A
normal dream is populated with scenery, people, things, and seems
perfectly real. The usual laws of physics seem to apply, such as if
you throw a rock into the water, the trajectory, the splash, and the
ripples are convincing. People in the dream respond just like in the
non-dream world. There is usually nothing you can do that violates the
laws of physics, except in retrospect after awakening. Flying during
the dream seems like a miracle, and it is accepted as being
reasonable. Meeting people who have died seems quite reasonable. Of
course, there is a whole field of study regarding lucid dreaming, where
one can be trained to actually know they are dreaming. But this is not
the usual case. Everything in the dream seems to be taking place in
space and time, but is actually taking place in the point of the
dreamer’s consciousness. The events in the dream are not imposed by
chance or from without, and the inhabitants of the dream are not
exercising their individual free wills. Everything in the dream is a
projection of the inner psychological drama of the dreamer. Cause and
effect seem to be operating. The tossing of the rock precedes the
splash, but since this is a dream, the splash could occur by itself.
It is our belief in the laws of physics that generates the trajectory,
not cause and effect. One might ask what happens to your dream
character when he realizes he is dreaming, or when he just wakes up.
The answer is that the dream character never wakes up, for he is a
projection of the dreamer. It is the dreamer who wakes up. Sometimes
one can re-enter the dream world immediately, knowing he is dreaming,
but usually the events take over and the dream world seems all there is.
In
the same way, the entire palpable Universe can be modeled as the
outward projection of the psychological drama of God. This implies, of
course, that the entire Universe exists in the single point of
consciousness of God. It also implies that the Universe was not
created some time ago, and exists independently, but rather that God is
creating the Universe instantaneously, now.
This model of the
analogy between dreaming and the palpable universe is a standard way of
expressing reality, as expressed by many philosophers, theologians, and
scientists:
“For the kabbalist, physicality does not exist in
and of itself; physical existence is animated by God, whose emanation
is everflowing, and without whom all physical existence would collapse
in a moment.” Feldman, Jewish Mysticism and Kabbalah, p 80.
“His (Faraday’s) gift to science amounted to a
fundamental shift in emphasis from the visible apparatus, the magnet of
electrical coil, to the invisible field that surrounds it and conveys
the electrical or magnetic force. Here began field theory, which today
explores processes ranging from the subatomic to the intergalactic
scale and portray the entire material world as but a grand illusion,
spun on the loom of the force fields. Einstein was to be its Bach.”
Ferris, Coming of Age in the Milky Way, p 186
“Truly things
seen are manifest images of things unseen.” Dionysius the Areopagite,
Letter to John, Theologos, Apostle and Evangelist, Imprisoned in the
Isle of Patmos.
“Physical science, assuming that each message
must have had a starting-point, postulated the existence of 'matter' to
provide such starting-points. But the existence of this matter was a
pure hypothesis; and matter is in actual fact as unobservable as the
ether, Newtonian force, and other unobservables which have vanished
from science. Early science not only assumed matter to exist, but
further pictured it as existing in space and time. Again, this
assumption had no adequate justification; for there is clearly no
reason why the whole material universe should be restricted to the
narrow framework along which messages strike our senses.” Sir James
Jeans, The new world-picture of modern physics, addressing the British
Association.
“The stream of human knowledge is impartially
heading towards a non-mechanical reality. The universe begins to look
more like a great thought than a great machine. Mind no longer appears
to be an accidental intruder into the realm of matter. We are
beginning to suspect that we ought rather to hail it as the creator and
governor of this realm.” Sir James Jeans, The Mysterious Universe
(1930), chapter 5
“"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one." Albert Einstein
“Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real.” Niels Bohr
