Nightmares are some of the most memorable moments in our lives. They can be bewildering, terrifying, outlandish, eerie, and impossible.
However, no matter how much we dread them, they might be one of the most essential ways to make sense of the world.
In the documentary “What Are Dreams?” scientists delve into the meaning, purpose, and function of these nightly episodes.
Finnish neuroscientist Antii Revonsuo has collected nightmares in order to explain their origins and reasons. He believes nightmares are a mechanism for rehearsing stressful real-life events.
Revonsuo poses the theory that “The nature of bad dreams and nightmares is that they contain threatening events and they force us to go through those simulated events [so] that in the waking world … we are more prepared to survive those when we have been training for them in our dreams.”
During a nightmare, we can also take on challenges and test the possibilities without any risk. We deal with terror in our sleep in order to handle the terror of real life (which is simultaneously encouraging and discouraging).
Dmitri Mendeleev developed the scientific periodic table of elements after having a dream in which he saw a table where all the elements fell into place. When he woke up, he wrote it down and later found only one correction was necessary. This dream formed the foundation of all modern chemistry.
Sewing machine inventor Elias Howe developed his design concept by recalling a frightening dream in which cannibals attacked him. The holes in their spears gave him the idea about where to place the eye of the needle.
Nobel Prize recipient James D. Watson also discovered the double helix shape of the DNA molecule in a nightmare involving two intertwined snakes. This work provided the gateway to the whole field of DNA chemistry and genetic engineering.
Sleeping brains clearly are not resting brains. Many want to write off dreams as meaningless neural impulses, but these random and chaotic signals cannot be ignored.
Deirdre Barrett of Harvard Medical School insists that discoveries such as these can be made because “We can see things much more clearly when we think about them in dreams, and it also helps us think outside the box. Our associations are looser and more intuitive and less linear.”
During these brief bursts of neural activity, vivid experiences are created and internalized. Fearsome nighttime visions can be a crucial tool and creative key to grapple with pressing concerns and questions.
The nightmares we least hope for can be the most valuable. Even if there is no direct purpose or symbolism to dreams, there is no denying there is psychological coherence.
As they say, follow your dreams, or rather, your nightmares.
Reach the columnist at mgrichar@asu.edu
