Dreams, Illusion, and Other Realities


Book Description

"Wendy Doniger O'Flaherty . . . weaves a brilliant analysis of the complex role of dreams and dreaming in Indian religion, philosophy, literature, and art. . . . In her creative hands, enchanting Indian myths and stories illuminate and are illuminated by authors as different as Aeschylus, Plato, Freud, Jung, Kurl Gödel, Thomas Kuhn, Borges, Picasso, Sir Ernst Gombrich, and many others. This richly suggestive book challenges many of our fundamental assumptions about ourselves and our world."—Mark C. Taylor, New York Times Book Review "Dazzling analysis. . . . The book is firm and convincing once you appreciate its central point, which is that in traditional Hindu thought the dream isn't an accident or byway of experience, but rather the locus of epistemology. In its willful confusion of categories, its teasing readiness to blur the line between the imagined and the real, the dream actually embodies the whole problem of knowledge. . . . [O'Flaherty] wants to make your mental flesh creep, and she succeeds."—Mark Caldwell, Village Voice




Dreams, Illusion, and Other Realities


Book Description

"Wendy Doniger O'Flaherty . . . weaves a brilliant analysis of the complex role of dreams and dreaming in Indian religion, philosophy, literature, and art. . . . In her creative hands, enchanting Indian myths and stories illuminate and are illuminated by authors as different as Aeschylus, Plato, Freud, Jung, Kurl Gödel, Thomas Kuhn, Borges, Picasso, Sir Ernst Gombrich, and many others. This richly suggestive book challenges many of our fundamental assumptions about ourselves and our world."—Mark C. Taylor, New York Times Book Review "Dazzling analysis. . . . The book is firm and convincing once you appreciate its central point, which is that in traditional Hindu thought the dream isn't an accident or byway of experience, but rather the locus of epistemology. In its willful confusion of categories, its teasing readiness to blur the line between the imagined and the real, the dream actually embodies the whole problem of knowledge. . . . [O'Flaherty] wants to make your mental flesh creep, and she succeeds."—Mark Caldwell, Village Voice




Reality Is But a Dream


Book Description

If this is reality, why is there so much unhappiness in the world? How do we know that what we see is reality? How do we know we're not asleep and dreaming? If the world is a dream, whose dream is it? And what power do we have in the dream? To find lasting happiness and peace, let alone awaken from the dream, we must surrender everything we believe about reality, about life, and most definitely about ourselves. Advanced praise for Reality Is But a Dream "The notion of flowing, one-way time is perhaps the most basic illusion that exists, and is a major cause of human suffering and the fear of death and annihilation. Reality Is But a Dream is an invitation to give up this illusion in favor of a more fulfilling, accurate version of reality." Larry Dossey, MD Author, The Power of Premonitions "A profound and insightful glimpse into the nature of perception and the self. Vandeman's book challenges us to reconsider what we take for reality, and inspires us to wake up from our illusions about what that reality is." Richard Smoley Author, The Dice Game of Shiva: How Consciousness Creates the Universe Helen D. Vandeman is an intuitive, and author of We Are One: Using Intuition to Awaken to Truth, and The Thresholds of Intention: Crossing from Dreaming to Awakening. She lives in Berkeley, CA, and can be reached through her website: http://helenvandeman.byregion.net.




Reality and Dreams


Book Description

DIVDIV“Sleek and suggestive . . . [Reality and Dreams] is so smart and seductive that you fail to notice how completely you’ve accepted a world gone utterly awry.” —Kirkus Reviews /divDIV/divDIVBritish film director Tom Richard won acclaim for his moments of pure creative inspiration. But when Richard is hospitalized after toppling from a crane during a shoot, he awakes not knowing what is real and what is not—and with no idea who to trust. Soon his wife, children, and friends are all undergoing crises of their own, from the breakup of a marriage to the loss of a job. As Richard fights to regain his health and stay centered amid the swirling chaos of his personal life, he must also wrest control of his film—his most prized pursuit—from those who seek to take it away./divDIV /divDIVWitty andengrossing, Reality and Dreams is a whiplash ride through the highs and lows of the creative process./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Muriel Spark including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author’s archive at the National Library of Scotland./divDIV /divDIV/div/div




True Detective and Philosophy


Book Description

Investigating the trail of philosophical leads in HBO’s chilling True Detective series, an elite team of philosophers examine far-reaching riddles including human pessimism, Rust’s anti-natalism, the problem of evil, and the ‘flat circle’. The first book dedicated to exploring the far-reaching philosophical questions behind the darkly complex and Emmy-nominated HBO True Detective series Explores in a fun but insightful way the rich philosophical and existential experiences that arise from this gripping show Gives new perspectives on the characters in the series, its storylines, and its themes by investigating core questions such as: Why Life Rather Than Death? Cosmic Horror and Hopeful Pessimism, the Illusion of Self, Noir, Tragedy, Philosopher-Detectives, and much, much more Draws together an elite team of philosophers to shine new light on why this genre-expanding show has inspired such a fervently questioning fan-base




Dreams of Reality


Book Description

Have you ever wondered if you might be living a dream? How do you know what is real and what is illusion? The popular movie "The Matrix" explored this theme a few years ago with great effect. Yet this is a serious question requiring serious thought. The book "Dreams of Reality", written from a scientifi c perspective, takes the reader on an intellectual journey through the various aspects and dimensions of reality, from our current state of understanding to the so-called metaphysical. You may find a number of surprising and thought-provoking vistas along this yellow-brick road. Consider them with an open mind and then let your intuition tell you where the dream ends and reality begins.




A Dream Interpreted Within a Dream


Book Description

An exploration of the wakeful character of the dream and the dreamful character of wakefulness. Dreams have attracted the curiosity of humankind for millennia. In A Dream Interpreted Within a Dream, Elliot Wolfson guides the reader through contemporary philosophical and scientific models to the archaic wisdom that the dream state and waking reality are on an equal phenomenal footing--that the phenomenal world is the dream from which one must awaken by waking to the dream that one is merely dreaming that one is awake. By interpreting the dream within the dream, one ascertains the wakeful character of the dream and the dreamful character of wakefulness. Assuming that the manner in which the act of dreaming is interpreted may illuminate the way the interpreter comprehends human nature more generally, Wolfson draws on psychoanalysis, phenomenology, and neuroscience to elucidate the phenomenon of dreaming in a vast array of biblical, rabbinic, philosophical, and kabbalistic texts. To understand the dream, Wolfson writes, it is necessary to embrace the paradox of the fictional truth--a truth whose authenticity can be gauged only from the standpoint of its artificiality. The dream, on this score, may be considered the semblance of the simulacrum, wherein truth is not opposed to deception because the appearance of truthfulness cannot be determined independently of the truthfulness of appearance.




Precognitive Dreamwork and the Long Self


Book Description

• Outlines a set of clear principles to help guide dreamworkers, illustrated through real precognitive dream experiences • Shows how to detect precognitive dreams through their characteristic features, explaining how dreams relate to memory and why dreams about future experiences are often symbolic or distorted • Explores the mind-blowing implications of precognition for our lives, including how our present thoughts actually shape--or shaped--our past Once only the stuff of science fiction, evidence has grown that precognition--glimpses of your future in dreams and visions and being influenced subtly in waking life by what is to come--is real. Your future thoughts and feelings shape who you are now. And your present thoughts and feelings shape--or shaped--your past. In this accessible exploration of precognition, precognitive dreamwork, and a radically new biographical sensibility, the Long Self, that precognition awakens us to, Eric Wargo shows how dreamworkers can play the role of citizen scientists, adding to our understanding of this fascinating, almost unexplored dimension of human life. Wargo outlines a set of clear principles to guide dreamworkers, each illustrated through real dreamers’ experiences. Drawing on psychoanalysis and contemporary sleep science, he explores how precognition relates to memory, explaining why dreams of future experiences are often distorted and what those distortions probably mean. He discusses never-before-described dream features, including “time gimmicks” (symbols hinting at time distortion) and “calendrical resonance” (the tendency of dreams to foretell experiences exactly a year or years later). He describes why an understanding of precognition augments Jung’s theory of synchronicity by highlighting our own role in producing meaningful coincidences in our waking lives. He also shows how precognition manifests in other states of consciousness like lucid dreams, out-of-body experiences, trance states, sleep paralysis, meditation, and hypnagogia. We are at a major turning point in science’s understanding of time, causality, and the self. We are more than who we think we are from moment to moment--we are our past, present, and future simultaneously. When we understand this, a dream journal becomes a personal time machine, with mind-blowing discoveries in store for the traveler.




Dreaming in the World's Religions


Book Description

Backstreet Boys were the biggest band in the world for a short while and that period is documented on their first hits compilation, 2001's The Hits: Chapter One. Twelve years later came Essential Backstreet Boys, a double-disc set that has all 13 songs from The Hits, along with another 16 songs -- generally, songs that came after 2001, when BSB started to slide down the charts. There were hits -- 2005's "Incomplete," 2007's "Inconsolable" -- that just showed up on the Adult Contemporary charts; a fair approximation of where the group wound up in their second decade. Essential Backstreet Boys traces this evolution, filling in a few more details of those early hit-making years, which makes this worthwhile for the dedicated fan, but many listeners may find either The Hits, or the variety of budget-line collections released since, to be a better bet as they contain the hits and nothing but. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine




Between the World and Me


Book Description

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER • NAMED ONE OF TIME’S TEN BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE DECADE • PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST • ONE OF OPRAH’S “BOOKS THAT HELP ME THROUGH” • NOW AN HBO ORIGINAL SPECIAL EVENT Hailed by Toni Morrison as “required reading,” a bold and personal literary exploration of America’s racial history by “the most important essayist in a generation and a writer who changed the national political conversation about race” (Rolling Stone) NAMED ONE OF THE MOST INFLUENTIAL BOOKS OF THE DECADE BY CNN • NAMED ONE OF PASTE’S BEST MEMOIRS OF THE DECADE • NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times Book Review • O: The Oprah Magazine • The Washington Post • People • Entertainment Weekly • Vogue • Los Angeles Times • San Francisco Chronicle • Chicago Tribune • New York • Newsday • Library Journal • Publishers Weekly In a profound work that pivots from the biggest questions about American history and ideals to the most intimate concerns of a father for his son, Ta-Nehisi Coates offers a powerful new framework for understanding our nation’s history and current crisis. Americans have built an empire on the idea of “race,” a falsehood that damages us all but falls most heavily on the bodies of black women and men—bodies exploited through slavery and segregation, and, today, threatened, locked up, and murdered out of all proportion. What is it like to inhabit a black body and find a way to live within it? And how can we all honestly reckon with this fraught history and free ourselves from its burden? Between the World and Me is Ta-Nehisi Coates’s attempt to answer these questions in a letter to his adolescent son. Coates shares with his son—and readers—the story of his awakening to the truth about his place in the world through a series of revelatory experiences, from Howard University to Civil War battlefields, from the South Side of Chicago to Paris, from his childhood home to the living rooms of mothers whose children’s lives were taken as American plunder. Beautifully woven from personal narrative, reimagined history, and fresh, emotionally charged reportage, Between the World and Me clearly illuminates the past, bracingly confronts our present, and offers a transcendent vision for a way forward.