If life were a dream...

I would probably fly more and reality would dissolve more often. And, my memory of things would be even worse.

I'd be mighty curious about what waking life was like.

It depends upon whether it was possible to wake from that dream and what you would awaken to. Is the dreamworld I inhabit a simulation of the real world or is the stark reality of reality something I would be psychologically unprepared for?

It also depends on whether the universe in which I reside is my own dream or a shared dream. Is everyone I interact with also dreaming or am I the only 'real' person? Are Kirk Cameron, Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, David Beckham, a Mrs. Trellis from North Wales and my own children all either figments of my own (surprisingly large) imagination or perhaps constructs created by the dream for an undetermined purpose?

For the purposes of answering the question I'll make the assumption that I cannot 'wake up' from this dream and that everyone who has ever existed is also participating in the same dream and can also not escape from it.

In this scenario, I would not change the way I lived. The acquisition of this knowledge neither creates new opportunities for me nor does it deny me new opportunities. Pain would feel the same and pleasure would feel the same. My dream body would work the same way it always had. The laws of the dream world would also be no less real to me. Jumping off a cliff would be no less fatal, murder would be no less illegal, imprisonment would be no less unpleasant and jokes would be no less funny.

Sometimes I do feel like life is a dream. Who is to say that it isnt? If I knew for sure I would be much more daring and bold.

Need more info. I wish my real life was more like my night dreams though-that'd be a lot of fun.

I don't know. It would depend on whether my actions still had consequences for me or for others. If so, then I'd probably act much the same. If not, then I might change a little, although not, I imagine, drastically. Old dog and all that...

I already decided to do that. I decided to go and buy the stuff I always wanted, like a spiked collar and arm warmers and things that I never thought I could pull off. I want to wear cool things, because that would distract me from the fact that I hate all of my clothes. I think it's cheaper this way, just buying accessories.

Since dreams tend to follow expectations, I'd probably expect a lot more. My house would be spotless, and I'd have a new car and a boat, and Sarah would stop dumping sand in the pool

Every time I came home or went to work, everything would be slightly different....you know, like in a dream you feel you're home but it's not quite home? And I might be braver if I knew I could wake up with no bad consequences.

No not any different

I tend to treat my real life as the reality or illusions it tends to be. If my life were to be a dream it would affect my life. I could fly or float, or do anything that my subconscience would say is possible. There would be no 3-D, it would allow so much more expansive awareness. I would punch that guy in the nose or I could shoot that guy because there would be no law type consequences. I don't think I ever went to jail in a dream. I could talk to strangers without them judging me. It would almost feel like I am free of the weight of 3-D.

ooooOOoo we are on the same page in the dream book!

Lets meet in dreamland, Sunday night 3am at that bar on the cloud that floats in the giraffe's spleen.

Bring your Uzi. Or, be an Uzi. Or drive your Uzi there.

Life is what it is...no

I thought she was a glock

No, because whether this is a dream or not, which is mostly my interpretation of it, it remains what I will experience for decades until I die.
I tried waking up from it 17 years ago and found myself in different places, some better, some worse, but they still all involved having a corporeal body.

I figure that even if I'm an eternal being of some sort, that this is clearly the experience I'm meant to be having for the time being.

Oh, that's the name of the gun I was looking for last night (carried by the Sheriff in the show 'Eureka'). Thank goodness this is only a dream, or I'd never have figured that out.

Me, I'm a glockenspiel, I even have one in arms reach.

I figured I could count on you for a clear analysis of this one.

Actually people's responses here remind me that my behavior actually was quite affected.

During my initial waking up phase I took plenty of social risks, responding to one plane of existence at the risk of appearing crazy on the mortal plane. It was rather painful complying.
After that phase, I was a different persona, calm and yet comparatively death defying. The laws of physics are no different in what I found the world to be, but the probability of circumstances is considerably different for me now.

I would still die if shot, but I'm not going to be shot - I can choose for it not to happen. If that choice fails, I was meant to be shot anyhow, and there's nothing I can do to avoid it anyhow.

Basically it's become enough of a dream for me that I have no fear. The tragedies which come my way I usually see coming down the pipeline and my reaction is exhausted before they occur, though some, like 9/11 or my son's suicide hit me hard anyhow even if they are no surprise.

You hit the key points. It doesn't matter if they are real or not. You still live with them. It's all moot question unless you can wake up, and one can make a solid rational philosphical case for not doing so even if they could.

Life seems dreamlike lately.

lol spleen? eww
It will be the dreamiest date ever!

At least they're vegetarians, though in dreams they could nebulae.

Nope..reality is a nightmare, dreams are wonderful. My worst nightmare is far better than my best day awake... Actually I like my dreams much better than so called reality. If I could sleep forever and just live in my dreams I would love it.

I'd just ask to be wokin up to eat and poo.

You have found acid appealing, haven't you?

I wouldn't worry so much about hurting people when I stick needles in them.

or bending good needles when you stick them in people.

> or bending good needles when you stick them in people.

I've not done that yet! I think it would be pretty difficult though, unless I was going into bone. One of the oddest things about the last few weeks is that I've been sticking needles and cannulas into people, only to have them thank me! Perhaps it's just relief that I'm slightly more competent than they expect when I explain that I'm a student...

..or that it's civil to thank a doctor or nurse for what ever they do unless pain is obscuring your memory of civil conduct.

Wouldn't that be a hoot, explain to all your new patients "Well, I've only done this on dogs and monkeys so far".
I think shots are one of those occasions though where preparing for the worst makes matters worse.

It could be great fun testing suggestive thought; "If you start feeling dizzy and seeing dancing colors" lean over with your head in your in hands"; see what happens. I bet 10% of your patients have the reaction.

Ooh hey, perhaps you are someone I can suggest my [serious] new concept for double-blind testing to. Instead of testing 200 people on NuMed vs. 200 people on Calciumose, maintain one database of every blind trial patient on anything, with just as many people on aspirin, iodine, or cornstarch, as Zoloft, Luzitall, St. Johns Wort, and whatever new meds are in for testing. It's multi-blind, where you don't even know 'what' they are on, if anything. The computer would do some undisclosed shifting of who gets what, for instance those with panic-attacks are more likely to get psych-meds and those with herniated discs are more likely to get pain killers and tranquilizers. Of course bad combos are prevented too.

Basially though, instead of having to waste 200 new people on the inert comparison, the whole body of test subjects on anything active or inert becomes the test comparison, and 400 new subjects can all be dedicated in quantity to the new med. That's on average of course, as 400 new testers could be given anything. Mostly it will be new meds though, and mostly within that it will be relevant meds.

The results are then statisticised: patients with poor sleep, with imaginary insects, etc etc, compared to aspirin, compared to sugar, compared to kelp. Each test subject has far more thorough monitoring and extensive questionaires, because they don't know if they are testing a sleep aid, an eyelash thickener, or an anti-convulsive. Years after the initial swell of NuMed in the trial pool, there will still be the occasional subject on NuMed, with a leaning toward patient types who have never tried NuMed. {Such that one day it may discovered that NuMed causes stroke in those with glaucoma}.

Numbers would be base adjusted for seasonal things like mass patient paranoia of any drugs.

Several benefits are to be had, namely more new targetted med testing per trial subject (less aspirin and kelp subjects are in the mix every season), finding unexpected benefits of alternative meds, and of course completely objective results which compare to both a variety of placebos and traditional cures as well as a variety of competitive meds.

Honest standards would of course have to be set, otherwise if one doesn't find favorable results in NuMed vs. Sugar Placebo, they may find some misrepresentative anomaly like NuMed vs Kelp and Aspirin with deranged patients.

Better yet would be combining results from half a dozen international facilities, each with the same monitoring data, but completely local staff methods, testing atmosphere, and such which further isolate aggregate drug results. Better yet if each facility has different new med testing swells and aren't each introducing NuMed at the same time to similarly prescribed testing pools.

If it's not being done already, I think it would revolutionize both cost and comprehensive effective evaluation of clinical trials vs. the the two group non-ongoing-study method. If you can find someone to pass the idea on to, please do so.

..or start your own clinical trials company. It's a multi-billion dollar idea if it doesn't exist yet.

> Wouldn't that be a hoot, explain to all your new patients "Well, I've
> only done this on dogs and monkeys so far".

We do have to tell them that we're students, and I think it's been pretty apparent to patients when we're doing something for the first time. I had taken "blood" from and cannulated dummy arms before I did it for real, but that's very different from pushing a sharp object through someone's skin.

> I think shots are one of those occasions though where preparing for
> the worst makes matters worse.

I think it's been the occasions when my hands have been obviously shaking that have been the worst. I failed taking blood from two patients one morning, then went to a third in the hope of regaining my confidence only to find her arms were really swollen and her veins were very difficult to find. I did get blood from her, but I doubt she had a huge amount of confidence in me!

> It could be great fun testing suggestive thought; "If you start feeling
> dizzy and seeing dancing colors" lean over with your head in your
> in hands"; see what happens. I bet 10% of your patients have the reaction.

Fun yes. But also grounds for disciplinary action!!!

> Ooh hey, perhaps you are someone I can suggest my [serious] new concept
> for double-blind testing to.

I've read over it a few times, and I still can't see how it is supposed to work. You might get reasonable data about side effects, but not efficacy. To prove efficacy, you have to compare the effectiveness of the drug in the target population - you get no useful data comparing the use of Drug X in preventing heart attacks if the control group who aren't on Drug X don't have the same risk profile for suffering a heart attack as the treatment group.

> Basially though, instead of having to waste 200 new people on the
> inert comparison, the whole body of test subjects on anything active
> or inert becomes the test comparison, and 400 new subjects can all
> be dedicated in quantity to the new med.

Except that in clinical research "do no harm" dictates that patients in the control group often can't be given something that is known to be ineffective if that's going to have a negative impact on their health. For example, you think you've developed a new therapy that can be given in the long-term and may prevent heart attacks. You take 400 people at risk of heart attacks and give 200 of them the new therapy, but you can't ethically deny the other 200 treatment so you actually give them the current standard treatment which would probably be aspirin. It's a better comparison anyway, as your new drug doesn't have to be better than placebo in order to go to market, it has to be better than aspirin.

>Mostly it will be new
> meds though, and mostly within that it will be relevant meds.

Mostly relevant meds?

In 1999, I woke up - briefly - but long enough to believe it wasn't a hallucination. Since then, I live life the same because the dream is the same. And just like you can hurt your head if you hit it in a night-time dream, you can hurt it in this dream world if you hit it too - I mean, just because I know this is a dream world doesn't stop my head from hurting if it gets hit. My awareness is different since I woke up - but here I am back asleep again - writing this survey. For many years I had a burning question - who's dream is it? I believe the answer is it's "His" dream. The Dreamer. and there are as many parts of "His Dream" as there are those dreaming it. How entertaining is THAT?! lol One thing for sure - being awake was awesome.

"To prove efficacy, you have to compare the effectiveness of the drug in the target population - you get no useful data comparing the use of Drug X in preventing heart attacks if the control group who aren't on Drug X don't have the same risk profile for suffering a heart attack as the treatment group. " - For the most part you do target the intended audience.

I'll get back to that one in a moment.

"Except that in clinical research "do no harm" dictates that patients in the control group often can't be given something that is known to be ineffective if that's going to have a negative impact on their health." - You must do things differently there, either that or I'm only familiar with psych meds which have different rules. All I ever see is comparisons to placebos.

To simplify what I am suggesting:
A) There's no need to have an equivalent sized placebo group for every test medication. 400 people on placebos were all we ever needed to know what the baseline results for people on placebos were. The only reason for more placebo victims is to keep the testing blind. If multiple meds are being tested, and the quantity of placebos in the pool may randomly ebb and flow at any time, as well doctors not knowing if other benigntreatments like aspirin or other appropriately targeting also-in-testing medications are being used, the results remain blind. If prozac improves leukemia you can chock that up to placebo effect unless a lot of people improve their leukemia on prozac.
B) Alternatives are compared to each other on an ongoing basis. Fewer people are on placebos so more random non-target combos are tried. Also patients list multiple initial symptoms as well as multiple improvements and multiple side effects. You were right in spotting one highlight of the method, improved recognition of side effects.
C) Most importantly all data is compared to extraction from the entire ongoing data pool, and not just a group/time to group/time comparison. Every subject becomes part of the base for side effects for which side effects of target med on target audience are compared to, as well as improvemments.

"you get no useful data comparing the use of Drug X in preventing heart attacks if the control group who aren't on Drug X don't have the same risk profile for suffering a heart attack as the treatment group."
- True. You still have to filter out by profiles. The difference is that everyone else ever studied is your control group, or at least anyone who ever walked in with the same target conditions.

Except that a greater range of comparisons can be made, looking at data from a wider perspective, it's a bit like getting by with only a 10% in size control group.

Mostly relevant meds - yes. That means depressives with back pain tend to get anti-depressants, muscle relaxants, pain killers, or St. Johns Wort, thought sometimes they get a plecebo, and on occasion they may even get something like a blood thinner or anti-convulsant. The monitoring technicians have to really be on their toes and do comprehensive analysis. Not only do they not know who's on trial meds and who's on placebos, they don't even know what symptoms the subject came in with or is being treated for. It's just pure objective 'what happens to them?' without them even having that 50% psychosomatic hope that they are being treated for their ailment. (In fact it would probably be more like 80%, but some months it could be 5%, and often it could be meds for different ailments. This is of course all kept secret; isolating data puller techs from symptom monitoring techs and dosage bottling techs and dosage dispensing techs; all four groups of techs each dealing only with the software.) It's not random though. Well, it is, but it's built on an expert system rule base. You never end up giving blood thinners to haemophiliacs for instance.

Some of the studies like aspirin, red wine solids, or st. johns wort are never particularly trials themselves, but eventually after being thrown in on occasion after years of testing on diverse groups, target or not, their efficacy grows to become solidly known as well, so one can in fact eventually accurately compare st. john's wort to prozac even though no one ever paid for a st. johns study.

The system would always be looking to extend it's fuzzy-logic scientific sampling in it's assignments, for instance assigning the depressive who tends to get burning feet to zoloft rather than prozac, because there aren't any zoloft trials yet on depressives wih burning feet. For that matter, it would keep track if subject X tends to get buring no feet no matter what med they try, including placebos, and factor that out.

It should be evident that another aspect of this sytem, unlike double-blinds, is that the machine knows who's who and chooses who to put on what. The impartial observors don't know, the human factor in the testing is blind, but the impartial machine arranges subjects to meds to greatest sampling adavantage.

I forget the name for this sort of math, but it's one where all the nodes multiply exponentially in what information they can offer. It combines markhov chains, probability, and such. Every aspect of every node is compared to every other node, rather than each node simply referencing a standard. I've been programming for 30 years now and my calculus exams were used as the scoring reference, and have even created new types of mathematics, but this system calls for networked statistical functions way beyond my skills. Considering the billions spent in pharmaceuticals, and the amount which goes into clinical trials, I'm sure they could afford one of the 30 folks on the planet capable of writing that math.

Basically you branch out factoring on exceptions and factoring them back in over pool averages. As time goes on the whole database exponentially reduces the deviation of such factoring. In current systems where each pair of groups forms the entire pool, there's not enough data with just 800 tests to factor in those few who get burning feet. It's treated as a side effect and can't be examined from the perspective of a criteria.

Dealing with non-meds is tougher, but in the same vein they should place target-med, random-med, and placebo folks on exercise regimens and such too for small percentages. I would love to see that walking in sunshine around the block daily was 12% more effective than any psych med.

I'd pull my burnt and spat on copy of Descartes' Meditations out of my bin just to do it all over again. Again.

If I found out it were all a dream, I'd probably stop being so polite to everyone.

Yes I'd make other people do and say what I want

Oh, you haven't tried that yet? It feels rather lonely and empty, I assure you. Best to forget that you can and may still be doing such a thing.

If we really are making this all up as we go...why do I make the people around me say such awful things to me and treat me so unfairly
There must be a lesson I'm still struggling through

It's usually either expectations of the subconscious or humbling anti-expectations of the ego. On the other hand many people just seem to be the deity of some particular quality. My bro is like the leprechaun with explosion accident things happening around him that he's not involved in but stays adamantly wary about. Another way of putting it is what flavor of energy we carry around. You practically have to become someone new to ditch that sort of thing. In fact having a split personality is how I got to learn a lot of this stuff in the first place. Just observing others, how they behave, what that attracts, helps make it apparent though.

I doubt you're either earning or expecting unfair treatment, nor the deity of such, so that leaves a lesson. I usually had a blessed path, but one night on a date I let three guys in a pickup yell insults. ..and realized I had let my grace slide. The next night someone followed me in the alley hurling insults. At the store I silently looked in their eyes with great love, and they dropped to their knees in tears saying bless you repeatedly.

I don't expect that of you, nor even of me again in this phase, but I don't want you to skip over part of it that's still accessable, and that is that unconditional love in no way involves being a floor mat. You need to lovingly respect yourself and feel naturally at home in and worthy of grace.

To get a good picture of what's going on, you need to be aware of if you're coming from subconcious, soul, or ego. Any can draw in good or bad experiences. Ideally all three are aligned.

I'd have to see you in person I think to know which your situation is. It could even be some wierd thing that you can patiently serve by ending the chains of anger people push on each other.

You used to be an angrier person, and as such might be more qualified to diagnose this yourself. Frustration and depression are the one's I'm more familiar with, and those are the result of trying to be a desperate control freak over my own life.

I want to be all about soul now. On some levels I have mastered that on others I still struggle. I can direct my dream self and others and stand back as an observer while sleeping knowing it's all a play. I'd like that peace in real life.

Life goes by without viseral engagement in that sort of serenity. It's nice to have on tap (for sake of security and perspective), but as you say, it's like a dream, a hologram, living in a video game. Like good music, it can take you to exquisite abstractly mystical experiences, but it's far from enjoying the mud between your toes.

The dream goes just as bad, containing things like 9/11 and hurricanes, which end up engaging your spiritual connection even more than the physical plane would have. You have to take the good with the bad on any plane, although they all have their vacation experiences.

Try looking back for any experience which didn't come with it's related opposite. The yin and the yang combine to create new universes you can steer into, but for every new place you arrive, any place which can be objectively/subjectively described, it's opposite lies lurking making that distinction possible. The trick thus is to relish both sides of any coin.

Exactly!

Start having more fun and be less restricted