I like to think I’m fairly grounded in reality.
Hm. I’m not sure any good discussion follows that statement. But I digress…
I find myself pondering the nature of reality, time, space. It makes me recall this video by Carl Sagan:
We think of ourselves as three dimensional creatures. Granted, we have three dimensions, but are we merely that? Sometimes — that is, a lot of the time — I wonder if we are four dimensional creatures. Our brains are the sense organ for the fourth dimension, and our consciousness is that movement through it. Just as we are familiar with our current, physical three dimensional surroundings, is our current state of being just the familiarity and nearness of that place in the fourth dimension we currently occupy? Looking off into the distance at some mountain peak or other far away place is analogous to when we dream or imagine — we are “looking” ahead or around in four dimensions to states that we don’t (or can’t) occupy. Remembering something is examining a previous state of our being. Our existence from birth to death, that is the entirety of who we are as four dimensional creatures, as much as I am the collection of cells, tissue and other bodily parts with respect to three dimensions.