XPost: alt.dreams, alt.dreams.castaneda, alt.dreams.edgar-cayce   
   XPost: alt.dreams.lucid.entities, alt.out-of-body, japan.dreams.lucid   
   From: laura@nospam.me   
      
   "kellie"  wrote in message   
   news:3cedd375.0410111636.2d3b894a@posting.google.com...   
   > Hello to everyone. I am new to this group and would like to ask some   
   > questions. I should tell you that I joined this group for my   
   > humanities class. We are suppose to pick a subculture on the web and   
   > get to know them. My group picked dreams because they found your posts   
   > interesting. I hope you are all willing to get involved and help us   
   > understand the subculture a little better. I will only ask one   
   > question at a time just to see if you are all interested in helping   
   > us. Here goes: Where did dreams originate from? What religions,   
   > countries, myths, etc.?   
   > Kellie   
      
   I think maybe it's going a bit far to regard us as a subculture :-)   
   We certainly are an extremely diverse group, who agree on little else than   
   that dreaming anomalies occur.   
      
   Anyhow, to answer your question:   
   Dreams seem to be a fundamental aspect of having a complex brain structure.   
   All creatures who do, dream.   
   So where do dreams originate? The obvious answer would be that dreaming is a   
   product of the brain performing some sort of task - probably in order to   
   consolidate real life experiences and discard irrelevant information. Sounds   
   awfully drab for something as fascinating as dreams, but it doesn't really   
   have to be when you keep in mind the extraordinary complexity of the human   
   brain. It's bound to come up with some most interesting combinations.   
   As for dreams containing elements of myth and symbolism - what C.G. Jung   
   called Archetypes - that is very interesting, when you consider that the   
   basic elements of myths are remarkably similar regardless of which culture   
   you look at. This is especially evident in the pantheons of the ancient   
   world; each distinct culture basically had the same gods with little   
   difference except in name.   
   So... I suppose the question really is this: Where did the archetypes come   
   from? Are they a product of dreams? Or is it just that they have become so   
   deeply ingrained in all of us over countless generations that our dreams use   
   their symbol-language?   
   Not that I have any idea of how to answer it, mind you :-)   
      
   Oh, and I'm fairly sure that not everyone in this group (let alone the   
   others that this is being posted to) will agree with anything I just said   
   :-)   
   Which is why I question our subculture-ness.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)