I think I dream in color because I have had several dreams in which color was a plot point, so to speak. However, it doesn’t seem implausible to me that I merely become aware of “facts” about dream color in the same way that I might become aware that a walrus is really my sister but not my real sister another sister I only have in the dream and this even though I’m not a walrus.
Keep in mind that all facts are going to have some fog precisely because it’s in a dream. I definitely have colour in my dreams, and I’m comfortable saying that I always dream in colour, because the fog I have in trying to remember anything from the dream is the same as the fog I have when trying to remember colours.
Giving a percentage seems absurd, but I remember dreaming in color at least a few times.
Small details often lack any specific color, but some vivid things I can see clearly. Blue sky and green vegetation being two examples. Brown for wood or blue for water is also often featured. But not everything seems to have a discernible color.
I’ve also had lucid dreams occasionally and the last one I remember even featured what is known as a false awakening. Basically you realize that you dream and then something happens to you and you think you woke up… but you didn’t, you’re in a new dream and some mechanism tries to sucker you into believing that you are actually awake now, which can catch you off guard and make you forget that you’re actually still within a dream.
The last time this happened to me, I remember becoming awake while climbing into my red car while on a friendly dirt-track in the woods. Something about the car seemed fishy to me and then it hit me—I was dreaming! I climbed out of the car, because I knew from previous lucid dreams that they become unstable and I wake up, if I try too awesome things… like sex or driving at breakneck speed with my car. So I studied a little wooden cabin that was nearby, but once I tried to focus too much on the details I suddenly “woke up”… or so I thought. I was suddenly on top of a dam or some kind of wide deserted bridge—concrete and water everywhere, as well as my car.
I went along for what subjectively felt like perhaps 30 seconds, thinking I must have fallen asleep while parking and waiting for something, when I realized yet again that there is no such bridge or dam that I know of, so why would I possibly be there waiting for something—I was still dreaming! Cobb would be proud.
Thinking back I remember that everything had very vivid colors. The car was bright red, the roof of leaves was vividly green with rays of yellow sun coming through… it is hard to believe, that I made up the colors after I awoke just to make sense of the narrative. The red of my car and the green of the treetops struck me as especially vivid, or even hyper-vivid. Come to think of it, my assumption that it was indeed my car probably rested primarily on its property of being red, rather than any defining features like the specific shape of my model.
The poll doesn’t cover all possibilities. My impression is that I don’t explicitly dream in grey scale, but color is usually not a salient feature. It’s an experience in many ways closer to black and white, but technically would have to be called in color when one of those terms has to be used.
Time for a poll:
Please upvote this comment if you dream in color at least, like, 5% of the time.
I think I dream in color because I have had several dreams in which color was a plot point, so to speak. However, it doesn’t seem implausible to me that I merely become aware of “facts” about dream color in the same way that I might become aware that a walrus is really my sister but not my real sister another sister I only have in the dream and this even though I’m not a walrus.
Keep in mind that all facts are going to have some fog precisely because it’s in a dream. I definitely have colour in my dreams, and I’m comfortable saying that I always dream in colour, because the fog I have in trying to remember anything from the dream is the same as the fog I have when trying to remember colours.
Giving a percentage seems absurd, but I remember dreaming in color at least a few times.
Small details often lack any specific color, but some vivid things I can see clearly. Blue sky and green vegetation being two examples. Brown for wood or blue for water is also often featured. But not everything seems to have a discernible color.
I’ve also had lucid dreams occasionally and the last one I remember even featured what is known as a false awakening. Basically you realize that you dream and then something happens to you and you think you woke up… but you didn’t, you’re in a new dream and some mechanism tries to sucker you into believing that you are actually awake now, which can catch you off guard and make you forget that you’re actually still within a dream.
The last time this happened to me, I remember becoming awake while climbing into my red car while on a friendly dirt-track in the woods. Something about the car seemed fishy to me and then it hit me—I was dreaming! I climbed out of the car, because I knew from previous lucid dreams that they become unstable and I wake up, if I try too awesome things… like sex or driving at breakneck speed with my car. So I studied a little wooden cabin that was nearby, but once I tried to focus too much on the details I suddenly “woke up”… or so I thought. I was suddenly on top of a dam or some kind of wide deserted bridge—concrete and water everywhere, as well as my car.
I went along for what subjectively felt like perhaps 30 seconds, thinking I must have fallen asleep while parking and waiting for something, when I realized yet again that there is no such bridge or dam that I know of, so why would I possibly be there waiting for something—I was still dreaming! Cobb would be proud.
Thinking back I remember that everything had very vivid colors. The car was bright red, the roof of leaves was vividly green with rays of yellow sun coming through… it is hard to believe, that I made up the colors after I awoke just to make sense of the narrative. The red of my car and the green of the treetops struck me as especially vivid, or even hyper-vivid. Come to think of it, my assumption that it was indeed my car probably rested primarily on its property of being red, rather than any defining features like the specific shape of my model.
Should we interpret “dream in color” to mean “always dream in color”, or “sometimes dream in color”?
Hmuh, let’s go with sometimes, I’ll edit it.
The poll doesn’t cover all possibilities. My impression is that I don’t explicitly dream in grey scale, but color is usually not a salient feature. It’s an experience in many ways closer to black and white, but technically would have to be called in color when one of those terms has to be used.
Please upvote this comment if you never or only very rarely dream in color.
Please downvote this comment until it’s at least −5 if you voted in the poll. Thanks!