system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why are dreams so much weirder when you have a fever?

I'm babysitting my little brother, and he's sick. At the dinner table, he drops this question: "Why are my dreams so strange when I have a fever?" I can't answer. Help me?
gpt
Your brain likes it to be warm. But not too warm. About 37 degrees celsius, to be exact. If it gets too cool (34-35 degrees), or too hot (40-41 degrees) things start going wrong.

Why? All the cells in your body have been made to work best in a specific, and quite small, temperature range. This is kind of like cooking - if you cook something, you're doing chemistry, and there's lots of chemistry going on in your body.

Your brain's thoughts (and dreams, because those are thoughts too) are all being "cooked up" at just the right temperature.

You know how you can't cook an egg without a fire (too cold!), and if you make the fire too hot, the egg would burn and go all black and horrid (too hot!)? Your brain (and all the cells in your body) are like that too.

So even if you've got only 1 or 2 degrees fever, your brain's "cooking" is a bit off, and things are coming out a bit "burnt" (funny).