I'm a dyed-in-the-wool skeptic. I don't believe in anything for no reason. I'm willing to believe some pretty crazy shit if there's evidence for it (quantum mechanics for example), but I don't believe in magic or spirits or anything like that. But ...
Every once in a while, shit happens. Maybe it's just coincidence but a part of me still wants to believe. Here's one of those things.
I've started playing a few games of chess using the Chess With Friends app (okiwi if you're keen), and a week or two ago I started playing against someone with the word "syzygy" in their handle. "Hmm, thinks I, that's familiar but I don't remember what it means. Must look it up", and never did.
Then yesterday, just after playing a move against this person, I picked up the book I've been reading (a short story collection), and the next story up is "It wasn't Syzygy".
Now, this book is one that's been on my bookshelf for many years, and I've read it before - once only, and I was in my 20's. I'm 50 now.
So either that's just a weird coincidence with the word "syzygy" - or maybe, just maybe, some part of my brain whispered to me when I was looking through my bookshelf for something to read last week, and said "pick that one" - connecting something I'd read and forgotten long ago with a recent occurrence. This is the one I want to be true, because it hints at hidden realms within our minds. But maybe I'm seeing a pattern where there isn't one.
Or maybe it was magic. But I doubt it.
I've had things like this happen to me. I had a student this year whose last name was Shams. It's an Arabic name, probably originally was Al-Shams. I thought nothing of it. It didn't sound familiar. Soon after my first class, I had a vivid dream about the poet Rumi. I thought that was strange and felt that my dream had something to do with this student. I had read a little bit about Rumi's life 20 years ago but was not particularly informed. Bingo: Shams had been Rumi's soul mate. Having met my student, my brain reminded me of the connection and expressed it in a dream. Or?? magic. No I think we have all kinds of bits in our brains...much more than we know.some part of my brain whispered to me when I was looking through my bookshelf for something to read last week, and said "pick that one"
You read this before in your 20s. Part of your brain remembered it and led you to pick up the book out of all the possible books.
I'd like to think you're right, but I'm not convinced. We humans love to see patterns in things, if at all possible. It just seems to be our nature.
There's no way to be sure, but if I had to pick what I truly believed, I'd have to say : that's wishful thinking, and what happened was a mere coincidence, and not an expression of any long-lost memory.
Confirmation bias is a powerful thing. What about all the times you picked a book that had nothing to do with words you were just thinking about? Or all the times lil had totally meaningless, life-irrelevant dreams? If you choose enough books or dream enough dreams, eventually your brain will find a pattern. It's just random chance.
I am aware of confirmation bias. Humans tend to be meaning-making. I'm aware of neurological experiments in which areas of the brain known to cause distress were stimulated. The subject knew his brain was being stimulated, yet he provided explanations for his sudden feelings of sadness. Interesting, no? So it could be completely random that shortly after meeting a student named Shams, I have a dream about Rumi, a 13th Century Sufi poet. The main reason that I think my subconscious was trying to alert me to this connection was the powerful feeling of Yes! when I put the puzzle together. When I interpret a dream accurately, I feel a sense of unity between my subconscious and conscious, as in this story and this one. I definitely agree with briandmyers that we like patterns and explanations -- but I also think the brain has more memories than we are aware of, some of which are transformed into symbolic expression in dreams.
I once thought so; now, not so much. One man's 'pedantic and cynical' can be another man's 'liberating'. "Random and meaningless' also implies 'no hidden masters'.
I'm not a theist by any stretch of the imagination, but by the same token, I don't assume to know too much about how the world works. What I do know is that our subconscious is far more complex than the average person likes to believe. To imply (as the other user did) that one cannot make a mental connection of which one is initially (consciously) unaware is to deny fact in favor of a version of nihilism that I personally find distasteful. It's such an easy thing to say, by the same token. It's equally as unsubtle and uninteresting as saying God's plan controls all. That's what I mean by pedantic an cynical. One can believe one has providence over oneself while still permitting that the universe may be more complex than meets the eye.
Our brains, our consciousness, memory, learning, thinking - all these things are far more complex than we know. As a species, our perception of the world is limited by our senses. If we had access to more senses, our beliefs would change with our new perceptions of the world. Other species have abilities that seem magical. The Arctic Tern can travel from the Arctic to the Antarctic without a map. A Chinook salmon can return from her Pacific travels to the river where she was born. I'm pretty sure that our brains do more than we can explain. All the time.What I do know is that our subconscious is far more complex than the average person likes to believe.
briandmyers would like to believe his chess experience was more than coincidence. Of course, there's no way to prove it, yet.