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I've been annoyed by dreams lately.

Like, the way dreams fudge the details of everything - I think the parallels between early LLM generated images is no coincidence.

Also frustrating is how they slip from memory.

I started reading "The Neuroscience of Sleep and Dreams" which is a bit eggheaded (kind of targeted to the intro-student text market) So far my biggest takeaway is that A. we're an intensely social species

The brain network that is typically called "the social brain network" is that set of interconnected brain regions that handles or mediates all of the thinking and emotional work we have to do to keep track of and regulate our social interactions with others. Since we are an intensely social species, most of what our brains preferentially process is composed of socially relevant information; things like: Who did what to whom and why?; What social alliances/groups am I in, and am I in good standing with those alliances?; Who can I trust and how do I remain on cooperative terms with various groups of people I have to interact with on a daily basis?; and so on.

And then B, sleep is part of working all that out:

Interestingly, the sleeping brain appears to be vitally important for this brain network. The set of structures comprising the social brain (particularly the mentalizing and amygdala networks) are gradually taken off-line after sleep onset and throughout NREM sleep (basically the first half of the night) and then are gradually put back together or reconnected and reactivated during each subsequent episode of REM until the brain fully comes back online after waking

I'm still annoyed that such a big fraction of our lives has to be spent in this weirdo state.