Thread: Shared Dreaming Debate

Originally Posted by Mindraker

I once thought I had a premonition of a guy committing suicide in High School. Was I right when the guy actually killed himself? Maybe I was just observant of something the other people weren't aware of. But it sure as heck wasn't some "telepathic event".

That must have been traumatizing for you. I am sorry to hear that. I had a premonition an acquaintance of mine, my cousin's friend was going to kill himself, and I did nothing, because I wasn't sure, and I barely knew the guy. It's always crappy when we have an intuition about a death, and then it happens.

Hi again Mzzkc.

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

a useful conceptual system still requires adherence to the definition of accepted terms.

I don't understand what you're trying to say in the above clause.

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

1. "real" and "imaginary" are non-distinct terms which exist as modifiers that can describe the set of all "experiences"

By agreeing these terms are non-distinct, and considering their inherent meaning, it can be concluded that these terms are less useful/descriptive than other common modifiers. For example, saying "I thoroughly enjoyed the red wedding" has more value than stating "I thoroughly enjoyed that imaginary wedding".[/indent]

2. "sleep" and "wakefulness" are terms (separate from "real" and "imaginary") that exist as states within the set of all "experiences".

I don't understand much in the bit just above either. Real and imaginary are non-distinct terms? Non-distinct terms have inherent meaning? Terms exist as states? Terms have inherent meaning? X can be concluded by agreeing that y? Saying x has more value than stating y?

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

your own philosophy of nature--as you put it--places the burden of proving that "sleep" and "wakefulness" are non-distinct on you.

That seems false. I can't see why I should need to prove that sleep and wakefulness are non-distinct given my philosophy of nature (which is a widely used term in certain circles, by the way).

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

2. Shared dreaming can be succinctly defined: mutual "experience(s)" between two or more individuals during "sleep".

No it can't. I don't have a shared dream if my partner kicks me in bed, not even if we're both asleep and both experience the kick.

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

Please notice the definition I present is extraordinarily distinct from 'mutual experiences between imaginary persons in dream reality'.

Yes, I was wrong to ascribe that definition to you. And I think I see the need to change what I wrote a bit, so I think I'll repost it below.

Mzzkc, I'm under the impression that what I'm getting at is somewhat beyond you at present. I encourage you to think my posts over a bit more.

Is there anyone out there with more philosophical acumen who'd like to engage what I posted? Shadowofwind? Sivason?

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

@rrrrocketrick

This debate is about "shared dreaming" which can be very succinctly defined: mutual experience(s) between two or more individuals during sleep.

Please note the term sleep. "Mutual experience(s) between two or more individuals during wakefulness" defines something else entirely.

The terms "real" and "imaginary" are superfluous to the conversation (as both are simply experiences), so I don't understand why you bring them into this discussion as part proof of some alleged fallacy.

Unless you are simply attempting to assert the well-tread "nothing can be known, because subjectivity" anecdote. In which case, I'm puzzled by the fact that you'd wish to try and end the conversation on rather a pointless absolute from which nothing of value can be derived.

Care to explain?

I'd like to make a few improvements to the response I made to the above post by Mzzkc, but I don't want to edit out anything he took issue with, so here's revision of my earlier response:


It's certainly relevant to the discussion to consider the meanings of and the nature of the relations between the various components of the conceptual system(s) through which we consider shared dreaming. You provide good reason to think so yourself by defining waking reality and dreams as you do. To define mutual experiences between people who are awake and (allegedly) mutual experiences between people who are dreaming (sleeping is your preference) in mutually exclusive terms (as you seem to) has a large number of consequences that are relevant here. First, one thereby decides by definition that life is not a shared dream. Second, one thereby imposes a dualistic metaphysic onto a world that might be better described monistically. Third, one thereby makes it much harder to imagine how shared dreaming could be actual even if it is, as we are then faced with the problem of developing entirely novel physical theories (etc.) to accommodate it. (And many more important consequences than these follow.) On the other hand, given a monistic metaphysic in which the distinction between the real and the imaginary is non-sharp, no sharp distinction will be drawn between the mutual experiences of "real" persons in waking reality and the mutual experiences of "imaginary" persons in dreams. Given such a metaphysic, furthermore, "real life" and dreams are of a kind and we need no special physics (etc.) to account for shared dreams.

Conceptual issues take priority here (as everywhere). The empirical question is secondary. If we impose a conceptual system onto the discussion that excludes shared dreaming a priori or renders it hard to conceive, then of course shared dreaming will appear unbelievable (to anyone who lacks compelling experiences with it, anyway). If we impose a conceptual system onto the discussion that entails shared dreaming, on the other hand, then anyone who embraces that conceptual system will naturally embrace shared dreaming as a fact as well. The empirical question (Is shared dreaming actual or not?) can be rationally pursued only within a conceptual system that doesn't entail either its affirmation or its denial. Powerful experiences with shared dreaming (or whatever else) aren't to be discounted just because we don't have or can't conceive of mechanisms to explain it; instead, those experiences should alert us to the fact that the conceptual system through which we engage the world is incomplete and requires modification (which is clear anyway).

Originally Posted by WakingNomad

That must have been traumatizing for you. I am sorry to hear that. I had a premonition an acquaintance of mine, my cousin's friend was going to kill himself, and I did nothing, because I wasn't sure, and I barely knew the guy. It's always crappy when we have an intuition about a death, and then it happens.

Creepy, eerie, unsettling... classic "drag the entire student body to the auditorium out of English class"-episode even though rumors had been raging all morning.

Oh yeah, and the principal really fumbled the news to everyone. More like a blurt. And... no school for the rest of the day to make you all feel better, and you can talk to the school counselor... and it's all back to normal, right kids?

Originally Posted by Mindraker

Coincidences *do* happen. And you're going to dream about people and events that you experience in real life, not things that you haven't experienced.

Mindraker, You continue to make a credible argument that your dreams are not shared dreams, but it still applies poorly to what some other people are taking about.

Its true that most dreams for most people are cobbled together collage-like from things they have experienced. Not all dreams are like this though, and this is part of what makes the premonitions and shared dreams stand out. You have a dream that does not connect in any recognizable way with your previous experience, it looks alien, and it feels alien, that something came into your mind from outside of yourself. Then you wake up and meet a new acquaintance a few hours later and it matches what they tell you. After even a few dozen clear experiences like this, the "its all a coincidence" hypothesis gets pretty implausible.

For the past few years I don't watch TV or movies at all, with one or two rare exceptions, and a large portion of my shared/telepathetic experiences are in relation to strangers I'm about to meet on the internet. So in most cases I don't have a stream of common sensate experience to confuse the issue. This is one reason why I don't have many objectively shared dream experiences with people close to me like my wife. There isn't any way to separate it from our existing knowledge of each other. And there isn't as much reason to have the experience, because there isn't anything in us pushing to be shared that can't get across any other way. But with someone I will meet for the first time a few hours after the dream, there is the potential of new experience, and often there are identifying details that can't have been drawn from any previous joint experience.

Originally Posted by Mindraker

The real question is -- what happens to all the OTHER dreams we have, which bear NO similarities to each other? For example, I dreamt about washing dishes yesterday. That has no relation to anything you dreamt. But we're just going to brush that off as "noise"?

No. For me almost all of the dreams that feel like shared dreams are followed a few hours later with a confirmation of the experience. Its not a matter of selectively pulling one coincidence out of a much larger sample of experiences. I already mentioned that possible fallacy in my previous response, though I didn't say specifically what the resolution was for me. For about 3 years I had one of these kinds of experience per night, clearly distinct from the other dreams. Now its more blurred together, with the same element weakly present in most of my dreams, but I learned to recognize how it feels when it was separated more. Since I have math and engineering degrees and work in light measurement, I know a bit about statistics, so statistical fallacies were the first possibilities I explored. During the period when the premonition and/or shared experiences were separated into their own dreams, close to 100% of them panned out, I didn't exclude any. And the couple that didn't pan out are still useful data points in their own right, since that in itself was unusual and distinctive. Now, even though the phenomena is blended more with my other dreams, most of it still connects in an identifiable way with next day experiences that can't be extrapolated from previous experience.

Last night I dreamed of climbing up a pole, and climbing up a tower. I was a character that reminds me a little bit of Dave Mustaine, with a daughter about 7 years old. I had another dream that some guy with a gun was coming to kill me. I'd gotten rid of all my guns, and was frantically searching in my house for one to defend myself with. The man came to the front door, and the woman I was with went out to stall him. At the end I found an old muzzle loading pistol under the oven. I had other dreams also, including one in a mini-van where I drove out to a beautiful but scary looking view. No washing dishes. I'd say that these dreams are weakly shared though, based on past experience and how they feel. There's an element in them that's not entirely me.

I skimmed a thread you started earlier where you tried to share passwords in dream. That kind of experiment would be quite hard for me, for reasons I've discussed at length in other threads. For me the connection in the so-called 'shared dreams' is emotional, and relates to the other person's identity as an individual. Generally speaking, a password doesn't relate strongly enough to that, there's nothing there I can feel clearly. My 'shared' experiences do often contain objective details that can be verified, but they appear as building blocks in metaphors for the more abstract subjects that drive the experience. So if I were going to intentionally try to share a dream with someone, I'd focus on a philosophical or personal topic that we both care about, and the synergies in our different perspectives on that will create the dream. I can't just create the dream with my own force of will. Its more like surfing, where you have to use the waves that are already there.

For example....I consider ourselves as humans to be 'damned' in some sense, our world has characteristics that I regard as hellish, notwithstanding the positive things. Is this damnation, such as it is, eternal? In other words, does our universe work pretty much the only way it can work, with no spiritual 'path' to anything significantly better? I asked this question before I went to bed. If someone else has a dream that connects to my dream, its likely that it will relate somehow to this as a theme, that there will be something in their dream that provides some modest perspective on my question that I lacked. Or the dream could as easily have to do with something they are concerned about, but there is generally that kind of connection. The reason for this is that the part of me that is capable of having this kind of dream cares about these kinds of subjects, and doesn't care about things like passwords. Personal relationships and moral choices are important to that part of me too though, so the topic doesn't have to be theoretical like the example I gave here.

On the topic of suicides....I had a roommate/landlord who was taking rent from us while not passing it on to the real property owner. That same individual also had a serious benzodiazepine addiction, and dramas going on with multiple girlfriends he was juggling. Shortly before he killed himself, I let him know fairly strongly that I didn't like being lied to, without however realizing what was going on with the rent. I also encouraged him to honestly face up to his situation, not to run away from it. A couple of hours before he killed himself, I told him I was moving out, and unknown to me, his situation with his landlord had also come to a crisis point. He said that he might become homeless. (He had parents, but didn't want to live with them because they required him to go to drug rehab.) I encouraged him that he could get through it, that it was spring, so the weather was warm, and I'd known a lot of other people who had gotten through that kind of experience in a positive way. With retrospect the things I said helped push him over the edge rather than helping pull him back from it. But I didn't understand his real situation, in large part because of his intent to hide his stealing from me. A disturbing thing to me about this experience is I was already having a lot of accurate premonitions by this time in my life, but I was completely oblivious to what was about to happen. I'd had a dream that exactly fit how he died, but the dream had come a while earlier and I didn't connect it with him. Had I realized he was a suicide risk, I would have acted differently. And its the kind of thing that I should have been able to pick up on, if I wasn't blinded by his attempt to deceive me, or for some other reason. Our other roommate didn't see it coming either, and had approached the situation in about the same way that I did.

My point is here isn't that what happened is or isn't partially my fault. I'm just sharing my experience, so you know you're not alone in this regard. Dream premonitions are largely beside the issue here, we'd be wrestling with the same thing anyway, everyone does.

I mentioned that I had a dream right before this incident (US Airways Flight 1549 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia). I'll describe it again now, as an example to illustrate how these kinds of dreams work for me, how the symbolism works. My topic of interest before going to sleep had been redemption. In my dream, I'm in a long, thin, low building with water on the floor. There's a small animal kind of like a polecat, which sort of reminded me of a miniature Ted Nugent. (If you shrink an aggressive asshole, it exhibits more of the skittishness of a small animal because it feels more vulnerable.) I was debating whether the water on the floor was spittle from the cat hissing, or something else. Next scene there are hymns of praise to this cat-like animal, "leo leo leo". Next scene I'm outside of the building, and there's another small building next to it, about the size of a pump house, with an opening in the side. Several times a blob of some heavy material smacks against the side of the building, as if someone has thrown a shotput at it. I think the sound it makes when it hits the building is kind of cool, like the sound of a hammer against a human skull. So I pick up one of the blobs and toss it through the opening. Inside there's a multifaceted metal contraption. When the object hits, the contraption rings like a bell, quickly vibrating out of control and tearing itself apart. Then there's another, louder deeper gong outside, like a knell of impending disaster. I move back towards the long thin building, because I have "children" in it which I have to save.

In my interpretation, the 'cat' symbolizes a spirit of aggression, which is very similar to a spirit of courage, such as was required to save the people in the long thin building. It relates to my question of redemption, because it allows me to feel the relationship between aggression and courage, which helps me understand the essential value in it and begin to change it into the other. Without this concern, I would not have had the dream. I also believe that the long thin building is related to an airplane fuselage, and the squat building next to it with the metal contraption inside is an engine. The episode with the metal blob corresponds to the destruction of one of the plane's engines in slow motion, milliseconds stretched out into several seconds. The 'leo' principle was exhibited in my death-loving aggression in the dream, which I experienced as a cause of the accident, and in the celebrated courage of the pilot who saved everyone.

One reason I didn't dream it as a literal airplane is I'd had no experience with airplanes for a while, and so had no closer memories on hand to build the image out of. Also, my previous experience with the inside of an aircraft engine was actually in a building I used to work in at NASA, not attached to a real aircraft. Another reason is that to a very large extent the dream isn't intended as a vision of the subsequent event. My dream is really more directly about courage, while drawing supporting metaphors from subsequent events. The dream and the heroic episode a few hours later are related to each other, but one doesn't 'cause' the other, and isn't really 'about' the other.

All of my dream premonitions developed this way: when I dreamed on certain kinds of relatively 'deep' topics, the imagery seemed to be drawn from future experience as easily as from past experience. The premonitory aspect of the dream was to some extent incidental. I also noticed that such dreams always relate to other people, there's always someone else's desire or thought connected to them. So I started paying more attention to that, and that's how the more clearly 'shared' experiences developed. Now the premonitory aspect is a lot weaker, probably in large part because its not interesting to me any more. Likewise the 'shared' experience isn't interesting to me any more either, because its no longer new to me and I'm no longer looking for more evidence to prove whether or not its real for myself. So its not as strong and overt as it had been either. But its still there in a more muddled form, because like everyone else in one way or another, I'm still wrestling with identity, and how to make real contact with other people without losing myself. And other people are in the process of trying to verify whether shared dreaming is real for themselves, and their aims interact with mine.

Besides the fact that its generated from something like a very detailed feeling, I think there's also another reason why my 'Hudson river' dream is loosely metaphorical in the manner I described. I've publicly shared this dream several times now, and its one of the few dreams that I have a kind of 'proof' of, in that I have it in a time-stamped e-mail from immediately prior to the corresponding event, demonstrating that I didn't make it up or embellish later. Is the dream 'just a coincidence', am I reading too much into it? If you want to believe that its a coincidence, the dream's metaphorical nature leaves you room do that. Its not right to force people to believe in this sort of thing, to push too strongly with evidence against their will to live in a world where this kind of thing doesn't happen. ("In the hunt the king uses beaters on three sides only, and forgoes game that runs off in front.") Some other dreams that I consider too personal to post, since they involve other people, are more direct and literal than this one.

Having skimmed your previous thread, you don't seem like the kind of person that fears psychological collapse if your life paradigm changes, which is why I'm saying as much as I am here. I think if you want the truth of the matter, it will allow itself to be caught. But the Michael Shermer types have the right to remain smugly the way they are.

Shared dreaming, such as I experience it, is deeply intimate. Its more like brain sex than sharing a movie. By sex I don't mean pornographic images, I mean that you meld a little bit with the other person on a deep level. Maybe doing it with strangers like I do isn't even healthy, I'm a psychic slut and drama queen, and I pay a price for that, even while I pretend that my sincere motive protects me a little bit. Are you comfortable with other people being in your mind? Do you really want their desires and fears to become a part of you? As with sex, once you open the door a little bit, you can't go back completely to the way you were. You can't undo your experience, and unlearn what you learned. So I think that declining the experience, deciding "I don't want to do that, I'm OK with not knowing one way or the other", is perfectly reasonable, and probably the best choice for a lot of people. (Maybe from some standpoint it would have been the best choice for me too, but events kind of seduced me into it before I understood where it was going.) It is possible to have these experiences while maintaining your honest skepticism though, you don't have to give that up. That's the road I took. Faith and credulity can make it happen easier, but isn't required. So I think you can keep all your skeptical ideas about random coincidences and other fallacies and still prove shared dreaming to yourself, as long as you apply that skepticism honestly.

I guess I'll stop here with a disclaimer: I realize I come across a bit as an arrogant ass. That's because I'm a bit of an arrogant ass. I can't turn that off completely, and if I try to clamp down on it too hard, it starts cutting too much into my intuitive and expressive directness. So all I can do is say yeah I see it, and apologize to whatever extent I appear to have been speaking to you in an unfair or annoying manner.

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

I may have a few ideas to add here at a later time, but I'm writing this up on a break, so I must be brief.

My life will change significantly in a couple of weeks, so I'm almost out of time too. One thing I wanted to mention relatively quickly though....Your tree-like icon connects to dreams and feelings I had a few years ago. Here's something of what it means to me, and maybe you can say what it means to you.

I know this might sound really weird, but in one interpretation, the two 'trunks' are twin spinal columns in some alien animal, one on the left and one on the right. The brain of this animal is more divided than our brains are also. An upside is this makes it easier to do dream-like thinking while awake, because one side can imagine freely while the other side is engaged in thinking actively about the external world. A downside is it makes it harder in some ways to integrate those two processes, and those two sides of experience. Its a bit like the separation we experience between waking and sleeping, but the division is more spatial and less temporal than it is for us.

I strongly feel myself 'being' this animal, and acutely feel the absence or loss of one side of the nervous structure, as if it has been torn out of my body, or I've suffered the death of a twin. I feel like crying a little bit when I think about it, and if speaking some effort would be required to keep my voice from catching. I'm not suggesting what this means or in what sense it is or isn't real, I'm just describing the experience.

I also feel an analogous loss of connection with others, as if openly psychic empathy has been the norm, and I'm more isolated now. In one dream I saw an image like your picture, and the branches from one side sort of shrunk and withdrew from the other, leaving it separate. The motion of it was a weird kind of feeling, sort of plant-like, sort of animal-like, sort of slippery and medical in a squeamish kind of way. The shape of the 'nerves' was a little bit more feather-like than in your picture, and I think it was on a slightly lighter background, but it feels similar.

(By the way Sageous, and other people I've mentioned this to, I finally got a job where my wife and kids are! So thanks for your prayers or atheistic well-wishes or whatever you've done in that regard. It will be a challenge I think, but all we can hope for in life is an opportunity, and it looks like a good one in terms of the opportunities and difficulties it involves. And of course being home all week except for business travel will be wonderful, its hard to be a good partner and parent from 500 or 2000 miles away.)

Originally Posted by shadowofwind

(By the way Sageous, and other people I've mentioned this to, I finally got a job where my wife and kids are! So thanks for your prayers or atheistic well-wishes or whatever you've done in that regard. It will be a challenge I think, but all we can hope for in life is an opportunity, and it looks like a good one in terms of the opportunities and difficulties it involves. And of course being home all week except for business travel will be wonderful, its hard to be a good partner and parent from 500 or 2000 miles away.)

That's wonderful news!

Originally Posted by rrrrocketrick

Mzzkc, I'm under the impression that what I'm getting at is somewhat beyond you at present. I encourage you to think my posts over a bit more. Is there anyone out there with more philosophical acumen who'd like to engage what I posted? Shadowofwind? Sivason?

For what it's worth, rrrrocketrick, Mzzkc is one of the most knowledgeable people I've encountered on these forums; I think you are going to have a very hard time getting "beyond" him, and I haven't noticed you doing so yet, by any measure. Given that he usually takes the high ground, I'm not sure Mzzkc will follow up after such an uncalled-for insult... But sort of hope he does.

Responses to different folks will come sporadically due to time constraints. Sorry in advance for the wait. <3

Originally Posted by rrrrocketrick

Hi again Mzzkc.

Hello.

Originally Posted by rrrrocketrick

I don't understand what you're trying to say in the above clause.

I will explain further.

To discuss any philosophical frameworks, we need language to do so. Language is a complex subject, but by sharing knowledge of English most of the work is done for us. However, basic discourse still requires a set of agreed upon terms and definitions to facilitate proper communication. If the framework of a conceptual system can only prescribe multiple, contradictory, or ambiguous meanings to the terms used in basic discourse, then it has no real value--since no coherent discourse can be had from which conclusions can be drawn.

Thus, I asked that we further develop the language with which we discuss shared dreaming and related topics. This is a necessary first step in a broader conversation. After all, without a common language, we may as well resort to grunts and handwaving to get our meaning across.

Originally Posted by rrrrocketrick

I don't understand much in the bit just above either. Real and imaginary are non-distinct terms? Non-distinct terms have inherent meaning? Terms exist as states? Terms have inherent meaning? X can be concluded by agreeing that y? Saying x has more value than stating y?

Would you prefer a more formal proof? Are you familiar with basic set theory and standard notation? That would make communication easier, I think. Though, I admit I'm a bit rusty. =)

Originally Posted by rrrrocketrick

That seems false. I can't see why I should need to prove that sleep and wakefulness are non-distinct given my philosophy of nature (which is a widely used term in certain circles, by the way).

I have experienced, witnessed, and researched multiple phenomena which prove that "sleep" and "wakefulness" are distinct states.

To show why you would need to prove that sleep and wakefulness are not distinct state (obviously, you wouldn't have to if you agree they are distinct), I provide a quote (with context).

Originally Posted by rrrrocketrick

I judge them from the perspective provided by a philosophy of nature (metaphysic, philosophical cosmology, worldview), 1) which is more coherent and adequate to experience than that of the so-called "modern scientific worldview" (by virtue of including it and going beyond it, not by virtue of denying it) and, 2) which implies that the burden of proof is not on those who accept the phenomenon but rather on those who deny it.

If I take you by your word, and I have no reason not to, then it would seem that any experiential claim I make (no matter how ordinary or extraordinary) I would neither need to support or prove. At least as far as your conceptual system will take us, anyways.

Originally Posted by rrrrocketrick

No it can't. I don't have a shared dream if my partner kicks me in bed, not even if we're both asleep and both experience the kick.

What a lovely imagination you have! Could you elaborate further on this hypothetical? How do these two experience the kick? Or is it only their bodies which experience the event, while their minds don't register a thing? Or if their minds do register the kick, and they experience it in dreams, do they experience it the same way? Would they be kicking each other in the dream? Or would the dream construct an event where one experienced kicking a tree and the other getting kicked from a bar--or something else entirely?

We'd have to delve deeper into this example to see how my proposed definition fares. There are simply too many potential symptoms with what you've presented to draw a reasonable conclusion on the veracity of my proposed definition--but I think you might be onto something here which can help us better focus our language.

I've still yet to see you offer definitions for consideration, though. I certainly hope you do.

Originally Posted by rrrrocketrick

Yes, I was wrong to ascribe that definition to you. And I think I see the need to change what I wrote a bit, so I think I'll repost it below.

All very well, but my definition of shared dreaming (alone) does not preclude the possibility of waking life being a shared dream. I'll allow you to figure out how that could be. It'll be a fun mental exercise, I'm sure!

A hint: the solution to the quandary relies upon an oft-discussed, well-known philosophical framework and a bit of recursion.

Originally Posted by rrrrocketrick

Mzzkc, I'm under the impression that what I'm getting at is somewhat beyond you at present. I encourage you to think my posts over a bit more.

Is there anyone out there with more philosophical acumen who'd like to engage what I posted? Shadowofwind? Sivason?

From what I've seen, you assume too much. Getting the basics right is a prerequisite to real philosophical discussion. Part of getting the basics right is agreeing upon language...terms...definitions. If we were already working with a common set, there would be no issue here. But by your own admission, you've brought a new framework to the table with which no one but you is intimately familiar.

If you want to discuss its merits, we must come to a consensus on the fundamental symbols to be used in discourse. There is value in symbols--in words and definitions. Surely, you are not blind to this.

Originally Posted by shadowofwind

<snip>

> you don't seem like the kind of person that fears psychological collapse if your life paradigm changes

Well, no, but I'd -prefer- stability over instability.

> That's because I'm a bit of an arrogant ass.

What? This is the Internet. OK, I admit to a *little* trolling myself online. I can get carried away myself. But in all seriousness, I do think your point about TV is interesting -- I find that on the nights that I watch TV, my dreams are consistently far less sharp than on nights that I do watch television -- to the point that I don't even have dream recall on the nights that I watch TV.

We will probably disagree on this issue. "Let us agree to disagree..."

Love Your New Avatar Mzzkc (post #510)

It looks like a dream Portal to "one plus one" trees

Do trees Communicate?

***

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8V0...e_gdata_player

***(4:41) 32,852 views

In the "show more" it sat:

In this real-life model of forest resilience and regeneration, Professor Suzanne Simard shows that all trees in a forest ecosystem are interconnected, with the largest, oldest, "mother trees" serving as hubs. The underground exchange of nutrients increases the survival of younger trees linked into the network of old trees. Amazingly, we find that in a forest, 1+1 equals more than 2.

Your avatar is one plus one trees,

Hmmmra (this is harrrd)

Am trying to link you 100+ readers of this thread to rvdc's work. In the first post (OP) is a link to a scientific, published paper by 86 year old rvdc.

In post #2 has a very interesting, online share dream experiment video. Fast forward to the 12 minute point to listen to what happened in shared dream, online experiment.

Discuss rvdc and synchronicities

***

http://www.dreamviews.com/beyond-dre...chonicity.html

***

Originally Posted by Sageous

Given that he usually takes the high ground, I'm not sure Mzzkc will follow up after such an uncalled-for insult... But sort of hope he does.

In my reading of the exchange, Mzzkc's responses to rrrrocketrick were hostile from the start, and rrrocketrick mostly reacted against that. I don't really mean that as a criticism of Mzzkc, since I've often led off with posts that were 10 times as aggressive as his. When I do that, its usually because what the other person seems to be saying is something that I've heard before and had a problem with, so I treat the other person as sort of a proxy for previous posters. I think rrrocketrick and I both did this a little bit in this thread in response to MindRaker's statement about the "burden of proof" being on believers in shared dreaming. People have come into the forum demanding that we justify our thoughts and experiences to them in terms of their own preferred paradigm, as if they have that authority over what its acceptable for us to think for some reason. I recognized MindRaker's handle, so had I been in less of a hurry, and if the site's search facility were not mostly broken, I'd have gone back and tried to get a better idea of where he's coming from before responding. Instead I just guessed based on his most recent posts. I think I guessed correctly to some extent, and missed to some extent, confusing him with somebody else. Anyway, I speculate that Mzzkc was reacting to rrrrocketrick in a similar kind of way. Maybe his reaction was in defense of MindRaker, or the apparent consequences of rrrocketrick's philosophy offended him, or maybe he smelled something in rrrrocketrick's attitude that he didn't like and went after that. In any case, as arrogant and rude as rrrrocketrick was at the end, I don't think he started it.

I disagree with rrrrocketrick that there is a "burden of proof" on people who deny shared dreaming. Many people who believe in shared dreaming lie about their experiences, or interpret their experiences in logically fallacious ways. Seeing that, its not unreasonable for someone to conclude that shared dreaming is probably all bullshit. And its fair for them to hold that position without somehow disproving shared dreaming, which would be pretty much impossible. I think that people who deny shared dreaming are wrong, but I expect them to make their best judgment based on the evidence they have. And not believing in shared dreaming is not an unreasonable view if they have no personal experience of it, given how much fabrication and delusion there appears to be on the other side. The best approach in my view though is simply not to form concrete opinions one way or another. A person can just leave it open to some extent, recognizing something of the degree to which their informed guesses are guesses. It doesn't seem reasonable to me to assume that claimed phenomena are real as a default position. I guess that maybe that's Mzzkc's view also, and he just reacted more strongly against some of the implications.

As I see it, rrrrocketrick is right that the dichotomy between "real" and "imaginary" has been a significant source of confusion on the topic of shared dreaming. So I think it was reasonable to bring it up, and I think it was unreasonable for the point to be dismissed as superfluous. The thread topic was "Do you believe shared dreaming is real?", and for very many people who have posted in this sub-forum on that question, the converse of "real" in this context is "imaginary". So how can that distinction not be relevant? Its a dichotomy that has confused my perceptions also. For example, when I first had an astral projection experience, I thought it was "real", that I was out of my physical body. Then after a couple of more I was able to determine that it was imaginary, that I was manipulating a kind of model in my imagination. Equating imaginary with physically unreal, like most people do, I dismissed it as unreal for about ten years before other experiences taught me that it doesn't fall cleanly into one side or the other of that category. So definitely its relevant. Also, rrrrockettrick didn't say that in his way of looking at the world the dichotomy goes away entirely, just said that its non-sharp. And he said that many times, so that we wouldn't misunderstand. So while I agree with Mzzkc that "nothing can be known, because subjectivity" is a stupid way of looking at things, rrrrocketrick seemed to me to be quite clear that this wasn't what he was saying.

I agree with both rrrrocketrick and Mzzkc that the paradigms through which we think about the world matter, and word definitions matter. But I also think its possible to try to do too much with definitions. Some thoughts can't be expressed as a sequence of symbols with definite meanings. No matter how you chop it up something is left out. Also, generally speaking, a "philosophy" is too limited to capture everything important that can be understood about nature. These are toy models. They're useful, but they're not even remotely isomorphic to reality. I think that when we try to discuss topics like shared dreaming, it doesn't work to try to pin everything down with careful definitions. We also have to try to read each others' minds to some extent. Without that we won't understand, because the words are not enough. Furthermore, the castles of definitions and ideas built by modern philosophers tend to become a world of their own, mostly disconnected from the rest of reality. Navigating these mazes isn't very interesting to me, they're not close enough to the heart. I think, for example, that if there's a serious debate about whether dream is different from waking life, somebody has become too wrapped up in subjective experiences and mental constructs and forgotten to look at the evidence. Yes there are things that are the same between the two, but if we try to make up a philosophy and try to impose it on the world its going to be wrong. I guess what I'm saying is that when there's a misunderstanding having to do with the way a word is used, then that has to be addressed. But at the same time its not possible to understand the world by careful philosophical construction. A person could do that forever, for instance, and never experience a shared dream. The tool is inadequate to the task, and in any case the spirit slips away.

This comes back a little bit to a criticism I made recently of so-called Thought Science. People who call such a thing science have, in my view, little understanding of what science is, and no experience with the incredible detail and rigor that goes into something like a successful physics model. I'd say the same thing about Objectivism or Zen Buddhism or Marxism or any other dogma or philosophy that I've ever encountered. Yes science has serious limitations also, but it has also been successful in a way that puts it in a whole different league than other philosophies. Mechanisms do matter, and the lack of a plausible mechanism for shared dreaming does matter. If rrrrocketrick has a way of looking at things that makes mechanisms irrelevant, that may be a useful way of looking at things in some regard. But I think it leaves something out also, and is not an alternative that can replace the 'scientific' way of looking at things.

I think to a large extent we've been speaking past each other. We see considerations that we think are important, so we try to communicate those, and we do that in a way that's at the expense of things that other people see as important. So I can't really pick a side here. I wish that we can respect that other people have something to say that's worthwhile, even if we must disagree with a large part of what it seems to be saying to us, and even if it doesn't interest us personally.

I messed it up. I knew I would. So, here is page one of that thread I meant to link you to:

***

http://www.dreamviews.com/beyond-dre...-thoughts.html

***

86 year old rvdc wrote this in 2012 and It was published in the:

International Journal of Dream Research

Volume 5 Number 1 (April 2012) Van De Castle

The article is called:

Exogenous dream continuity:

Exploring the matrix of entangled dreams


You can print a PDF of the 8 page article here:

***

Exogenous dream continuity: Exploring the matrix of entangled dreams | Van de Castle | International Journal of Dream Research

***

Here are some exerts:

In post #3

The largest collection of psychic experiences was compiled by Louisa Rhine who filed over 15,000 reports (Rhine, 1978, pg. 21). (...) over 60% of these reports consisted of dreams,*

In post 4

*On p. 141, Hall wrote:*“With the advent of sleep monitoring techniques and objective methods of content analysis, it has become possible to do fairly rigorous controlled experiments on the incorporation in dreams of material subliminally presented during sleep. In the language of parapsychology these are investigations of mental telepathy during sleep.”

post 5

”The first two presentations with Van de Castle as the subject did not have any discernible effect on the dreams he reported.

But

The third topic consisted of watching a prize fight. The experimenter

visualized a prize fight mentally,
looked at pictures of prize fighters in a magazine,
wrote out the message:“You are watching a prize fight”.And
stood up and engaged in shadowboxing.*

These activities were continued for about fifteen minutes.*When the subject was awakened, he reported a long dream into the tape recorder.The first third of the dream was sexual in character, then the following episode was recorded:

“The setting shifted to a large auditorium and there was a boxing match going on. There were two young lightweight boxers who were fighting and one of them was doing much better than the other. It seems his opponent became vanquished and then another lightweight contender got into the ring with him. This new contender now started to give a pretty savage beating to the other boxer who was at one point kind of started to use a double punch where both hands would be brought from the outside and would simultaneously hit the other boxer’s head at the same time.*My sentiments began to be for the underdog, and I remember standing up and throwing a few imaginary punches myself because I was so involved with the action in the ring.”The description of the fight continued for 9 more lines, and then shifted back to the theme of the first part of the dream” (p. 145).

Post 6

Although I experienced this dream back in 1967, I can still recall the vividness and intensity of that dream 45 years later.

It served as my personal introduction to the reality of psychic phenomena, even though I had an extensive reading background on the subject matter for 15 years prior to that time.

For the person experiencing this kind of impactful dream, no amount of scepticism by omniscient scientists can ever dissuade an experiencer of this kind of powerful psychic event that they were deluded.*

If you get hit by a truck, you know that you hit by a truck, and no amount of critical comments ‘by these arbiters of reality’ will ever convince you that the truck that hit you was an imaginary truck.

Hostile? Is that how I come off nowadays?

Hmm...maybe it's the terse prose?

For the record: I have no animosity towards anyone here. Don't have a reason to; we're all here to learn, aren't we?

Too often these debates foster an "us vs. them" mentality that I find absolutely ridiculous. We're all people, all humans in our own right.

What's more, by its very virtue, my belief system (if you can call it that) precludes offence from new ideas. And that would presuppose the ideas rick presented were new to me in the first place (they weren't).

When I read rick's post, I saw potential for real conversation, if I could only get him to move beyond such mundane topics as "reality" and "imagination" by pushing his presented points to their logical ultimate. If I had not seen this potential, I would not have posted; not worth my time otherwise.

But as of yet, rick doesn't seem to be willing to work out the absolute basics needed to have a meaningful discussion (how can we talk about shared dreaming when we can't even agree upon a definition for the phenomenon). That's a shame.

No its not the terse prose. Not the style of what you said so much as the substance. It looks more like aggressive arrogance than anything else. Right or wrong, deep or superficial, insightful or cliche, rick had something he was trying to communicate, and you crapped on it while falsely characterizing what he was actually saying. With that attitude, it doesn't matter how much intelligence or knowledge you have, nobody is going to be able to learn very much from you because you don't respect other people's intelligence enough to understand where they're coming from and what they're actually asking. When you say "I saw potential for real conversation, if I could only get him to...." I don't think you're thinking about who you are in relation to other people in a realistic way.

As far as I understand what both of you are saying, I think I agree more with your ideas than with his. And I didn't have a problem at all with how you responded to my posts. But Sageous suggested that rrrrocketrick's attack wasn't provoked, so I'm just saying what I saw.

Statistically speaking, I'm more adept at symbol manipulation, pattern recognition, and recall than 99.9% of the population. This is a simple fact supported by numerous tests and accompanying documentation. I say this not to brag, but to help you better understand my perspective.

Given this knowledge, is it arrogance to think that I am capable of taking the ideas presented by rick much further than they are at present? Or would this be a reasonable conclusion based on overwhelming probability?

As for respect, if I thought rick unintelligent and beneath me, I would not have bothered to engage in discourse. If you would all rather I leave, I would not be opposed to do so; I've continued posting thus far only at Sageous' implied request.

More on topic: Regarding the search for a suitable definition of shared dreaming, there is a fantastic work of fiction which describes shared dreaming experiences as accurately as I've yet seen in literature. Here, let me google it for you.

^^ Nice link, Mzzkc; don't know whether to smile or sigh.

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

Statistically speaking, I'm more adept at symbol manipulation, pattern recognition, and recall than 99.9% of the population.

Fantastic, so am I.

If you're better at basketball than 99.9% of the population, and trying to play at a pro level, that's likely not good enough. We self-select into different groups to a remarkable degree. Being smarter than 999 other people doesn't mean much if your view of yourself prevents you from communicating with the people you are actually in contact with.

Being as brilliant as you are, you must understand that there are different types of intelligence, and that people who are notably less intelligent than you in some ways can nevertheless sometimes know things that you would benefit from learning. Even if your goal is to teach them, and not to learn anything from them, you can't teach effectively if you can't look for the truth in what they're saying and treat it accordingly.

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

Given this knowledge, is it arrogance to think that I am capable of taking the ideas presented by rick much further than they are at present?

Yes, definitely. It didn't work very well, did it?

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

Or would this be a reasonable conclusion based on overwhelming probability?

No. I could have predicted the outcome with nearly 100% certainty based on your first post.

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

As for respect, if I thought rick unintelligent and beneath me, I would not have bothered to engage in discourse.

You thought him worthy of being blessed with your wise radiance, yes, if he was humble and open enough to receive it.

Just to be clear, I'm not saying that you're more arrogant than he is, or even more arrogant than me. What I'm suggesting is that your arrogance is producing a deep blind spot for you in this particular area, and I'm able to tell you about it because my particular flavor of bullshit blinds me in slightly different areas. Not that I'm being any more effective here than you were in relation to rick.

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

If you would all rather I leave, I would not be opposed to do so; I've continued posting thus far only at Sageous' implied request.

No, please don't go, we would be lost without you! Seriously though, I find this conversation a lot more interesting than the other one, tedious as it might seem to you. I've known a lot of really talented people in my life, and I've learned a lot from them. But a point comes where I'm working on questions that they can't help with, not because I'm smarter than them or they don't have anything to contribute, but because they can't imagine that I could know anything worthwhile that's not a subset of what they know. So they interpret everything I say through that filter, and understand very little of it. And so they can't help with what I'm thinking on because they don't understand it. Not because they're not smart enough, but because they're too full of themselves. Then they feel isolated on their esteemed mountaintop, that the world is too primitive to receive their offering. It eventually becomes painful for them, its a sad waste of talent for everyone else, and its insane.

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

More on topic: Regarding the search for a suitable definition of shared dreaming, there is a fantastic work of fiction which describes shared dreaming experiences as accurately as I've yet seen in literature. Here, let me google it for you.

Yeah I have one of those, thanks. I think Peter has a bit of a sage complex too, though from what I've seen so far, yours is a lot further progressed.

^^ I was going to put on my arrogant-sage hat and self-importantly apologize for perhaps triggering this current conversation, but I changed my mind because damn, it was entertaining! And I even somehow got a free plug in the process (a backhanded plug, no doubt, but that's okay). So never mind.

shadowofwind:

Understood. Thanks. =)

Sageous:

We aren't allowed to post direct links, so I had to get creative. XP

I have neither time nor opportunity to visit this page every day, and I shouldn't visit it as often as I do. I've just skimmed (lightly skimmed) recent postings, however, and I see that people are discussing the recent "exchange" between Mzzkc and I. I don't like to do this, but I feel pushed at this point to say that I'm a PhD writing from my field of expertise. I offered what I believe is a very deep point in my post. Mzzkc appeared to me not to grasp the substance of it, I consequently found his dismissal of my post uninformed and arrogant, and I found it outrageous that he was suggesting I might just be a "hypocrite" (a hypocrite?) right off the bat (his first post in response to me!), so I opted to disengage. I'm reluctant to post on dreamviews anyway, because the level of discussion is too often low and because there's way too much shouting, arrogant swagger, and superficial engagement to deal with. It's thanks to certain significant exceptions to that rule that I took a chance.

I'll be back later--perhaps later today--to take a closer look at what's been posted recently. Perhaps I'll re-engage. Or maybe I'll just go back to lurking.

Originally Posted by rrrrocketrick

I have neither time nor opportunity to visit this page every day, and I shouldn't visit it as often as I do. I've just skimmed (lightly skimmed) recent postings, however, and I see that people are discussing the recent "exchange" between Mzzkc and I.

I don't like to do this, but I feel pushed at this point to say that I'm a PhD writing from my field of expertise.

I offered what I believe is a very deep point in my post.

Mzzkc appeared to me not to grasp the substance of it, I consequently found his dismissal of my post uninformed and arrogant, and I found it outrageous that he was suggesting I might just be a "hypocrite" (a hypocrite?) right off the bat (his first post in response to me!), so I opted to disengage.

I'm reluctant to post on dreamviews anyway, because the level of discussion is too often low and because there's way too much shouting, arrogant swagger, and superficial engagement to deal with.

It's thanks to certain significant exceptions to that rule that I took a chance.

I'll be back later--perhaps later today--to take a closer look at what's been posted recently. Perhaps I'll re-engage.

Or maybe I'll just go back to lurking.

I just checked your profile. Thank you for what you told us about yourself in your biography. Here is a copy and paste:

***

About rrrrocketrick

Biography:

I'm new to lucid dreaming; started trying it in late 2012.*

I'm an academic; I have a PhD in 'Science and Religion.

'I'm interested in lucid dreaming because it seems to carry important implications about the nature of nature. Specifically, I think it very strongly suggests that materialistic theories of nature are false, strongly suggests that dualistic theories of nature are also false, and also strongly suggests the superiority of what might be called dialectical monisms. In other words, it suggests that no sharp boundary can be drawn between the imaginary and the real. This in turn has important scientific, philosophical, and religious implications.

How you found us:

Nick Newport lucidology video on youtube[

***

Originally Posted by rrrrocketrick

I have neither time nor opportunity to visit this page every day, and I shouldn't visit it as often as I do. I've just skimmed (lightly skimmed) recent postings, however, and I see that people are discussing the recent "exchange" between Mzzkc and I. I don't like to do this, but I feel pushed at this point to say that I'm a PhD writing from my field of expertise. I offered what I believe is a very deep point in my post. Mzzkc appeared to me not to grasp the substance of it, I consequently found his dismissal of my post uninformed and arrogant, and I found it outrageous that he was suggesting I might just be a "hypocrite" (a hypocrite?) right off the bat (his first post in response to me!), so I opted to disengage. I'm reluctant to post on dreamviews anyway, because the level of discussion is too often low and because there's way too much shouting, arrogant swagger, and superficial engagement to deal with. It's thanks to certain significant exceptions to that rule that I took a chance.

Wow.

Sorry you're having trouble lowering yourself to our puny level, rrrrocketrick. If you don't rejoin because we're all just too stupid, swaggering, and emotional, well, I guess we'll just try to get along without your wisdom and marked humility.

Good luck finding a site stocked with smart people ... I'm sure there are many of them, no doubt flush with self-affirming Phd's, if not experienced LD'ers.

sheesh.