Lecture on Lucid Dreaming: Dreadful! Not the talk, the response from the sceptics! I can?t believe I was the only one questioning the amount of ?Woo? and unscientific references that were being talked about/referred to here.
Dreams and Dreaming are a fascinating subject and worthy of study but I am sorry I can?t let a speaker get away with anecdotal references to talk on forums, results of a one person study ? that person also being the researcher and their own thoughts/ideas

There are many more than the select few experiments I discussed, and they involve more than one person studies. However, the purpose of the presentation wasn't solely to prove lucid dreaming exists, especially since approximately 35% of Tuesday's audience indicated they had experienced one. The purpose was simply to raise awareness of this remarkable but little known ability our brains are capable of. I'm thrilled to have received an email from a member who had a lucid dream following my talk!

I've been wrestling with Clive's comment, and not wanting to be the first to post, but now someone has (apologies to Madeleine for being such a chicken!):

I don't believe that as a skeptic I need grumpteen peer reviewed papers before I accept something. I was first exposed to the idea of Astral Projection in 1980, thought it was 'woo' at the time, and haven't thought much about it since. Madeleine's presentation for me was a rationalist's explanation of the woo. (continuing in next post)

... For me, Madeleine's presentation was about 3 things:

1. There are rational/ non-supernatural explanations for Astral Projection/Lucid Dreaming

2. There are techniques that have been empirically shown to enhance the non-natural-lucid-dreamer's chances of achieving lucid dreams. (A completely rational approach that has numerous precedents)

3. There is some peer-reviewed research to back up the empirically proven methods.

Continued in the next post ...

... This was my first visit to Auckland Skeptics in the Pub. I sincerely hope that the criteria for presentations is NOT that one can produce a specified number of peer reviewed papers to support every statement or assertion in a talk or presentation.

I hope that people who make presentations do not have the epithet 'woo' flung at them if they cannot produce X peer reviewed papers to support every claim they make. To me such behaviour is dangerously close to crying 'heretic' or 'infidel'.

... In conclusion, I would like to thank Madeleine for giving a presentation that challenged my preconceptions regarding dreams.

I would like to thank ALL who attended for the lively questioning and debate, along with the fellowship of a bunch of skeptics. I really enjoyed the evening and meeting those of you I had the opportunity to talk to.

But finally, as a aerobatic pilot and scuba diver, I think I'll stick to my current techniques of flying and diving, instead of getting up at 4am!!

I found the talk disappointing mainly because one of the things M said she was going to cover was the science behind lucid dreaming. This she spectacularly failed to do. And then she started with the novawatsit... Wooalert! M admitted herself her talk was going to be controversial so it surprised me she didn't arm herself better, especially with a skeptical audience. Saying that, perhaps I am being too harsh as M is not a scientist so presumably doesn't have access to the resources I do.

I'd like to thank Madeleine for being brave enough to talk about such a controversial topic. I liked the discussion and questions that it generated. This what skepticism is about, after all - being able to ask questions and require evidence, rather than knee-jerk reactions of "This is woo!" I hope we can have some more similarly provocative talks in future.

You're welcome, David & Craig. Thanks all for listening! I'd never given a public speech before and perhaps I didn't do a particularly thorough job of explaining the science. Anyone interested is best to do their own reading if they want clearer, more in-depth scientific information on the subject. I just wanted to bring it to people's attention that not only does the ability exist, but for those who have already experienced and enjoyed lucid dreams, you can learn to induce them more regularly.

Thank Thor for the skeptical nature of fellow members however I think the word woo is being thrown around with a bit of abandon. If someone thinks the presentation made supernatural claims then they should be specific. I understood the Novadreamer to be a small EEG device that alerted dreamers to their state of REM. Where is the woo in that? The only part of the presentation that I thought strayed was talk of using lucid dreaming for self improvement. However (continued)

however that was quickly debated and was maybe 4 minutes of an hour talk. Come on people - if there was a bit you disagreed with or didn't understand do the scientific thing and question it without generalisation. Cheers. Grant

I though the talk was interesting, but I'm not sure why it was a subject for the skeptics. It seemed more like a "Hey guys this is cool" kinda talk, rather than one that discussed the scientific evidence, and most importantly, took a critical approach and explained and possible problems with the research.

Some specific examples (as requested).
I can't recall any slides detailing specific studies and data presented... (continued)

Madeleine didn't seem to know the difference between alpha waves and waking waves, and commented that the subject would have reported they were a sleep as evidence.

Self report was continually used as evidence, without mention of how problematic self report is in psychology.

Single subject experiences were used as evidence.

There was no mention of any critics of the research that was not covered....

As I said originally, if 'hey this is kinda cool" is part of what we do for speaker subjects, then the above is not a problem. If the subject is supposed to cover scientific evidence, and the scientific debate around it, then I think this subject was a bit off topic, and the speaker did not seem to have good scientific analysis, rather than anecdotal evidence as a goal for the talk.

(This "100 characters left bit" is pretty annoying)

If I could actually construct a cogent point, I'd like to think it would sound like what Matt started with. It just felt like a teaspoon of science in an ocean of anecdote.

I feel a "Psychology, can there be an objective science of the subjective mind" speaker/presentation coming up...

How about we take this to the message board - I have some more comments to make - and I agree the character limit here is annoying - but it is meant for short comments!

good idea! Go for it

Having built simple ECG & EEG gear at uni, there doesn't seem to be any "woo" at all in the NovaDreamer. It just gives a flashing light or auditory cue when you begin dreaming, which is readily detectable.
I just kick myself that I didn't do it myself.
As with meditation, there are going to be plenty of woo claims from fringe 'users' (remember TM & 'flying') but that does not invalidate the work of those developing ways to invoke a mental experience, be it lucid dreaming or meditation.

I'm becoming skeptical about skeptics. Where were the peer reviews leading up to invention of the wheel? How many peer reviews had been done in the 1930s supporting the view that diabetes was considered to be a contagious disease? Without apparently crazy ideas and totally "unscientific" dreams, ideas, etc society would not have evolved beyond the Stone Age.

I think its good to always be skeptical about the skeptics, from Michael Shermer:
When lecturing on science and pseudoscience at colleges and universities, I am inevitably asked, after challenging common beliefs held by many students, ?Why should we believe you?? My answer: ?You shouldn?t.?

I also think anecdotal evidence and untested ideas are a great source of possible truths. I'm arguing is that when something is anecdotal/self report, it's better to label it as hypothesis, not evidence

That quote was taken out of context a bit, here is his page:
http://www.michaelshermer.com/2001/

My, my, Madeleine. You certainly opened a can of worms. Well done.

I do know the difference between alpha waves and "waking waves" or "beta waves" as they are officially named. I didn't go into depth about the stages of sleep due to time constraints. Yes the subject would have reported being asleep, but I did say the scientific evidence for their brain state came from the EEG recording, which can't be faked by an awake subject. I didn't articulate the science section very well because my area of expertise is the practise of lucid dreaming not the science of it.

cont... I guess I figured anyone left skeptical could go and read up about the scientific side of lucid dreaming in their own time. It has taken me nearly two years to train myself to be able to have a lucid dream on any night I choose. Only a small percentage of lucid dreamers appear to be able to achieve this. Therefore, I felt the limited time I had to talk was better spent relaying my personal knowledge on how to achieve lucidity during dreams and how exhilarating the experience can be.

Just looking at the past meetups Madeleine's presentation seems to have generated far more interest/debate/posts than any previous presentation, which is surely a good thing :).

Madeleine, I really don't think you have to defend your presentation. I really hope that you have given other non-scientists and non-specialists among us the courage (that you showed) to share things we have practical, empirical knowledge of. Peer reviewed research isn't the be all and end all of rational thinking.