MacEwan Open Journals (MacEwan University)
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A Response to "Concerns with Lucidity Essay" by Jayne Gackenbach
No full textJayne Gackenbach reports that in recent conversation with many people in the United States and abroad she has heard voices expressing concern about the potential for “abuse” of lucid dreaming. Gackenbach feels that it is incumbent upon the leaders of this emerging field to also voice concerns, and claims that “we are at fault if we do not routinely caution audiences about abuse or even dangers in accessing an incredibly powerful state of mind.”While I share some of my colleagues concerns, if not apprehensions, I believe it is premature and inappropriate to “routinely caution audiences” about supposed “dangers”- that have not yet been convincingly demonstrated.I do not really believe that there is cause for alarm. I have already discussed my own concerns regarding the proper use of lucid dreaming in my 1985 book, to which I direct readers interested in my views. Here I will limit myself to a few comments on the issues addressed by Gackenbach
Panel Discussion: Ethical Issues for Applications of Lucid Dreaming
No full textA panel discussion featuring Joseph Dane, University of Virginia; P. Eric Craig, Center for Existential Studies and Human Services; Morton Schatzman, St. Thomas’ Hospital, London
Non-REM Lucid Dreaming
No full textAs with Pierre and others, I’m not going to try to present a lot of the details of our study, nor defend what I think is probably the most unique and therefore most valuable aspects of the study I’ll be talking about. I’ve spoken elsewhere (Dane, 1984) about the general background of the full three years of study that we did on lucid dreamers, first with frequent lucid dreamers, and then with non-lucid dreamers. What I want to focus on today are the findings relevant to non-REM lucid dreaming in the non-lucid dreamer population that we used. So I’m going to briefly describe the study itself and focus on the non-REM results. I don’t want to put myself in the position, today, of having to defend the existence or non-existence of non-REM lucid dreams, so let’s just assume today that it’s an existing phenomenon, at least in the early stages of non-REM sleep, and see what the implications are. I’ll point out as I get to that point in the presentation where I think Stephen LaBerge has some good points, not necessarily objec-tions, but alterations, things that need to be checked further with respect to non-REM lucid dreaming
Dream Psychology: Operating in the Dark
No full textThe questions I want to address today concern the scientific significance of lucid dreaming, especially for our understanding of the function of dreaming. There is an emerging consensus that scientific dream psychology has not lived up to the potential which motivated much of the research following the discovery of REM sleep in 1953 (see Antrobus, 1978). For example, Foulkes (1976; 1982; 1983a; 1983b) has claimed that the three foundation disciplines of dream psychology, specifically psychoanalysis, psychophysiology and evolutionary biology, in fact have contributed very little to our scientific understanding of dreaming. Similarly, Fiss (1983) has argued that we desperately need a clinically relevant theory of dreaming. One important reason for this apparent lack of fruitfulness is the exclusion of lucid dreaming from the central concerns of dream psychology. Ogilvie (1982) has aptly observed that until recently lucid dreaming has been consigned to the “wasteland of parapsychology”. This exclusion of lucid dreaming from scientific dream psychology finally has been rendered untenable by the dramatic demonstration by a number of researchers that lucid dreaming is a scientifically real phenomenon (Covello, 1984; Dane, 1984; Fenwick, Schatzman, Worsley & Adam, 1984: Hearne, 1981, 1983; LaBerge, 1980a, 1980b, 1981; LaBerge, Nagel, Dement & Zarcone, 1980; Ogilvie, Hunt, Tyson, Lucescu & Jeakins, 1982; Tholey, 1983; Tyson, Ogilvie & Hunt, 1984). ‘Scientifically real’ in this context means that researchers such as LaBerge were able to show, among other things, that prearranged signaling was possible from lucid dreaming during stage REM sleep without the intervention of an electrographic transition to the waking state. In effect, the dreamer was simultaneously awake and asleep. The significance of this finding has yet to be fully appreciated within dream psychology in particular or cognitive psychology more generally
The Dream Lucidity Continuum
No full textDream lucidity occurs along a continuum of subjectively experienced lucidity. Lucidity can fluctuate in a dream and this can be in response to the intentions of the dreamer. The continuum runs from varying degrees of partial lucidity to full lucidity and to possible advanced states
The Manifest Content of Self-Reported Lucid Versus Non-lucid Dreams Among College Students
No full textA major research interest of mine has been in the systematic content analysis of the lucid dream, and probably stems from my own experiences with this dream. This work started with my dissertation in the mid-1970\u27s and has continued. To date the majority of my work involves asking people to evaluate their own dreams. For instance I might ask, \u27To what extent is the dream you just had very recallable?\u27 They are then asked to evalulate their dream experience along a likart-type scale. This is a well accepted procedure in the personality literature in terms of the self evaluation of internal experience. We are fairly accurate judges of our own internal experiences
The Problems of Induction
No full textAll of us here are drawn together by our fascination with the lucid dream experience. We believe that it has the potential to enhance personal development and perhaps to increase our scientific understanding of dreams and consciousness. Without intentional induction procedures, lucid dreams tend to occur spontaneously but sporadically. An individual experiencing a lucid dream for the first time, will often become intrigued by it, and attempt to increase the frequency of these experiences by trial and error. These hit and miss methods do not often achieve their goal consistently. If we are to make progress toward scientific and the personal understanding of lucid dreams, we must first develop techniques to induce the lucid dream experience reliably. This is the most important task currently facing lucid dream research
EEG Cartography of a Night of Sleep
No full textQuantitative analysis of EEGs has been applied since 1932 by using Rourier spectral analysis. However, it is only in 1963 that D.C. Walter was able to use Fast Fourier Transform algorithm (FFT) for computing power spectra. With the introduction of mini-and micro-computers, spectral analysis of EEG has been extensively developed. First, it was used for clinical pathology and pharmaco-EEG research. More that 800 references and almost 15 books are indicative of this growing trend. Quantitative EEG analysis was first applied to a few EEG channels. Pioneers like A. Remond in Paris, H. Petsche in Vienna, D. Lehmann in Zurich, have published articles on brain electrical field distributions over the scalp, applying quantitative EEG techniques to 32 electrodes and more. Only ten years ago S. Ueno published on “Topographic Computer Display of Abnormal EEG Activities in Patients with CNS Diseases.” We may consider that EEG cartography started with this publication, using all the resources of computerized imaging techniques. This was followed in 1979 by F.M. Doffy’s first articles on brain electrical EEG mapping (BEAM) and in 1982 by M.S. Buchsbaum and R. Coppola article describing “A New System for Gray-level Surface Distribution Maps of Electrical Activity”. In the same year, M.S. Buchsbaum published the first article on “Topographic Cortical. Mapping of EEG Sleep Stages During Day-time Naps in Normal Subjects.” This was followed by a growing research interest on EEG cartography in psychiatry, neurology, psychophysiology and pharmaco-EEG
Robert Monroe\u27s "Far Journeys"
No full textFar Journeys is the long awaited sequel to Robert Monroe\u27s Journeys Out of the Body. This latter work has become an international classic in the out-of-body literature. In Far Journeys, Monroe describes the further development of his own out-of-body experiences (OBEs) and his development of an institute to study states of consciousness. This new work is likely to be even more widely read than his first book although, unfortunately, neither book has been, or is likely to be, widely read in current scientific circles. The world view that Monroe presents is simply so foreign to the current scientific zeitgeist that most will view this book as a work of fantasy or kookery. I view this book as neither