Do blind people see clearly in dreams?

[Bin Qasim]

Hello guys

Hope this find you in the best health.

I want to know about people who have glasses and they see dreams clear.

How can that be possible?? I mean I myself sometimes see some places in my dream so clearly, I don't get it.

please reply soon.

peace

 

[tfleming]

probably because the sight AFTER the optics is corrected by the glasses is what stored in our memory! somehow, we don't need to remember consciously in our sleep that we need glasses. interesting stuff Qasim

 

[Bin Qasim]

Hello

thanx or replying.

I got it what you said. but sometimes i also see places I haven't seeen before.

Please reply soon.

peace

 

[tfleming]

well, if you're asking what our dreams consist of; it's my personal opinion that dreams are somewhat like a 'defrag' if you know what that means; in computers, the system reorganizes the links between files that are stored in bytes on our hard drive. i see REM sleep as similar to this this means that our mind tends to make 'strange' connections in our sleep; this doesn't account to 'new' data that we haven't seen consiously however. could these be stored memories from our genetics??

 

[tfleming]

i mean do we 'inherit' dream state consciousness from our parents, grandparents, etc, etc?? hopefully if so, this isn't as bad as it sounds eh??

 

[Moonbear]

i mean do we 'inherit' dream state consciousness from our parents, grandparents, etc, etc?? hopefully if so, this isn't as bad as it sounds eh??

Dreams and memories don't alter DNA, so cannot be inherited.

 

[gerben]

...but the DNA presumably determines to a large extent how the brain is build and how it functions, so it may also determine how you see/feel things and how/what you dream...

In daily life the things you see depend on the images that are falling on your retina's and the quality of these images depends on wearing glasses. The things you experience in dreams do not depend on retinal images and so the lack off glasses does not influence these experiences.

 

[Moonbear]

...but the DNA presumably determines to a large extent how the brain is build and how it functions, so it may also determine how you see/feel things and how/what you dream...

Phrased that way, yes, it makes more sense. That wasn't how I read the other posts, but if that's what they meant, then it wasn't as far-fetched as my first impression.

 

[tfleming]

i beg to differ

Dreams and memories don't alter DNA, so cannot be inherited.

i'm not so sure about that, moonbeam.

gene expression and memory CAN be linked

http://www.jneurosci.org/cgi/content/abstract/21/8/2571

as to dreams, then i would hazard a guess that dreams CAN and DO affect conscious actions, and vice versa.

 

[transit442003]

i don't think we can inherit memories maybe when you are dreaming you can see the place that you haveread about in a book it could be a fictional or a real place somewhere and our brains create an image of what we read or even heard explained. like when I'm reading a book i can see the surrondings of the bok as if they were pictures and when i try to remeber what happened in a previous bok that i had read it plays in my head like a film.



a day without sunshine.....is like...well......night

 

[iansmith]

this doesn't account to 'new' data that we haven't seen consiously however. could these be stored memories from our genetics??

i'm not so sure about that, moonbeam.

gene expression and memory CAN be linked

http://www.jneurosci.org/cgi/content/abstract/21/8/2571

as to dreams, then i would hazard a guess that dreams CAN and DO affect conscious actions, and vice versa.

From the article you pointed out, gene expression is change by stimuli but it does not support your claim. For memories to be stored, DNA inside the gametes has to be changed and directed mutagenesis must occur. DNA expression change in the brain will not have an effect in the gametes

 

[tfleming]

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pubmed&pubmedid=8942956

Mark Bear's article above shows how the synapses are modified by "learning" while Anne West's colloquium (previously quoted) shows how some genes are modified by synapses or more correctly by Ca2+ flow following membrane depolarization. this adds up to a distinctly possible method for experiences being laid down as memories via specific gene expression.

it's interesting that the neurones seem to change according to our memories; so what happens when we are born? are we a clean sheet in terms of neuronal genetics?? what some of you are saying equates to us all having the same 'zero' genetic state a birth which IMHO is the more ludicrous of two possibilities! so we must have a stock of genetic thoughts/memories surely?

do we know definitively that the gametes are independent of the neuronal data? we do know there's an awful lot of redundancy.

 

[Moonbear]

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pubmed&pubmedid=8942956

Mark Bear's article above shows how the synapses are modified by "learning" while Anne West's colloquium (previously quoted) shows how some genes are modified by synapses or more correctly by Ca2+ flow following membrane depolarization. this adds up to a distinctly possible method for experiences being laid down as memories via specific gene expression.

Gene expression is not the same as mutating DNA. It refers to the transcription of DNA to mRNA or translation of mRNA to protein (often the same term, "expression" is used for both of these processes, so you need to glean the usage from the context). This distinction is explained in any introductory biology course; you should be able to find more detail of this process in any general biology or introductory genetics texbook.

Continuous modification of synapses is normal neuronal activity. Yes, it is involved in learning and memory, but that has nothing to do with germ line genetic modifications that would be passed onto offspring. Inheritance of acquired characteristics (Larmarkian theory) has been LONG ago disproven. The ability to learn and for synapses to be modified is due to genetic coding, as gerben qualified previously, but what you learn, dream, experience, etc., during your lifetime does not alter the genetic code to be passed on to offspring. Even if (I'm not saying it happens, just a what if scenario) some process in the brain altered/damaged DNA in neuronal cells, that is a somatic cell mutation, not a germ cell mutation. In other words, it is not affecting sperm or oocytes, just neuronal cells, thus not passed on to offspring.

(Also, please note, my name is Moonbear not Moonbeam. You've made this error more than once, so I don't think it's just a typo. )

 

[tfleming]

Gene expression is not the same as mutating DNA. It refers to the transcription of DNA to mRNA or translation of mRNA to protein (often the same term, "expression" is used for both of these processes, so you need to glean the usage from the context). This distinction is explained in any introductory biology course; you should be able to find more detail of this process in any general biology or introductory genetics texbook.

Continuous modification of synapses is normal neuronal activity. Yes, it is involved in learning and memory, but that has nothing to do with germ line genetic modifications that would be passed onto offspring. Inheritance of acquired characteristics (Larmarkian theory) has been LONG ago disproven. The ability to learn and for synapses to be modified is due to genetic coding, as gerben qualified previously, but what you learn, dream, experience, etc., during your lifetime does not alter the genetic code to be passed on to offspring. Even if (I'm not saying it happens, just a what if scenario) some process in the brain altered/damaged DNA in neuronal cells, that is a somatic cell mutation, not a germ cell mutation. In other words, it is not affecting sperm or oocytes, just neuronal cells, thus not passed on to offspring.

(Also, please note, my name is Moonbear not Moonbeam. You've made this error more than once, so I don't think it's just a typo. )

sorry, it WAS unintentional; yes ok, so IYHO there's no way our memories can be passed from generation to generation?

 

[Moonbear]

sorry, it WAS unintentional; yes ok, so IYHO there's no way our memories can be passed from generation to generation?

Not in biological terms, no, only in anthropological terms, such as through story telling.

 

[tfleming]

ok, thanks, Moonbear ( i got it right this time huh? LOL), actually that's nice to know, i'd hate to be dreaming the same as my grandfather who fought in the Great War (LOL); i agree about the anthropological myths and legends, but this dall doesn't answer bin qasim;why does he see places he hasn't been to. my guess would be that the mind can 'create' visions to match the context (emotions etc)

you only get smileys when you DON"T use the quick reply?

cheers tony

 

[Moonbear]

...but this dall doesn't answer bin qasim;why does he see places he hasn't been to. my guess would be that the mind can 'create' visions to match the context (emotions etc)

That would be my answer (as in, I agree, but don't know if there's a "correct" answer). I've only experienced my own dreams to know what ends up in them, and it's a combination of things I've experienced, mixed in with some emotions, and a healthy dose of imagination/fantasy. Since you don't "see" things in your dreams through your eyes, your vision would be completely unrelated to how your dreams portray images. Though, I've always wondered what the dreams of blind people are like (those who were born blind, so have no visual memory of their environment). I've been told they dream in touch and feelings, but have a hard time even imagining it.

you only get smileys when you DON"T use the quick reply?

cheers tony

Yes, you need to click on "go advanced" to get the smilies to select, but you can type them in too. We just discussed this in this thread: https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=54540 for someone whose computer is for some reason not being nice about letting him use smilies.

 

[tfleming]

wow , really interesting, maybe that tends to demonstrate that dreams are visuals, acoustics and other sensory inputs into the pool. so i guess Bin Qasim can see something in conscious 'reality' that gets intermingled with touch taste, hearing, emotions, so that he gets an impression that he's seen it before; in other words maybe dreams can influence the conscious reality in a two-way feedback!??

 

[matthyaouw]

Slightly off topic, but still on the subject of dreams:
Last I heard, dreams occur during the REM stage which is during deep sleep, and that a dream would not be remembered unless the sleep cycle was interrupted. Is this true? My personal experience tells me not entirely, as I often dream as I'm on the fine line between awake and asleep. I'm often conscious enough to open my eyes a crack and incorporate any blurred shape that may be in front of them into it, or (potentially embarrasingly) wake up suddenly and almost shout something related to the dream. I'm not saying that I don't dream in REM sleep, I'm just saying in my experience it's not just confined to that stage.

 

[tfleming]

Slightly off topic, but still on the subject of dreams:
Last I heard, dreams occur during the REM stage which is during deep sleep, and that a dream would not be remembered unless the sleep cycle was interrupted. Is this true? My personal experience tells me not entirely, as I often dream as I'm on the fine line between awake and asleep. I'm often conscious enough to open my eyes a crack and incorporate any blurred shape that may be in front of them into it, or (potentially embarrasingly) wake up suddenly and almost shout something related to the dream. I'm not saying that I don't dream in REM sleep, I'm just saying in my experience it's not just confined to that stage.

when I'm in that same 'semi-state', i see a 'matrix' vanish before my eyes! as if one image is becoming overtaken by the conscious one; at about this time, i realize I'm awake; the other thing is i often dream of flying over my suburb, even over the coast line i live near. i even have to 'land' without crashing; and i do love birds, maybe this is a projective wish?

 

[Moonbear]

Slightly off topic, but still on the subject of dreams:
Last I heard, dreams occur during the REM stage which is during deep sleep, and that a dream would not be remembered unless the sleep cycle was interrupted. Is this true? My personal experience tells me not entirely, as I often dream as I'm on the fine line between awake and asleep. I'm often conscious enough to open my eyes a crack and incorporate any blurred shape that may be in front of them into it, or (potentially embarrasingly) wake up suddenly and almost shout something related to the dream. I'm not saying that I don't dream in REM sleep, I'm just saying in my experience it's not just confined to that stage.

We discussed a related topic here, that addresses this question. Re-reading it, it seems I have an outstanding promise of a further answer. I think I already deleted the PDFs of those articles though.

 

[matthyaouw]

Oops. Silly me. thanks!

 

[tfleming]

...snipped...there's no way our memories can be passed from generation to generation?

thought you might be interested in a follow up or two here; I described a flying dream I've had from time to time over the years; it turns out my 26 year old daughter has a very similar dream, flying over the neighbourhood! not saying this is anything but coincidence but it does raise an interesting survey of people with flying dreams.

also I'm intersted in what is considered to be the cause of sleep during night and consciousness during day. obviously the presence or otherwise of light is at teh head of the list??