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Everybody's an Ethnographer!
Dhruv Sharma has a background in anthropology, has worked in various countries as an ethnographer, and also holds a master's degree in design ethnography from Dundee University. His doctoral research is concerned with radical digital interventions designed to address issues of loneliness among the elderly. As the title of this piece may suggest, he believes that Everybody is an Ethnographer!
Editors note: Dhruv's delightful post takes us on a journey that begins with a shape shifting monkey jumping over the ocean on a rescue mission. We segue via the wonderful term 'lemon difficult' (derived from twisting the strange English colloquialism 'easy peazy lemon squeezy'). Finally, Dhruv explains how evolutionary factors have endowed our whole species with a tacit interpretive ability. If everybody is an ethnographer, then perhaps the future role of professional ethnographers is to play a supportive role as facilitator: is our future to act as the opposable thumb to the fingers of humanity?
This post is part of the Post Disciplinary Ethnography Edition based on work done at the HighWire Centre for Doctoral Training and curated by Joseph Lindley.This post is part of the Post Disciplinary Ethnography Edition based on work done at the HighWire Centre for Doctoral Training and curated by Joseph Lindley. The other articles in the series are "What on Earth is Post Disciplinary Ethnography?", "What's the matter with Ethnography?", "Don't Panic: The Smart City is Here!" and "Lemon Difficult: Building a Strategic Speculation Consultancy".
Mythology of the ethnographic hero
In the Hindu Mythological story of Ramayana, the evil king Raavana had abducted Lord Rama's wife Sita. When Rama and his army of monkeys (Vanaras) found out where she was being held captive, they wanted to send someone to find her to check if she was doing okay and to reassure her that Lord Rama and his army were on their way to rescue her. The only problem was that she was located on a remote island. Lord Rama et al. had no means of crossing the ocean to reach her.
There comes a point in the story when Rama and his army have reached the edge of the sea and are wondering if they'll ever be able to send a messenger across. In the absence of any other means of getting there, they need someone who can leap across the ocean to land safely on the island and still have enough energy left in them to leap back after finding Sita. According to the story, Hanuman (the Hindu Monkey God) was frustrated at the group's inability to find a way to get there. Unaware of the part he would ultimately play, and the extraordinary abilities that he would have to draw upon, Hanuman was destined to fulfil a crucial role. In the meantime though, he sat depressed in a corner.
Hanuman was born with supernatural powers, including the ability to alter his body size at will and take giant leaps. However, as a child, he was very mischievous and while playing he would often cause disruption to religious rituals. When it became impossible to control and discipline young Hanuman, one sage put a curse on him making him forget the abilities and super powers that he possessed. The curse would only be lifted when Hanuman's powers were the only viable option. In the aforementioned scene of Ramayana, Hanuman keeps suggesting that he is not able to cross the ocean, but through constant convincing, reassurance and cheering by his peers, he finally realises his potential, the curse is lifted, and he emerges as the hero. Hanuman had the innate ability to perform the task but needed help, support, encouragement and reassurance to lift the curse and to put his abilities into practice.Read More… Everybody's an Ethnographer!


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By Carol Pierson Holding
On November 7 in Seattle, 350.org launched its "Do the Math" campaign to target college and university investment funds to divest of fossil fuel stocks. While this strategy is bound to raise awareness among college kids, I initially questioned if there was enough money at stake to actually influence behemoths like Exxon.
The audience at the kick-off was not a radical crowd. Like the Keystone Pipeline protests, attendees were about half college students and half veterans of previous divestment efforts. I walked in with two such veterans, now oceanographers in their 60s.
Ticket demand in Seattle was so intense that the event had to be moved to Benaroya Hall, where 2,000 seats sold out within days. Seattle was just the first city in a 21-city tour, all of which have had similar responses. The numbers and passion should be enough to spark college divestiture. But that still begs the question: will divestiture by colleges have any meaningful impact?
College and university endowments are about $400 billion, and given the high returns in fossil fuel, most no doubt hold these stocks.
On the other side of the equation is $27 trillion, or the value of 2,795 gigatons of fossil fuel reserves identified by financial analysts at the The Carbon Tracker Initiative.
In other words, even if all university endowments held only fossil fuel stocks and every stock was divested, it's still only 1.5% of the value of underground carbon holdings.
So the question is, where else can this movement go?
350.org is using apartheid as its forebear, but in many ways, the comparison is inapt. South African manufactured goods and natural resources, even diamonds, could be sourced from other nations. Unlike the energy industry, substitutes were already available. Even more important, apartheid is a political issue and disruption would be limited to South Africa.
With fossil fuels, life itself would be disrupted. To name just one example: oil is the heart of global transportation systems, driving the auto industry, refineries, retail gas stations, encompassing hundreds of millions of jobs around the world. As the American Petroleum Institute says in its current ads, fossil fuels = jobs, energy, growth and security.
Even these seemingly unassailable arguments have holes. As Naomi Klein said this week to Bill Moyer, right now, fossil fuel companies don't pay for the real harm in carbon waste. Hurricane Sandy's direct economic loss is estimated at $50 billion so far. Swiss Re put total losses from Katrina, including loss of productivity, at $250 billion. Both extreme- climate events affected jobs, energy, growth and most certainly security.
What starts with college campuses could well move on to larger sustainable investment pools. Bloomberg News reported last week that—
"Institutional investors are now employing sustainable investing strategies in more than $3.7 trillion of investments -- a 22 percent increase in two years. Hospitals, retirees, pensions, banks and religious institutions used sustainable and responsible investing (SRI) strategies for $1 out of every $9 invested in the U.S. at the end of 2011."
And the divestiture movement could spread even beyond SRI. Colleges and SRI funds use their shareholder clout to influence the actions of companies. But Lisa Woll, CEO of SIF, the SRI industry association that reported the results, credits another less selfless reason: clients are protecting themselves against risk.
Risk plays a much more important role in today's post-great recession investment environment. Now, indices like the Dow Jones Sustainability Index are integrated into financial and management performance analysis. Blue-chip financial media from the Financial Times to the Wall Street Journal hold annual SRI conferences. Bloomberg added sustainability metrics to its analysis. Data providers such as CSRHub provide sustainability metrics to corporate supply managers and consumers when they are making purchase decisions.
The risk of what might happen in terms of fossil fuel liability for climate disasters could start to dissuade investors, especially with students and grumpy green grandparents taking to the streets. The SIF report on SRI investments found that climate change is already an issue for 23 percent of institutional asset owners using sustainability criteria. Institutional investor assets guided by environmental concerns increased 43 percent from 2010, to $636 billion.
Still chump change next to $27 trillion in carbon assets, but we're starting to approach some numbers that could cause hurt. And hurt forces change, not just with carbon producers but with regulators. We used moral condemnation to drive divestment of tobacco companies, even after some funds lost value due to apartheid divestiture, and regulators stepped in where they'd been reluctant in the past. Are fossil fuel companies next?
Photo courtesy of Georgie R via Flickr CC.
Carol Pierson Holding writes on environmental issues and social responsibility for policy and news publications, including the Carnegie Council's Policy Innovations, Harvard Business Review, San Francisco Chronicle, India Time, The Huffington Post and many other web sites. Her articles on corporate social responsibility can be found on CSRHub.com, a website that provides sustainability ratings data on 6,000 companies worldwide. Carol holds degrees from Smith College and Harvard University.

subset: commoncrawl


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You may have noticed that I've been wearing my own pair of low cut Chuck Taylors in natural canvas quite often lately. They round out the essential Summer shoe wardrobe, along with boat shoes and white bucks. What with being the prime care taker of two wee children all day long, I find the comfort of sneakers to be quite welcome. Chuck Taylors pull this off and let me remain true to my style. Then I get this email from Dave applauding my choice of footwear, but with an added bonus. Dave has hit upon the brilliant, yet oh-so-simple, idea of swapping the cloth shoelaces for leather rawhide:
Dave, if you're reading this, I hope you don't mind. But seriously, what a great idea. I love it. Any of you others steal this, remember to buy Dave an imaginary beer, or something.


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Despite twice co-sponsoring UNHRC resolutions calling for comprehensive transitional justice measures, the present coalition government has not lived up to its commitments and yet to take any meaningful steps in this respect."
In a press statement issued from London it said "The lack of progress to-date in many ways is eerily reminiscent of the past when commitments made on political and governance issues concerning the Tamil people (such as Bandaranaike-Chelvanayakam or Dudley-Chelvanayakam pacts) were reneged at the slightest of political opposition. While GTF acknowledges that some progress has been made it is far from adequate.
"A careful comparison of the commitments made and the actions carried out unambiguously shows a glaring disparity. No efforts have been made by the top Sri Lankan leaders to integrate credible international participation in the local judicial processes as stipulated in the UNHRC resolutions. The report from the government's own Consultation Task Force (CTF) – set up to recommend transitional justice measures based on country-wide consultations – has remained ignored for more than six months after its official release, reinforcing the impression most Tamils have that setting up Commissions and then discarding their reports is a continuation of delaying strategy practiced by many previous governments.
"The Office of Missing Persons (OMP), the only transitional justice mechanism Sri Lankan Parliament enacted exactly a year ago, was signed into law by the President only recently and yet to be operationalised. Mothers of disappeared have been protesting for over five months crying for attention living with the agony of not knowing the fate of their children for so many years. A month has passed since President Sirisena met with the relatives of the missing, but his promise to release any existing lists of surrendered and detained within 48 hours remains unfulfilled. We fail to understand the obstacles in bringing justice to these mothers, four of whom have died since the vigils started, and the unwillingness on the part of the government to bring closure to this highly emotive issue.
"The parliamentary process to ratify Enforced Disappearances as illegal has been indefinitely postponed and the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) is yet to be repealed, while continuing use of torture to extract confessions is widely reported. Complete elimination of this dreadful practice from Sri Lanka needs leadership from the government which is solely lacking.
The government has utterly failed to engage the majority Sinhala community about the need for true reconciliation and the indispensability of transitional justice to achieve that. In fact, a consistent narrative articulating the above and the need for ending the culture of impunity is absent in the political discourse of the country. If Sri Lanka is to enter a new era of respect for rule-of-law and good governance, resolute and consistent efforts are imperative".
Though the GTF commends Sri Lankan Government for allowing external scrutiny of the human rights situation by facilitating visits by various UNHRC Special Rapporteurs, their assessments and reports are unsurprisingly scathing. The latest (July 14, 2017) is from Ben Emmerson, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counter-Terrorism, who told reporters at the conclusion of a four-day visit: "There is little evidence that perpetrators of war crimes committed by members of the Sri Lankan armed forces are being brought to justice,"… … "None of the measures so far adopted to fulfill Sri Lanka's transitional justice commitments are adequate to ensure real progress" … … and progress on meeting commitments made under a 2015 U.N. Resolution have ground "to a virtual halt."
A report tabled at the 35th session of the UNHRC (May 2017) by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers, Diego García-Sayán, was again highly critical of the Sri Lankan justice system. The report identified 'continuation of a normative framework based on PTA', 'persisting impunity for any abuses committed by the police or the security forces' and 'the lack of effective victim and witness protection' as key areas where urgent action was needed. Both Special Rapporteurs concluded that it was the Tamil community that was at the receiving end, disproportionately.
Various statements released by International Crisis Group (ICG), Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the International Truth and Justice Project during the last six months also concur with the findings and sentiments expressed by the UN Special Rapporteurs. Clearly stating that Sri Lanka is faltering on its commitments made to its own people as well as to the international community, these institutions have called for re-energising the process of addressing the war's legacy.
The latest report from the ICG (July 28) highlighted the plight of the Tamil speaking women in the North and East, stating that these women "have been marginalised during the transitional justice process" and called on the government to act "promptly by establishing the offices on missing persons and reparations" to prevent the emergence of "renewed grievance that damage already slim hopes of reconciliation among communities, and between the state and its Tamil citizens."
GTF calls upon the International Community and the Government of Sri Lanka to take serious note of the impartial assessments made by such eminent organisations and mandate holders, and to recognise that Sri Lanka is truly in danger of losing the momentum in addressing the accountability issues that are critically important at this juncture. The Tamils are seeing the same old political dynamics that has plagued Sri Lanka since Independence and are understandably becoming cynical of the Government. For our part, the GTF would like to reaffirm its commitment to assist in any meaningful initiatives to arrest this dangerous trend.
It is essential that Sri Lanka take urgent concrete measures that will assure confidence to all its people, and most importantly to the victims, that achieving justice that has been denied for so long is possible.
The Island


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This unpublished working paper from 2010 was the foundation of Bill Domhoff's 2022 book, The Neurocognitive Theory of Dreaming. For a summary of the ideas in the book, a 12-page PDF handout is available.
Four very different types of unexpected research findings from inside and outside the sleep laboratory since the 1950s make it possible to suggest a new cognitive approach to dreaming and dream content, an approach that has the potential to be extended into a neurocognitive theory as well. These findings, which are discussed throughout this article, cast doubt on the Freudian, Jungian, and activation-synthesis theories that dominated thinking about dreams in the twentieth century. Those three theories all began with the idea that there were major differences between waking cognition and dreaming, but the findings presented in this article suggest that there are far more parallels between dreaming and waking thought than they realized (Domhoff, 2003b).
If there are more similarities than differences between dreaming and waking cognition, then there may be only small changes when alert waking thought turns into dreaming. Therefore, the key issue is not the activation of a "primary process" and "repressed" wishes, as in Freudian theory, nor the expression of "archetypal symbols" lodged within an inherited "collective unconscious," as in Jungian theory. Nor is there a need for allegedly random stimulation from the pontine tegmentum within the brain stem or for the unique neurochemical state that is part of REM sleep, as in activation-synthesis theory (Hobson, 2002; Hobson, Pace-Schott, & Stickgold, 2000b).
Instead, dreaming can be seen as the "default" position for the activated brain when it is not forced to focus on physical and social reality by (1) external stimuli and (2) the self system that reminds us of who we are, where we are, and what the tasks are that face us. This possibility is supported by laboratory studies revealing the dreamlike nature of thinking during the transition from waking to sleeping (Foulkes & Vogel, 1965; Vogel, 1991; Vogel, Barrowclough, & Giesler, 1972). It is also supported by systematic observations demonstrating that dreaming can occur during relaxed waking states when lying quietly in a darkened room, with wakefulness monitored by the EEG (Foulkes, 1999; Foulkes & Fleisher, 1975; Foulkes & Scott, 1973). There are also strong cognitive connections between waking fantasy, daydreaming, and dreaming (Levin & Young, 2001-2002). Furthermore, these findings on similarities between dreaming and daydreaming may provide a bridge to studies of mind-wandering and the default network that seems to underlie drifting waking thought (e.g., Mason, et al., 2007; Smallwood & Schooler, 2006).
Based on the evidence for parallels between dreaming and waking cognition, what makes a cognitive approach to dreams distinctive is that it begins with concepts derived from laboratory studies of waking thought. The emphasis is on the fact that thinking and imagining develop as part of a "conceptual system," that is, a system of schemas and scripts, which is the organizational basis for all human knowledge and beliefs. Drawing on the same conceptual system that underlies waking thought, dreaming occurs whenever there is (1) an intact and fully mature neural network for dreaming; (2) an adequate level of cortical activation; (3) an occlusion of external stimuli; and (4) the loss of conscious self-control, i.e., a shutting down to the cognitive system of "self" (Foulkes, 1999)
From a cognitive perspective, dreams express people's "conceptions," which are also the basis for action in the waking world. Dreams are a dramatic and perceptible embodiment of schemas, scripts, and general knowledge. They are like plays that the mind stages for itself when it doesn't have anything specific to do. In particular, many dream scenarios express several key aspects of people's conceptual systems, especially self-conceptions, which can be defined as a set of cognitive generalizations about the person that guide the processing of self-relevant information and events. Starting with the idea that dreams often reveal highly personal conceptions, it is possible to build a complex picture of a dreamer's overall conceptual system because people usually have more than one conception of themselves. Dreams also express conceptions of family and friends; they less often involve politics, economics, or other current events. However, there is also a significant minority of dreams, perhaps as many as 30% for some adults, which have no easily discernable connections to the person's waking life (Domhoff, Meyer-Gomes, & Schredl, 2005-2006). They are more like sagas or adventure stories; Foulkes (1999, p. 136) calls such dreams "narrative-driven" to contrast them with dreams that seem to be based on personal concerns. (For more detail on these issues, read my 2003 article about a cognitive theory of dreams; specifically, the section entitled "Dream Content and Waking Cognition.")
A cognitive approach also contains a way to assess the weight to be given to the conceptions expressed in dreams: by determining the relative frequency of their occurrence. Numerous studies show that the frequency with which a person, action, or activity occurs in a series of dreams reveals the "intensity" of the "concern" with that person, action, or activity in waking life, which means that dreams are dramatized enactments of both "conceptions" and "concerns" (Domhoff, 1996, 2003b). The emphasis on "concerns" links dreaming with the fact that the drift of waking thought is shaped to a great extent by underlying concerns (Klinger, 1978, 1999)
In the following sections I turn to the evidence that led to this theory. It comes from (1) laboratory studies of the Rapid Eye Movement (REM) and non-REM (NREM) dream reports of adults; (2) laboratory investigations of the development of dreaming in children; (3) studies of large samples of dreams collected outside the laboratory from groups and individuals; and (4) neuropsychological studies of patients who experienced changes in their dreaming as a by-product of brain lesions.
Before I do so, however, it might be useful to avoid any potential confusion by mentioning the four interrelated meanings of the word "dream" that follow one from the other. First, a "dream" is a form of thinking during sleep that, as already briefly stated, occurs when there is (1) an intact and fully mature neural network for dreaming; (2) an adequate level of cortical activation; (3) an occlusion of external stimuli by the sensory gates located in the thalamus; and (4) the loss of conscious self-control, i.e., a shutting down to the cognitive system of "self." Second, the word "dream" is used to describe a cognitive state that people "experience" as an ongoing narrative because the thought patterns simulate waking reality. Third, a "dream" is also what people remember in the morning, so it is in this sense a "memory" of the dreaming experience. Finally, a "dream" is the spoken or written "report" provided to researchers based on the memory of the dreaming experience. Put another way, there is a dreaming process, an experienced dream, a remembered dream, and a reported dream.
It also might be useful to mention the three ways in which dream reports differ from other types of oral utterances or written reports. First, dream reports are not generally self-initiated; in other words, very few of the people who provide dream reports would have written down or spoken their dreams if they had not been asked to do so by researchers, although those few who keep dream diaries for their own personal reasons are an important exception. Second, the dream reports that are used in dream research are a unique human statement in that they were not spoken or written -- even by those who keep personal dream journals -- in order to communicate with or influence other people. That is, they are "representational," not "instrumental," communications (Hall & Van de Castle, 1966, p. 21). Third, it is noteworthy that dreams are usually experienced as something that happens to the dreamer without self-effort, and therefore not as something intended, so people do not tend to accept as much responsibility for their dream reports as they do for what they say or write based on waking thoughts and experiences.
The many laboratory studies of adult dreams in the 1960s and 1970s, now often forgotten or ignored, led to a very surprising result: the dreams reported from REM awakenings are usually reasonable simulations of the waking world that deal with everyday topics and contain relatively few fantastic or bizarre aspects; then, too, the speech acts included in dreams are as well executed and context-appropriate as in waking life (Foulkes, et al., 1993; Meier, 1993)
The most comprehensive study of REM dream content in the sleep laboratory was based on 635 dream reports collected "for a variety of experimental purposes" in a series of investigations over a period of seven years between 1960 and 1967 (Snyder, 1970, p. 127). The 58 young adult men and women who participated in these studies were awakened on 250 nights in two different laboratories. Although there were some small differences due to word length, the overall finding was that "dreaming consciousness" is a "remarkably faithful replica of waking life;" a prototypical REM dream report is a "clear, coherent, and detailed account of a realistic situation involving the dreamer and other people caught up in very ordinary activities and preoccupations, and usually talking about them"(Snyder, 1970, p. 133, 148). Overall, as many as 90% of the dream reports "would have been considered credible descriptions of everyday experience" (Snyder, Karacan, Tharp, & Scott, 1968, p. 375).
This conclusion is based primarily on a series of ratings for coherence, dramatic quality, credibility, and bizarreness. Sixty to 80% of the reports were highly coherent on a three point scale, as compared with less than 5% that were rated as low on coherence. Three-fourths had a "nil" or "low" degree of drama on a four-point scale, and less than 10% were high on drama. Fully 65% of the dream reports were rated as highly credible and another 25% as of medium credibility; about 8% were rated as low on credibility and 2% as having no credibility. In keeping with the findings on credibility, the dreams were rated as having a low degree of bizarreness. Fifty percent of the longest reports were rated as having no bizarreness, 30% as having a low degree of bizarreness, 8% as having a medium degree, and 2% as having a high degree (Snyder, 1970, pp. 145-146).
The apparent lack of highly unusual dream content in REM reports was investigated in more detail in a study of 16 young adult women who spent two consecutive nights each in the lab and answered questions about the familiarity and likelihood of specific dream elements after an average of four REM awakenings per night (Dorus, Dorus, & Rechtschaffen, 1971). The investigators concluded that their results "emphasize the rarity of the bizarre in dreams" because major distortions of actual waking experiences reach a high of only 16.7% of all the activities and social interactions, and of 6.2% and 7.8% for all characters and physical surroundings (Dorus, et al., 1971, p. 367). The figures for the most improbable category of events that were never experienced by the dreamer in waking life were 4.9% of all physical surroundings, 1.3% of all characters, and 6.8% of all activities and social interactions. When the investigators carried out global ratings of each dream for overall novelty, they found that 25.8% contained large but plausible differences from previous waking experiences and that 8.9% were highly improbable by waking standards.
In general, then, REM dreams are a more realistic enactment of everyday life than is suggested by the psychiatric tradition from which the Freudian, Jungian, and activation-synthesis theories derive. However, this does not mean there is no bizarreness in dreams, just far less than Freudian, Jungian, and activation-synthesis theorists assume. But the secondary nature of bizarreness in dreams also raises another question: what about bizarreness in waking thought? Studies of waking thought samples suggest that there are far more jumps in thinking and the sudden appearance of thoughts that seem to come out of nowhere than is implied by a juxtaposition of bizarre dreaming with rational waking thought (Kane, et al., 2007; Klinger, 1999; Klinger & Cox, 1987-1988).
Still other laboratory studies concluded that NREM dream reports do not differ very much from REM reports, especially late in the sleep period when participants are awakened from Stage II NREM (Antrobus, 1983; Antrobus, Kondo, & Reinsel, 1995; Cicogna, Natale, Occhionero, & Bosinelli, 1998). This conclusion was first denied and then downplayed by activation-synthesis theorists because of their emphasis on REM sleep as the basis for the allegedly bizarre nature of dreams (Hobson, et al., 2000b). More recently activation-synthesis theorists have found it more difficult to defend their REM-based theory of activation since results from one of their own studies demonstrated that REM and Stage II NREM reports are increasingly similar after the third REM period, as earlier studies also showed (R. Fosse, Stickgold, & Hobson, 2004). They now cling to the fact that two studies using their database of home-collected REM and NREM dream reports found differences in the frequency of aggression in the REM and Stage II NREM reports (McNamara, McLaren, & Durso, 2007; McNamara, McLaren, Smith, Brown, & Stickgold, 2005). In the first of these studies, 24% of 100 late-night REM reports had at least one hostility or aggression, compared to only 12% for the 100 NREM reports, but that leaves 82% of the dreams in the combined sample similar in that they contained no aggression. Moreover, there were no differences on friendly interactions in the first of the two studies. In the second study, there were more similarities than differences for reports from the two stages of sleep.
Taken together, the important point is that all these studies show that "real" dreaming can take place, at the least, in REM and Stage II NREM. The finding that the frequency of aggression varies in dreams from the two different states, which still needs to be replicated with another database before it is accepted as gospel, is an interesting subsidiary finding that fits with the fact that aggression is the element in dreams that differs the most by age, gender, culture, and method of dream collection (home vs. laboratory) (Avila-White, Schneider, & Domhoff, 1999; Domhoff, 1996; Domhoff & Schneider, 1999; Foulkes, 1979).
Thus, the activation-synthesis theorists are refuted in their emphasis on the brain stem origins of dreaming because slight differences in actual content, which activation-synthesis theorists usually dismiss as a secondary issue, are not enough to defend their weak claim that REM activation is the only basis for vivid dreaming. Nor does it make sense to resort to the claim that "covert REM sleep" is causing the Stage II NREM dreams (Hobson, 2000; Hobson, Pace-Schott, & Stickgold, 2000a; Nielsen, 2000). It is be more accurate to say that common sources are activating the brain in REM and Stage II NREM to a level where dreaming can occur (Wamsley, et al., 2007). This broader view fits with a cognitive theory of dreams, which emphasizes the level of brain activation, whatever its source.
Longitudinal and cross-sectional studies of children ages 3 to 15 in the sleep laboratory reveal that dreaming gradually develops beginning late in the pre-school years in steps that parallel waking cognitive development (Foulkes, 1982, 1999; Foulkes, Hollifield, Sullivan, Bradley, & Terry, 1990). The median recall of pre-school children from REM awakenings of anything that could reasonably be called a dream was only 15%, and the content of the few reports that were obtained was static, undeveloped, and lacking in any emotion. The REM reports became more "dreamlike" (in terms of characters, themes, and actions) in the 5 to 6 year-olds, and the dreamers themselves began to play a more central role in their dreams by ages 7-8. Dreaming became adultlike in its cognitive complexity at ages 9-10, but it was not until the children were 11 to 13 years old that their dreams began to resemble those of adult laboratory participants in frequency, length, content, and emotions, or to have any relationship to personality.
Detailed studies of the waking cognitive abilities of the children in these studies showed that verbal and linguistic skills do not play a role until dreaming is fully developed. They also reveal that the lack of dream reports cannot be attributed to a failure to recall or an inability to communicate. The one good and consistent predictor of the frequency of dream reporting in children ages 5-9 is visuospatial skills, which leads to the hypothesis that mental imagery may develop gradually and be a necessary cognitive prerequisite for dreaming. This idea is supported by studies revealing that those who are born blind or who become blind before the age of 4 have no visual imagery in their dreams, whereas those who become blind after age 6 continue to have visual imagery in their dreams (N. Kerr, 1993).
Based on the results of these laboratory studies, dreaming appears to be a gradual cognitive achievement that depends upon the development of cognitive abilities that are also important in waking life. These results are compatible with a cognitive theory of dreams and call into question the claims about pre-school children's dreams by Freudians and Jungians, who rely on retrospective reports from adults or on home dream reports that are now suspect as possible confabulations due to pressures from adults to report a dream (Domhoff, 2003b, pp. 23-24). In addition, these findings were completely unanticipated by activation-synthesis theorists, who have refused to accept them. As if to underscore their scorn for a cognitive theory, the activation-synthesis theorists have stated that "we specifically suggest that the human neonate, spending as it does more than 50% of its time in REM sleep, is having indescribable but nevertheless real oneiric experiences" (Hobson, et al., 2000b, pp. 803). This statement shows that their theory begins and ends at the neurophysiological level, whereas a cognitive theory begins with phenomenal experience and dreams reports -- or the lack thereof. (For more detail, see the section entitled "The Development of Dreaming Cognition" in my 2003 article.)
Thanks to several studies demonstrating that dream reports collected in the laboratory are similar in most respects to those collected from home recall, except for the greater frequency of aggression in home dream reports (Domhoff, 2003b), it is possible for a cognitive approach to draw on studies of home dream reports using a rigorous and comprehensive coding system for dream content developed by Hall and Van de Castle (1966) to quantify home-reported dreams. This system of 10 general coding categories for settings, objects, characters, social interactions, activities, emotions, misfortunes, successes and failures, food and eating elements, and descriptive elements rests on the nominal level of measurement, uses percentages and ratios to correct for differences in dream length, and has good reliability (Domhoff, 2003b). Studies using this system reveal that the dream lives of college men and women in the United States remained about the same throughout the second half of the twentieth century. College students from several other industrialized democracies, including India and Japan, have similar patterns to the American students, as do teenagers and young adults in Argentina, Mexico, and Peru (Domhoff, 1996).
Despite the generally realistic nature of these home dream reports, the studies demonstrate that dreams are not a perfect simulation of everyday life, as also found in the laboratory studies. For example, in the Hall and Van de Castle (1966) normative samples of 500 male and 500 female dream reports, 7% of the familiar male settings and 14% of the familiar female settings were in some way different from the way they actually were in waking life, and almost 2% of the characters were dead or imaginary, or else turned into another character (that is, a metamorphosis occurred). It is also noteworthy that about one-third of all dream reports contained "misfortunes" that range from being lost to illness to the death of a loved one, and that the negative emotions of sadness, anger, confusion, and apprehension, when taken as a whole, greatly outnumber the expression of happiness.
In contrast to the changes in dream content from early childhood to adolescence that were uncovered in the sleep lab, dream content is extremely stable in terms of characters, social interactions, and most other dream elements after age 18 according to cross-sectional studies in the United States, Canada, and Switzerland, except for a possible decline in physical aggressions and negative emotions. Dream content thus seems to parallel the stability of adult personality (Domhoff, 1996, Chapter 5).
Within the context of these many well-established group findings, blind analyses of dream journals kept by individuals for personal, intellectual, or artistic reasons are useful as nonreactive measures not influenced by the purposes of the investigators who code and quantify them. Conclusions drawn from such nonreactive archival data are considered most reliable and useful when they are based on a diversity of archives likely to have different sources of potential biases. Studies of dream journals reveal an individual consistency in dream content that stretches from the late teens to old age, which is further support for a cognitive theory of dreams because of waking evidence that people's personalities change very little once they are adults (McCrae & Costa, 2003). People's dream lives vary from day to day and week to week, but consistency in both themes and quantitative content categories manifests itself through comparisons of hundreds of dream reports and with time spans of months and years (Domhoff, 1996, 2003b).
Blind analyses of dream journals also have made it possible to do detailed studies of specific aspects of dream content and their relationship to waking thought through the formulation of inferences that can be accepted or rejected by the dreamer and other respondents. Such studies lead to the conclusion that much, but not all, dream content is continuous with the dreamer's waking concerns and interests. The most direct continuities involve the main people in a dreamer's life and the nature of the social interactions with them. There also is considerable continuity for many of the dreamer's primary interests and activities. This continuity is not with day-to-day events, but with general concerns, which provides yet another parallel between dreaming and waking cognition. However, there are as many as 30% of dreams that do not seem related to waking concerns (Domhoff, 2003a; Domhoff, et al., 2005-2006).
The blind analyses based on inferences drawn from Hall/Van de Castle content analyses have been supplemented and independently verified by studies using strings of words entered into the search engine on dreambank.net, a large archive of over 23,000 dream reports that also includes several technologies for retrieving and studying specific elements of dream content (Schneider & Domhoff, 1999). In one such study it was shown that correct inferences could be made by a researcher who only knew the frequencies for 40 word strings; the inference concerned the dreamer's waking personality (e.g., socially outgoing, even tempered), the activities in which he is involved (e.g., works with newspapers, sexually active), cultural preferences (e.g., a science-fiction fan), and relationships with family members (Bulkeley & Domhoff, 2010). Another study of this type showed that the inferences drawn from word-string results paralleled and supplemented those based on Hall/Van de Castle codings (Bulkeley, 2009),
In concluding this overview of findings on dream content inside and outside the sleep laboratory, it should be noted that the coherence, consistency, and continuity of most dream content revealed in virtually every study is not what would be expected on the basis of Freudian, Jungian, or activation-synthesis theory. In fact, these studies contradict every specific hypothesis that was put forth by Freud in The Interpretation of Dreams (1900), as shown in detailed critiques of the theory and its current main proponent, Mark Solms (Domhoff, 2003b, pp. 136-143; 2004). In the case of Jungian theory, the finding of continuity between dreams and waking concerns is in direct contradiction to its claim that dreaming has a "compensatory" function (according to this key Jungian tenet, dreams purportedly reveal the underdeveloped aspects of the psyche that are not expressed in waking life) (Jung, 1974). As for activation-synthesis theory, it is most severely challenged at the content level by the realistic and coherent nature of dream content revealed in both laboratory studies and studies of lengthy dream journals that stretch over decades.
Asking neurological patients if their injuries had caused any changes in their dreaming led to the unanticipated discovery that different types of deficits and excesses of dreaming have waking cognitive parallels. Such a finding is further support for a cognitive approach to dreams because it suggests that dreaming and imaginative waking cognition may be dependent upon the same brain networks. For example, the reported loss of the ability to produce visual dream imagery in some patients studied in the sleep lab is paralleled by their reported loss of waking visual imagery (N. Kerr, 1993; N. Kerr & Foulkes, 1981; N. H. Kerr, Foulkes, & Jurkovic, 1978).
Building on this and many other examples of changes in both waking visual imagery and dream imagery, it might be possible to extend a cognitive approach in a neurophysiological direction and make it neurocognitive. This neurocognitive model would start with neuropsychological work from the late 1980s relating certain brain lesions, as determined by CAT scans, to the alteration or elimination of dreaming (Solms, 1997). It also would draw on brain-imaging studies comparing wakefulness, REM, and NREM (Braun, et al., 1997; Braun, et al., 1998; Maquet, 2000; Maquet, et al., 1996; Nofzinger, Mintun, Wiseman, Kupfer, & Moore, 1997). Both types of studies suggest roughly the same neural network as the basis for the conceptual processes involved in dreaming (Domhoff, 2003b, Chapter 1).
This neural network encompasses the limbic, paralimbic, and association cortices, with little or no role for the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, sensorimotor cortex, or primary visual cortex. Thus, the association cortices, paralimbic structures, and limbic structures may operate as a closed loop to generate the process of dreaming. On the one hand, this subsystem is cut off from the primary sensory cortices that provide information about the external world, and on the other from the prefrontal cortices that integrate incoming sensory information with memory and emotion in the process of decision-making. This model implies that an unconstrained and freewheeling conceptual system can operate when there is sufficient brain activation. At the same time, it is clear from the nature of dream content that the neural network for dreaming contains enough cognitive processing areas, such as the medial frontal cortex and anterior cingulate cortex, to produce coherent dramatizations that often reflect the dreamer's conceptions and concerns in waking life. (For a detailed account that brings together the early neuropsychological and brain imaging studies, go to my 2003 summary, which fits with more recent findings except on a few details.)
There are many different theories concerning the possible adaptive function of dreaming. The most famous and intriguing theory of dream function, Freud's (1900, p. 180) idea that dreams are the "guardians of sleep," that is, a response to bodily-based wishes, seems to be refuted by several different types of findings. First, the frequency and regularity of dreaming in most people suggests that the process cannot be primarily a way to deal with wishes that emerge episodically during sleep, as Freud claimed. Second, there is very little dream content that seems to relate to the wishes Freud had in mind -- for food, drink, and sex. Third, there is every reason to believe that pre-school children seldom or never dream, but they sleep very soundly nonetheless (Foulkes, 1982). Fourth, lobotomized schizophrenics showed normal sleep in the laboratory, but they rarely reported dreams from REM awakenings (Jus, et al., 1973). Fifth, there are neurological patients who lose dreaming but retain the ability to sleep (Solms, 1997). Finally, there are even a few normal adults who do not dream, as shown through REM awakenings over two or three nights in the sleep laboratory (Pagel, 2003).
Nor, as noted earlier, at the end of the discussion of dream content, is there any support for Jung's well-known idea that most dreams, and especially those with roots in the "collective unconscious," have a compensatory function. Although this idea is very difficult to refute in a definitive way because there may be subtle forms of compensation, every relevant systematic study suggests that most dream content is continuous with waking thought or personality rather than compensatory (Domhoff, 2003b, pp. 144-147 for a critique of Jungian theory).
Activation-synthesis theorists argue that dreaming is the by-product of the "off-line" cognitive processing and sleep-dependent memory consolidation that allegedly occur during all stages of sleep, with some stages of sleep enhancing one kind of learning and other stages aiding other kinds (Stickgold, 2005). There are several major problems with this claim. First, there are serious methodological problems with the research on memory consolidation during sleep that have not been answered; it seems unlikely to some sleep researchers that very many, if any, of the claims about any special role for sleep in enhancing memory consolidation will be sustained (J. Siegel, 2001; J Siegel, 2005; Vertes & Eastman, 2000; Vertes & Siegel, 2005).
Second, the best case for memory consolidation during sleep concerns procedural memory, such as learning to weave a basket, which would not seem to have much to do with dreaming. Third, if dreaming is somehow intertwined with the consolidation of memories from the previous day, then it seems surprising that there are very few episodic memories in dreams (Baylor & Cavallero, 2001; M. Fosse, Fosse, Hobson, & Stickgold, 2003) and that only half of dreams at best have even one element that relates to events of the previous day (Botman & Crovitz, 1989; Harlow & Roll, 1992; Hartmann, 1968; Marquardt, Bonato, & Hoffmann, 1996; Nielsen & Powell, 1992). Fourth, if the function of dreaming is to process the emotional content of recent events in a person's life, as Stickgold (2005) claims, then the lack of emotion in the dreams of children under age 12 needs to be explained (Foulkes, 1982; Foulkes, et al., 1990), as does the absence of emotion in as many as 25-30% of dream reports from REM periods in three different studies (Domhoff, 2003b). Given these many problems, it is unlikely that any memory processing that might occur in sleep would have anything to do with dreaming except for its possible involvement in creating the level of activation necessary for dreaming to occur. Thus, it is more likely that activation-synthesis theorists will prove to be as wrong on this issue as they were on their claims for the location of the REM activation system (Sastre, Sakai, & Jouvet, 1981; J. Siegel & McGinty, 1977; J. Siegel, McGinty, & Breedlove, 1977), the nature of the interaction between REM and NREM sleep (Jones, 2005), and the role of brain stem signals in creating allegedly bizarre dream content (Jones, 2000; Pivik, 1991).
Several clinically oriented dream researchers from outside the Freudian, Jungian, and activation-synthesis realms believe that dreams have a general problem-solving function. However, this idea seems unlikely when it is realized that most people remember only a few percent of their many nightly dreams. More importantly, dreams collected inside and outside the sleep laboratory rarely have even the hint of a solution to a problem, and most of the anecdotal examples that are provided by proponents of the theory actually involve reveries, drug-induced states, or thoughts while falling asleep or waking up (Domhoff, 2003b, pp. 158-162).
Facing up to the rarity of dream recall and the lack of solutions to problems in most of the dreams that are recalled, some advocates of problem-solving theories now claim that only dramatic emotional dreams have a problem-solving function. There are two important distinctions that have to be made in considering this possibility. First, it is one thing for a dream to "reflect" a problem, as many dreams surely do; it is quite another for the dream content to offer a "solution." Second, a distinction has to be made between solutions that are present within a dream and waking ideas that are based upon thinking about the dream. New insights in the waking state are a much more plausible alternative because there is evidence that conscious attention is usually needed for problem solving (Blagrove, 1992, 1996, 2000).
As the foregoing discussion of rival theories of dream function suggests, there are many findings that contradict the idea that dreams have any kind of physiological or psychological function. It therefore makes sense to consider the possibility that dreams do not have an adaptive function. This hypothesis is consistent with a cognitive theory of dreams, which views dreaming as a complex cognitive achievement that is dependent upon the evolution of cognitive skills that may only be present in humans after they reach the age of 5 or 6 (Domhoff, 2003b, pp. 163-164). While the likely lack of dreaming in other mammals and pre-school children does not preclude an adaptive function for dreams in human adults, it does make it less probable, and it narrows the focus as to what that function might be if we recall that less than 5% of dreams are remembered by most adults and that virtually none of those dreams can be claimed to provide new insights or the solution to problems..
It therefore seems plausible that dreaming may not have any adaptive function. Just as the human love of and aptitude for music may be "an accidental by-product of traits that evolved for other purposes," (McDermott, 2009, p.164), so too the ability to dream may be a by-product of at least three specific cognitive abilities that have great adaptive value in the waking world: the ability to generate mental imagery, the ability to organize our experience in narrative form, and the ability to create an autobiographical self. It is noteworthy that all three of these abilities seem to develop between the ages of 3 and 6, which may be why there seems to be little or no dreaming before age 6. From that point on dreams occur, as already noted, simply because there is sufficient brain activation in a context where there is little or no guidance for the brain from external stimuli or the self-system.
Because dreams often seem to draw upon the same conceptions and concerns that are central to a person's waking life, they do have psychological meaning, and they therefore can portray central emotional preoccupations in creative and dramatic ways, but this does not necessarily mean that they have a purpose. From a cognitive point of view, function and meaning can be distinguished, a possibility that is rarely raised within the context of other dream theories.
Moreover, due to the fact that dreams have psychological meaning, people in many different cultures have developed "uses" for them in the course of history, including creative inspiration and personal exploration in our own culture. But emergent cultural uses, as important as they can be in human lives, are not the same as evolved psychological functions; not everything with a form or structure has an adaptive function (Thompson, 2000). In summary, and in a phrase that could be a mantra for a cognitive theory of dreams, dreams have psychological meaning and cultural uses, but it is unlikely at this point that they have any adaptive function.
Several different kinds of research projects could be carried out to test hypotheses generated by a cognitive theory of dreams. First, inquiries could be focused on pinpointing the small changes in cognitive functioning that might be responsible for the shift from relaxed waking thoughts, such as daydreaming and reverie, to the dramatic, self-involved, sensory-laden narratives called dreams. Studies of the imagery at sleep onset might be helpful in this regard (Nielsen, 1995), as might further studies of the relationship between daydreaming and dreaming (Levin & Young, 2001-2002).
Second, hypotheses related to a cognitive theory of dreams could be tested by in-depth examinations of both non-dreamers and those who recall several dreams a night in great detail. Comparisons of these two small "extreme" groups on cognitive and neuropsychological tests might prove especially useful.
Third, in-depth neuropsychological studies are needed of those people with brain lesions in the medial prefrontal cortex, the anterior cingulate cortex, and the basal forebrain who also suffer from excessive vivid dreaming during the night and the intrusion of dreaming into waking life. They are of great potential interest for a cognitive theory because some of them say that their waking thoughts quickly turn into pictures or that they feel like they are always dreaming, a claim that is supported by hospital staff members who report that these patients suffer from a confusion between dreaming and waking thought (Solms, 1997, pp. 198-199). So, too, Damasio et. al. (1985, p. 269) describe their patients with medial prefrontal lesions as suffering from "waking dreams;" Whitty and Lewin (1957) report several similar cases. It is also noteworthy that the medial prefrontal cortex is involved in processes of arousal and attention in waking life, and that injuries to this area can lead to confabulation and compulsive fabrication.
Fourth, in-depth investigations of dream journals from a few excellent recallers might help to explain the aspects of dream content that are not continuous with waking conceptions and concerns. These anomalous aspects of dream content may be the products of metaphoric thinking, although very little progress has been made in testing this cognitively based hypothesis (Domhoff, 2003b). Or it may be that unusual juxtapositions, blended settings, metamorphoses, and sudden scene changes reveal the limits of the mind under the conditions that produce dreaming (Domhoff, 2007; Foulkes, 1999).
Finally, there is a need for studies that compare dreams and waking thought samples from the same participants. Based on my reading of the protocols, the one effort along this line was inadequate because most of the participants simply reported what they were doing when they responded to a pager during the day (e.g., they report that they were eating lunch with friend, or walking to class, or sitting in class, or studying) (R. Fosse, Stickgold, & Hobson, 2001; Stickgold, Malia, Fosse, & Hobson, 2001). Contrary to the findings from that flawed database, other studies focused strictly on waking cognition provide evidence of frequent thought intrusions, mind wandering, attention lapses, and daydreaming, along with wide individual differences that make it essential to have the same participants in both conditions in order to say anything meaningful about the bizarreness of dreams in general (Kane, et al., 2007; Klinger, 1999; Smallwood & Schooler, 2006). It also would be useful to see if the default neural network in which mind wandering most often occurs has any relationship to the neural network for dreaming (Mason, et al., 2007), and if the areas involved in waking mental simulation have the degree of overlap with the neural network for dreaming that I suspect they do (Szpunar, 2010, for a summary of brain imaging studies of simulation tasks).
The systematic research findings briefly overviewed in this article add up to a strong refutation of the three traditional dream theories that predominated in the twentieth century. At the same time, these findings are consistent with a cognitive theory of dreams. This does not mean that the cognitive theory is now firmly established. But it does mean that such a theory is deserving of further testing. Indeed, it is the best current possibility for understanding the ongoing puzzle of the origin and meaning of dreams because using the most plausible ideas to explain the most systematic data is the hallmark of a scientific approach. By that standard, a cognitive theory of dreams is the only current theory that can encompass two well-established findings (1) dream content is for the most part coherent, consistent, and continuous with waking concerns; and (2) dreaming is a gradually developed cognitive achievement based on the ability to imagine and to generate mental imagery. Dreams are a perceptual embodiment and dramatization of a person's thoughts, an fMRI of the mind at night. They are the quintessential cognitive simulation because they are experienced as real while they are happening.
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Vogel, G., Barrowclough, B., & Giesler, D. (1972). Limited discriminability of REM and sleep onset reports and its psychiatric implications. Archives of General Psychiatry, 26, 449-455.
Wamsley, E. J., Hirota, Y., Tucker, M. A., Smith, M. R., Doan, T., & Antrobus, J. S. (2007). Circadian and ultradian influences on dreaming: A dual rhythm model. Brain Research Bulletin, 71, 347-354.
Whitty, C., & Lewin, W. (1957). Vivid day-dreaming: An unusual form of confusion following anterior cingulectomy. Brain, 80, 72-76.
Go back to the Dream Library index.


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It's well known that the teen years are the most trying time for parents. It may seem like their rebellion is personal, and that they're determined to make your home life miserable; but in reality, this is a natural process. Your teenager is maturing both physically and emotionally, and their brain is still developing. When their frontal cortex develops in a few years, you will see a different person. Until that time however, talking to them can feel nearly impossible. Here are some tips for talking to your angry teen.
Change Your Parenting Style
If you have an authoritarian parenting style, you'll need to switch styles. An authoritarian method of parenting will cause you to butt heads with your teen, resulting in increased anger and lack of resolution. Switch your style to an authoritative style to get better reactions. An authoritative parent explains their reasoning, gives consequences while taking their child's feelings and other circumstances into consideration, and overall puts a great deal of effort into the relationship they're developing with their child.
Frame the Conversation
When it's time to have a conversation with your teen, first frame the conversation so they know that you're not angry. If they think you're angry, they're more likely to get defensive or shut down. Because they're unable to fully control their emotions or foresee the consequences of their behavior, they're highly reactive and will immediately become irrationally angry. To avoid this, let them know that you are irritated, disappointed, or upset, but that you're not angry with them.
Overall, it's important to keep lines of communication open with your teen. You can turn anger into dialogue by simply making an effort to listen to and understand your teen, and ensure that you heard them and understand their feelings. Trying to give advice or enforce rules can break communication down when you need it to stay open.
Your teen is trying to figure out their identity as they go through many hormonal, growth and development changes that are out of their control. Understand that their anger is about asserting themselves or trying to separate themselves as an individual. This is a difficult time, and your teen needs empathy. Stay your child's safe and secure base, so when they've calmed down or are growing out of this phase, they know where to come back.


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Assign any of 63 different functions to each button. Popular keys such as Shift, Esc, Enter, Ins, Ctrl, etc, can be assigned at anytime
A standard 4 function calculator with memory, that always stays on top, has its own pop-up Tape and Send function that places the display information right into your current document or field.
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Show & Hide keys, program keys in Key Options, Custom logo display, Operator mode, on-demand functionality. The Developer's Kit comes with all kinds of utilities, source code, sample code, and a wealth of information for integrating My-T-Soft TS with your own application.
From Left: Num Keypad with custom colored text in size 10, My-T-Soft TS on-screen keyboard with custom colored background and control panel open in size 8. Color Support includes: Button text, Button face, Button highlight, Button shadow, and Keyboard background.
IMG's latest release of My-T-Soft, My-T-Pen, and My-T-Touch allows you to use custom on-screen keyboard layouts created with IMG's Build-A-Board Virtual Keyboard Designer or from IMG's Online Layout Database.
My-T-Soft TS is a standard Windows Application and does not require any special drivers. It will work with all pointing device interfaces (touch screen, mouse, pen, HID, etc.), along with keyboard and mouse emulation drivers that are compatible with the ones that ship with Microsoft Windows.
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There are countless of configuration options, settings, and special features available that have been added by customer requests since the original product release in 1993. Refer to the User's Guide for release specific technical notes, product options, and complete documentation.


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From Colette:
Invest some time in Albion to create a classic duffle style coat (version 1) or jacket (version 2). Each version features toggle closures, tailored two-piece sleeves, yoke details, and a stylish three-piece hood.
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Albion is a versatile, simple shape that transitions easily from menswear to women's wear.


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Exorcism, Demons, Witchcraft, and Astrology
Many theories have been advanced to account for the origin of demons. Some say demons are the offspring of angels cohabiting with women (Genesis 6:1-4). But angels are sexless beings who apparently are incapable of such unions (Matthew 22:30). Instead, "sons of God" and "daughters of men" in Genesis chapter six is an idiomatic expression for the intermingling of good people with bad people—which inevitably results in moral corruption (1 Corinthians 15:33) [see Major, 1993].
Some say demons are the spirits of wicked dead men whom God permitted to leave the hadean realm to indwell some people in harmony with His divine purposes. Still others say demons are fallen angels who were allowed to escape their confinement (cf. Jude 6) to accomplish some divine purpose. The fact of the matter is, the Bible simply does not tell us where demons came from. No legitimate or useful purpose is served by dwelling on the matter.
On the other hand, the Bible does tell us many things about demons. For example, demons are spirits (Matthew 8:16; Luke 24:39). Demons are always depicted as unclean, evil, and malevolent. They are associated with Satan's influence (Matthew 9:34; 12:24,43,45; Luke 11:15). Demons also are shown to be conscious, intelligent entities who possess true knowledge of God and Christ. In Mark 1:24, a demon spoke to Jesus, "I know who you are—the holy one of God." Demons exercised volition and even locomotion (Matthew 12:44-45).
Demons frequently caused physical and/or mental illness. For instance, in Matthew 9:32, the victim of demon possession experienced "dumbness," i.e., the inability to talk. Such illnesses were distinguishable from the demons themselves (Matthew 4:24). Some say demons have never actually existed, and that the Bible account of demons is simply the superstitious, pre-scientific explanation of epilepsy and other physical or emotional disorders. But in the New Testament, a clear distinction is drawn between demons and the illnesses that a demon might cause. Some demons had superhuman strength (Mark 5:4; Acts 19:16). No reason is given in the New Testament for why some individuals were singled out for demon possession. Included were men (Matthew 9:32), women (Luke 8:2), and even children (Mark 7:30).
What was the purpose of demons, and what was their relationship to God? It is clear from the Bible that God had ultimate control over them. For example, in Luke 10:17, the seventy returned from their preaching tour and said to Jesus, "Lord, even the demons are subject to us through your name." A careful study of the New Testament will disclose the fact that demon possession was divinely permitted to show the supreme authority of Christ and His inspired representatives. During His earthly stay, Jesus demonstrated His power over: (1) nature and the created order (Mark 4:31); (2) disease (Mark 1:32-34); (3) physical substances (John 2:9); (4) death (John 11:44); and (5) the spirit realm and Satan (Mark 1:27). This supreme authority and manifestation of power set the stage for the establishment of His kingdom. In Luke 11:20, Jesus said: "But if I, with the finger of God, cast out demons, no doubt the kingdom of God is come upon you." The reader is urged to study carefully John 12:31, Ephesians 2:2 and 4:8, Colossians 2:15, Acts 10:38, Luke 10:17-20, and Matthew 12:28-29. John explained that "he who commits sin is of the devil; for the devil sins from the beginning. For this purpose, the son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil" (1 John 3:8). John's statement correlates well with Hebrews 2:14, where the writer states: "Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil."
These passages show that when Christ effected His death, resurrection, and kingdom, Satan's power was dealt a blow that resulted in a measure of limitation. He was restrained to the extent that direct, supernatural influence over a human being ended. Just as the ability to expel demons has ceased (Mark 16:17; 1 Corinthians 13:8-10), so the ability of demons to possess humans has ceased. When direct miraculous ability gradually ceased as the apostolic age drew to a close, so demonic activity also ceased.
That is the Bible picture. This picture is very different from the claims being made today regarding demon possession and Satanism. In the New Testament, Jesus expelled evil spirits publicly and in the presence of multitudes (Luke 4:36). But much of the work of exorcists today is hidden and only reported second hand. The alleged exorcisms by those who are daring enough to operate publicly are contrived and unconvincing.
In the New Testament, expulsion of demons was achieved by a word with immediate results. For example, "Jesus rebuked the demon; and he departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour" (Matthew 17:18). Read also Acts 19:12. But exorcism today is a long, drawn-out process in which multiple attempts are made. In the New Testament, demon possession caused the malfunction of otherwise normal body traits. You simply do not find in the New Testament the theatrical manifestations alleged by those who affirm demon possession occurs today—fire from the mouth, bulging eyes, transparent teeth, green slime spewing forth, and electricity emitted from fingers.
Another significant difference between demon possession in the Bible and alleged demon possession today is that in the New Testament, demons were respectful of deity and acknowledged Jesus as the "holy one of God" (Mark 1:24; 3:11). Demons knew that Jesus ultimately would banish them to torment (Matthew 8:29). They did not blaspheme deity. But claims today include curses and blasphemy directed against God.
In view of these biblical facts, what must we conclude? Demons do not possess people today. The Old Testament predicted that demon possession would cease in the first century.
In that day there shall be a fountain opened to the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin and for uncleanness. And it shall come to pass in that day says the Lord of hosts that I will cut off the names of the idols out of the land and they shall no more be remembered; and also I will cause the prophets and the unclean spirit to pass out of the land (Zechariah 13:1-2).
In addition, the Bible everywhere condemns those who practice spiritualism, sorcery, witchcraft, astrology, and all other forms of divination. Moses warned the Israelites as they were about to enter Canaan:
When you enter the land which the Lord your God gives you, you shall not learn to imitate the detestable things of those nations. There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, one who uses divination, one who practices witchcraft, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, or one who casts a spell, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead. For whoever does these things is detestable to the Lord; and because of these detestable things the Lord your God will drive them out before you. You shall be blameless before the Lord your God. For those nations, which you shall dispossess, listen to those who practice witchcraft and to diviners, but as for you, the Lord your God has not allowed you to do so (Deuteronomy 18:9-14, NASB).
To God, all of these magical arts were an abomination.
Isaiah declared that all of Babylon's sorceries and spells would be unable to avert the punishment that God would inflict against her (Isaiah 47:8-15). This observation points to a significant conclusion. The Bible repeatedly portrays those who claim sorcerous powers as fakes and counterfeits (e.g., Genesis 41:8; Exodus 7:10-12; Daniel 2:2-11). Even the action of the so-called "witch of Endor," who actually is identified in the text as a "medium" (NKJV) or having a "familiar spirit" (KJV) [1 Samuel 28:3ff.], must be deemed fraudulent for three reasons: (1) she was surprised that a spirit actually appeared (vs. 12); (2) she thought the spirit was elohim—the Hebrew word for God or gods (vs. 13); and (3) she did not recognize Samuel, but had to describe him to Saul who in turn recognized him (vs. 14). In the New Testament, the claims of both Simon in Acts 8 and Elymas in Acts 13 also were bogus. All these sorcerers and astrologers were fakes who had no real power—though they fooled a lot of people into thinking they did.
Astrology, witchcraft, sorcery, spiritualism, and yes, those who claim to be "psychic mediums," are all condemned by God. Why? Because these practices implicitly present themselves as substitutes for God, the one and only true Power of the Universe, and His Word, the one and only valid spiritual Guide. No wonder witchcraft is listed as a work of the flesh (Galatians 5:20). No wonder the Bible declares in no uncertain terms that "sorcerers…shall have their part in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death" (Revelation 21:8). The only "crossing over" that is actually occurring is by those whose spirits exit their bodies (i.e., they die) and who then are transported to the hadean realm to await the Day of Judgment and eternity. Their abode is fixed and unchanging (Luke 16:26-31).
The Bible speaks decisively and definitively on the subject of demon possession, witchcraft, astrology, sorcery, divination, enchantment, and wizardry. With a united and concerted voice, God's Word condemns it and pronounces it false. People could be possessed by demons for a brief period of time in the first century. But this phenomenon has ceased. Those who wish to be Christians—those who wish to be pleasing to God—will give no credence to such claims today. No doubt, many of us like to break open that fortune cookie at the oriental restaurant and read the note inside; we might even occasionally glance at our horoscope in the newspaper—but only as a source of amusement, because there is absolutely no validity to it. The moment a person puts trust in such, and thinks that the future is determined by such, he or she is trusting in something other than God, and is sinning.
The only reliable guide in life is the Bible. It is a lamp to our feet and a light to our path (Psalm 119:105). The Word of God is living and active, quick and powerful (Hebrews 4:12). It is the sword of the Spirit (Ephesians 6:17). By that Word we will be judged one day (John 12:48). May we set aside all other claims to guidance and rely solely and strictly upon the Bible, wonderful words of life—the all-sufficient and authoritative Word of God.
Major, Trevor (1993), "Genesis 6:1-4 and the 'Sons of God,'" Apologetics Press, https://www.apologeticspress.org/pdfs/reprints_pdf/sonsgod.pdf.
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