-synthesis hypothesis is a neurobiological theory of dreams forwarded by Harvard University psychiatrists James Allan Hobson and Robert McCarley, first published in the American Journal of Psychiatry in December of 1977. It states that dreams are a random event caused by firing of neurons in the brain. This random firing sends signals to asserts that the sensory experiences are fabricated by the cortex as a means of interpreting chaotic Chaos theory is a field of study in mathematics, physics, economics and philosophy studying the behavior of dynamical systems that are highly sensitive to initial conditions. This sensitivity is popularly referred to as the butterfly effect. Small differences in initial conditions yield widely diverging outcomes for chaotic systems, rendering long- signals from the pons The pons , sometimes pons Varolii (after Costanzo Varolio, a 16th-century Italian anatomist and surgeon) is a structure located on the brain stem. It is superior to (up from) the medulla oblongata, inferior to (down from) the midbrain, and ventral to (in front of) the cerebellum. In humans and other bipeds this means it is above the medulla, below. They propose that in REM sleep, the ascending cholinergic Cholinergic means related to the neurotransmitter acetylcholine, and is typically used in a neurological perspective. The parasympathetic nervous system is entirely cholinergic. Neuromuscular junctions, preganglionic neurons of the sympathetic nervous system, the basal forebrain, and brain stem complexes are also cholinergic. In addition, the PGO (ponto-geniculo-occipital) waves stimulate higher midbrain In biological anatomy, the mesencephalon comprises the tectum (or corpora quadrigemina), tegmentum, the ventricular mesocoelia (or "iter"), and the cerebral peduncles, as well as several nuclei and fasciculi. Caudally the mesencephalon adjoins the pons (metencephalon) and rostrally it adjoins the diencephalon (Thalamus, hypothalamus, et and forebrain In the anatomy of the brain of vertebrates, the prosencephalon is the rostral-most (forward-most) portion of the brain. The prosencephalon, the mesencephalon (midbrain), and rhombencephalon (hindbrain) are the three primary portions of the brain during early development of the central nervous system. It controls body temperature, reproductive cortical structures, producing rapid eye movements. The activated forebrain then synthesizes the dream out of this internally generated information. They assume that the same structures that induce REM sleep also generate sensory information.

Hobson's 1976 research suggested that the signals interpreted as dreams originated in the brain stem during REM sleep. However, research by Mark Solms Mark Solms is a psychoanalyst and a lecturer in neurosurgery at the St. Bartholomew’s and Royal London School of Medicine; chair of neuropsychology, University of Cape Town, South Africa and director of the Arnold Pfeffer Center for Neuro-Psychoanalysis at the New York Psychoanalytic Institute. He is a registrant of the BPC suggests that dreams are generated in the forebrain In the anatomy of the brain of vertebrates, the prosencephalon is the rostral-most (forward-most) portion of the brain. The prosencephalon, the mesencephalon (midbrain), and rhombencephalon (hindbrain) are the three primary portions of the brain during early development of the central nervous system. It controls body temperature, reproductive, and that REM sleep and dreaming are not directly related.^[17] While working in the neurosurgery department at hospitals in Johannesburg Johannesburg also known as Jozi, Jo'burg or eGoli, is the largest city in South Africa. Johannesburg is the provincial capital of Gauteng, the wealthiest province in South Africa, having the largest economy of any metropolitan region in Sub-Saharan Africa.[citation needed] The city is one of the 40 largest metropolitan areas in the world, and is and London London is a leading global city, the world's largest financial centre alongside New York, and has the largest city GDP in Europe. Central London is home to the headquarters of most of the UK's top 100 listed companies and more than 100 of Europe's 500 largest. London's influence and strengths in the arts, education, entertainment, fashion, finance,, Solms had access to patients with various brain injuries. He began to question patients about their dreams and confirmed that patients with damage to the parietal lobe The parietal lobe is a lobe in the brain. It is positioned above the occipital lobe and behind (posterior to) the frontal lobe stopped dreaming; this finding was in line with Hobson's 1977 theory. However, Solms did not encounter cases of loss of dreaming with patients having brain stem damage. This observation forced him to question Hobson's prevailing theory which marked the brain stem as the source of the signals interpreted as dreams. Solms viewed the idea of dreaming as a function of many complex brain structures as validating Freudian dream theory, an idea that drew criticism from Hobson. In 1978, Solms, along with partners William Kauffman and Edward Nadar, undertook a series of traumatic-injury impact studies using several different species of primates A primate is a member of the biological order Primates (/praɪˈmeɪtiːz/ prī·mā′·tēz; Latin: "prime, first rank"), the group that contains prosimians (including lemurs, lorises, galagos and tarsiers ) and simians (monkeys and apes). With the exception of humans, who inhabit every continent on Earth,[a] most primates live in, particularly howler monkeys Howler monkeys are among the largest of the New World monkeys. Nine species are currently recognised. Previously classified in the family Cebidae, they are now placed in the family Atelidae. These monkeys are native to South and Central American forests. They live in groups of usually about 18 individuals. Threats to howler monkeys include being, in order to disprove Hobson's postulation that the brain stem In vertebrate anatomy the brainstem is the posterior part of the brain, adjoining and structurally continuous with the spinal cord. The brain stem provides the main motor and sensory innervation to the face and neck via the cranial nerves. Though small, this is an extremely important part of the brain as the nerve connections of the motor and played a significant role in dream pathology In medicine, pathology is the study and diagnosis of disease. The related scientific study of disease processes is called "general pathology". Medical pathology is divided into two main branches, anatomical pathology and clinical pathology. Medical pathologists work through examination of organs, tissues, bodily fluids, and whole bodies. Unfortunately, Solms' experiments proved inconclusive, as the high mortality rate Mortality rate is a measure of the number of deaths in some population, scaled to the size of that population, per unit time. Mortality rate is typically expressed in units of deaths per 1000 individuals per year; thus, a mortality rate of 9.5 in a population of 100,000 would mean 950 deaths per year in that entire population. It is distinct from associated with using a hydraulic impact pin to artificially induce brain damage in test subjects meant that his final candidate pool was too small to satisfy the requirements of the scientific method.^[18]

Continual-activation theory

Combining Hobson's activation synthesis hypothesis with Solms' findings, the continual-activation theory of dreaming presented by Jie Zhang proposes that dreaming is a result of brain activation and synthesis; at the same time, dreaming and REM sleep are controlled by different brain mechanisms. Zhang hypothesizes that the function of sleep is to process, encode and transfer the data from the short-term memory to the long-term memory, though there is not much evidence backing up this so-called "consolidation." NREM sleep processes the conscious-related memory (declarative memory), and REM sleep processes the unconscious related memory (procedural memory).

Zhang assumes that during REM sleep, the unconscious part of a brain is busy processing the procedural memory; meanwhile, the level of activation in the conscious part of the brain will descend to a very low level as the inputs from the sensory are basically disconnected. This will trigger the "continual-activation" mechanism to generate a data stream from the memory stores to flow through the conscious part of the brain. Zhang suggests that this pulse-like brain activation is the inducer of each dream. He proposes that, with the involvement of the brain associative thinking system, dreaming is, thereafter, self-maintained with the dreamer's own thinking until the next pulse of memory insertion. This explains why dreams have both characteristics of continuity (within a dream) and sudden changes (between two dreams).^[19][20]

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