The analysis most strongly supported by the text is that while some researchers believe that dreams serve a purpose related to problem-solving and processing emotions, others argue that dreams are essentially meaningless and arise from random brain signals that the mind tries to interpret. The text presents both perspectives but emphasizes the idea that skeptics view dreams as bizarre and illogical products of random neural activity, suggesting that the process of dreaming does not have an intentional function.
If you find yourself arriving late for an exam, sprouting wings and flying above your town, or enjoying an elegant meal with popular celebrities and long-dead historical figures, you likely wake up and think, Why did I dream about that? To approach an answer, you might consider a broader question: What purpose do dreams serve? Researchers hold varying opinions as to why, even as we sleep, our brain creates vivid and sometimes frightening worlds for us.
Humans have long attempted to attribute meaning to their dreams, and some researchers believe this is a worthwhile effort. Many sleep researchers believe that dreaming is a crucial process by which our brains solve problems and process emotions that have accumulated during the day. Others say that dreams are the brain's way of training us to be alert against threats in our daily waking lives. In other words, by exposing us to our fears while we sleep, dreams help us to be more prepared to face our fears when we are awake.
Although researchers have attempted to trace the source of dreams through various means, some neuroscientists believe that dreams are essentially meaningless. They assert that while it is true that the neurons of the brain are activated at night, this is not an intentional effort to run simulations of real events. Rather, the brain signals are random, and our mind detects them and attempts to ascribe meaning to them after the fact. Dream skeptics say that this process results in what we know as dreams. Since, according to these researchers, dreams are essentially images and memories tied to random brain signals, they are often, for better or worse, bizarre and illogical.
Which analysis is most strongly supported by the text?
1 answer