Food For Thought

A selection of quotes that I like. Feel free to add your own in the "Comments" below:

Size matters not. Look at me. Judge me by my size, do you? Hmm? Hmm. And well you should not. For my ally is the Force, and a powerful ally it is. Life creates it, makes it grow. Its energy surrounds us and binds us. Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter. You must feel the Force around you; here, between you, me, the tree, the rock, everywhere, yes. Even between the land and the ship.
~ Master Yoda


It is the mark of an educated man to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.
~ Aristotle









The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness. For he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know I am the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon you.
~ Ezekiel 25:17

If at first you don't succeed, remove all evidence that you tried.
~ David Brent






None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.
~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe









Be who you are and say what you feel; Because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter won't mind.
~ Bernard Baruch








gutta cavat lapidem, non vi, sed saepe cadendo: The drop hollows out the stone by frequent dropping, not by force; constant persistence gains the end.
~ Ovid







Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter
~ Dr Martin Luther King Jr







A man with one watch knows what time it is; a man with two watches is never quite sure
~ Lee Segall








Beware lest you lose the substance by grasping at the shadow
~ Aesop

Petrodollar Madness

Petrodollars, for those that don’t know, is money paid to countries that produce oil (particularly countries in the Middle East), money which is then deposited back in US banks.

This dollar based global oil trade now gives the United States ‘carte blanche’ to print dollars without sparking inflation.

Here is how it basically works: In order to purchase oil, you must purchase it through the New York or London oil exchange. These two oil parties provide the market for virtually all oil exchange world wide.

The single currency used by these exchanges is US dollars, meaning that if you want to buy oil, you need to first obtain some US currency.

When constantly trading for oil, you therefore need to stockpile dollars in order to satisfy the future demand for oil. Countries that export the oil similarly have huge reserves of dollars from the oil they have sold. These US dollars are then stored in US banks and effectively invested back into the US economy.

Imagine this analogy of a farmer wanting to purchase some pigs for his farm… He must first go to the market in order to purchase them.

The market dealers will only agree to sell him pigs for US dollars, but because the farmers local currency is not US dollars, he needs to acquire them from the US first.

However the US, are not interested in his local currency either, as its of little use to them, but they are interested in the corn the farmer produces. The farmer is then faced with the decision to trade his corn with the US, or borrow from the US and pay additional interest on the loan.

After acquiring the correct currency, the farmer then hurries off to the market to buy his pigs, and stock piles more US dollars for future purchases. The market in-turn then takes the farmers dollars and deposits them back into US banks.

Almost two-thirds of the world's currency reserves are kept in US dollars, since oil importers pay in dollars, and oil exporters keep their reserves in the currency they are paid. This allows the US to print as much money as it wants, knowing that it will all eventually end up safely back in its own banks, supporting its own economy.

Due to this vested interest in the security of the US economy, countries are effectively blackmailed into paying for US economic stress. After all, if the US economy plummets, then your stockpile of US dollars is going to be worth far less.

This zero currency risk investment, allows the US to carry on printing and lending money, whilst at the same time pouring billions into military spending, funding tax cuts, and allowing consumer spending on imports, without fear of inflation, or that these loans will ever be called in.

---

Gross Domestic Product (GDP), is the total value of goods and services produced within a country over a single year. It can be used to gauge a countries standard of living.

Central bankers around the world do not expect either the US dollar or the US stock markets to sustain the levels they are currently at.

William Greider in ‘The Nation’ 23/09/02 pointed out:

"US economy's net foreign indebtedness--the accumulation of two decades of running larger and larger trade deficits--will reach nearly 25 percent of US GDP this year, or roughly $2.5 trillion. Fifteen years ago, it was zero. Before America's net balance of foreign assets turned negative, in 1988, the United States was a creditor nation itself, investing and lending vast capital to others, always more than it borrowed. Now the trend line looks most alarming. If the deficits persist around the current level of $400 billion a year or grow larger, the total US indebtedness should reach $3.5 trillion in three years or so. Within a decade, it would total 50 percent of GDP."

These growing trade deficits set to rapidly unhinge the US financial position. By trying to run the world, they have heavily mortgaged themselves, and like anyone who borrows more than they can afford, and with no means to stop. The US economy is effectively a ticking time bomb, heaping further dependency on its creditors.

Currently the majority of these creditors (Private investors and Asian and European governments) are not inclined to tip the scales, and disrupt the balance with the worlds most powerful country. It is in their best interests to give their exports access to the colossal market of the US, and gain greater strength in the market share.

But with sufficient encouragement, these creditors will eventually tip the scales on the US. This is likely to happen either because the American debt burden has become so great that additional lending would be too risky or because the creditors want to stir trouble for the US.

This threatened to happened in September 2000 when Saddam Hussein announced that Iraq was going to reject dollars as the main currency exchange for oil, and use euros instead.

Fortunately for the US, under the disguised attack to seize "weapons of mass destruction" (weapons which were never found), Saddam’s plan was thwarted.

The Financial Times published an article in June 2003, confirming that Iraqi oil was once again safely returning to the international market, using US dollars not euros.

At the time this happened the euro was valued 13% higher than the US dollar, but despite the Bush administrations claims to rebuild the infrastructure of Iraq as quickly as possible, the swift move back to US dollars was enforced, regardless of the profit that would have been made by Iraq had it dealt in euros.

Iran are also now proposing to do what Saddam did, and go one step further, by creating their own Oil Exchange Market, which trades in euros instead of US dollars. This proposition will create a solid standing in the international trade for oil, which could have devastating repercussions on the US economy, especially if other countries follow suit.

Recent news reports indicate the Iranian oil bourse will start trading on the 20th of March 2006, to coincide with the Iranian New Year.

It will be interesting to see if Iran are accused of heinous acts, and if this euro based oil exchange is allowed to continue. Even more interestingly, if the US is forced to wage war with Iran in order to avoid an economic collapse, what disguise will they use to hide the truth this time?

Produced By:
Alex Chapman
Lance Challenor

Murder In The Medicine Cabinet: Part II

The below article was not written by myself. It was written by Marshall Smith and published on the The Brother Jonathan Gazette website.

It is an excellent article, and one which I wish to share. Please read and enjoy…

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THE BROTHER JONATHAN GAZETTE
DAILY DIGEST
Monday November 14, 2005

MURDER IN THE MEDICINE CABINET: Part 2
How Did so many Doctors and Health Professionals get fooled?

At the very beginning of the 2005-2006 Flu season in October 2005, a story started going around the news circuits, that the dangerous Bird Flu is only five mutations away from becoming transmissible to humans. When that occurs, a vast global Pandemic will sweep around the world killing billions of people. That story is, in fact, complete myth, misdirection and cover story. It could never happen. By the time you finish reading this article you will know why that story is false. You will also know how and why the people spreading that false story are planning on making hundreds of BILLIONS of dollars in profit just in the next October 2005 to May 2006 flu season alone.

The current "Bird Flu Pandemic" terrorist-scare-tactic being reported in the news is based on confusing viruses with bacteria as sources of disease. Bacteria are living single-celled animals which reproduce and thrive. Viruses are only tiny strings of DNA or RNA molecules which are NOT alive. They cannot grow nor reproduce. Since they are not alive, you can't kill them. You can't kill atoms or molecules. You can only dissolve them or break them apart with acids or enzymes. Your T-cells and white blood cell macrophages do exactly that when they fight a viral infection in your body.

Bacteria cells are large enough to be seen with a microscope. Some invading bacteria are dangerous since their waste products may include toxins which can kill body cells, and maybe even you. They can make you sick. Other bacteria are actually used by your body as helpers or defenders. Numerous forms of benign bacteria naturally live in your mouth and in your intestines to kill any dangerous bacteria which you may eat. They also help with digestion. breaking down the food you eat. Invasions of bad bacteria are now treated with antibiotics which enter the bacteria and kill them. Common bacterial infections include polio, TB, salmonella, E. coli and Hepatitis A.

All viruses are so much smaller than bacteria that they cannot be seen with a normal light microscope. They are dangerous, since they can enter certain target cells in your body and replicate so fast that they cause the cells to burst open, and thus destroy the cell. The newly replicated viruses can then attack neighboring cells. The replication process can be so fast that a single virus can turn into millions of copies of itself in just several hours.

Antibiotics have no effect on viruses. Most viral diseases are pretreated with anti-viral shots, such as flu shots, but these are only about 50% effective at best. The body reacts to viral infections by raising the body temperature. Viruses cannot replicate, or can only make copies very slowly with a body temperature above 102 degrees F. Common viral infections include colds, flu, chicken pox, AIDS and Hepatitis B.

Viruses make copies or replicate themselves similarly to the way crystals grow. They can only replicate when immersed in a fluid containing an abundant supply of the raw amino acids which make up the virus. This only occurs inside an animal or human host cell in which the cytoplasm fluid is rich in amino acids. The virus is not a parasite, any more than a salt crystal is a parasite when you drop it into a salty tank of brine, and the salt crystal starts to grow by gathering salt molecules from the brine. That's all a virus does when it replicates.

THE LITTLE KNOWN "SECRET" OF VIRAL INFECTIONS

A virus from a bird can never enter into any human cells. That is despite what you may have been told or read, and is now much ballyhooed in the press and news media. This unique behavior of viruses is caused by the species-specific protein coating that surrounds the viral DNA strand. That protein coat is unique to each animal species. This is also the exact same reason why the protein-coated sperm from one species cannot enter and impregnate the ova of another species.

Both viruses and sperm are DNA strands or genetic material surrounded by a species-specific protein coat. Only an ovum from the same species with the same protein coat can be entered by sperm from that species. That is the rule for sexual reproduction on planet earth. This exact same rule applies to viruses. The biochemistry of sexual reproduction and viral infection are almost exactly the same. That is the little known "secret" which has fooled most doctors and epidemiologists who, it seems, never really learned the actual biochemistry and cytology of sexual reproduction in medical school.

For so-called "Bird virus experts" to proclaim loudly to the public that they believe a bird lung virus could infect a human lung and cause Bird Flu in humans, would also have to believe that a horse could impregnate a woman, or a man can impregnate a cow. From ancient texts, it seem humans have been attempting such cross-species DNA implantation antics for millennium. But so far, it's never worked - and it never will. It can't be done. It is a property of the unique chemical and electrical properties of the surface material of each virus and sperm which prevents transfers across species. Despite how many times the core or genetic DNA material may be mutated, it still only has the unique viral surface material unique to that species. No matter how may times sperm from a bull is mutated chemically or with radiation, it may product multitudes of hideous mutant cows, but it will never make a funky cow-chicken.

The fact that millions of birds may be dying of H5N1 Bird Flu, should mean nothing to humans. It can never directly infect humans. You can't get it by eating chickens, nor doing anything else with a chicken. The so-called 65 cases of bird flu which supposedly have killed people in Asia, are NOT bird flu. The H5N1 designation only refers to the type of molecules in the protein coating and not to the actual viral DNA genetic strand inside the virus.

The 65 people who died, had H5N1 Human Flu and not H5N1 Bird Flu. They are not the same. The currently used primitive clinical viral tests only determine which molecules are present in the surface coating (H5N1) and not the actual viral DNA molecule inside. That's how millions of people around the world, including doctors, have been fooled into thinking that H5N1 Bird Flu could mutate and spread to kill humans. It'll never happen.

HOW ALL FLU TRANSFERS FROM BIRDS TO PIGS TO HUMANS

For the Bird Flu Virus to infect humans, it must first enter into a pig cell. But why pigs? This can happen when pigs root through dirt which also contains abundant dried bird droppings from infected chickens or ducks. The pigs, while rooting in the dirt, inhale the dried virus-infected bird droppings constantly. This mostly and commonly only occurs in Asia where pigs and fowl are raised together. The chickens eat the pig droppings and the pigs eat the chicken droppings. It doesn't sound very appetizing, but it works, and is called "recycling of waste products." It is a very inexpensive and useful farming technique and is used throughout much of Asia - except it also creates and spreads a unique disease which affects millions of people each year. It's called Flu or influenza.

If a pig breaths in a large amount of bird flu virus, nothing happens, unless the pig also happens to be sick with pig flu. Then the bird virus can actually enter into a partially opened or ruptured lung cell, damaged by pig flu virus. Then the bird virus will replicate and use the damaged pig cell coating as the new coating for the bird virus. The bird flu core virus now has a pig surface protein coat. It is now a pig virus. This is cross-species infection. The new "pig virus" with the bird core, can now attack and enter millions of lung cells in the same pig, killing the pig, and spreading to other pigs and to humans.

This is very rare, but is the method by which all influenzas transfer originally from birds to humans through cross-species mixing inside pig lungs. And though rarely occurring, with only about a one in several thousand chance to occur, it can and does occur. But with hundreds of millions of pigs and ducks being raised together each year in Asia, this farming practice results in hundreds of new and unique variants of bird influenza which can then infect humans each year. It is the primary and almost only source of all new human influenza infections.

DO THE FLU SHOTS IMMUNIZE AND PROTECT?

For over 40 years, the U.S. CDC-approved annual Flu Shot only tries to protect against the five most prevalent variants of bird-pig influenza which can infect humans. There are still hundreds of other variations each year which are not targeted by the flu shot. The result is that the annual flu shot only works about 20% of the time. Would you buy a new car each year which only worked 20% of the time? But you were told that the flu shots always work. Wrong!

A virus does not make its own surface coating but "steals" it from the infected host cell. The tissue-cell-type of pig lung cells is sufficiently similar enough to human cells, that a pig influenza virus (from a bird) can infect a human. The odd or accidental very close similarity between pig and human tissue-types is why pig heart valves, body parts and insulin can be used and implanted in humans without severe tissue rejection or adverse reactions.

Thus, Bird Flu can never infect a human lung without first infecting a pig lung. The only exception to that rule is: modern "criminal" scientists who may take deadly bird viral DNA and manually insert it directly into a human protein coating. This is the same new hi-tech process used in making clones. The theory of DNA cloning has been around since the late 1960's, but actually making it work in sheep, dogs and some other animals, has only been around for the last couple of years.

Along with advancing the interesting science of cloning, comes the technical ability to clone a form of bird flu with human surface proteins which could kill nearly half the population of planet earth. Could this explain the mysterious deaths or murders of 78 bioresearchers in recent years? Did they know too much about who it is that is doing "DNA and RNA viral engineering?".

HOW TO PREVENT AND CURE ALL VIRAL INFECTIONS
-- The Temperature Connection

Viral DNA can only replicate or grow like a crystal, if the temperature of the host cell liquid cytoplasm is below 100 degrees F, and it "prefers" a temperature of 96F or below. For "cold-blooded" birds and reptiles this can occur all year long, but mostly in winter. For humans and most mammals this lower body temperature condition actually occurs during sleep and when under stress. This lower body temperature may also occur when exposed to cold winter weather. This is why winter is flu season.

A human "fever" above 102F completely stops all viral replication, giving the immune system T-cells and macrophages enough time to track down and destroy the invading virus. Lowering the fever temperature with modern over-the-counter cold medications can kill you. The only thing an annual flu shot does is speed the process of T-cells finding certain viruses. The flu shot does not actually give immunity or prevent infection, especially if the person also takes cold medications or prophylactics such as Tamiflu which lower the body temperature and thwart the normal immune system fever response. It could actually be deadly.

The similarity of viruses and sperm also includes their sensitivity to temperature. In almost all male mammals, the sperm replicating sites, the testes are always external to the body, so they will be maintained at lower than normal body temperature. In modern times, many men may wear tight-fitting briefs or have jobs sitting all day at desks or driving trucks. Those individuals very commonly have low sperm counts with very low motility. The sperm just don't replicate very well at the higher body temperature. This is one of the most common reasons for modern-day male infertility. The simple cure is to lower the testicle temperature. How that is accomplished, I leave to the imagination of the reader.

The extreme similarity between viral infection and sexual reproduction is why most people have no clue as to how a virus spreads. For most people, frank and open discussion of sex and sexual reproduction is difficult and often taboo, even among medical circles. This explains why many doctors will treat a patient with a cold or flu, by giving antibiotics. Or giving the patient with influenza, a course of anti-virals which treat the symptoms and lower the patients fever - and usually kills the patient.

The simple way to prevent and cure viral infection in the human body is to raise the body temperature above normal. This is the normal and natural immune system response to a viral infection. It's called a fever. It is normal and natural with nothing you need to buy from the local drug store to make it work. Your body does it all by itself - you don't even need to think about it. It is part of being human.

Thus the infecting virus can only replicate in humans with a stress-lowered or artificially medicine-lowered body temperature. This explains why cold and flu viruses spread more often during the winter. It also explains why some people may get six or more colds per year. And then some other people seem never to catch a cold. It's their body temperature.

Unlike the current medical practice for the last 100 years, the nurse should not be too concerned when taking your temperature and then it reads 101 degrees. That's your body reacting to a viral infection. That is a normal immune system response - and that is good.

Instead, the nurse or doctor should be very concerned when your daytime body temperature reads only 97 degrees or less. It does happen. That means your immune system is under stress. You are wide open to viral infections and your immune system has no means to respond to the infection. You are at severe risk for a lethal disease.

WHY THE CURE WILL NEVER BE "DISCOVERED

"But for the medical professional to recognize this simple fact, would turn modern medicine right up-side down. It would also mean that doctors would no longer treat colds and flu with medications to "treat the symptom" by lowering the fever. And that would put Big Pharma right out of business. Which is why it will never happen.

Big Pharma will continue to sell over-the-counter cold and flu meds at tremendous multi-billion dollar profits each year. And millions of people will die in lonely hospital beds around the world, not from flu, but from drowning in their own lung fluids resulting from severe viral pneumonia - caused by lowering the immune-system-response fever. With all those cold 'n flu pills and bottles which you've bought - it can only be called Murder in the Medicine Cabinet. Is that what the 78 mysteriously murdered international bio-researchers were trying to tell us? The Bird Flu story in the news is a complete hoax, being spread by the same people who who also have the ability to spread the human-cloned version of Bird Flu and then also convince you to make sure to get your flu shot and stock up on Tamiflu.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

Your mission, should you accept it, is to discuss what you've just read with your doctor. Discuss it with your family and friends. Discuss it at work, and even on Internet chat channels and boards, and call-in radio programs. If you choose to do nothing, then those who are making the outrageous claims of world pandemics which would kill millions, and who actually now also control the newly cloned and manufactured stockpiles of Human Bird Flu or the replicated 1918 Spanish Flu, could actually be making self-fulfilling prophesy. It's up to you. Don't panic, as they expect you to do, and rush to wait in line to get their very expensive flu shot or antivirals. Know that your own fever is your own first line quick-acting (usually 4 to 6 hour) defense against any viral infection. Peace.

Marshall Smith
Editor, Brother Jonathan Gazette
newseditor@brojon.com

For more information See: "Fever and the Mystery Disease SARS" and "Murder in the Medicine Cabinet: Part 1" in the BroJon archives.

Do You Mind?

The human brain acts like an enormous sponge, constantly absorbing the information it receives throughout the day, from millions of sensors and senses. For the most part it works almost entirely on autopilot (for want of a better term), without our awareness.

My view of the human mind therefore, is separated into two distinct and completely separate entities, the Conscious and the Subconscious.

If we, as human beings, were consciously aware of the millions of processes our brain was going through, we would barely be able to concentrate on breathing, let alone hold a conversation over lunch.

To that end, we have developed a filtering method, that allows our brain to carry on working behind the scenes uninterrupted, whilst our conscious mind basks in the light of more leisurely pursuits, namely creative thought.

From an evolutionary perspective, this gives us a major advantage, in that our conscious mind is allowed the freedom to evolve ideas and invent new concepts.

Whilst behind the scenes our brain is frantically processing all the information its receiving, our conscious mind is only capable of performing a very small number of simultaneous tasks, and in reality, to do them thoroughly, it can only do them one at a time.

Whilst this may not seem a powerful tool, it allows us the ability to focus our attention diligently in one area, without being overwhelmed by everything else. Effectively the conscious mind has managed to filtered out all automotive functions of the body, and many of its senses, in order to concentrate without distraction, on a topic of choice.

The Subconscious mind, is therefore the rest of the brain that’s working on autopilot. From the millions of things its processing, it makes calculations and snap judgements incredibly quickly, and is capable of processing a multitude tasks simultaneously.

Whilst the conscious mind is separated from the subconscious mind, by way of these filters, the subconscious mind is capable of communicating to the conscious mind by way of emotional feelings, or general impressions. These chemical reactions in the body, are powerful enough to interrupt the conscious mind enough to concentrate on something else, namely what our subconscious mind is trying to bring to our attention.

These feelings or communications from the subconscious mind, in my opinion, are often misinterpreted as intuition, gut instinct, or even divine and mystical messages from another entity or plane of existence.

An example of how this conscious, subconscious split works, can be seen in say, a restaurant.

Whilst seated with a friend, you engage in a highly intellectual and absorbing conversation (ok just pretend its intellectual and engaging to humour me please). Whilst your conscious mind is fully engaged in the conversation, your subconscious mind is processing everything else... How to open you mouth and produce words, how to breath, how to regulate your bodies temperature, what the couple next to you are talking about.

Your conscious mind has filtered out those other voices, but your ears are still hearing what they say, and your subconscious mind is still processing it.

It is also aware of each individual noise emanating from the kitchen, the aroma of cooked food, and a pheromone emanating from a potentially suitable partner seated behind you.

For some strange reason, you get the urge to look around, and as your eyes fall upon the potential mate, your subconscious mind releases a good dose of hormones. All of a sudden your conscious mind looses all interest in the current conversation, and instead focuses its attention on the attractive person seated behind you.

The subconscious mind has done its job well. Whilst keeping you alive, safe, and breathing, it has also made an attempt to secure the future of the species, by focusing your conscious minds attention on the potential mate seated behind you.

It did this by first imparting the impression to look round, and secondly by way of releasing a chemical into your system, forcing you to be attracted to them.

The Conscious and Subconscious mind exist side by side, and communicate subtly with each other, helping us ascertain when people are feeling down or upset, what responses are appropriate to a given situation, how to move and breath, and basically how to conduct ourselves in everyday living.

When you suddenly receive a sense of dread or fear, its probably your subconscious digesting information you are otherwise unaware of, and sending a powerful warning signal to your conscious mind.

Because of the nature of our subconscious mind, processing information indiscriminately, it can sometimes send these emotions falsely. This is why when engrossed in a horror movie, we feel afraid. Or when we are alone in the dark we get anxious.

Regardless of weather there is any real physical threat, our subconscious mind, is processing the signals and feeding the results back to our conscious mind, forcing us to concentrate on a potential threat. When those threats are found to be genuine, we often attribute those feelings to be inspired, when in actual fact it is simply the natural process of the subconscious mind, alerting you to signals that you were otherwise unconscious of.

Whilst these analogies are simple example, I feel they holds merit for a great number of strange phenomena, such as intuition and instinct, even ESP.

So what happens when we sleep? Well the vast majority of all human behaviour is done without any conscious thought at all, muscular movement, balance, placing one leg in front of the other to walk, raising the corners of your mouth into a smile, blinking to keep your eyes moist etc. All these actions and events whilst seemingly having no impact on our conscious mind, take their toll on the subconscious actions of our brain that is tirelessly working very hard, every second of the day.

As with all exercise, there follows a required period of rest, and the only way for our brain to rest, is to processing all those movements, actions and senses, and enter the comatose state known as sleep.

To do this it sends feelings of drowsiness to the conscious mind, until the conscious mind can no longer concentrate on ‘any’ specific tasks. At this point it gives up being the boss of conscious motor control and thought, and shuts down. In other words, you fall asleep. Only then in this comatose state can the mind fully rest and recharge its batteries, for the following day.

During sleep, we go through five main stages. The first stage is a very light sleep from which it is very easy to wake up. The second stage moves into a slightly deeper sleep, and stages three and four represent our deepest sleep. Our brain activity throughout these stages is gradually slowing down so that by the time we reach deep sleep, we experience nothing but delta brain waves (the slowest brain waves).

After the fourth stage of sleep, we begin the stage commonly known as REM sleep (Rapid Eye Movement), which is the fifth stage of sleep, and is the stage where almost all dreams occur.

During REM sleep, several physiological changes also take place. The heart rate and breathing quickens, our blood pressure rises, we can't regulate our body temperature as well, and our brain activity increases to the same alpha level as when we are awake, or sometimes even higher. The rest of the body, however, is essentially paralyzed until we leave REM sleep. This paralysis is caused by the release of glycine, an amino acid, from the brain stem onto the motoneurons (neurons that conduct impulses outward from the brain or spinal cord). It is widely theorised that this paralysis is to stop us from acting out our dreams whilst sleeping and otherwise causing injury to ourselves.

The body then continues to cycle through these 5 stages of sleep, however the fifth stage becomes more and more prominent as the night goes on, whilst the deeper stages of sleep become les and less.

By morning we are virtually cycling through stages one two and five, with no deep sleep required at all. This is because our mind requires no further rest, and needs some means of reviving itself from the comatose state it has fallen into. It does this by providing more and more means of stimulation in the form of dreams.

So what about the dreams themselves? Well, the pictorial stories within our dreams could easily be created from the images and experiences we have stored away in our memory. The stories associated with those dreams, are our imaginations embellishments of the images based on our most prominent thoughts, our hopes and even our worst fears and insecurities (nightmares). I believe it is a significant point in time where our Subconscious and Conscious communicate more openly, and where our imagination is at its most active stage because it has no other form of external influence.

It is however mankind’s nature to always provide a reason to that which is unexplained, it is why we are the most advanced species on the planet and constantly pushing the boundaries of science and invention. However more often than not, when we encounter an event which is otherwise unexplainable, our brains force a contrived explanation to fill the uneasy and unpleasant void of the unknown.

These contrived explanations, are usually spiritual, mystical, or otherwise divine in nature. We perceive the unexplainable event to be miracles, when in reality there is a logical explanation, we simply aren’t aware of it. This reasoning, whist wildly contrived, puts our minds at ease providing an acceptable explanation, even if that explanation itself is illogical.

This may explain why people are inclined to believe in God even though there is no evidence of his existence. It may also explain why people are inclined to believe that our dreams are spiritual and prophetic even though we have thousands of dreams each year which have no meaning whatsoever. It could explain why some of our most coincidental actions are perceived as inspired and intuitive, and why so many people can be impressed and dazzled by the magicians illusions and tricks.

Having said that, the power of human imagination provides us with a means of invention and problem solving that would otherwise never be explored. Many inventors and scientists throughout time have attributed their inventions or solutions to various problems, from things they had dreamed about.

Elias Howe, inventor of the sewing machine in 1884, dreamed he was surrounded by jungle tribesmen holding spears which had a hole in the head. It was this dream that inspired the way needles work in sowing machines.

Mary Shelly, got the idea for "Frankenstein," from a dream (shudder).

Jack Nicklaus claimed the success to his new golf club grip was discovered in a dream he had, significantly improving his golf game.

So it would seem that there is much to be gained through the process of dreaming, but be careful not to trust in them foolishly.