Why do we dream? 10 theories to explain this phenomenon

Everybody dreams. ANDThe human being spends a third of his life sleeping and, of that third, at least another third spends dreaming, so for a large part of our lives we live in a true dream world.

Both the question of why we dream like the interpretation of dreams have been a fascinating subject for mankind since ancient times, and have always been surrounded by an atmosphere of mystery, since a definitive theory has not yet been reached about this creative process of our subconscious.

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The first interpretations of dreams in history

In Mesopotamia, the Babylonians believed that dreams considered "good" were sent by the gods and the "bad" were sent by demons. They had a goddess of dreams named Mamu to which the priests prayed and tried to please to prevent bad dreams from coming true.

The Assyrians also interpreted dreams as signs. They believed that bad dreams were a warning and required action to correct the problem that had appeared in the dream. They thought that the person who had a bad dream should follow whatever advice they interpreted from the dream.

On the other hand, the ancient Egyptians believed that the gods were revealed in their dreams. They thought these visions cause the real things that cannot be controlled or interpreted by the consent. They wrote down their dreams on papyrus and differentiated between three types of dream experience: those in which the gods demand a act on the part of the dreamer, those that contain warnings or revelations and dreams in which it was reached through a ritual. The three types of dreams served as a way to know the messages of the gods, such as oracles.

Since the best way to receive divine revelation was through the dream, the Egyptians induced sleep in people who they asked for answers from the gods. They traveled to sanctuaries or holy places to lie down, sleep, and dream in hopes of receiving advice, healing, or consolation from the gods.

• You may be interested: "Types of religion (and their differences in beliefs and ideas)"

Why we dream: approaches from psychology

Psychology is not alien to this interest and has approached the world of dreams from various disciplines (anthropology, neuroscience, psychology, literature ...), although the reasons why we dream are still mysterious there are a number of interesting hypotheses and theories and relevant that try to explain why we dream.

1. Wish fulfillment

One of the first and main scholars of dreams was Sigmund Freud, who analyzed various patients and even used his own dreams as examples to prove his theory. He proposed that dreams represent the realization of a wish on the part of the dreamer either in a real or symbolic way, even nightmares.

According to Freud, dreams are considered a collection of images from our conscious lives that have symbolic meanings. related to our subconscious desires.

In order to Sigmund Freud All dreams are interpretable and what is dreamed does not have to be a totally real desire, but a symbol of something we want to happen, which is why he proposed that all dreams are interpretable.

2. Secondary effect

J. Allan Hobson and Robert McClarley in 1977 developed the activation-synthesis theory. According to this theory in the REM sleep phase brain circuits are activated causing areas of the brain to limbic system (including the amygdala and hippocampus) involved in emotions, sensations and memories are activated.

The brain tries to interpret these signals and dreams are the subjective interpretation of the signal generated by the brain while we sleep. However, the theory does not imply that dreams are meaningless but rather suggests that it is our most creative state of consciousness.

3. Keeping the brain active

The psychiatrist Jie Zhang proposed the theory of continuous activation of dreams, dreams being the result of the constant need of our brain to create and consolidate long-term memories for proper functioning.

When we are asleep, our brain automatically triggers the generation of data from the stores of memory and these data are not shown in the form of feelings or thoughts but we experience them in our dreams According to this theory, our dreams would be like a kind of random "screensaver" that our brain starts so as not to turn off completely.

4. Forget: mental cleansing

Neuroscientist Francis CrickTogether with the mathematician Graeme Mitchiso in 1983 he developed the theory of reverse learning.

The theory indicates that we dream to get rid of the accumulated connections and associations in our brain that we do not need to store. Therefore, we dream to forget as a kind of mental escape route, as if dreaming were a method of garbage collection or mental cleansing.

5. Learning consolidation

At the end of the 19th century, the German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus After various experiments and observations he indicated that dreams serve to consolidate what we have learned during the day. However, this theory was discarded by the scientific community since they considered that the brain is not active while we sleep.

In the 1950s Aserinsky and Nathaniel Klietman found in various experiments that the brain continues to work while we sleep and is dedicated to process everything you have acquired during the day. It reviews the recently formed memories, analyzes them and discards those that are irrelevant, enhancing and qualifying those that may be useful. However, how the brain performs this task remains a mystery.

6. Defense mechanism

The dream could be related to a defense mechanism. When we dream, the brain behaves in the same way as when we are awake, although the dopamine system associated with movement is not active. Therefore, said tonic immobility or playing dead could be considered as a defense mechanism.

7. Test

Dreams commonly include threatening and dangerous situations. The Finnish philosopher and pseudoscientist Antti Revonusuo suggested the primitive instinct theory of the essay by which the function of dreams would be simulate threatening events or situations and rehearse the perception of said threats in order to avoid them.

This theory maintains that the content of the dream has a lot of meaning for its purpose. In addition, not all dreams are threatening or unpleasant, they can also serve as practice or rehearsal of other situations.

8. Problem resolution

Deirdre Barret suggests that dreams are a way to solve problems. Author John Steinbeck called this the "Sleep Committee." As if it were a theater, lacking the rules of conventional logic and the restrictions of reality, the mind can create in dreams all kinds of scenarios solving problems more effectively than when we are awake. For this reason, we tend to think that the best solution to a problem is achieved after having slept.

9. Dream Darwinism

Psychologist Mark Blechner claims that dreams function as a natural selection of ideas that would serve to generate new ideas. Some research suggests that in the various situations we dream about, we try to select the most useful reaction to successfully cope with those situations.

Dreams introduce useful variations to psychic life and internal narratives, would produce variations to generate new types of thought, imagination, self-awareness and other psychic functions

10. Processing of painful emotions

Finally, dreams could be considered like some kind of evolutionary therapy in which in dreams we do not select the best emotion or behavior but rather serve as an outlet through the association of some emotions with symbols that appear in dreams.

Conclusion

These are just a few of the more prominent explanations, as technology and research advances. our ability to understand the brain will increase and we may one day discover the ultimate reason why that we dream. Today, despite everything we know about the physiology of sleep, dream thoughts remain an enigmatic and controversial field.