Cocoon: Speculative Dream Engineering

The ethics of dream engineering and sleep manipulation is a critical public discussion—the mind and body are vulnerable in sleep, and tools to influence dreams can be used for either self-improvement or manipulation. We want to create technologies which are optimized for good, and to do so we need to understand where people’s boundaries and comfort levels lie with regards to sleep and dream hacking. 

Therefore, to generate discussion, we created Cocoon, a dystopian video showcasing a fictional programmable dream machine enabled by the synthesis of real work-in-progress prototypes developed at the MIT Media Lab’s Fluid Interfaces Group. As a dreamer descends into sleep, Cocoon tracks three sleep-stages using brain activity, muscle tension, heart rate, and movement data that are revealed through its dome. Cocoon uses ongoing platforms we developed. External stimuli in the form of scent, audio, and muscle stimulation direct the content of the dreams. We use Dormio to detect Hypnagogia, the state between sleep and wake, influencing visual and idea generation using audio. We use Essence to alter the emotional content of dreams and memory consolidation during Rapid Eye Movement (REM) and Deep Sleep. We use Electronight to administer muscle stimulation to arms and legs and change the kinesthetic content of dreams. Crossing boundaries both disciplinary and experiential, Cocoon offers an embodied investigation of one’s own consciousness, a philosophy in the flesh; with it, users can observe and engage the torsion of their senses, see and shape dreams which are otherwise entirely uncontrollable, unlinked, and unseen.