Ten days before Abraham Lincoln was assassinated, he shared a troubling dream with an aide. He imagined wandering through the White House when he heard people crying. Following the sound to the East Room, he saw a casket guarded by soldiers. “Who died?” he asked. “The president,” came the reply. On April 14, 1865, Lincoln was shot at Ford’s Theatre. Since then, his dream has become a legendary example of a possible premonition, a story that has fascinated people for generations.
Stories of prophetic dreams are not limited to Lincoln. Ancient Greek texts describe visions that predict events, medieval Christian mystics wrote about spiritual foresight, and even Enlightenment-era manuals guided people in interpreting their dreams. Before modern science formalized our understanding of the mind, dreams were studied as serious phenomena. The idea that the mind could access knowledge about events before they occur, now called precognition, was largely pushed to the fringes of science in the early twentieth century.
Today, the question of whether humans can sense the future is moving back into scientific research, thanks to a Cambridge-backed experiment led by David Luke, PhD. Luke is an associate professor at the University of Greenwich and a senior researcher at Trinity College, Cambridge. His study is attempting to test whether dreams can provide a glimpse of events that have not yet happened.
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How the Experiment Works
Luke’s research recruits volunteers to keep detailed dream journals. Participants are asked to set an intention to dream about an unknown “future target,” which could be an image, symbol, or piece of data that does not yet exist. The dreams are recorded either during lucid dreaming, when the dreamer is aware of being in a dream, or during ordinary sleep. After the dream journals are completed, a true-random number generator selects the actual targets. These targets are generated in a way that cannot be predicted by conventional means. Researchers then compare the dream reports with the targets to see if any matches exceed what would happen by chance.
“This is a unique study,” Luke explains. “Most research has not focused on precognition specifically, and very little has examined lucid dreamers. Lucid dreamers have heightened awareness in dreams and better dream recall than ordinary dreamers, which may make them more likely to notice patterns or glimpses of the future if such a phenomenon exists.”
The study is still in its early stages, preparing for data collection as part of a multi-year program. Luke expects that if dream-based precognition exists, lucid dreamers may show stronger correspondence with future targets. Discovering such a signal in the mind could challenge one of science’s most fundamental assumptions: that time moves only forward and that the present is all the mind can perceive.
The Science of Feeling the Future
Most of us have experienced a strange sense of knowing something is about to happen. Perhaps it is a sudden feeling of deja vu, a message from someone we were just thinking about, or a dream that appears to predict a real-world event. Are these coincidences, or do they hint at something deeper?
Over the last twenty years, a small group of experimental psychologists and neuroscientists have explored what they call “presentiment.” This concept suggests that the body and brain may show subtle changes before unpredictable events occur. In 2011, Cornell psychologist Daryl Bem sparked global debate when he published research reporting “anomalous anticipatory effects” in laboratory experiments. More recently, cognitive neuroscientist Julia Mossbridge and her colleagues have published meta-analyses suggesting that human nervous systems can sometimes detect changes seconds before random future stimuli are revealed. These findings remain controversial but are consistent enough to stay in peer-reviewed research discussions.
Despite these intriguing results, most cognitive scientists maintain that precognitive dreams are not supernatural. They argue that dreams that seem prophetic are the brain’s natural way of processing memory, emotion, and coincidence.
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Why Dreams Seem to Predict the Future
Antti Revonsuo, PhD, a cognitive neuroscientist in Sweden, explains that our minds often make connections between dreams and later events after the fact. “The feeling that a dream knows the future is created post-hoc,” he says. Billions of dreams occur every night across the globe, and statistically, some will resemble later events. He compares it to a lottery: with enough guesses, someone is bound to be correct.
Revonsuo also suggests that dreams evolved for survival. His threat-simulation theory proposes that dreams allow the brain to rehearse dangerous scenarios, preparing us to respond to threats. When a real-life event later mirrors a threatening dream, it can feel as if the dream predicted the future.
Memory and emotion amplify this effect. Kelly Bulkeley, PhD, a psychologist of religion, notes that when people recall dreams, their brains often edit and enhance the story, adding meaning or sharpening the imagery. Intense dreams—those involving danger, loved ones, or dramatic scenarios—are more likely to stick in memory. When something similar occurs in real life, the brain links the two, creating the impression that the dream was prophetic.
Dreams as Emotional Simulations
Bulkeley emphasizes that dreams serve a practical purpose. In times of uncertainty—whether war, illness, or personal crises—the sleeping brain runs simulations of possible futures. These mental exercises help humans remain vigilant and prepare for potential challenges. Historically, leaders relied on prophets to forecast outcomes, while today, politicians and managers use data and polling models. Dreams continue to be one of the most vivid ways the mind explores uncertainty and potential outcomes.
However, Bulkeley also warns against taking dreams too literally. False confidence in predictions can be dangerous, especially if used to influence or control others.
Luke is careful in his approach as well. He explains that lucid dreamers are a rare group, so even if research finds evidence of precognition, it cannot automatically be applied to everyone. If the mind is capable of glimpsing the future, it must produce measurable results that go beyond random chance.
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Was Lincoln’s Dream a Glimpse of the Future?
It is impossible to know for certain. Lincoln may have been rehearsing fears in a turbulent and unstable world. Perhaps his dream was ordinary but became legendary through storytelling. Or, in an extraordinary but not impossible scenario, his mind may have accessed information unavailable to him in the present.
Science cannot yet determine which explanation is correct. What is clear is that dreams continue to offer a space where imagination, memory, and the future seem to converge. They allow us to revisit the past, imagine scenarios that never occurred, and occasionally sense possibilities ahead.
Whether or not laboratory research confirms the existence of precognition, dreams remain a profound and mysterious feature of human consciousness. They invite reflection, imagination, and perhaps, a hint of what is yet to come.
