The Superhuman Mind: Free the Genius in Your Brain by Brogaard PhD Berit & Marlow MA Kristian

Author:Brogaard, PhD, Berit & Marlow, MA, Kristian
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2015-08-24T14:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 7

Not a Worry in the World

Problem-Solving Strategies

In the summer of 1816, Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, the author of the famous work Frankenstein, hit on the idea for the book in a dream. In the introduction to the book, she writes: “With shut eyes, but acute mental vision, I saw the pale student of unhallowed arts kneeling beside the thing he had put together. I saw the hideous phantasm of a man stretched out, and then, on the working of some powerful engine, show signs of life, and stir with an uneasy, half-vital motion.”

In 1903, Otto Loewi had the idea that there might be a chemical transmission of nerve impulses, but he was unable to prove it until one night when he dreamed about the design of an experiment that was able to prove his theory. This work led to a Nobel Prize.

In 1964, golfer Jack Nicklaus had had a run of poor scores when he dreamed about his golf swing and discovered that he had been holding the club incorrectly. When he woke the next morning he was able to correct it and shot a 68.

It might come as a surprise that sleep can be a time of great accomplishment. After all, how could you get anything done reclined and paralyzed? But people are capable of strange things while they sleep. Some talk. Some kick their partners due to restless leg syndrome. Some snore and temporarily stop breathing. And then there are people who get out of their beds while still asleep and complete complicated actions. We call it sleepwalking, but walk is not all they do. One Australian woman would regularly get out of bed at night and have sex with strangers. Former chef Rob Wood cooked spaghetti Bolognese, omelets, and fish and chips during his sleep. The late Australian visionary, inventor, and artist Myra Juliet Farrell wrote the solutions to various problems in her sleep. Nurse and renowned artist Lee Hadwin produces unbelievable artworks while asleep. Computer expert Ian Armstrong was observed by his wife mowing the lawn naked at two a.m. while asleep. And it was recently discovered in a sleep lab that I regularly sleep-work on my laptop, which includes sending fairly coherent and meaningful e-mails to people. This is also known as zzz-mailing.

Sleepwalking has even been used as a defense for murder. The first case was Albert Tirrell. In 1846, he slit the throat of a Boston prostitute, set fire to a brothel, and took off to New Orleans. The defense was able to convince the jury that Tirrell was a chronic sleepwalker and could have committed the crimes while sleepwalking. Perhaps the most interesting and convincing case of a killer who was sleepwalking is that of Kenneth Parks, then a twenty-three-year-old father and husband from Toronto. One early morning in May 1987, Kenneth got out of bed and drove twenty-three kilometers from Pickering to the house of his wife’s parents, where he proceeded to bludgeon them to death with a tire iron. After careful examination of the case, the experts could find no other explanation of the crime than sleepwalking.

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