Imagine using your sleeping hours to work on your projects, prepare for your presentations, or hone your skills. It sounds too good to be true. Well, not anymore. A new startup called Prophetic claims to have developed a device to help you control and use your dreams for your benefit.
Prophetic, founded in March this year, has created a headpiece called the "Halo" that can induce a state of lucid dreaming. Lucid dreaming is when you are aware that you are dreaming and can manipulate the content of your dreams. Prophetic says that using the Halo can turn your dreams into a virtual workspace where you can do anything you want.
Whether you are a CEO, an athlete, or a web designer, you can use your dreams to practice, create, or explore new possibilities. The founder and CEO of Prophetic, Eric Wollberg, told Fortune in a report that imagination was the only limit.
The Halo
The Halo is not the first device that claims to induce lucid dreaming. Many other products, such as headbands, eye masks, electrodes, and supplements, promise to help you achieve clarity. However, Prophetic says that its device is different and more effective, as it uses focused ultrasound beams to stimulate a specific brain region involved in lucid dreaming.
The ultrasound beams, which are also used to monitor a baby's health in the womb, can activate the brain parts responsible for decision-making and awareness, thus triggering lucidity. Prophetic is working with Afshin Mehin, the founder of Card79 and the designer of the Neuralink N1 device for Elon Musk's brain implant company, to create the Halo.
Prophetic says that the potential of lucid dreaming is not just about solving specific problems but about finding new and creative ways to approach topics you could not think of while awake. For instance, a mathematician may not find the exact answer to a math problem in a dream but may discover new methods later. Wollberg told Fortune that they wanted to offer their customers control.
However, not everyone is convinced by Prophetic's claims. Antonio Zadra, a psychology professor at the University of Montreal and an expert on sleep and dreaming, said that inducing lucid dreaming was not that simple. He noted that many people who experience lucid dreaming often forget they are dreaming or wake up too soon.
He also said that controlling a dream was even harder and required a lot of practice and skill. He suggested that people use other techniques, such as meditation, dream journaling, and visualization, to enhance their chances of controlling their dreams.
Wollberg responded to this skepticism by citing a series of studies that linked the level of prefrontal cortex activation with the ability to control a dream. He said the more stimulation there was, the better users could control their goals. He also noted that many studies recommended additional testing to confirm their hypotheses.
Prophetic's product relies on research conducted by the Donders Institute, a brain research center in the Netherlands. From the institute's studies, Prophetic will determine what specific brain areas need to be targeted and the frequency of ultrasound waves to induce lucid dreams. The company expects to get this data in spring 2024 and ship devices in spring 2025.
Halos will cost around $1,500 to $2,000 each, Wollberg estimated. Consumers can reserve a product ahead of time with a refundable $100 down payment. Wollberg did not disclose how many people had signed up but said that the first few weeks after the company opened its reservation system generated several hundred thousand dollars in booking revenue, suggesting that the wait list was in the thousands.
Originally published on Interesting Engineering : Original article