Sleep literally cleans your brain. During slumber, more cerebrospinal
fluid flushes through the brain to wash away harmful proteins and toxins
that build up during the day.
Harmful build up of proteins and brain toxins can lead to neurological damage. Many dementia patients have a difficult time sleeping. They can never "switch off" their brains in order to rest. The brain is in constant "on" mode which can lead to hallucinations, temper and mood changes.
Throughout the series, the castaways were shown constantly on the move, day and night, mission after mission, worn down by lack of sleep. The physical strains of island survival took a mental toll on them. They became irritable, possessive, paranoid, abusive and sly. Even level headed Sawyer showed those various traits as the days and weeks passed on the island.
If the first theme of the show was the standard "how would you survive on a deserted island," then the basic survival instincts would take charge of your body. The gut instinct of fear of the unknown would be front and center in your mind. What is behind the bushes? What is that noise? Is something out there that can harm me?
That is why the castaways felt compelled to stay together; strength in numbers. That is also why they chose the beach to set up camp; they only had to worry about the land side at night.
Getting past the fear, castaways in this situation would have four things on their mind: food, water, shelter and rescue. The island seemed to have sufficient plant life to provide some basic nutrition. Water was the first problem that needed to be solved which led to exploring the island. Shelter was from the airplane debris which kept the castaways focused on something else besides their plight.
The one issue that did not take center stage was rescue. It was more an afterthought than a compelling mission. Even when they found a way by finding the cockpit radio, things stopped by a tragic death. Only when the Others created a more dramatic need for survival did the main characters, as leaders, tried to find a way off the island. Michael's boat was really the first and last chance. When the freighter arrived, a second set of danger emerged which left most of the castaways unable to escape.
Throughout the incidents, it seemed that main characters stopped thinking rationally - - - asking the key questions to their colleagues. Information was sparsely communicated on a need to know basis. This led to jealousy and splits among the group. The island began to assert a deranged assertiveness in both Jack and Locke which drove a stake between a combined effort to leave the island.
At one point, Hurley hallucinations became so real that he almost killed himself by jumping off a cliff. His friend, who may have been imaginary, almost got him to buy into the premise that the only way to leave the island was to die. In some respects, this was a true statement. (Anti-purgatory theorists will not fixate on the Ending church as anything particular to island life.)
Hurley was the world in which the other characters orbited. Hurley was the only character to truly fit into all the castaway sub-groups and with the Others. (He was let go without any torture or retribution.) Some theorists believed that the entire show was within Hurley's own mind. A sleep depraved mind that got the story line farther and farther away from reality as each season ended. Hurley was a known mental patient - - - who seemed to get along with all the day room patients just like he did with the island people. He was not special. He was not a forceful personality. He was not a danger. He was the perfect observer.
Or, in the analogy to another fantasy, he could have been the Wizard behind Oz's curtain.
Collective dream theorists think that Hurley could have been the "thought engine" that connected the various characters subconscious dreams, desires, thoughts and issues to "life" on an imaginary island world. Dreams and a weakened mental state was suggested as the reason why the story lines had so many continuity errors and dead ends.
With so many tangents weaved into the LOST episodes, it is not difficult losing sleep over trying to figure everything out.
Showing posts with label sleep. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sleep. Show all posts
Thursday, April 16, 2020
Friday, October 20, 2017
BRAIN LIVES ON
There is a haunting story from the UK Sun.
A UK study on what happens to cardiac arrest patients (where the heart stops) that "come back to life" indicates that brain activity continues after death. Specifically, a person's consciousness continues to work after the person has died. In other words, your brain knows you are dead when you die.
Dr. Sam Parnia and her team from New York University Langone School of Medicine set out to find the answer in a much less dangerous fashion, looking at studies in Europe and the US on people who experienced "out of body" death experiences.
“They’ll describe watching doctors and nurses working and they’ll describe having awareness of full conversations, of visual things that were going on, that would otherwise not be known to them,” Parnia said. Their recollections were also verified by medical staff who reported their patients could remember the details.
Death, in a medical sense, is when the heart stops beating and cuts off blood to the brain.
This means the brain’s functions also stop and can no longer keep the body alive.
Parnia explained that the brain’s cerebral cortex — the so-called “thinking part” of the brain — also slows down instantly, and flatlines, meaning that no brainwaves are visible on an electric monitor, within 2 to 20 seconds.
This study adds a factual context to several LOST theories. For those who believe that the series premise was contained inside the mind(s) of a character, then the after death experiences (which could seem to last for a long time like short REM dreams) could explain LOST's mysteries and inconsistent parts. For those who believe that LOST was staged in the after life underworld, the vivid life and death dreamscapes could be from the moments right after death - - - the brain pulling memories, fantasies and information from a still-active brain after the body has died.
A UK study on what happens to cardiac arrest patients (where the heart stops) that "come back to life" indicates that brain activity continues after death. Specifically, a person's consciousness continues to work after the person has died. In other words, your brain knows you are dead when you die.
Dr. Sam Parnia and her team from New York University Langone School of Medicine set out to find the answer in a much less dangerous fashion, looking at studies in Europe and the US on people who experienced "out of body" death experiences.
“They’ll describe watching doctors and nurses working and they’ll describe having awareness of full conversations, of visual things that were going on, that would otherwise not be known to them,” Parnia said. Their recollections were also verified by medical staff who reported their patients could remember the details.
Death, in a medical sense, is when the heart stops beating and cuts off blood to the brain.
This means the brain’s functions also stop and can no longer keep the body alive.
Parnia explained that the brain’s cerebral cortex — the so-called “thinking part” of the brain — also slows down instantly, and flatlines, meaning that no brainwaves are visible on an electric monitor, within 2 to 20 seconds.
This study adds a factual context to several LOST theories. For those who believe that the series premise was contained inside the mind(s) of a character, then the after death experiences (which could seem to last for a long time like short REM dreams) could explain LOST's mysteries and inconsistent parts. For those who believe that LOST was staged in the after life underworld, the vivid life and death dreamscapes could be from the moments right after death - - - the brain pulling memories, fantasies and information from a still-active brain after the body has died.
Wednesday, April 5, 2017
BETWEEN SLEEP AND AWAKE
The little clue about being "awake," from something, still haunts theorists.
The debate focus is on whether the sideways world was real, paranormal, heavenly or an illusion.
Scientists are researching the mental condition which occurs just before a person wakes up from sleep. There is a distinct period where things can happen to a person: experience a paralysis nightmare or sleepwalk. The sleep paralysis occurs when your mind wakes up prior to your body. The sleepwalking occurs when your body wakes up before your mind.
History is littered with references to "demonic" sleep attacks. No one knew why people acted strangely. Since it was not normal, the explanation had to be it was paranormal. The content of hallucinations can often be thematically linked to the feeling of paralysis – manifesting as visions of an intruder in the bed who is physically holding the sleeper down. Records of incidents attributable to sleep paralysis can actually be found throughout history, in different cultures, dating back as far as 400 BC. Some blamed witchcraft and curses.
Sleep paralysis is when your limbs are frozen but your mind is dreaming about a terrible thing, for example, a monster attacking you. Your mind races its instincts to flee or fight back, but your body does not respond. That increases the fear one feels in the moment.
Science states that a person could be awake and been dreaming at the same time. Sleep disturbances include types of parasomnia, the inability to move, these periods of wakeful paralysis are often accompanied with vivid multisensory hallucinations. Effectively, imagery from your dreams can actually intrude into your waking reality.
The precise physiological mechanisms that result in sleep paralysis are still not entirely understood. What is known is that, typically, when we dream, our actions are confined to our imagination. We all have a built-in safety mechanism, which you can think of as something like a circuit breaker; it effectively blocks your brain’s motor planning signals from becoming motor action signals. This mechanism prevents us from physically acting out the actions that we dream of making. Thus, when you’re being chased by a monster in a dream, you don’t actually rise up and charge into the bedroom wall, or evolutionarily-speaking, tumble out of your tree. However, our brains are highly complex systems, and, as such, are prone to the occasional glitch.
One example is sleepwalking, which occurs when the paralysis eases too early, while you’re still asleep. On the flip side, sometimes the paralysis lingers – even after you’ve awoken. This typically happens just on the threshold of sleep – either just as you’re waking up or just as you’re drifting off. You can be conscious, with your eyes open, but be completely unable to move your body. Again, this is a fairly common occurrence, but the experience can be understandably alarming.
Such problems may be a consequence of more general sleep disruption. Researchers have shown that sleep paralysis experiences can be induced in lab settings when subjects are repeatedly woken from deep sleep. Researchers believe that 50 percent of people will experience at least one episode in their lifetimes.
Why would a person's mind act in such a strange fashion? One theory is that sleeping might serve to ‘consolidate’ memories from our waking life. The brain is de-fragment its information just like a computer software program corrects disjointed stored files.
But the sleep disturbances occur when the normal sleep process (and its mental sorting process) goes out of whack.
There is an old saying that you should never wake up a sleepwalker. It would be too traumatic for them to wake away from their resting place. People have had actual conversations with sleepwalkers. The idea that a person can be living in two "different states," awake and asleep is part of the issue with the LOST mythology paradoxes.
Were the main characters always awake? They were rarely shown sleeping - - - or was that purposeful to mimic the projection of a dream state. Why were clues such as "Illusion" on the name of a boat so clear at major story points? Why were Egyptian symbols of the dead used so often?
It begs the question of whether the characters were in some sort of "in-between" state of existence: partially awake (which accesses their personality traits) and partially asleep (which accesses their memories, fears, desires, emotions, etc.). Science research is beginning to think that there is such a place in daily human life.
The debate focus is on whether the sideways world was real, paranormal, heavenly or an illusion.
Scientists are researching the mental condition which occurs just before a person wakes up from sleep. There is a distinct period where things can happen to a person: experience a paralysis nightmare or sleepwalk. The sleep paralysis occurs when your mind wakes up prior to your body. The sleepwalking occurs when your body wakes up before your mind.
History is littered with references to "demonic" sleep attacks. No one knew why people acted strangely. Since it was not normal, the explanation had to be it was paranormal. The content of hallucinations can often be thematically linked to the feeling of paralysis – manifesting as visions of an intruder in the bed who is physically holding the sleeper down. Records of incidents attributable to sleep paralysis can actually be found throughout history, in different cultures, dating back as far as 400 BC. Some blamed witchcraft and curses.
Sleep paralysis is when your limbs are frozen but your mind is dreaming about a terrible thing, for example, a monster attacking you. Your mind races its instincts to flee or fight back, but your body does not respond. That increases the fear one feels in the moment.
Science states that a person could be awake and been dreaming at the same time. Sleep disturbances include types of parasomnia, the inability to move, these periods of wakeful paralysis are often accompanied with vivid multisensory hallucinations. Effectively, imagery from your dreams can actually intrude into your waking reality.
The precise physiological mechanisms that result in sleep paralysis are still not entirely understood. What is known is that, typically, when we dream, our actions are confined to our imagination. We all have a built-in safety mechanism, which you can think of as something like a circuit breaker; it effectively blocks your brain’s motor planning signals from becoming motor action signals. This mechanism prevents us from physically acting out the actions that we dream of making. Thus, when you’re being chased by a monster in a dream, you don’t actually rise up and charge into the bedroom wall, or evolutionarily-speaking, tumble out of your tree. However, our brains are highly complex systems, and, as such, are prone to the occasional glitch.
One example is sleepwalking, which occurs when the paralysis eases too early, while you’re still asleep. On the flip side, sometimes the paralysis lingers – even after you’ve awoken. This typically happens just on the threshold of sleep – either just as you’re waking up or just as you’re drifting off. You can be conscious, with your eyes open, but be completely unable to move your body. Again, this is a fairly common occurrence, but the experience can be understandably alarming.
Such problems may be a consequence of more general sleep disruption. Researchers have shown that sleep paralysis experiences can be induced in lab settings when subjects are repeatedly woken from deep sleep. Researchers believe that 50 percent of people will experience at least one episode in their lifetimes.
Why would a person's mind act in such a strange fashion? One theory is that sleeping might serve to ‘consolidate’ memories from our waking life. The brain is de-fragment its information just like a computer software program corrects disjointed stored files.
In 2000, a team of scientists at Harvard Medical School reported that participants who played the video game Tetris would continually report seeing game-like imagery, the iconic falling blocks, just before falling asleep. Similar results have been obtained using other types of video games. This evidence has been used to support the idea that sleeping might serve to ‘consolidate’ memories from our waking life - consolidation is term that refers to the process of reinforcing and strengthening newly created memories. Experiments have demonstrated that people who are given memory-based tasks will perform better if they’re given the opportunity to sleep after learning. It seems as though after we’ve been engaged in a learning task, our minds might be using sleep as a sort of rehearsal space to practice problems.
But the sleep disturbances occur when the normal sleep process (and its mental sorting process) goes out of whack.
There is an old saying that you should never wake up a sleepwalker. It would be too traumatic for them to wake away from their resting place. People have had actual conversations with sleepwalkers. The idea that a person can be living in two "different states," awake and asleep is part of the issue with the LOST mythology paradoxes.
Were the main characters always awake? They were rarely shown sleeping - - - or was that purposeful to mimic the projection of a dream state. Why were clues such as "Illusion" on the name of a boat so clear at major story points? Why were Egyptian symbols of the dead used so often?
It begs the question of whether the characters were in some sort of "in-between" state of existence: partially awake (which accesses their personality traits) and partially asleep (which accesses their memories, fears, desires, emotions, etc.). Science research is beginning to think that there is such a place in daily human life.
Friday, January 27, 2017
PRUNING THE MIND
Arstechnica reported new findings on memory and sleep.
REM sleep is known to help solidify memories, but the mechanism for making memories more permanent is not well-understood. A recent study published in Nature Neuroscience shows that, during REM sleep, some of the structures neurons use to make connections with each other are pruned, while others are maintained and strengthened. The findings indicate that sleep's role in solidifying memories comes through allowing the brain time to selectively eliminate or maintain newly formed neural connections.
Dendritic spines are small outgrowths on a neuron’s dendrite, which is the portion of the neuron that receives chemical signals from other neurons. These spines enhance the strength of connections between neurons so they can play an important role in strengthening new neural circuits and solidifying new memories. These spines aren't permanent structures; instead, nerve cells can create new ones or get rid of existing ones (a process called pruning) as the importance of different connections shifts.
The new memories in this case were formed in mice, which were trained to complete a treadmill-like motor task. Then, the mice were either deprived of REM sleep or allowed to experience this form of sleep. The mice that were allowed REM showed significantly higher pruning of new dendritic spines compared to the mice that were REM sleep deprived. This difference in pruning was only seen for new dendritic spines, and previously existing dendritic spines were pruned at the same rate.
The researchers looked at how REM sleep influenced dendritic spine pruning at various points throughout the mice’s lives. They found that this neural pruning occurred while the mice were in REM sleep during their development (during the equivalent of mouse adolescence) but could also occur when the mice experienced REM sleep later in life after motor learning tasks. REM sleep increased the size of the spines that were retained, both during development and after motor learning tasks—these unpruned new spines were strengthened, reinforcing the developing neural circuitry.
In other words, during REM sleep, the brain selects which portions of new neural circuitry it wants to eliminate and which portions it wants to strengthen and enhance for future use.
The researchers then looked at the role calcium channels, which let calcium ions across membranes, may play in these decisions, as changes in the levels of calcium in cells is a normal part of brain activity. They found that sudden changes in the amount of calcium seen during REM sleep were critical for selective pruning and strengthening. When these calcium channels were blocked, the previously seen changes in dendritic spines no longer occurred.
Too little REM sleep during development is known to have detrimental effects on brain maturation, and this recent study provides new insight regarding the mechanisms that may be at play here.
Without sufficient REM sleep during development, juvenile and adolescent brains may not be able to adjust the connections among their neurons to hold on to what they've learned. Similarly, REM sleep is known to help with learning during all stages of development, including adulthood. In both cases, lack of REM sleep prevents the brain from eliminating unneeded spines generated during learning and prevents the strengthening of critical new spines that make newly learned tasks stick.
The interesting caveat to this study as it relates to LOST is that the main characters had a hard time grasping and retaining island knowledge. Many fans were upset when a group would return from a mission, the other castaways would not ask them basic questions of what happened to them. Other times, a character would continue to get manipulated, such as Locke.
So were the main characters unable to retain knowledge because of sleep deprivation? We did not see extended periods of time when the characters were asleep, except for Jack when he was captured at the Hydra station. At that point, Jack was asking Juliet many pointed questions, but did not get the responses he wanted (and recognized it).
If the island was a metaphor for some other place, such as a medical research facility, could the characters have been test subjects in sleep and REM research? And if it is true that lack of sleep can effectively strip your brain's ability to make or break connections to retain important memories, could that have been the real power that Widmore and Ben wanted to control?
REM sleep is known to help solidify memories, but the mechanism for making memories more permanent is not well-understood. A recent study published in Nature Neuroscience shows that, during REM sleep, some of the structures neurons use to make connections with each other are pruned, while others are maintained and strengthened. The findings indicate that sleep's role in solidifying memories comes through allowing the brain time to selectively eliminate or maintain newly formed neural connections.
Dendritic spines are small outgrowths on a neuron’s dendrite, which is the portion of the neuron that receives chemical signals from other neurons. These spines enhance the strength of connections between neurons so they can play an important role in strengthening new neural circuits and solidifying new memories. These spines aren't permanent structures; instead, nerve cells can create new ones or get rid of existing ones (a process called pruning) as the importance of different connections shifts.
The new memories in this case were formed in mice, which were trained to complete a treadmill-like motor task. Then, the mice were either deprived of REM sleep or allowed to experience this form of sleep. The mice that were allowed REM showed significantly higher pruning of new dendritic spines compared to the mice that were REM sleep deprived. This difference in pruning was only seen for new dendritic spines, and previously existing dendritic spines were pruned at the same rate.
The researchers looked at how REM sleep influenced dendritic spine pruning at various points throughout the mice’s lives. They found that this neural pruning occurred while the mice were in REM sleep during their development (during the equivalent of mouse adolescence) but could also occur when the mice experienced REM sleep later in life after motor learning tasks. REM sleep increased the size of the spines that were retained, both during development and after motor learning tasks—these unpruned new spines were strengthened, reinforcing the developing neural circuitry.
In other words, during REM sleep, the brain selects which portions of new neural circuitry it wants to eliminate and which portions it wants to strengthen and enhance for future use.
The researchers then looked at the role calcium channels, which let calcium ions across membranes, may play in these decisions, as changes in the levels of calcium in cells is a normal part of brain activity. They found that sudden changes in the amount of calcium seen during REM sleep were critical for selective pruning and strengthening. When these calcium channels were blocked, the previously seen changes in dendritic spines no longer occurred.
Too little REM sleep during development is known to have detrimental effects on brain maturation, and this recent study provides new insight regarding the mechanisms that may be at play here.
Without sufficient REM sleep during development, juvenile and adolescent brains may not be able to adjust the connections among their neurons to hold on to what they've learned. Similarly, REM sleep is known to help with learning during all stages of development, including adulthood. In both cases, lack of REM sleep prevents the brain from eliminating unneeded spines generated during learning and prevents the strengthening of critical new spines that make newly learned tasks stick.
The interesting caveat to this study as it relates to LOST is that the main characters had a hard time grasping and retaining island knowledge. Many fans were upset when a group would return from a mission, the other castaways would not ask them basic questions of what happened to them. Other times, a character would continue to get manipulated, such as Locke.
So were the main characters unable to retain knowledge because of sleep deprivation? We did not see extended periods of time when the characters were asleep, except for Jack when he was captured at the Hydra station. At that point, Jack was asking Juliet many pointed questions, but did not get the responses he wanted (and recognized it).
If the island was a metaphor for some other place, such as a medical research facility, could the characters have been test subjects in sleep and REM research? And if it is true that lack of sleep can effectively strip your brain's ability to make or break connections to retain important memories, could that have been the real power that Widmore and Ben wanted to control?
Wednesday, July 20, 2016
SHORT SLEEPERS
Researchers have found a gene mutation which allows some people to sleep as little as four hours a night.
Researchers discovered a tiny mutation in a gene DEC2 that was present in those who were short-sleepers, but not in members of the family who had normal length sleep, nor in 250 unrelated volunteers.
When the team bred mice to express this same mutation, the rodents also slept less but performed just as well as regular mice when given physical and cognitive tasks.
Getting too little sleep normally has a significant impact on health, quality of life and life expectancy. It can cause depression, weight gain and put you at greater risk of stroke and diabetes. “Sleep is so important, if you sleep well you can avoid many diseases, even dementia,” said the lead researcher. “If you deprive someone of just two hours sleep a day, their cognitive functions become significantly impaired almost immediately.”
People with the DEC2 mutation can do
the same cleaning up process in a shorter period of time – they are just
more efficient than the rest of us at sleeping.
Since discovering the DEC2 mutation, a lot of people have come forward claiming to only sleep a few hours a day. Most of these had insomnia. “We’re not focusing on those people who have sleeping issues that make them sleep less, we wanted to focus on people who sleep for a few hours and feel great.”
One can assume sleep deprivation can cause lingering mental issues including concentration, nightmares, lack of focus, anxiety, stress, tiredness and physical and mental mistakes. It sounds like much of the early characters coping with the island. In fact, rarely did we see any character sleeping or awaking from a deep slumber. It was non-stop action and reaction.
Is that itself a clue to the dynamics of the story? Were the fact that the LOST characters on edge, seeing smoke monsters, hallucinations and voices really caused by sleep deprivation? And if this was a giant experiment to determine who could function with less REM sleep, did anyone come close to a functioning, normal human being?
Researchers discovered a tiny mutation in a gene DEC2 that was present in those who were short-sleepers, but not in members of the family who had normal length sleep, nor in 250 unrelated volunteers.
When the team bred mice to express this same mutation, the rodents also slept less but performed just as well as regular mice when given physical and cognitive tasks.
Getting too little sleep normally has a significant impact on health, quality of life and life expectancy. It can cause depression, weight gain and put you at greater risk of stroke and diabetes. “Sleep is so important, if you sleep well you can avoid many diseases, even dementia,” said the lead researcher. “If you deprive someone of just two hours sleep a day, their cognitive functions become significantly impaired almost immediately.”
But why sleep is so important is still a bit of a mystery. The general consensus is that the brain needs sleep to do some housekeeping and general maintenance, since it doesn’t get much downtime during the day. While we sleep, the brain can repair cellular damage, remove toxins that accumulate during the day, boost flagging energy supplies and lay down memories.
Since discovering the DEC2 mutation, a lot of people have come forward claiming to only sleep a few hours a day. Most of these had insomnia. “We’re not focusing on those people who have sleeping issues that make them sleep less, we wanted to focus on people who sleep for a few hours and feel great.”
A positive outlook is common among all of the short-sleepers studied. “Anecdotally,” the report says, “they are all very energetic, very optimistic. It’s very common for them to feel like they want to cram as much into life as they can, but we’re not sure how or whether this is related to their mutations.”
One can assume sleep deprivation can cause lingering mental issues including concentration, nightmares, lack of focus, anxiety, stress, tiredness and physical and mental mistakes. It sounds like much of the early characters coping with the island. In fact, rarely did we see any character sleeping or awaking from a deep slumber. It was non-stop action and reaction.
Is that itself a clue to the dynamics of the story? Were the fact that the LOST characters on edge, seeing smoke monsters, hallucinations and voices really caused by sleep deprivation? And if this was a giant experiment to determine who could function with less REM sleep, did anyone come close to a functioning, normal human being?
Wednesday, January 20, 2016
WHEN YOU CAN'T SLEEP
There is a Japanese legend that states that if you cannot fall asleep it means that you are awake in another person's dream.
How interesting.
LOST had several key trigger words or concepts: awakening, dreams, alternative reality, changes in time and space.
But what is a better representation of an alternate reality or change in time and space than dreams?
Even another person's dreams that affects you.
It is not that the person who cannot sleep knows about, or controls the other person's dream. It is probably the exact opposite. When one tosses aimlessly trying to get to sleep, you are restless and not in a dream state. It is like the actual dreamer has pulled the mechanism for your dreams, your subconscious REM dream state, from you to power their vivid imagination with your appearance, words, character and personality.
Would this be a dream thief in action? No, because they are not "your" dreams since you are still awake.
The idea that a heavy, deep thinking dreamer can attach their mental thought waves to other people to harvest and extract "better" more lucid dreams is a fascinating collision of philosophy and science fiction.
Through the series, we rarely saw any of the main characters actually sleeping. They were constantly on the move, in day light and at night. And over time, they did look tired. Their mental faculties were low. (How many times did we complain that the characters failed to ask basic questions to people coming back from a mission?) The island characters were the ones who were sleep deprived for a reason.
It still could be associated with a Dharma experiment on weaponizing dreams for the military. Or it could be that the stress levels and electromagnetic properties of the island interfered with anyone getting REM sleep (the biological basic need to rest and recharge one's internal batteries). Prolonged non-sleep can make people forgetful, irritable, and psychotic.
But what does the original legend mean?
It may be a philosophical means to explain how being awake can be expressed on different levels of reality. Being in another persons dream for example can simply mean that person has interest in you or it can actually be a theoretical idea that you exist many different places at once.
In LOST, we presume that the main characters were in two different places (island world and the sideways plain of existence) at the same time. The sideways people could not "remember" their island pasts until "they were awakened." Since the sideways world was the after life, it could be equated that the main characters were "restless ghosts" who could not come to terms with their pasts.
Or it could mean that in each person, we have many people: we have our biologic human form that is transfixed to this planet. We may also have a spiritual form which rests inside our body, but it can be released into a different plain of existence. Perhaps, people whose "soul" has left their living body are suddenly defenseless against the temptations and evil urges that plague mankind.
In the sideways world, the characters did not reunite with their bodies. Their souls "remembered" their past - - - their island past and their friendships, the missing pieces in their lives.
How interesting.
LOST had several key trigger words or concepts: awakening, dreams, alternative reality, changes in time and space.
But what is a better representation of an alternate reality or change in time and space than dreams?
Even another person's dreams that affects you.
It is not that the person who cannot sleep knows about, or controls the other person's dream. It is probably the exact opposite. When one tosses aimlessly trying to get to sleep, you are restless and not in a dream state. It is like the actual dreamer has pulled the mechanism for your dreams, your subconscious REM dream state, from you to power their vivid imagination with your appearance, words, character and personality.
Would this be a dream thief in action? No, because they are not "your" dreams since you are still awake.
The idea that a heavy, deep thinking dreamer can attach their mental thought waves to other people to harvest and extract "better" more lucid dreams is a fascinating collision of philosophy and science fiction.
Through the series, we rarely saw any of the main characters actually sleeping. They were constantly on the move, in day light and at night. And over time, they did look tired. Their mental faculties were low. (How many times did we complain that the characters failed to ask basic questions to people coming back from a mission?) The island characters were the ones who were sleep deprived for a reason.
It still could be associated with a Dharma experiment on weaponizing dreams for the military. Or it could be that the stress levels and electromagnetic properties of the island interfered with anyone getting REM sleep (the biological basic need to rest and recharge one's internal batteries). Prolonged non-sleep can make people forgetful, irritable, and psychotic.
But what does the original legend mean?
It may be a philosophical means to explain how being awake can be expressed on different levels of reality. Being in another persons dream for example can simply mean that person has interest in you or it can actually be a theoretical idea that you exist many different places at once.
In LOST, we presume that the main characters were in two different places (island world and the sideways plain of existence) at the same time. The sideways people could not "remember" their island pasts until "they were awakened." Since the sideways world was the after life, it could be equated that the main characters were "restless ghosts" who could not come to terms with their pasts.
Or it could mean that in each person, we have many people: we have our biologic human form that is transfixed to this planet. We may also have a spiritual form which rests inside our body, but it can be released into a different plain of existence. Perhaps, people whose "soul" has left their living body are suddenly defenseless against the temptations and evil urges that plague mankind.
In the sideways world, the characters did not reunite with their bodies. Their souls "remembered" their past - - - their island past and their friendships, the missing pieces in their lives.
Friday, September 18, 2015
WHY WE DREAM
Sleep is a must for all animals, including you. You must
sleep to live. When we sleep it may seem like we’re not doing much. But
this is when our bodies are busy growing, healing, and
learning—especially our brains. They make sense of the lessons, games,
words, feelings, and thoughts we had during the day.
We have something inside our bodies called a circadian (sir-CAY-dee-an) clock that tells our bodies when it’s time to sleep. It’s not a real clock! The circadian clock is a system controlled by neurons,
or brain cells, behind your eyes that react to light. This clock tells
us to be awake during the day and to go to sleep at night.
The LOST universe contains many aspects of necessary sleep: vivid dreams about being chased in the jungle, the falling feeling like the plane crash, the quest for love and to be loved - - - all fairly common dream episodes in individuals. But there is also a strange element to the LOST saga that is underappreciated: very rarely did we see any character actually sleep. The key moment was the eye lid shot of the character's eye opening (which some believed was a symbol to the gateway of their soul - - - in a corresponding flashback.)
And when in the sideways (death) universe, the characters had to "awake" in order to remember so they could move on in the after life. But this would mean that the characters prior to the sideways universe were (a) asleep all the time or (b) that immediately after life, our limbo existence is a sleep state not to maintain one's life forces but to organize your memories so you don't forget who you are in your next existence. It is not so much as reincarnation but re-recognition of what made you who you were - - - every experience is a learning lesson which sets in motion future decisions, good and bad.
Some scientists believe that another reason we dream is to work out our real world problems in a personal laboratory setting called our mind. If you want to ask out a young woman, you may dream of different ways of asking her out so you prepare you conscious state for the time you have the courage to make your dreams come true. The restless energy of a dream mimmicks the butterflies in one's stomach so you are training your mind to react to a real world event.
Some people are better at anticipating future real world events, especially in personal relationships. Other people have problems or are clueless to how others will react to their advances. Some people who have difficulty relating to other people may find more comfort working through their life dreams in a dream state than trying to apply their wants or desires in the real world.
The LOST landscape is littered with characters with the latter traits. Loners who are intense dreamers who perceive their future in unrealistic happiness. Introverts, who would rather run away from the hard work of forming lasting relationships, caught up in the bitterness of their own self-loathing. Their only escape is to dream that they are famous, adventurous, a criminal, an outback survivalist, a miracle surgeon, a military McGyver, a rock star or an unwed mother. Throw all these dreams into the reality of a vivid, collective dream scape, you have the basis of LOST.
Thursday, February 26, 2015
PARALYSIS
Even when you sleep, you mind can get you.
If you've ever woken up unable to move or talk, you know the feeling can be absolutely terrifying. It is so alarming that it has become the subject of folklore across the world and is often associated with the supernatural. The good news is you're not being attacked by the unknown, what you're experiencing is a medical condition called sleep paralysis.
Dr. Manny Alvarez, senior managing health editor of FoxNews.com, recently received an email from a viewer about this phenomenon:
Q: There have been times when I wake up out of a dream and am not able to move. I am fully conscious and aware of my surroundings but I am completely paralyzed. Is there anything I can do to stop this from happening?
Sleep paralysis is a jarring occurrence that leaves you temporarily paralyzed while being fully conscious. It is often seen in people who have sleep apnea or narcolepsy and can also be found in those who suffer from bipolar disorder and are taking certain medications for conditions like ADHD and substance abuse.
In addition to the helpless feeling that one may have while being cognizant and unable to move, the fear surrounding sleep paralysis is heightened by the fact that it's usually coupled with a feeling of pressure or choking and troubling hallucinations. Visions ranging from home intruders to demons have plagued those who suffer from sleep paralysis.
Sleep paralysis usually occurs during REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, a phase where your "brain is active but your muscles are turned off,” Dr. Shelby Harris, a sleep specialist at Montefiore Medical Center, told FoxNews.com. It occurs when you mentally awaken before the REM cycle is finished, but your muscles remain turned off.
According to Harris, as long as there is no known underlying cause for sleep paralysis, there is no need for concern. She recommends maintaining healthy sleep habits and managing stress to reduce the frequency of the condition. She adds that if you are still bothered by it, you can consult a sleep specialist who can prescribe certain medications and treatments.
As an aside to the recent LOST posts, the concepts of sleep paralysis, including temporary paralysis while being fully conscious, fear heightened by the fact that it's usually coupled with a feeling of pressure or choking and troubling hallucinations ranging from home intruders (the Others?) to demons (such as smoke monsters?)
The one aspect of LOST which is still open to interpretation is the "awakening" clue. The characters had to "awaken" their island memories in order "to move on." If the characters are patients in some deep REM experiments (gone wrong), waking up from the dream state is the only way to save them from the mental anguish of sleep paralysis. People do not realize that vivid REM sleep only lasts seconds to minutes even though dreamers perceive those dreams as lasting for hours. The entire series of island events, adventure, misadventure, danger and chaos could have actually been imagined in one long night of a dream patient.
If you've ever woken up unable to move or talk, you know the feeling can be absolutely terrifying. It is so alarming that it has become the subject of folklore across the world and is often associated with the supernatural. The good news is you're not being attacked by the unknown, what you're experiencing is a medical condition called sleep paralysis.
Dr. Manny Alvarez, senior managing health editor of FoxNews.com, recently received an email from a viewer about this phenomenon:
Q: There have been times when I wake up out of a dream and am not able to move. I am fully conscious and aware of my surroundings but I am completely paralyzed. Is there anything I can do to stop this from happening?
Sleep paralysis is a jarring occurrence that leaves you temporarily paralyzed while being fully conscious. It is often seen in people who have sleep apnea or narcolepsy and can also be found in those who suffer from bipolar disorder and are taking certain medications for conditions like ADHD and substance abuse.
In addition to the helpless feeling that one may have while being cognizant and unable to move, the fear surrounding sleep paralysis is heightened by the fact that it's usually coupled with a feeling of pressure or choking and troubling hallucinations. Visions ranging from home intruders to demons have plagued those who suffer from sleep paralysis.
Sleep paralysis usually occurs during REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, a phase where your "brain is active but your muscles are turned off,” Dr. Shelby Harris, a sleep specialist at Montefiore Medical Center, told FoxNews.com. It occurs when you mentally awaken before the REM cycle is finished, but your muscles remain turned off.
According to Harris, as long as there is no known underlying cause for sleep paralysis, there is no need for concern. She recommends maintaining healthy sleep habits and managing stress to reduce the frequency of the condition. She adds that if you are still bothered by it, you can consult a sleep specialist who can prescribe certain medications and treatments.
As an aside to the recent LOST posts, the concepts of sleep paralysis, including temporary paralysis while being fully conscious, fear heightened by the fact that it's usually coupled with a feeling of pressure or choking and troubling hallucinations ranging from home intruders (the Others?) to demons (such as smoke monsters?)
The one aspect of LOST which is still open to interpretation is the "awakening" clue. The characters had to "awaken" their island memories in order "to move on." If the characters are patients in some deep REM experiments (gone wrong), waking up from the dream state is the only way to save them from the mental anguish of sleep paralysis. People do not realize that vivid REM sleep only lasts seconds to minutes even though dreamers perceive those dreams as lasting for hours. The entire series of island events, adventure, misadventure, danger and chaos could have actually been imagined in one long night of a dream patient.
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