Here’s another reason to prefer reality over dreams; dreams are darker:
We collected dream reports (N=419) and daily event logs (N=490) from 39 university students during a two-week period, and interviewed them about real threat experiences retrievable from autobiographical memory (N=714). Threat experiences proved to be much more frequent and severe in dreams than in real life, and Current Dream Threats more closely resembled Past than Current Real Threats.
If someday we have tech to suppress dreams (or at least memories of them), will it be considered cruel to allow your kids to dream? HT to Tyler.
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Sure, that's why we have a name for bad dreams ("nightmare") but none for good dreams. I think to discuss the issue of dream suppression we should better understand their purpose (either some sort of evolutionary thing or just how they affect your mind's housekeeping).
Very interesting post! And, on a related note, just a few days ago at Buddhist Geeks, there was a nice podcast, titled Dream Practices: Comparing Dream Yoga and Lucid Dreaming in which B. Alan Wallace compares and contrasts two dream practices, viz. Dream Yoga (originating with yogi Naropa) and Lucid Dreaming (pioneered by Dr. Stephen LaBerge). 'Dream Yoga' is employed by some Tibetan Buddhists in their spiritual practices.