Virtual Universe

[SteveA]

Something I realized about not just dreams but waking life as well is that whether or not things appear to be sensical, accurate or vivid etc. are really in terms of conscious qualities perceived to surround that state - if someone "feels" a statement makes perfect sense, this that's how it is - the statement "seems" to make perfect sense (at the time) though later that could change - though the statement (at least seemed) to have never changed.

I'm just trying to point out that what's considered to be real, accurate etc. is derived from feelings and beliefs regarding what these are - they generally seem to agree with things that we might expect to be accurate/logical etc., but there are times I've encountered a few little "cracks" where not everything appeared to add up correctly (then again, that was also a belief or feeling and so if something didn't appear to add up right and some conflict appeared to exist, then which was wrong - the believed states of the moment or the believed state that something didn't add up? Anyway, it's similar to deja vous where you feel like you did something before but you can't remember how that could be true - of course someone could say it's just some mistaken association or a random neural spike etc., but that doesn't really mean much because we could similarly say that all of it is this hence which version is the "mistaken" one? I actually think there may not be any such mistakes and that beliefs themselves are similar to seeing colors or something with a particular smell and there could be a deeper order that generates these beliefs - it would be nice to be able to hit a final layer that has to remain true and though it may again be another false belief, it doesn't seem impossible that could exist something that generates beliefs and could even reorder a perception of time and memory etc. I don't see how such a machine could be physically built because perceived physical laws would arise from those memories and beliefs and so, not only could such rules appear almost irrational, physically trying to change them would be similar to trying to reprogram a computer using the monitor - then again, even that wouldn't necessarily be impossible - I can just image walking by a computer with a message on the screen saying "Please change address 17247219 to the hexidecimal value 0x67BE" including a promise to pay the favor back by adding $100 credit to their phone card )

And the wheel spins, but never quite the same ... it could be that there is no specific top or bottom level but that any of it can change (I admit I can't understand how that could be possible - there should still be in that case, a form of center, but there do appear to be things beyond logical explaination so I really don't know how it all fits together, but I'll still cling to the belief that there is a logic connecting it all together - and I might even get lucky and find that to be true ... for a time ).

In the end, something to consider is that unless you had a specific choice regarding your circumstances in life (which may not be impossible) then there was always an unknown from the start and it appears that no matter how far out/back you go, there remains a point that just can't be seen past in any way (and maybe not even seen past even as belief) and it really could literally be anything, though if some faith is placed in some of the insights people have had over time, there are actually rather concrete proofs regarding this and one way of looking at it is that if "everything" exists we could just look at it in terms of the contrast between known and unknown, not everything has to be knowable in a typical sense and even if we removed that and replaced it with a division for believed/not believed or true/untrue etc., there would likely always be some component of this that would remain on the unknown/unbelieved/untrue side of all these - what sort of specific properties could such a thing have?

Anyway, it's definitely a subject that could keep someone busy for a long time trying to figure out

Oh well, I'm off to work with the known side of things for a while (they're more entertaining and lively).

[labelwench]

It has occured to me, that during our resting and/or dreaming state, we are more open to learning. Lessons of the day and or recent past, pleasurable and painful experience may be re-visited and assimilated.

We are less inclined to resist, there being no need to maintain 'face' when one is not in the company of others, (although how one behaves socially within a dream can be an interesting study... )

The frequency and subject of dreams has been an area of on-going study by many disciplines, and as we learn more about the brain/body functions, I expect some interesting revelations.....

What does 'Wench dream about? Wouldn't some like to know....keep your friends close and your enemies closer.....

Regards,

Labelwench

[SteveA]

It has occured to me, that during our resting and/or dreaming state, we are more open to learning. Lessons of the day and or recent past, pleasurable and painful experience may be re-visited and assimilated.

It might be that there are some things that are maintained while awake that aren't required when dreaming and so the realm of dreams is "freer" - notice that dreams are not generally remembered in detail later and they don't always need to make "sense" either. So you have some forms of continuity of experience that don't appear required by dreams.

As usual, I think there's actually a mathematical space that can sort of demonstrate how this is possible and basically you could see it as things requiring at least 3 dimensions to be shared in order to communicate over time, but relationships that have fewer dimensions of interaction can be greater in quantity and more diverse, though not as precisely localizable in a higher dimensional space - they aren't precise points in higher dimensional spaces but instead exist similar to volumes of possibilities (though many would describe these as lines or planes etc., but I don't think that's really how it works - that's just a mental simplification).

We are less inclined to resist, there being no need to maintain 'face' when one is not in the company of others, (although how one behaves socially within a dream can be an interesting study... )

It might also be that some things are simply not considered in a dream.

One thing I've noticed about my dreams is that they're often symbolic of things that were on my mind recently that might have had a larger impact on me than I'd really considered - then again, maybe I just add those interpretations to dreams, but it does seem that there are feelings associated with things in dreams that can be correlated to events that might be almost subconsciously retained.

I don't remember my dreams much, but as an example, maybe a dream is in some forest and you're swimming in a river and notice fish swimming near you too - in real life you might have seen some television show with a nature theme and you'd been thinking of fishing also, or you might have been at a beach and seen some fish and then gone to a park ... in the dream, the concepts get mixed together though usually they had some greater than normal significance (then again it may be that this is just a bias because the "normal" goings on aren't generally remembered and so they wouldn't be remembered to be interpreted as a component of the dream).

Anyway, that's at least been a common observation about dreams for me and I assume it's similar to a subconscious "house cleaning" tying up lose ends or trying out things that might not have been done in real life to see what things might have been like.

The frequency and subject of dreams has been an area of on-going study by many disciples, and as we learn more about the brain/body functions, I expect some interesting revelations.....

Well one thing that dreams appear capable of is rather lifelike properties and there do appear to be "latent" abilities that are released during dreams that are restricted while awake (I'm referring to at least a couple dreams I remember in particular in which after waking it was clear that the mind is very capable of creating complex and lifelike environments - in one of the dreams I was in an audience at a theater watching and hearing an orchestra. I remembered thinking that I'd never heard the song before but it was good and then suddenly I realized I was dreaming and so I figured I'd try improvising a little and so I went ahead and added some additional little flourishes to the music and some crescendos and got the beat going better etc. and I was on the edge of a dream half awake and half asleep, but I just had a little too much fun and slowly got nudged out and woke up. It stuck with me because I realized that all that music is tucked away somewhere but maybe it's one of those things nature keeps under lock and key because of the highly addictive properties - sort of a choice whether or not you want to stay at door #1 or open some more and make a better informed decision later. If someone had nothing, then anything appears great, but having a selection from a few things could be better - of course more isn't always better though in this case - if there are an infinite number of things, then never making a decision may not be optimal either

What does 'Wench dream about? Wouldn't some like to know....keep your friends close and your enemies closer.....

You're going to have one of those gossip magazines trying to pry this out of you now

[austintorn@aol.com]

Part 2 of 'Phantasmagoria' coming soon in which I may have to pull a Super Melanie.

[sillysally]

So, were our lucid dreams just short dreams within much longer (life-long) dreams??

How could we ever tell? Only after the dream ends??

My oldest daughter has lucid dreams. I have been in a few and strangely enough, we both had the same dream when we discussed with each other the next morning that we both had dreams about each other. She controls them and it would be hard to know whether or not the people involved in the dream are having the same dream because most the time you don't know who they are. But I think those people are having the same dream because she and I had the same dream on those nights.

[JAK]

...
And the wheel spins, but never quite the same ... it could be that there is no specific top or bottom level but that any of it can change (I admit I can't understand how that could be possible - there should still be in that case, a form of center, but there do appear to be things beyond logical explaination so I really don't know how it all fits together, but I'll still cling to the belief that there is a logic connecting it all together - and I might even get lucky and find that to be true ... for a time ).

In the end,
...
there would likely always be some component of this that would remain on the unknown/unbelieved/untrue side of all these - what sort of specific properties could such a thing have?
...

As Heraclitus said, "You never put your foot in the same river twice." If there is a constant - somewhere, somehow - I suspect that Heraclitus nailed it: "change". And it is "change" that is the cornerstone of creativity. Wherever we are, whenever we are, we are agents of change - co-creators.

And "Thank You" SillySally for revealing co-dreams with your daughter. If she controls them, then you would be ideal for providing feedback. When in a lucid dream state, if she pours milk on the floor like Austintorn, and you report it in the morning, then you have a powerful story. Better still, if you can repeat it, then you have hit "pay dirt". The JREF forum, a group of skeptics, offers $1,000,000 for proof of paranormal phenomena.

[austintorn@aol.com]

Pulling the Super Melanie

(read across first)