Hmmm...Frank, an admirable position, and clearly writ, too.

That last sentence is a doozy, though.

By "real", in this context, I assume you mean consistent with and measurable within the normal bounds of space and time, and repeatable in that framework so that any one repeaating the conditions will also get a repetitiion of the result as measured? That's good scientific protocol.

But when you start talking about the dynamics of thought itself, the continuum suddenly looks full of holes, and the core character of "real" versus "unreal" gets a lot mre nebulous. This is sometimes frustrating and grounds for washing your hands of the whole business because it is obviously imaginary.

But that is exactly the question. What are the laws, or at least patterns, behind the realm of imagination, intention, aspiration, and those non-tangible aspects of experience which seem to play so large a part in individual well-being?

The question also raises the issue of what is "legitimate", as you use the word, when applied to the unknown lands behind the ordinary material frame of operation?

Trying to reduce this entire spectrum of things down to purely functional and bio-mechanicaql elements does not seem to me to work very well. If these matters were understood there would be far more efficacious remedies, for example, for people like bitter young Cho of VT fame, because the workings (and restoration) of happiness and sanity would be accessible.

A