Hain

Just a fun thought about lucid dreams. When you "wake up" in your dream to realize that it is a dream, you can do anything in it. I'm asking if at some point our brain could "wake up" in reality and begin manipulating it consciously.

I humor this because I read the novel Illusions by Richard Bach and it is an amazing story. The message behind it is very thought provoking about this topic. Briefly: the next messiah, a reluctant one at that, on earth teaches a man (Richard Bach) that the world is not as complicated as we understand it. That underneath all the conclusions and rules is a power to control it like the messiah. While you read this you cannot help but feel positive about the idea that we are capable of anything our minds imagine.

So who thinks that people can create reality like a dream? Is our brain capable of understanding this "higher" existence to control it? If not, when? Just a fun place to talk about those great dreams where you lift your feet and float in space.

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ObieX

If you think about it, everything is made of the same stuff: empty space and "energy". If we can will this energy that makes up our bodies to move who's to say that we can't do it with other stuff if we try. The world we experience every day is an illusion created by our minds by way of signals from our senses. For all we know the world could really be all glowy like the end of the 3rd matrix, only we read it as "white" or "dog" or "whistle" or "cold". Stories of telekenetics and such may have some basis in fact, although from what i gather telekenetics would only be the tip of the iceberg with what this novel proposes.

Do I think that people can or could eventually (with some evolution or technology) manipulate reality like in a dream? I actually think it could be possible one day, if not already. There are many mysteries about our existance that people have yet to discover or are too "busy" to worry about. Doing the normal every day routines is more important than discovering the origins of all creation or the meaning of life or God.

I love lucid dreams. I have them VERY often, sometimes once or twice a week, and have been experimnting with them for many years now. I've taught myself to fly in them and do it pretty much every time lol. I just lift my feet off the ground and can hover. Flying any distance and at some speed does actually take some concentration though, its strange. And it always seems that the harder i try to do things in a lucid dream the more likely i am to wake up from it. I'm starting to branch out from just flying to controling the dream as a whole, from things like where it takes place to who's in it, and the events taking place. Just stating with that though so its difficult. I've got the hovering pretty much down to a science though, and flying is coming along nicely

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We Must Dissent.

CSflim

Augi: Why are you posting such questions to us?
If reality is a dream, then we do not exist. We are figments of your imagination and could not possibly tell you anything you do not already know.

Also I have to congratulate you on all of the wonderful literature that you personally are responsible for. All of the world's great masterpieces of art. Every great piece of music. Every insightful work of philosophy and science. You really are an absolute genius to have created it all.

Or maybe...just maybe (as crazy as this is going to sound), the real world actually exists. And in it other people exist too. And that just believing something doesn't make it so.


EDIT: It has been drawn to my attention that this post was phrased in an overly sarcastic manner. I accept the charge and appologise. I won't change the content of this post, for fear of being thought of as dishonest, but my objections are stated more clearly and less sarcastically below.

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CSflim

Eventually? We already do use technology to manipulate our reality.

We have the incredible ability to fly at great speeds over great distances.
We can have lively conversations with people who are thousands of miles away from us.
We can fight the invisible causes of illness and restore many people to good health.
We can capture the sights and sounds of any event in a small container and see and hear them again whenever we please.
We can travel, and leave this planet far behind, and look down upon it from far above.
We can command the tiniest particles to do our bidding, which allows us to solve incredibly complex computation problems is milliseconds.
We can do so, so many things, and our ability to do the fantastic grows every day.

There is magic everywhere in the real real world. People who desperately wish for magic just aren't looking hard enough.

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Suave

He never said that reality is a dream; he only postulated that it might be manipulatible in a manner similar to lucid dreams. I'm sure he also doesn't appreciate it when "figments of his imagination" use sarcasm to express their views.

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"Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions which differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are even incapable of forming such opinions." - Albert Einstein

"Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something." - Plato

Robaggio

Suave's right. Augi's trying to propose another angle of looking at things here. You've presented yours- but you don't have to do it in such a way that belittles his. No need to crush his "fun thought about lucid dreams".

There's nothing wrong with Augi's angle. He's not wishing for magic- he's merely open minded. Leave him be. It's people like him that make all the "magic" world possible. Without individuals searching for things that don't exist, and going beyond what is so blatantly perceived, we would have never become so technologically advanced in the first place. We'd have no "magic" in our world had people not wished to search for it in the past.

CSflim

The reason that lucid dreaming is possible is because the "world" which you are experiencing is entirely in your head, and you are ultimately responsible for everything that is in it. Once this is realised, it gives one the ability to 'manipulate' the "world" as one sees fit.

The reason we can never "lucid wake" is because the world that we experience is not fully determined by our beliefs about it. Hence lucid dreaming is a false analogy in an attempt to show the plausibility of...well whatever it is that is being argued for...presumably the ability to directly manipulate the world via mental powers (psychokinetic powers, telekinesis or whatever you wish to call it).

My point was to illustrate that of course we can manipulate the world via our thoughts. But we don't do it "directly" in the way it is presented in fantasy novels or paranomalism. We do it by applying our intellect to a problem and find some way to implement a solution. I also wished to counter the widespread notion that mysticism is beautiful and magical, and everything else is boring and prosaic. There is magic to be had in the real world if one just opens his eyes.


Some people are likely to argue that, yes indeed, the state of the real world is just like the state of a dream world, and hence, it is not a false analogy. This is the kind of thinking I was 'prefuting' by showing the consequences of such a belief: nobody else exists, and you are 'forced' to single handedly take the credit for all of humankind's great achievements.
Of course I cannot prove to anyone that I do exist, or that the world is not just the product of their imagination. But I can show how arrogant one needs to be to actually believe it.

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CSflim

The title of the thread commands one to "wake up from reality", which would certainly lead one to believe that it is being asserted that reality is in fact a dream.
More likely it was not being used in a literal sense, and dreaming is being used as an analogy. In my above post I explained why it is a weak analogy and that to draw conclusions from it would be fallicious reasoning.

Point taken. See the 'edit' applied to the post in question.

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Hain

Well CSflim I hope that you understand that I was not sarcastic when I created this thread's title. The titled this "Wake Up From Reality" because nothing is or was worth while in this world that did not make someone go "Hmmm." But I imagine that you at first glance said "What?" and shut off your creativity from there. I don't mind but it was rather pompous just to come in here and make a mockery of it and me. I didn't say "you all are my toys." I said, "Is our brain capable of understanding this 'higher' existence?"

And thank you Suave for replying so. This is a thread to question the nature of our own reality. Like ObieX said, we are "too busy" with the dull, boring, monotonous motions of our day to day life that we don't stop and look around and ask, "How is this real?" or "Why is this?" It was people that questioned their world that leaps of technology and ordered thinking came about.

To be curious about the world is to delve deeper to its hidden secrets... Who is to say that when on does realize that this is real BUT something else is just beneath it, would not feel just like waking inside a dream?

And something ObieX said intrigues me.
I don’t get that. I receive complete control, without restriction, when I begin to dream lucidly. But I "feel" the different parts of my conscience working to create new elements in the dream without my control. It is like seeing through my eyes but existing behind myself looking at the other thoughts I didn’t realize I was having.

Once I awake from that dream, I cannot recall the same feeling that I had when in control. But, the more I try to recall that feeling in my waking life the more invigorated I feel. I could do things that I never thought physically possible of myself. When I recall that sensation I feel more alive. I don't even think drugs could do that for me.

Anyone else know of that feeling right after a lucid dream? That is the thread I posted, this is the conversation I wished for, and hopefully there will be an answer that invokes another question. If nothing else, have fun when you lucid dream.

Sleep tight.

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Philangicality

There's some movie about this topic. I forgot what it was called can any of you help me out. It's animation over real live film. There's like 10 different stories where different topics about life and dreams are discussed. One of em is Ethan Hawk and some other actress having a conversation and another is a kid in front of a tree and then he floats away as he's talking about how a millisecond in our dreams is equal to about 15 minutes in real life. It goes on to talk about how after you die your brain is still active for about 3 minutes so the activity equals to years of real life time and action. I remember this movie was very entertaining but forget the name of it. If any of you know what I'm talking about could you tell me the title please. I'd like to check it out again and also give it to some people as gifts.

CSflim

The film is Waking Life by Richard Linklater. Interesting film, and the animation is wonderful.

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C4 Diesel

Being that I do not believe that there is an existence in which our own is merely being percieved in the manner in which a dream is, no I do not think that we could "wake up" and manipulate our reality in such a manner. I'd find it more likely (although I still do not believe it to be the case) that we are the products of someone else's dream, and if that entity wakes up, we will simply disappear.

As far as manipulating our reality with our minds, I believe this to be possible but unlikely and limited. First off, let me say that by "manipulating reality" I do not mean one's own personal, percieved reality but rather the generally accepted reality that comes as a result of concurrent observation by people (so making yourself trip face would not be "real"). Now I do not see a reason why telekinesis (or even something so extreme as pyrokinesis or other similar "magical" occurances) are not possible, but there has to be a method of doing it. In other words, the body has to be capable of initiating a process by which one of these "kinetic" effects would be the end result, and the body would have to be able to supply the energy enabling it to do so. In theory, the body could eventually evolve a laser beam eyeball on the forehead, but it would need the proper components and energy supply to do so. The components and the energy become the limiting factors, and since there is no reason for humans to evolve in such a manner, it becomes highly unlikely.

By allowing such mechanisms to only come about through evolution, I inherently dismiss the ability of a single person to acquire these abilities.

P.S. - Sorry for adding evolution to the discussion. It was kind of unintentional, but that's the way my thoughts went.

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C4 to your door, no beef no more...

Hain

Go ahead. I don't mind. I am the type of person that takes 8 or 9 friends of completely different interests, put them in a social situation, and the conversations we have jump everywhere. It does not matter as long as it kept light hearted and no huge arguments unfurl.

Evolution was part what I had originally figured someone would reply with, hoping someone loved X-Men as much as I did. I still though believe that there is some unaccounted for part of our being. I believe that it was in The Stand by King (the unedited version is the one I read, incase you read this and go "No that wasn't!") where the characters discussed about human potential. Looking through history one finds that it was filled with large components of magic and mysticism, things that now-a-days I even find laughable and ludicrous. The answer is that we let such talents wither because no one needed them anymore--the inventions by those who could not access that power removed it.

I have witnessed things and even preformed things that I can't explain with logic. Predicting one or two things of the next day is usual for people. But accurately guessing someone's life as I have done with people that I meet face to face for the first time is something that even scares me. How does it make the other person feel now? Coincidence and good guessing does not explain detailed histories of people by talking to them about unrelated things.

This is just another aspect of what I am wishing anyone to reply with. What is some talent, gift, power, what have you, that we have that defies what we deem as normal reality.

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Dbass

My chemistry teacher would drop a book on a desk everyday in the hopes that this one time, just maybe, it wouldn't fall. To me, it demonstrates an important principle. While we are all bound by physical laws, and the real world, etc. the law of randoms says that if anything can happen, it eventually will.
I don't know that anybody has ever awoken from reality, but it's possible that at least one of the countless "psychics" and spoon-benders was actually capable of manipulating things outside of the body without any means we are capable of perceiving. It's possible that someday, Sokol's book will hover in place...why not? There's plenty of quantum justification, electrons and such. I've seen people walk down the street and put out every single street light as they go past them. Who's to say shamans and other crazy-types don't know things we don't? It's far too early in human evolution to know that shit!

C4 Diesel

That's kind of why I automatically eluded to any current "psychic" capability as taking place in the mind... It's the only part of the body that we really know very little about, and it's insanely difficult to gather more information on it. It's this big, glob of stuff with essentially the same mushy pudding found throughout and very few discrepencies, yet it produced every different conscious thought? WHAT!?!? It blows my mind to think that neuron #1305849403 may have 50 functions while nuron #23843298432 might have only one, and neuron #73 might not even get used... ever. And you can't track this stuff. You can't place little nano-electrodes on assloads of individual neurons or groups of neurons and tell somebody to think and read what they all do. I mean, more macro-scale studies have done things similar using CAT scans and the like to get a general idea of what happens where, but the specifics of neural networks are VERY eluding. There's 100 billion of these little things!!!

Last I had heard (a year or so ago) some scientists made a tiny little chip with like 12 electrodes and they inserted it inside a mouse's brain and could make him hungry via remote control. I thought that was pretty impressive.

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C4 to your door, no beef no more...

Master_Shake

I see telekinesis as a biological or evolutionary power to be unlikely. However, I do recognize that technology may very well make these things possible. As C4 Diesel explained with his mouse example, I too have heard of such procedures and experiments. Why wouldn't it be possible to insert a transmitting chip in the brain, so that you could think the lights on or off. Just find a part of the brain activated while you think about the lights, connect a radio transmitter to it, and wala! You can control the lights with your mind.

Think about remote controls for your television nowadays, you are able to control the physical characteristics of an object from far away. That would have seemed like magic even 100 years ago.

I think it was Arthur C. Clarke who said that any civilization which has sufficiently advanced technologically past another would seem to be capable of magic.

I think technology is where such powers will come from in the future, not mysticism.

EDIT
As for lucid dreaming, and which reality is real, Phillip K. Dick's "The Man in the High Castle" is great reading.

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You know something, I don't think the sun even... exists... in this place. 'Cause I've been up for hours, and hours, and hours, and the night never ends here.

Yakk

I would disagree.

If someone is simulating my consciousness, than I exist. Even if there isn't a single particle of matter that corresponds to my body, I exist.

Hell, sometimes I catch myself simulating my own consciousness. =p~

More practically, the models in my head of other people exist. They aren't the same thing as the 'real' people, but they do exist. If all we are is a model in someone's head, then we do exist as a model in someone's head.

I have felt that feeling while awake.

In particular, I figured out how to fly while lucid dreaming. It was pretty simple.

While awake, during one of my random-thought-walks, I remembered how to fly, and it took a second of confusion for me to remember that that was dream-flying, not real-flying, that I knew how to do.

More impressive:
Vision given by brain implant
Computer control by brain implant
Hearing repair by brain implant
Flight sim controlled by rat-brain-cell neural network

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Last edited by JHVH : 10-29-4004 BC at 09:00 PM. Reason: Time for a rest.

Hain

I remember seeing on Fox News in the Morning (you all can yell at me later) about a group in England that used that same priciple C4 posted about the remote control hunger on the mouse. Except this group used the electrodes to bypass singals from your brain to your vocal box and ears to allow artificial telepathy between the two subjects. I wish for the life of me I could remember that but this is something that is close enough, even more so for government work.

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C4 Diesel

Just so all you guys know what to call it, the object or idea of connecting a human mind to a computer (or about anything else) is commonly referred to as the man-machine interface. I know it has other names (I actaully think that one is a little outdated) but that's the one I know so I thought I'd toss it out there for ease of conversation.

'Tis all.

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C4 to your door, no beef no more...

Hain

Cyborg come to mind??? :laughs:

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