[NetBehaviour] The dream philosophy

[Alan Sondheim]

The dream philosophy

https://youtu.be/OpzS4TFCVqc
[See http://www.alansondheim.org/partial.txt for full text]
http://www.alansondheim.org/partial.jpg

So I was sleeping and she was sleeping and apparently I had a
dream that I was in a staring contest with her and then I
apparently let out in real life a big whoop and as a result of
that she woke up to find me staring at her. I don't know whether
the whoop was something that I did when I was dreaming or when I
woke up or whether I was awake and not dreaming or whether I was
dreaming and not awake and she was dreaming one of us was doing
the dream which was in a sense a kind of sharing or non-sharing
of a dream because there was a split between whether I was
staring or whether I was not staring although it was clear when
she woke up that she was staring which makes me think that I
probably was awake and let out the whoop which woke me first and
then woke her into the staring position. This is the way reality
seems to move in that there always would seem to be divisions of
one sort or another whether it's multiple heavens or multiple
hells or that hill over there or is that woman or man down the
street or that person behind you. This is not a fabrication but
it's something embedded in language and not clearly embedded in
the real world insofar as the real world is not a world of
interpretation. I think the real world is not a world of
interpretation. I think interpretation is a form of character
carapace or habitus that's a habitus on us that we apply to
ourselves and by doing this and this is done only in a group
context of mutual identifications that as this happens we begin
to assume so we have some understanding of how the world exists
as a coagulation or a network of boundaries however soft.

But I think on the other hand is that it's a situation of streams
and particles and ruptures in the streams to which we have
learned to give names or negotiate in order to survive. And I
assume that this is probably all there is to it except insofar as
we tend to believe in some form of afterlife that gives meaning
beyond the meeting we have constructed for ourselves. But if it
were such an afterlife clearly it would be destroyed by the
presence of a neutron star or two black holes in collision or the
exhaustion and yawning of dark matter in the abyss. There's no
way out of this because our will to live at least momentarily
also becomes a way to corral to make sense of things in order to
survive. All of this is so simple it's embarrassing and what I
don't understand is how all of human culture seems built, was
built on this unbelievable sadness in the long run to which we
are only partial

And I must say partial to what? What sort of partiality is it
that both divides the world and then situates you on one side or
another? Is it sensible to assume that reality is based on this,
on taking sides? Does taking a side mean one possesses that side?
If one possesses that side can one carry that possession with him
or her or them? Does the carrying of a side turn into an aside?

The aside is the partial.

__