Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Discuss any topics related to metaphysics (the philosophical study of the principles of reality) or epistemology (the philosophical study of knowledge) in this forum.
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Michael McMahon
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Post by Michael McMahon »

Belindi wrote: August 27th, 2021, 4:06 am What dream content or dream mood XYZ makes me do is not the same as what dream content or dream mood XYZ makes you do.
Indeed! Our perception of the physical world is similar. Brain hormones for me might overlap with the same emotional states for others. But dreams are unique and our responses to them may or may not correspond to other people's responses. When it comes to free will, dreams can be some of the most secretive experiences we have that individually distinguishes us being metaphysically separate from others.
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

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We can convey to others much of the content and emotions of our dreams.Yet a few aspects of dream imagery and rationality are almost indescribable, irreducible and concealed just like the randomness and indecipherability of encryptions.
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

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We can partially decrypt the meaning of the dreams we do remember and use our self-awareness to speculate in order to fill in the gaps of what happened in the forgotten intervening period between two dreams; what actions would I normally have done for the situation in one dream to turn into another dream?
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Post by Michael McMahon »

The smooth circular flow of neurons in slow-wave sleep could be compared to the rotating wheel in an enigma machine!
Belindi
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Post by Belindi »

Michael McMahon wrote: August 27th, 2021, 7:46 am
Belindi wrote: August 27th, 2021, 4:06 am What dream content or dream mood XYZ makes me do is not the same as what dream content or dream mood XYZ makes you do.
Indeed! Our perception of the physical world is similar. Brain hormones for me might overlap with the same emotional states for others. But dreams are unique and our responses to them may or may not correspond to other people's responses. When it comes to free will, dreams can be some of the most secretive experiences we have that individually distinguishes us being metaphysically separate from others.
What is free will?
Belindi
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Post by Belindi »

Michael McMahon wrote: August 27th, 2021, 8:58 am We can convey to others much of the content and emotions of our dreams.Yet a few aspects of dream imagery and rationality are almost indescribable, irreducible and concealed just like the randomness and indecipherability of encryptions.
Some people do better verbal or pictorial descriptions than others. Some works of art elicit feelings that can be described only b means of other works of art.
Belindi
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

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Michael McMahon wrote: August 27th, 2021, 9:24 am We can partially decrypt the meaning of the dreams we do remember and use our self-awareness to speculate in order to fill in the gaps of what happened in the forgotten intervening period between two dreams; what actions would I normally have done for the situation in one dream to turn into another dream?
During the same REM sequence how might it be possible to distinguish one dream from another ?
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

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"During the same REM sequence how might it be possible to distinguish one dream from another ?"
-Belindi

We can't always keep up with the location and characters but the themes are usually different in each dream.


"Some people do better verbal or pictorial descriptions than others. Some works of art elicit feelings that can be described only b means of other works of art."
-Belindi

Our ability to understand and describe dreams can improve with practice. We can compare dreams to previous descriptions we gave to a different night's dreams and see if they can be interrelated and put into genres.


"What is free will?"
-Belindi

Instinctively it feels like a random energy that we can guide somehow. Not completely deterministic; not totally random. For me it's the incessant antagonism between the polar opposites of dreams and reality. Free will is different for each person. Perhaps it's an ability to work well with unknown variables; like the way we work out the existence of known unknowns. When we know our limitations we have to prioritise some goals and sacrifice others. The way we use our free will is neither perfectly logical nor illogical; it's as if we're semi-logical creatures that have the potential to do good or bad. People say moral people know what's right, amoral people don't know what's right and immoral people intentional choose wrong. So free will is a personal combination or spectrum of our own moral, immoral and amoral beliefs and attitudes.

"A known unknown is information whose existence someone is aware of but does not possess." -techtarget

'Socratic ignorance refers, paradoxically, to a kind of knowledge–a person’s frank acknowledgment of what they don’t know. It is captured by the well-known statement: “I know only one thing–that I know nothing.” Paradoxically, Socratic ignorance is also referred to as "Socratic wisdom."'
-https://www.thoughtco.com/socratic-ignorance-2670664
Michael McMahon
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Post by Michael McMahon »

We don't have to be reliant on one dream in isolation to get free will but rather dreams in general throughout our life.
Michael McMahon
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Post by Michael McMahon »

If human behaviour were entirely deterministic then the universe would have to be extremely fine-tuned to account for the sheer complexity of our beliefs and behaviour. It's not scientific to rely on a God making physical determinism compatible with infinite fine-tuning unless we somehow bestow impersonal, timeless and transcendent qualities to the physical, material world itself.
Belindi
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Post by Belindi »

Michael McMahon wrote: August 27th, 2021, 12:21 pm "During the same REM sequence how might it be possible to distinguish one dream from another ?"
-Belindi

We can't always keep up with the location and characters but the themes are usually different in each dream.


"Some people do better verbal or pictorial descriptions than others. Some works of art elicit feelings that can be described only b means of other works of art."
-Belindi

Our ability to understand and describe dreams can improve with practice. We can compare dreams to previous descriptions we gave to a different night's dreams and see if they can be interrelated and put into genres.


"What is free will?"
-Belindi

Instinctively it feels like a random energy that we can guide somehow. Not completely deterministic; not totally random. For me it's the incessant antagonism between the polar opposites of dreams and reality. Free will is different for each person. Perhaps it's an ability to work well with unknown variables; like the way we work out the existence of known unknowns. When we know our limitations we have to prioritise some goals and sacrifice others. The way we use our free will is neither perfectly logical nor illogical; it's as if we're semi-logical creatures that have the potential to do good or bad. People say moral people know what's right, amoral people don't know what's right and immoral people intentional choose wrong. So free will is a personal combination or spectrum of our own moral, immoral and amoral beliefs and attitudes.

"A known unknown is information whose existence someone is aware of but does not possess." -techtarget

'Socratic ignorance refers, paradoxically, to a kind of knowledge–a person’s frank acknowledgment of what they don’t know. It is captured by the well-known statement: “I know only one thing–that I know nothing.” Paradoxically, Socratic ignorance is also referred to as "Socratic wisdom."'
-https://www.thoughtco.com/socratic-ignorance-2670664
I agree different themes mark out the territories of different dreams. I'd add that different material content also marks out different dreams. I think the most important marker of difference is feeling tone, for me anyway, and for me feeling tone has been set by certain items of material content, especially various animals.
Our ability to understand and describe dreams can improve with practice. We can compare dreams to previous descriptions we gave to a different night's dreams and see if they can be interrelated and put into genres.
I agree. However I get the impression that comparisons and allocation to genres are, for you, either objectively true or else everyone would agree to the same allocations. For me I am more inclined to believe that allocation to genres is cultural or even personally subjective.

I used to do I Ching and I found the Chinese symbolism quite hard to understand.I gathered from doing I Ching that interpretations were not predictions but could be divinations .

What Free Will means to me is not what free will means to you. This is too large a topic to start discussing under the heading you chose.

I don't think Socratic ignorance is a paradox. Any man who does not leave room for uncertainty, whether he be a scientist or an interpreter of dreams, is too cocksure and conceited to be worth taking seriously.
Michael McMahon
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Post by Michael McMahon »

"What Free Will means to me is not what free will means to you. This is too large a topic to start discussing under the heading you chose."
-Belindi

If other people pursued lucid dreaming and had the same dreams I experienced then I think they'd be fairly convinced. Only last night I'd a lucid dream where it was like sleep paralysis except my eyelids were still closed in pitch black and I couldn't wake up until I could feel my body and move my arm.
Michael McMahon
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Post by Michael McMahon »

Sometimes my dream character would think to himself about lucid dreaming before I'd feel conscious in a dream.
Michael McMahon
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Post by Michael McMahon »

So for me lucid dreams often don't occur out of specific reality checks but by my dream character asking himself what a lucid dream would be like and thinking about past lucid dreams.
Michael McMahon
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Re: Is Dreaming an Encryption Procedure?

Post by Michael McMahon »

Belindi wrote: August 28th, 2021, 4:12 am I agree different themes mark out the territories of different dreams. I'd add that different material content also marks out different dreams. I think the most important marker of difference is feeling tone, for me anyway, and for me feeling tone has been set by certain items of material content, especially various animals.
With literary fiction it's up to us whether or not we pay attention. In dreams our unconscious mind forces us to emotionally engage with the stories. The tone of our dream can make us rethink our plans. Therefore interpreting the pure randomness of dreams into glimpses of stories can alter our trajectory.
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