How does a brain/mind project images in dreams?

Started by Mindship2 pages

Originally posted by King Kandy
Just had my first lucid dream in forever after a month trying. Pretty neat.
Cool. What happened?

"woke up", realized I was dreaming but kind of fumbled over to a light switch to make sure, sure enough it didn't change. Went to my back yard and tried flying, but it was hard and I made pretty minimal progress. Felt like I was waking up so used spinning technique to stay in the dream, then decided I wanted to see this girl I knew, drove over to her area and started looking around but nobody knew where she was, then I woke up.

Quite oversimplified, of course.

Originally posted by King Kandy
"woke up", realized I was dreaming but kind of fumbled over to a light switch to make sure, sure enough it didn't change. Went to my back yard and tried flying, but it was hard and I made pretty minimal progress. Felt like I was waking up so used spinning technique to stay in the dream, then decided I wanted to see this girl I knew, drove over to her area and started looking around but nobody knew where she was, then I woke up.
Do you feel the spinning technique helped?

I feel an agenda set beforehand (eg, "When I know I'm dreaming, I want to look in a mirror"😉 sometimes helps, this way I can get right to my 'experiment' before I wake up or the lucidity fades.

I think the spinning technique helped a lot (I used it twice over the course). Setting an agenda is good, but since I never lucid dream, I ultimately stopped it because it was a waste. But, i'll probably start doing it again.

I've had a couple of lucid dreams years ago, it's a pretty odd experience. The one that I remember best started a bit like a nightmare, I was being chased by someone through some neighbourhood and then somehow I noticed just to many things being out of place and became aware that it was a dream, but I didn't wake up. I was then able to manipulate the dream to some extend, like being able to fly and even changing my appearance to scare the chaser. Still, I was bound to the 'story' of the dream as he kept chasing me and I never got Inception-style control of the dream.

Originally posted by Pandemoniac
Still, I was bound to the 'story' of the dream as he kept chasing me and I never got Inception-style control of the dream.
It would appear dreams have their own agenda; best to enter into a partnership than try to take over.

Originally posted by inimalist
lol

well, you certainly aren't tricking the eyes. The eyes only have 3 colour receptive detectors, that work in an on/off manner. They can't really be tricked. It would be either in V1 or some later colour processing area (maybe V4....(?)) [the V means Visual cortex]. The reason it is possible we might see "non-real" colours would be because it is theoretically possible that some mechanism would cause those cells to activate in ways nature can't produce through the eyes.

Indeed, which is why I put "tricked" in quotes because "imaginary colors" were being done in the brain, not the eyes doing it.

And, that was the conclusion from that study: we could create impossible visual experiences with only visual stimulation.

I suspect that figuring out how to make the brain "think" in different ways is a much better path to doing the above, however. Right now, we aren't even close.

Originally posted by inimalist
ya, this is much different. After the eyes, there are what are called "opponent process" pathways. Its the same reason that if you look at a green object for a while, then look at a white wall, you will see an afterimage of that object, only in red. Green vs red, blue vs yellow, black vs white (though, this last one is more used for the perception of motion vs the perception of colour).

So, if you used a blue road, you wouldn't get as powerful of an effect, if you got one at all, because blue uses a different opponent pathway than green.

😎

Yes, that is what they called them: "opponent pathways." And, yes, that comment was completely unrelated to the study I mentioned prior.

creativity, sensory/memory synthesis.