Jung believed a main function of dreams was compensation, which is the expression of thoughts or emotions opposite of those we have when conscious. In addition to Freud's theories and Jung's theories, other theories as to the function of dreams have been advanced and this topic is still debated. The activation-synthesis theory suggests that dreams are the response of the cortex to pulsed signals from the brain stem. This means that dreams are a physiological function with little psychological purpose. Francis Crick and Graeme Mitchinson have suggested that, during dreams, the brain is filtering data taken in during the day and stored in the cortex, in order to eliminate redundant or unimportant information.
Dreams then are simple a result of all the released data.
Rosalind Cartwright and others have advanced theories to suggest that dreams are extensions of our conscious thought processes and may serve the function of creative problem solving.