This’s an interesting concept that I explored in an ND. Me and my cousin were in a room with a counselor-guy and his three daughters and I was saying something about them not being real and they were all part of a complex bio-computer program (I even showed them the box that the program came in–it was Windows-compatible). Basically, I told them that the dream and themselves were apart of a Matrix.
The counselor-guy tried to disprove this by touching me–this seemed to be indisputable proof that they were in fact real! Then his daughters pulled me down and I made-out with all three of them simultaneously (tasting the rainbow ) and things got really sexxxy from there Basically, it was supposed to affirm that they were real, but I woke up and, alas, they weren’t…
But that’s just one ND on the matter. As to what I believe–I dunno…the dream was quite an interesting one in the argument as to the realness of DCs as actual people…so…I’m not sure yet.
Well… I agree but disagree…
I think they should have some rights and people shouldn’t make them miserable, but I think you can show of in front of them and stuff like that, and I think that if people really wants to kill them and to do stuff like that, they should ask them first, and if they say “no” I think that the dreamer should respect the answer.
But, on the other hand, I think that if the dreamer really wants to kill his/her DC’s, no one can stop him - they are his/her DC’s after all.
As I didn’t have much to do I read all of the do dream characters have rights stuff. I got inspired to write something.
Ofcourse, From everything said there, the question is really that of this topic. Are they real? I know that they are a part of the world in the sense that they exist in dreams. Many people confuse “real” with “physical”. On that note I can prove dream characters PHYSICAL existance. All scientific too. In the materialistic view, dreams are “nothing more” than constructions of our minds. But, we all know that our minds are created by our brains, wich are physical. So, then our minds must be physical, if they exist in our brain, they exist “somewhere”. And consist of “something”. Electrical activity, connections between braincells. Much as computer software exist physically as scratchings on a harddrive or whatever. yeah, I think that’s it.
But I don’t even think it matters. In my opinion, in a dream. Anything goes! And for me that means that dream characters DO have rights. They have all the rights in the world, much more than in any civilised society on earth. Because there ARE NO RULES. Rules such as “don’t kill…” limits our rights. I have the same rights as the DCs. I’m free to do anything. It’s total anarchy, because noone has set any rules.
I believe that it’s impossible to kill in a dream not because DCs aren’t real (though I don’t believe they are) but because dreams don’t work like real life. there IS NO DEATH, only the appearance of death. DCs don’t die, they play the game and pretent do die, but could easily stand up again if that’s how the dream goes.
Morally though. I can see how it’s evil to kill in a dream, simply because it’s an evil thought. Come on, admit it! But it’s not like killing in real life, because noone gets hurt. The reason killing in real life is evil is because it hurts people. Even if DCs are real people, they don’t get hurt any more than you do in a dream.
Wether they have consciousness or not we can’t prove either way, only assume, wich is done readily around here on that particular matter. Mostly I see very certain messages that DCs don’t have thoughts or feelings of their own with no evidence to prove that. I do believe that is right but I can accept it if it’s not. Until proof comes I’ll do what I want and if the DCs don’t like it they can go on strike or something, or at least tell me. Come to think of it, sometimes my LDs are empty of people.
I reckon DC s are who you want them to be. What you want them to be. They can be real people if you want. They can be figments of your imagination, but if you meet a DC version of a real person you’ve met your subconscious will be able to predict their character traits. They are patchwork of the mind, basically. That’s what I think anyway.
But I agree with what Stormthunder said. It reflects what,who you are if you decide to hurt them. I mean, I’ll defend myself and fight sometimes, fighting simply to see if this practice will affect it in real life (I want to learn to defend myself in real life).
ACTUALLY, forget what I just said. What krakatoa said is the answer! THE ANSWER!
Also, what dannyboy said about DCs not being cleverer than the dreamer? That was a good point, but…
the DCs are created by our subcinscious, right?
Our subconsciouses pick up a load more information than our conscious minds, and it has a much better memory and is way cleverer!
So the subconscious uses those attributes to create lifelike, intelligent DCs. Everything they know is known by us, the dreamers, we just don’t know we know it.
Maybe…
I have my own opinion on the “realness” of DC’s, and its probably a bit more vague than most peoples.
First, I believe context matters in that your surroundings and the characters initial demeanor should show what would be “right” to do. I really don’t think that should you should find yourself in a serene city park that it would be proper to start chainsawing DC’s, but if your being chased by said chainsaw, go ahead and start something up!
Next, and probably more relevantly, I think the image the characters represent matters. Think of it this way, in all honesty a small wooden cross is nothing but two sticks fitted in a very simple shape, yet would you do something like burn it or blow it up? In essense what I’m saying is respect the representations of greater things.
This is just a bit of the randomness that my head can product, so meh.
Yeah. The subconscious has infromation that the conscious does not. Simple example is this. Think of your mothers name! Before you read that, you were not conscious of your mothers name. It was in the subconscious, ready to be pulled out. So, what other information do you have in your head that you are not conscious of? You couldn’t possibly be aware of all of it at once. Therefore the subconscious “knows more” than the conscious mind at any time. Unless you are conscious of your enitre mind. David Lynch said that that is what he belives to be enlightenment, if that interests you.
At this moment, I dont know exactly which side of whether DC’s are real I buy into. I just have not had enough interaction with a DC to convince myself one way or another.
Consider something, though. Is it possible that DC’s are in fact merely other dreamers? Now, in some cases you’ll have dreamers that dont know how to lucid dream, and therefore it’s easy for YOU, as a lucid dreamer, to control their actions. Think back, for example, when you yourself are dreaming and are not lucid. Often it seems as if it’s not you that’s controlling your words and actions, but they’re just happening.
On the other hand, there may be some DC’s that can’t be controlled…could these be lucid dreamers, whether human or otherwise?
I find the discussion of dream characters to be interesting because a part of me strongly believes that while dreams may in fact just be ‘in our head’, there is so much we can learn from the dreams we have, and lucid dreaming in general. Inevitably, dream characters are an important part of this learning experience.
My opinion, I think DCs are just our imagination. If you ever daydream, make up stories, music, art, (I do all of the time) I’m making up new characters when I do this. DCs for me are just my imagined characters that should or will exist in real life. Kind of like all of my scatterbrained imaginations coming together and meeting, and I only select a few of these to think about in real life.
) and things got really sexxxy from there 
Basically, it was supposed to affirm that they were real, but I woke up 
and, alas, they weren’t…
: