…and how is d63?
Always pushing further than I should probably go…
You?
And, BTW, always a pleasure looking at you…
hearing from you, even.
Nothing wrong with pushing further… as long as no-one is getting hurt in the process
I’m fine… apart from having a large dose of chronic fatigue.
Do my words an image of me make? or do you really have an image of me? 
Still seeing Thandie Newton, Maj.
In the podcast, the question was posed by Ken Taylor to the guest Deirdre Barrett as to what the evolutionary value of dreaming was. And while I would not, given her expertise in the field, dismiss her explanations, I would, humbly, offer a couple of my own.
The first, which is less evolutionary and more existential, has to do with the concept of intentionality as it was embraced by Husserl and Phenomenology: the notion that consciousness is always consciousness of something. And if we follow the reasoning through, we realize that in order for something to be conscious, it has to, at bottom, recognize that it is conscious. But as Barrett points out, there are points, at our deepest level of sleep, at which consciousness just dissipates: its very nothingness and non-being. And it would make perfect sense for consciousness to resist this while the body requires it. Therefore, consciousness has to ease into it (dip its toe into the water), via dreams, by immersing itself step by step. This is why, for instance, while we fall asleep, we tend to experience our thoughts suddenly projecting into the visual and often find ourselves jolting into full consciousness because of something jumping out at us. That jumping out basically represents the possibility of consciousness’ non-being. This, for me, always brings to mind a quote by an old man in the movie Moonlighting:
“I hate sleep! It’s too much like death.”
The second, which is more evolutionary in nature, has to do with brain plasticity. Here we have to look at dreaming as a kind of mental bricolage in which the mind and brain (via consciousness (does a kind of random psychic inventory in which it goes through its contents (its memories, its emotions, its knowledge, etc. (and randomly fuses them together until it finds patterns that resonate with it that it then stores so that it can play those patterns off of other random mental units. In this aspect, it makes perfect sense, as Barrett points to, that many of our greatest minds would turn to dreams for inspiration. But I would argue that it is a little more fundamental and democratic than that in that dreams are the process by which the brain (via brain plasticity (improves the underlying structures of how we think so the mind can move to the next level. This would explain, for instance, why less creative people tend to claim to not dream.
I look more like Zoe Saldana, but I prefer to relate to Thandie Newton… because she is also a Brit, but I don’t look much like her at all.
Still thinking about that screenplay. And I really do need to take some time out and come back here: like a vacation where I visit old friends or something.
That’s what we’re here for d63 
Have you ever thought of submitting your screenplays to a film festival? I’m going to a networking event at one of the biggest…
I would first have to write it. My time for this is so limited.
Many in that situation start with a short story and then turn it into a feature film later on, when time and funding allow for it. This too is my plan for the current short story I am starting to write.
As Coleridge says, sweetheart:
It’s alright to build castles in the sky. The trick is to build foundations under them.
But in order to build those foundations, we first have create castles in the sky in order to drive us.
It’s just how it works. At least, that is the way it has worked for me. At the same time, it has always left me feeling I am behind myself.