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The Paradox of Sleep: The Story of Dreaming
Michel Jouvet is perhaps the world's leading sleep and dream researcher. He discovered a mysterious dream state that he called paradoxical sleep. This third category of brain activity (distinct from sleeping and waking) is a state of very deep sleep with some specific motor events, including rapid eye movements (REM). In The Paradox of Sleep , Jouvet takes the reader on a scientific and sociological tour of the history of sleep and dream research, concluding with his own ideas on the function of dreaming.
Jouvet tells the story of a handful of neurobiologists, including himself, who pioneered sleep and dream research in the 1950s. He describes the technical and ideological obstacles they faced and opens his own laboratory to the reader, explaining anatomical, biochemical, and even genetic techniques. He also touches on psychological, philosophical, and metaphysical aspects of sleep and dreaming.
A key section of the book is Jouvet's discussion of why we dream. After summarizing Freud's theory of dreams, he contrasts it with current neurobiological data. Finally, he outlines his own controversial theory about why we to preserve our individuality. Dreaming, claims Jouvet, is necessary for the genetic reprogramming of our brain.
Jouvet tells the story of a handful of neurobiologists, including himself, who pioneered sleep and dream research in the 1950s. He describes the technical and ideological obstacles they faced and opens his own laboratory to the reader, explaining anatomical, biochemical, and even genetic techniques. He also touches on psychological, philosophical, and metaphysical aspects of sleep and dreaming.
A key section of the book is Jouvet's discussion of why we dream. After summarizing Freud's theory of dreams, he contrasts it with current neurobiological data. Finally, he outlines his own controversial theory about why we to preserve our individuality. Dreaming, claims Jouvet, is necessary for the genetic reprogramming of our brain.
227 pages, Hardcover
First published July 2, 1999
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About the author
Michel Jouvet
16 books8 followersMichel Valentin Marcel Jouvet was Emeritus Professor of Experimental Medicine at the University of Lyon. He spent one year in the laboratory of the Horace Magoun in Long Beach, California in 1955. Since this date, did research of Experimental Neurophysiology in the Faculty of Medicine of Lyon and of Clinical Neurophysiology in the Neurological Hospital of Lyon.
Experimental Medicine Professor at the University of LYON 1, he was the Director ot the Research Unit INSERM U 52 (Molecular Onirology) and of the Associated Unit UA 1195 of the CNRS (states of vigilance Neurobiology).
He described the electroencephalogram signs of cerebral death in 1959, and in 1961 categorized sleep into two different states: telencephalic (slow wave) sleep and rhombencephalic sleep (paradoxical sleep, known as REM sleep in English-language writings on the subject).
In The Paradox of Sleep (MIT Press, 1999) Jouvet proposed the speculative theory that the purpose of dreaming is a kind of iterative neurological programming that works to preserve an individual's psychological heredity, the basis of personality.
He was elected in 1977 to the French Academy of Sciences and has received the Intra-Sciences Prize in the United States in 1981 and the Prize of the Foundation for the Medical Research in 1983. In 1991 he was awarded the prestigious Prix mondial Cino Del Duca. His works, and those of his team, have brought about the discovery of paradoxical sleep and to its individualisation as the third state of functioning of the brain in 1959, to the discovery of its phylogenesis, of its ontogenesis and its main mechanisms.
Experimental Medicine Professor at the University of LYON 1, he was the Director ot the Research Unit INSERM U 52 (Molecular Onirology) and of the Associated Unit UA 1195 of the CNRS (states of vigilance Neurobiology).
He described the electroencephalogram signs of cerebral death in 1959, and in 1961 categorized sleep into two different states: telencephalic (slow wave) sleep and rhombencephalic sleep (paradoxical sleep, known as REM sleep in English-language writings on the subject).
In The Paradox of Sleep (MIT Press, 1999) Jouvet proposed the speculative theory that the purpose of dreaming is a kind of iterative neurological programming that works to preserve an individual's psychological heredity, the basis of personality.
He was elected in 1977 to the French Academy of Sciences and has received the Intra-Sciences Prize in the United States in 1981 and the Prize of the Foundation for the Medical Research in 1983. In 1991 he was awarded the prestigious Prix mondial Cino Del Duca. His works, and those of his team, have brought about the discovery of paradoxical sleep and to its individualisation as the third state of functioning of the brain in 1959, to the discovery of its phylogenesis, of its ontogenesis and its main mechanisms.
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January 20, 2016
I really enjoyed this book. Read about 2/3rds before I had to return it to the library. Since then I bought a copy, but haven't returned to it. Someday!
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