Several decades ago, a woman living in a second-floor apartment dreamed of falling through the wooden staircase in her building. A few days later, one of the steps actually collapsed under her weight, and she barely avoided a serious fall. Did her dream somehow predict the accident?

The woman’s neighbor was a young dream researcher named Antonio Zadra. After hearing her story, he inspected the steps and noticed signs of rot. She swore she had never noticed any damage, and he believed her. He knew, however, that we consciously perceive only a subset of the total information our minds absorb from the world. He suspected that she had unconsciously registered the rotting stairs, and her dream was a vivid depiction of the threat.