In yesterday’s blog, I discussed how the CNS, given sufficient sensory, somatic, and visceral neural input, generate two separate, mental images, or imagines (sing. imago). When I use the word ‘mental’ I am not referring solely to the traditional operation of the neuronal circuitry of the biological CNS. Included, in the word ‘mental,’ are: [1] the timespace-variant electromagnetic fields associated with neurons and glial cells, [two] an observing function to experience these imagines as realized pictorial representations, and [three] a nonphysical residuum (which arises from a generalized quantum metric theory unique to the Institute).
The outward-imago operator duplicating the spatial distribution of objects in the immediate physical environs in a virtual image which is externalized and overlaid upon the parent physical. The inward-imago operator creating a three dimensional virtual body image of sufficiently fine scale so to reflect the temporal physiology of all the organ tissue volume elements of the physical body.
As discussed previously, during the day all of us are ‘neurologically aware’ of our physical surroundings via the continuous activity of our outward-imago operators (realizing that I am implying an operational hierarchy of awareness). Clearly, it is important for us to be conscious of our surroundings so to avoid injury. However, most times of the day, the body and brain automatically control our overt motor skills and navigational capacity, allowing our full conscious awareness to focus elsewhere (driving and chatting). In fact, all of us would survive and perhaps prosper in the physical world without full conscious awareness, i.e., knowing that I know what I know and knowing I am not you.
However, our mental awareness is much more interesting in our dreamworlds. For instance, during dreaming, the CNS generates different scenarios, or pictorial dramas, situated in most interesting geographies populated with objects, persons, archetypes and mythical creatures. Dreams arise from the operation of the outward-imago operator creating an inner space to be filled with object-apparitions and imagine constructed using information stored within our several memory systems.
The best evidence for the actual existence of mentally-generated virtual images, or imagines, is in our psychological experiences in the dreamworld. For dreams are always experienced from the perspective of an act of observing, be it ‘movie-like’ or as one of the internally involved dream characters.
During the act of watching nonhorror movies, generally, our attention is captured by the flickering images and our awareness is fully passive. We do not reawaken to our own personal existence until the movie is completed. It can be a rather unpleasant experience to return to personal life realizing that one has forgotten that one existed for a few hours.
Alternatively, we may find ourselves acting as one of the dream characters and so experience the dream as a ‘living event.’ Sometimes, we consciously observe the dream from a disembodied vista while realizing that we are also present
Regardless, in every dream scene, our mindbrain is experiencing the virtual world as either a disembodied (functional perspective) or embodied (a personalized agent) observer. If such be accurate for dreams, it must be accurate for diurnal awareness.
We will continue discussing such ‘observers’ in our next blog.