(Repost of an old message I sent to SL4 in 2003.)
Usually, like everyone, I forget my dreams. When I'm suddenly woken up, for example, by an alarm clock or by my cellphone ringing, it seems - I'm not quite sure if this is what is happening, but it's the explanation that seems most likely - it seems as if the last fifteen seconds of mental imagery are still "in my loop" when I wake up, so I remember them too, just as if they were lucid.
So the memory I actually have is of waking up, and then five seconds or fifteen seconds later, the phone rings. With an experience like that, it's easy to see why anyone less than a dedicated rationalist would assume psychic powers; "Oh, look, I become lucid fifteen seconds before the phone rings, I must be psychic".
Sometimes I'll even apparently remember that I have a dream in which an alarm goes off in my dream, which wakes me up, and then five seconds later the alarm goes off.
One needs to have done quite a lot of reading in cognitive science before one looks at that and says, "Timing fault in memory formation - yes, the brain really is that fragile", and not "I had a precognitive dream."
This led me to ponder the problem of dream memories and personal continuity. I now remember having experiences that I would not remember if I had not been woken up by an alarm clock; I remember those apparently lucid dream experiences, and those "inserted" memories, as if they were part of my ordinary life continuity. What happens to the person who experiences the dreams I have and don't remember? Did I really experience the dream of the alarm going off, or was the memory manufactured and inserted without ever being experienced? Are all dreams manufactured and inserted without ever being experienced?
This is where we stand at the moment I had my anthropic dream.
My cellphone rang and woke me up. I apparently remembered becoming lucid in my dream a few seconds before the cellphone woke me. And my "inserted" dream experience leading up to the cellphone ringing was the thought:
"If I don't wake up now, this experience will not have existed in retrospect. Therefore, since I'm now having this experience, something will wake me up."
Now, what this feels like is this:
You're dreaming, and your dream turns lucid, and you think to yourself: "If I don't wake up now, this experience won't have existed in retrospect. Therefore, since I'm having this experience, something will wake me up."
And then, a moment later, the cellphone rings and wakes you up.
The illusion of a spooky anthropic effect was very strong.
I suspect my brain likes to play nasty tricks on me. During the 3 years I worked at call centers, I became very conscious of the time of the day because our shifts were strictly monitored. I had to be logged on to the phone by an exact time. I remember there was a month when I had little sleep and suddenly I no longer heard the alarm clock. It felt like my brain was telling me, "Either you give me enough hours to sleep, or I won't let you wake up in time."
Now I'm at a different job, much less strict in matters of shift hours, but still I carry th...
This is a kind of "X files" thread.
Post experiences which spooked you, which made you doubt reality, mathematical or physical laws, your sanity, memory or perception. The more improbable the better, but no second-hand legends please, share only what you personally experienced. If you had the event later explained rationally please use rot13 to avoid spoilers.