Debunking The Spiritual: Dreams
Introduction to Series
The Debunking The Spiritual Series is not a series that picked a side in the debate about whether the spiritual exists or not due to a bias but due to the existence of unshakable arguments.
It would be great to see someone who disagrees come up with an argument or arguments that can shake these "unshakable arguments".
The general premise is that the spiritual was made up by ancient man to explain the world because he had very little scientific knowledge about the world. It all started with men thinking the gods wanted to punish them whenever there was a drought, a famine, a flood, or any disaster.
Now with all our scientific knowledge and resources, we know better. And to show that no gods are involved we can come together and tackle these disasters with technology and win. You couldn't win against gods if it was spiritual and they really wanted to punish you.
This series is for those who want to get their beliefs or the so-called supernatural.
It is also for the interesting group of people who were brought up secularly and feel like there's probably a spiritual side to the world that they have to dig deep to be conversant with. This series is telling you that you are fine just where you are, there's no deep spiritual stuff you've been hidden from due to your upbringing.
At the end of the day, a truly wise man knows that his knowledge is limited. For this series, the limits of our knowledge are simply revealed by the following:
The spiritual probably exists, but it has never been proven. All the things regarded as proof of the spiritual, after a closer look are always found to be false proofs.
However, lack of proof does not mean something does not exist, that's why we said "the spiritual probably exists".
But since you have no proof, and all your prior held proofs have been debunked you shouldn't make the claim that the spiritual exists. If you must make the claim, though, you should make it very lightly and understand that this claim is baseless until you can find something.
Today one of such proofs we would be debunking is as regards Dreams.
Dreams
Amongst the people who claim that the spiritual exists, one of the proofs they point to is dreams. They say:
(1) You have dreams because that is your soul leaving your body and wandering about when you sleep. When your soul returns you wake up, if not you die in your sleep. You sometimes see scars on your body from injuries inflicted in your dream or wake up in sweats breathing heavily from dangerous events in your dreams all because it is spiritual. Why have real scars and resultant breathing when all you did was lie down?
(2) What you see in a dream manifests in reality sometimes because the dream was a prophecy. Some spiritual force wanted you to know something beforehand. You have a spiritual gift.
(3) Dreams have meanings because of their spiritual qualities. Like eating in a dream, swimming in a dream, etc.
About (1) above. That is just a laughable claim. There is no reason to accept that it is an act of a soul leaving a body and wandering about. Sleep is just a state of rest the body falls into, and dreams are your imagination/subconscious running wild while you're in this state.
You wake up when your resting state is disturbed, or when your body has rested enough. You die in your sleep due to health issues, suffocation, etc.
The scars from injuries inflicted in your dreams are because something was injuring you here in real life and your imagination/subconscious turned it into a dream.
For example, while sleeping, if an insect perches heavily on you or stings you, even while sleeping you might scratch that spot, and if you scratch too sharply you'd have an injury. Once your body starts to feel the injury while you're still asleep it would turn it into a dream and make a story out of it just to keep you asleep.
It can make a story that you were fighting ninjas and got cut by a stroke of their sword. Then when you wake up you'll see the scar from your scratch and say it was the exact place the ninja cut you in your dream.
The mind really does turn real-life events that happen while you're asleep into a story/dream just to keep you asleep. Especially when you're in a very deep pleasurable sleep and it doesn't want to wake up.
One common experience we've probably all been through that shows that your body does this is when it comes to urine.
Many of us have had dreams where we were urinating only to wake up and find out it was real life. Sometimes when we wake up it is already too late. What happened is that you felt the urge to pee, but your imagination turned that into a dream just so you'd stay sleeping and not disturb your sleep.
The dreams usually show that you found a toilet and you're letting it go so that you'll get it over with right there in your imagination and not have to wake up to handle it.
As for the breathing and sweating? It goes without saying, but: you were most likely suffocating in real life and your imagination turned it into something more interesting. You may have been having sleep paralysis and fighting to wake up and your mind turned it into some dream.
Also, it may have started as a dream and the breathing and sweating were a response to the fear that you saw in the dream instilled in you.
About (2) above. Not true. The reason why what you see in your dreams happens sometimes is that what you see is just everyday occurrences, it was just a coincidence.
You see a lot of everyday things happen in your dream, so why wouldn't at least some of them happen sooner or later? It's just like writing everyday events on small papers, folding them, and throwing them into a basket. Then you pick one and open it, if you do that every day it is just inevitable that one day the stuff you pick will happen that day.
People who say their dreams come true never tell you about the vast majority of their dreams that never came true. They only tell you about the few times over the years. That is two or three dreams out of the 5000 dreams or so they've had.
When the dreams are not about everyday things, for example, a family member dying, a bomb blast, etc. What simply happened is that you've thought about these things in real life before and while your imagination was wandering as you slept it picked those thoughts up.
About them manifesting later on it is simply because that was a possibility in the first place. It's just a coincidence. Sometimes the option one picks turns out to be the right one because one option had to be the right one.
Sometimes you even had these dreams because you saw signs in real life that they were going to happen. And when there are signs of something, chances are they will happen.
We should be reminded again of the vast majority of dreams that never come true. That's because these things are random, and sometimes random pickings can turn out to be special a few times.
About (3) above, dreams can mean something, but nothing spiritual. Dreams are thoughts and imagination, so someone's thoughts and imaginations can show you a lot about the person, but that's about it.
There are no spiritual connotations because all these can be explained naturally. Eating and/or swimming in a dream are some of the usual dreams that are said to mean something.
They have been said to be dreams that mean you got initiated into witchcraft or some occultic realm. That is just funny because eating and swimming are normal things we do often, and as a result sooner or later our imagination would have us doing those in a dream.
The real surprise would be if we never swam or ate in a dream.
This same explanation can go for every other type of dream that is said to have one meaning or the other.
Conclusion
What else has been said about dreams that weren't tackled by this episode? It would be nice to have a look at that. It would even be nicer to see if you have any argument(s) against the above debunking arguments.
The major arguments about the spirituality of dreams were tackled, though, and with this one gets a great insight into dreams and how ordinary they are. The major arguments for why/how dreams are spiritual turn out to hold no water.
The End
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