How do you know you're not dreaming right now?

[Eudaimonist]

Because I'm posting on CF.

If I ever dream about posting on CF, kill me.

Okay, I'll send a nightmare your way.

And, remember, if you die in your dreams, you die for real!!! (<-- recurrent movie cliché)


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Gottservant]

Ask not why do I dream

Ask how can I be Rejected for my Dream?

 

[Eudaimonist]

Ask how can I be Rejected for my Dream?

Answer: it would be completely silly to be Rejected for one's Dream.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Illuminaughty]

The quality of my dreams is very different than the quality of conscious experience. I know that I'm not dreaming because I know what it is like for me to dream.

That tends to be the case but there are times when dreaming can be just as realistic and textured as waking reality. The mind often seems to skimp on the details and provide just enough for the dream story to unfold but not always. Right on the verge of many of my lucid dreams I have a near awake level of focus and everything but I don't yet know I'm dreaming. At those times the dreams seem just as high definition as reality and they provide all sorts of sensory information just like I'm awake. I have to test it be seeing if I can fly our not. If I can fly I know I'm dreaming lol. I know the mind can make a perfectly believable simulation of "reality".

 

[Gracchus]

Row, row, row your boat... back to the Matrix! Are you really just a butterfly dreaming that you are ... sometimes just a cigar?

When you're a baby sensory inputs are sent to your brain for processing. Gradually your brain sorts them out, learning to process and filter so that some inputs are routed to specialized processing nodes. These nodes hold a sort of committe meeting, and pass the results on to other nodes that formulate a response. You learn to recognize a smiley face and associate it with food and warmth, so when you start making noises and smack your lips and "mama" comes out the smiley face reinforces that behavior and you are on your way to learning language.

When you have pain, certain nodes become active. When you remember pain, those nodes become active again. And (If you are not a sociopath!) when you see others in pain the nodes again become active, and we say you have empathy.

The point is that each neural node, can sit on numerous committees, and more than one committee may think it appropriate to respond. Hence the symbolism of dreams. Hence poetry, which, if it is good poetry, causes response not just to the rational definition of words, but from associated nodes that call forth emotions. Hence also the attribution of intelligent agency to chance events, and faces of Jesus or Elvis on a water-stained wall or a piece of toast. It is in our interests to discern the reactions and motivations of others, so we may react to chance events as if they are caused by intelligent agencies. Hence, we postulate gods, demons, angels, spirits, fairies, "und so weiter".

From the attribution of intelligent agency to patterns of input we formulate the ideas of gods, spirits, and magic. From these arise superstition and religions, but also ideas that embody what most persons consider reality. Sometimes, in other words, the dream-world of partial signaling coalesces into something just as convincing and nearly as consistent as reality, (which can be pretty inconsistent at times, giving rise to much confusion) and having inadvertantly built part of the subconscious associations of the dream-world into our idea of reality, we thereafter resist its elimination from our world-view.

What I'm saying is that dreaming mind is not separate from the waking mind, but it is always acting, whether we are dreaming or not. We only become aware of the dream state when the major neural committees have ceased communicating with each other. (But the minor committees just keep on in idle gossip!)

 

[WonderBeat]

sensory inputs are sent to your brain for processing

Now wait a minute... if we are in a dream... couldn't this also be part of the dream...?!

Oh how little we know.... that isn't revealed to us.

 

[variant]

Challenge: Being that it is possible (or at least conceivable) that you could just be dreaming right now. How would you prove to yourself that you are not?

I can not prove that this is not a dream, but as long as my actions have consistent, persistent and logical consequences it doesn't matter.

A dream with consistent, persistent and logical consequences is as good as a reality.

 

[Gracchus]

Now wait a minute... if we are in a dream... couldn't this also be part of the dream...?!

You obviously didn't read the whole post, or if you did, you didn't understand it. Whenever you are conscious you are dreaming. Consciousness is just the final step in dreaming. Dreaming is the operation of the sub-concious mind. It is the association of sensory input with similar input.

Neuropsychology trumps semantic sophistry. Sorry! (Actually, I'm not sorry, but I am trying to be diplomatic. This is the "Philosophy" forum, not the Comedy Club.)

 

[WonderBeat]

You obviously didn't read the whole post, or if you did, you didn't understand it. Whenever you are conscious you are dreaming. Consciousness is just the final step in dreaming. Dreaming is the operation of the sub-concious mind. It is the association of sensory input with similar input.

Neuropsychology trumps semantic sophistry. Sorry! (Actually, I'm not sorry, but I am trying to be diplomatic. This is the "Philosophy" forum, not the Comedy Club.)

Guesswork is fun.

Sorry, didn't mean to dis you. (not)

 

[Gracchus]

Guesswork is fun.

Sorry, didn't mean to dis you. (not)

You may be facing charges under Poe's Law.

 

[GrowingSmaller]

Read the arguments above and then copy.

 

[32k]

Why would that be important to know?

It is a matter of how a person perceives reality.

 

[GoldenBoy89]

Challenge: Being that it is possible (or at least conceivable) that you could just be dreaming right now. How would you prove to yourself that you are not?

Like this.....

 

[32k]

That is by far the best reply as of yet. Pure genius. Then again, I may be reading too much into the text.

 

[madaz]

Challenge: Being that it is possible (or at least conceivable) that you could just be dreaming right now. How would you prove to yourself that you are not?

Seriously?

 

[GrowingSmaller]

Being that it is possible (or at least conceivable) you are awake right now, how would you prove you are not?

 

[WonderBeat]

No one in the act of dreaming knows he is dreaming. If they say they know of a higher reality than the one they are immediately experiencing and involved with, they are lying. That said, I would define dreaming as a lesser reality. There could also be levels of reality. Like rungs on a ladder, when we are dwelling on only one rung we do not see the whole. However, looking back, we arrive at a "meta" point of view.

 

[Illuminaughty]

No one in the act of dreaming knows he is dreaming

I do on a regular basis. Lots of people do actually. Lucid dreaming is a pretty common occurrence. Most people have them now and then or so I've read. They are lot of fun. You can learn to have them more often too.

 

[WonderBeat]

I do on a regular basis. Lots of people do actually. Lucid dreaming is a pretty common occurrence. Most people have them now and then or so I've read. They are lot of fun. You can learn to have them more often too.

I meant non-lucid dreaming.

 

[Chris81]

I am certain that I am awake, reality has a certain feel to it that is different than a dream .... sorry guys, a penguin wearing a top hat just asked me where the bathroom is located and I have a wizard who would like to borrow my cell phone. Well, I have to go now, I will talk to you about dreaming later...