Time dilation in Lucid and Non-Lucid dreams.

[bluebird]

I have recently been reading "Exploring the world of Lucid Dreaming" by Stephen LaBerge, and whilst I agree with most of the things he says in the book, there is a part which I find myself questioning. He says that time dilation in Lucid Dreams is not possible, due to an experiment he did in which the subject would indicate a starting point, then count 10 seconds of dream time, then indicate the end point. This was almost exactly 10 seconds of waking life time also, which brings him to the conclusion that it is not possible to have dreams which actually seem longer than the time you spend asleep in them.

However, there are a few reasons why I don't think this is sufficient evidence to discount the idea completely. Firstly, just because these experiments proved the subjects were able to judge 10 seconds properly, I don't think that means it's impossible for time dilation to occur in lucid dreams. Secondly, I was chatting to Hukif a while back and he was telling me that he experimented a lot with time dilation, having some dreams which did literally feel like years had passed. I have also got an elderly friend IWL who isn't in to lucid dreaming, but claims to have had a non-lucid dream in which he lived an entire lifetime.

I'm looking for more accounts like this, so does anyone here have any experience with time dilation in their dreams? Or does anyone have any theories or research either in favour of or against this idea?

[Zhon]

In my personal experience, the scenes where there are actual conversations, actions, exciting moments or combat, etc., all happen in real time.  However there are many times where I get an impression of time passing in leaps and bounds, like jumping forward in time by hours/days/months, and it feels like that much time has actually passed in-dream.  But I can't think of any specific moments where things happen in that time interval, so it comes across more as a fast forward than as time actually passing.

[Sunshine]

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[Snaggle]

  Stephen Laberge had no right to jump to that conclusion from such a small sample base and subject base. Hard to forget he's from a university with a reputation for shoddy science.

  Ignoring his awful science, My own experience is that dream time is usually real time, still dreams can be speed up and not moving at real time. I assume they can both be sped up and alternately move at real time, so time dilation is theoretically possible in my experience. A whole life dream might also be just a dream where one aged from dreamscape to dreamcape, so also possible to have a whole life dream without time dilation.

  

[Sunshine]

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[Shellidfl]

I've mentioned this elsewhere, but I read Laberge first, and did not know there was any other material about LD'ing out there at the time (about 12 years ago???).
From him, I assumed I should have SP, vibrations prior to OBE-like dreams, etc, etc, etc.  Robert Munroe made me assume similar things as well - that everyone experiences these "experiences" the same.
After joining here, I have learned that there is no one way to induce LDs, nor does one method work for everyone, let alone every time.
For the moment, my dreams "seem" to last like real time, but who really know - maybe those with Nova Dreamers and the like?

[howitzer]

What he did was show that people count the same in dreams as when they are awake.  I'm not sure why this is considered significant.  Anybody can estimate time by saying "one mississippi, two mississippi, three mississippi" for a short duration.  Everybody also knows that the feeling of the amount of time that has passed is highly variable depending on what you are doing.  Why would dreams be any different? 

I think the significance had nothing to do with time. It showed in a scientific atmosphere that people could administer control while it proven to be in a REM stage.

[Sunshine]

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[greg lousy]

Secondly, I was chatting to Hukif a while back and he was telling me that he experimented a lot with time dilation, having some dreams which did literally feel like years had passed. I have also got an elderly friend IWL who isn't in to lucid dreaming, but claims to have had a non-lucid dream in which he lived an entire lifetime.

      we had a similar thread a while back, and Hukif's input was part of it.  I'd love to know more about this "elderly friend"'s dream.

In my experience, lucid dream time feels pretty damn close to waking time, despite how much time goes by in the narrative of the dream.  So much so that it feels a bit vindicating to hear that it was shown experimentally to be very close.  But even if this is the rule of thumb, I'm open to other possibilities, from the waking or dreaming mind.
     
   

Hard to forget he's from a university with a reputation for shoddy science

  that's not fair at all. 

[bluebird]

It seems like the general consensus here is that dream time usually maps to real life time pretty well, and if you do experience several days in a dream it would usually just be because those days passed, not because 48 hours of time passed. I think I can agree with that consensus, whether or not it's possible to extend dream time subjectively I guess is a matter of opinion, I'm willing to at least humour the idea for now though, but that is just my own view.

But even if this is the rule of thumb, I'm open to other possibilities, from the waking or dreaming mind.

Well it is possible to increase how long time feels to you in the waking mind. Some examples are if you try and sit still and wait for 5 minutes to pass, you will be so incredibly bored it will feel like time is taking forever. I also find that when I meditate I always think I was doing it longer than I actually was. I have also had some pretty extreme time dilation (in both directions) when on certain drugs in the past.

[Sunshine]

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[howitzer]

No it was to show that time passed the same in a dream as in IRL.

 
Not the way I read it!
It did set up their approach to their mind/body relationships studies.

Furthermore, subjective things are never a matter of opinion. They just are.  If I say I had a dream that feels like it lasted months (and I'm not lying), then I actually did have a dream that felt like it lasted months.  That's the definition of "subjective".  Nobody decides about subjective feelings other than the person having them.

An opinion is a personal view or vantage point. Since subjectivity is based on bias and emotion then they would sometimes fall under "subjective."

[greg lousy]

number of Time dilation threads on this big ole dream forum  -  2

number of specific, journaled examples of time dilated dreams brought to the table  -  0

    Yes we all know the experience of time is relative and hard to discuss and all, but if tomorrow someone tells me they experienced an eon on the ride to work I will still raise a questioning eyebrow.  
And if, when questioned, that person responds with "I just did, you can't tell if I didn't, it's subjective", or any other response that doesn't seem to me to reflect a profound, bewildering mindfuck, that eyebrow will return to its normal position as I walk away.

 Because i'm just a guy with little confidence in his ability to squeeze years out of seconds and I just don't have the....    yep.... you guessed it....   time

[bluebird]

I guess you are right greg, I just thought it couldn't hurt to ask. I might take a look on deepdreaming as well just in case there is anything on there about it, but I suspect that you are probably right.

[Sunshine]

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