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23 September 2019 | Draft

Annexing the World as the Deal of the Century

Imaginative global transformation through full-spectrum dominance by MeToo

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Introduction
World making, diasporas and virtual communities
Dreaming rights and unsought dreams
Making things whole -- imaginatively?
Radical appropriation of otherness -- as "mining"
Annexing the world?
Engaging with aesthetic and design constraints
Engaging with constraints of the dealer
Living "outside-inside": embodying the dream
Designing and governing my world -- Heaven on Earth?
Through psychodrama to enantiodromia?
Engendering systemically viable narratives -- stories that work
Re-dreaming Israel and Palestine -- in my world?
References

Inspired by the proposal for a Deal of the Century regarding the challenge of Palestine-Israel and by Green New Deal initiatives

Introduction

Dreaming of a Deal: Through the proposal by the USA at a "Peace to Prosperity" workshop in Manama (Bahrein, June 2019), a degree of credibility has been given to a so-called Deal of the Century to resolve the iconic Israel-Palestine conflict (Kushner unveils economic part of 'deal of the century' Middle East peace plan, The Guardian, 22 June 2009; The "Deal of the Century"e; for Israel-Palestine: US proposals are likely to speed demise of two-state settlement, German Institute for International and Security Affairs, 20 April 2019; Palestine: the Arab 'deal of the century', Al Jazeera, 18 June 2019). Presented as the economic dimensions of the New Deal, the world awaits the promised political counterpart -- probably now to be understood as having been transformed into the annexation of portions of the Jordan Valley (Arab nations condemn Netanyahu's Jordan Valley annexation plan, BBC News, 11 September 2019; Netanyahu vows to annex all settlements, starting with Jordan Valley, Jerusalem Post, 11 September 2019).

As might be imagined, the original proposal was met with widespread scepticism (Trump's 'deal of the century' offers nothing good to Palestinians, Financial Times, 5 September 2018; Jared Kushner's 'deal of the century' fails to materialise in Bahrain, The Guardian, 26 June 2019; Sarah Saadoun The Gaping Hole in Jared Kushner's 'Peace Plan' Other News, 4 July 2019). It is claimed that it is designed to fail (Jonathan Cook Trump's Peace Plan Has Been Designed to Fail – Exactly Like its Predecessors, CounterPunch, 2 July 2019).

Arguably that proposal had been implicitly framed by the Project for the New American Century (PNAC, 1997-2006), whose strategic thinking was seemingly taken up by the Foreign Policy Initiative (2009-2017), and then embodied from 2017 in the thinking of the newly elected Donald Trump and his advisors. Significant to the following argument was the overriding electoral promise to the American people to Make America Great Again. However dubious to some, this could be recognized as a dream which proved especially attractive to electors, irrespective of its questionable deliverability (Dreamables, Deniables, Deliverables and Duende: global dynamics "at the table" inspired by dining and wining in practice, 2015). Leaders of other countries now offer analogous dreams in their discourse.

In contrast to the short-termism now prevailing in global decision-making, such purportedly long-term thinking is however consistent with the challenges of climate change and resource shortages in the decades to come (through 2050 and to the end of the century) -- when the majority of those alive today will be long dead. Hence the value of the Global Green New Deal initiative previously launched by UNEP, now a focus of proposals to save the planet (New Economics Foundation, A Green New Deal, 2008; Naomi Klein, On Fire: The Burning Case for a Green New Deal, 2019; Ann Pettifor, The Case for the Green New Deal, 2019).

Any proposal for such long-range thinking therefore invites imagination regarding the viability of a Deal of the Century -- unconstrained by the inadequacies of that currently on the table for Israel-Palestine. The following is an exploration of such a possibility -- with the implications for Israel-Palestine as a concluding footnote.

Multiplicity of dreams: Clearly Donald Trump has every right to articulate a dream inherently meaningful and attractive to the American people. This is consistent with the modality adopted by leaders of the past. Use of "dream" is of course evident with respect to the American dream, long presented as attractive to so many -- especially including refugees. This has been notably nuanced and enriched by the speech of Martin Luther King: I have a dream.

Advocates of any strategic initiative can claim the right to dream and to persuade others of their dream. Jared Kushner, as the son-in-law of Donald Trump is clearly free to do the same in the hope that Palestinians would be persuaded by it. In proposing it as a a deal, Kushner goes further, specifically in emulation of the deal-making lead propounded by Donald Trump as his mentor (Trump: The Art of the Deal, 1987).

Innovators and entrepreneurs may well be driven by a dream -- even a "childhood dream" -- and may explicitly make that claim. Processes of dreaming may be closely related to creativity, especially with respect to design. (Inventions that Came in Dreams; 12 Famous Dreams of Creativity and Inventions, Mind Power News).

Arguably there are many such dreams, with what are effectively associated deals, most notably those of the estimated 4,200 religions of the world. The many philosophies may also be considered as dreams to which people may subscribe -- especially when they take the form of political ideologies.

The following goes further in arguing that everyone indeed has the right to dream -- effectively a right consecrated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Less evident is the fact that everyone has the right to imagine themselves to be a Martin Luther King, a Jared Kushner, or a Donald Trump -- in framing a dream -- and embodying it in a Deal of the Century, to which all are free to subscribe. More subtle is the modality of Mahatma Gandhi, to "be the dream" -- namely through personal embodiment of it as expressed by the phrase Be the Change, widely attributed to him (however questionably).

Articulating a dream: The following is an articulation of such a dream. However the argument goes further in suggesting that people are free to recognize that dreaming is also a responsibility -- as in the elaboration of any Deal of their Century in the light of their dream. That responsibility could well feature in any proposed Universal Declaration of Responsibilities of Human Intercourse (2007). Succinctly phrased, the argument is that people have no obligation to "stick around" and "buy into" anyone else's dream. The Deal of the Century is to Go With One's Own Dream -- wherever it leads. Beyond the dream of "laying down a path in walking" (Francisco Varela, 1997), or of "laying down a path in talking" (Ludger van Dijk, 2016), there is the possibility of reimagining the universe in which one lives (Being the Universe: a metaphoric frontier, 1999).

The opportunity is all the more credible in that the proliferation of information of momentary significance is such that no one is listening to anyone -- except as briefly as possible, before moving quickly on to other points of attraction. In the political arena this is exemplified by the short-term focus on the news cycle as a desperate means of avoiding more challenging questions of long-term significance. Widespread consensus on strategic action therefore has little possibility of effective implementation, except as an exercise in tokenism for purposes of public relations. With the focus on the short-term, strategic initiatives as currently conceived necessarily also run the risk of unforeseen consequences of disastrous proportions.

Escapism? With space travel as a dramatically imaginative exemplification of escapism from the problems of this world, it can be argued that many are already travelling "to the stars" as they imagine them to be -- and by various means -- leaving little trace, except perhaps a twinkle in the night sky. In fulfilment of their dream, those rightfully travelling the universe in this way can be imaginatively compared to people in space-time vehicles of various dimensions -- single-seater, family-size, bus-size, cruise-ship-size, or larger -- each having only the most constrained communications with those travelling elsewhere and otherwise, readily to be considered meaningless and irrelevant. Expectation of consensus is then as probable as comprehension of the universe -- as comprehension is currently understood (The Consensus Delusion: mysterious attractor undermining global civilization as currently imagined, 2011).

Dream time? Is there a curious sense in which humanity is entering a new form of mythical Dreamtime, as collectively cultivated by indigenous Australians in terms of what is named and articulated in their contemporary art as the Dreaming? The widely disseminated statement by the iconic climate change activist to world leaders at the United Nations included the accusation: You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words (Greta Thunberg to U.N. climate summit: 'you have stolen my dreams', Reuters, 22 September 2019 -- video).

Does everyone have the right to engage in "global hegemony", as previously argued (Embodying Global Hegemony through a Sustaining Pattern of Discourse: cognitive challenge of dominion over all one surveys, 2015)?

A form of dreaming may be framed as significant to envisioning the future, as exercises in collective imagination (Kenny Ausubel, Dreaming the Future: reimagining civilization in the Age of Nature, 2012). Such imagination may well be enabled by predictive and divinatory processes (Clifford A. Pickover, Dreaming the Future: the fantastic story of prediction, 2001). The widely recognized influence of science fiction can be understood in such terms (Hilary Rose, Dreaming the Future, Hypatia, 3, 1988, 1, pp. 119-137). Crist Iman cites Jonathan Ledgard to the effect that Imagination At Scale Is Our Only Recourse (La Paz Group, 17 September 2019; Ben Taub, Jonathan Ledgard Believes Imagination Could Save the World, The New Yorker, 18 September 2019). Within the same discourse a fundamenal question has been asked by Jonathan Franzen (What If We Stopped Petending the Climate Apocalypse Can Be Stopped?, The New Yorker, 8 September 2019). Is that pretence a dream in its own right -- meriting attention as such -- in a society as prone to hope-mongering as to doom-mongering?

Necessarily more familiar is use of "dream" by individuals with respect to their own future and what they hope to be and to achieve in their life. This may take extremely intimate forms through the dreams during sleep deemed significant by individuals and as a focus of interpretation by psychotherapists and psychoanalysts as enabling their development. A recent framing of this process is that of Steven M. Rosen (Dreams, Death, Rebirth: a topological odyssey into alchemy's hidden dimensions, 2014).

For many the nature of heaven, and the possibility of experiencing it as a feature of an afterlife, may constitute the ultimate dream. The question explored here is the possibility of new narratives which are appropriately engaging -- and which individuals can develop for themselves, independently of those which external authorities may seek to impose. Arguably everyone is free to imagine their world otherwise, whether or not they seek approval from others. Such freedom can of course be understood as encouraging a form of madness. However in a world now widely perceived as "going mad", and governed by "mad men", many have variously argued that sanity can be otherwise understood:

Jean-Jacques Rousseau: To be sane in a world of madman is in itself madness
Akira Kurosawa: In a mad world, only the mad are sane
Sherwin Wine: Staying Sane in a Crazy World (Center for New Thinking, 1995)
Niels Bohr (to Wolfgang Pauli): Your theory is crazy, but it's not crazy enough to be true.
Richard Feynman: I thought one should have the attitude of 'What do you care what other people think'!
Roy H. Williams: Are You Sufficiently Ridiculous? To accomplish the miraculous you must attempt the ridiculous. Before you attempt the ridiculous you must announce it to the world. If you don't have the courage to announce it, you must at least whisper it in the dark. Because it must be spoken. You've got to hear yourself say it. And then you've got to take action. (Monday Morning Memo, 9 February 2015)

World making, diasporas and virtual communities

World making: This theme has been variously explored:

The latter notably has sections on The Bonds that Make a World, on Framing a World, and on the Coexistence of Several Worlds, including the following:

Christoph Schaub (Re-Imagining the World in an Era of Globalization: Christoph Ransmayr's Atlas eines ängstlichen Mannes, Monatshefte, 110, 2018, 1) This article analyzes literary world-making in Christoph Ransmayr's Atlas eines ängstlichen Mannes against the background of current debates about globalization and from a planetary studies perspective.

Territorial disputes enabling or disrupting world making: The coherence of any world is clearly disrupted by territorial disputes -- most obvious between countries (List of territorial disputes, Wikipedia). The latter distinguishes between:

The latter case, as currently evident in the Arctic, anticipates the probability of territorial disputes in outerspace, most obviously on the Moon and Mars. Seemingly less evident are the disputes regarding territory to be considered virtual in some respects. These include intellectual property, cultural property, electromagnetic bandwidth and space orbits -- all variously subject to regulation by authorities.

The hundreds of such disputes, and their variety, usefully reframe any preoccupation with one in particular (such as Israel-Palestine) -- as indicated by that of China-Taiwan, Jammu-Kashmir, Falklands-Argentine, and the like.

Diasporas: Especially noteworthy in this regard is the massive dispersion of populations whose identity is subsequently associated to some degree with their geographical origin. Recognized as diasporas, it is then any nostalgic sense of relation to a "homeland" -- a powerful dream of a kind -- which may frame individual identity to some degree (List of diasporas, Wikipedia). Major examples include:

The curious feature of diasporas is the ability of their members to frame and cultivate a very particular bond with their place of origin. To whatever degree it is fundamental to their identity, no one else needs to know -- although that bond may be celebrated collectively anywhere in the world, however remote. Thus in the most southerly part of New Zealand, the bond with Scotland is especially celebrated in places named to reinforce that bond: Invercargill, Dunedin, etc.

More curious is the degree to which diasporas tend to be ignored by their country of origin -- at least with respect to any formal notion of citizenship, or any rights with respect to the "homeland" -- even visiting rights. There is no question of soliciting the views of those who identify with a distant country for their views on its future -- as in the case of the possible independence of Scotland, for example. This formal detachment from a diaspora may however be disguised by the cultivation of cultural relations under certain conditions.

A notable exception is indicated by the solicitation by the Turkish government, of the Turkish diaspora of 2.5-4 million in Germany, to participate as recognized members of the Turkish electorate (Turkey election: expats play decisive role in Erdogan vote, BBC News, 21 June 2018). Other countries may enable postal voting of those who are resident elsewhere under various formulas (Right of expatriates to vote in their country of origin, Wikipedia). As of 2006, 93 countries allowed their expatriate citizens to vote: 21 African countries, 13 countries in the Americas, 15 Asian countries, 6 Pacific countries, and 36 European countries. The important distinction is that "expatriates" retain some formal relation to the country of origin, possibly dual citizenship, whereas a diaspora includes those who have no such formal relationship. Having a birth certificate from that country may however constitute such a relationship -- whereas having parents (or earlier generations) born in the country typically does not.

More problematic is the degree to which countries may formally define the identity of an individual in terms of their country of origin, irrespective of their being part of its diaspora. This is especially evident in the case of the USA and its unique approach to the taxation of individuals having being born in that country (Why expat Americans are giving up their passports, BBC News, 9 February 2019). Such questions are rendered more complex in the case of countries which no longer exist, of forced resettlement, or of being born on vessels or on military bases elsewhere (for which very particular rules may apply). Some indeed become "stateless" as a result of administrative rulings and unforeseen circumstances. Others may acquire dual nationality, multiple passports, or rights of residence away from their country of origin.

Artificial world construction: There is extensive interest in the design and construction of artificial worlds. The theme is a feature of science fiction -- beyond the preoccupation of the natural sciences with terra-forming (Evan Raskob, Science Fiction and Design as World-Making, ArtificiallyIntelligent).

Of related interest is the design and construction of virtual worlds through computer simulation. These may be conceived as habitats for collective interaction (as with Second Life) or as environments for multiplayer online gaming.

Intentional communities: Another aspect is evident in the design and intentional communities -- effectively worlds unto themselves -- exemplified by the tradition of monastic style environments and the current network of ecovillages.

Groups on social media may be understood as "worlds" -- if not "bubbles". This reflects use of the latter term through the metaphor of a filter bubble (Eli Pariser, The Filter Bubble: what the internet is hiding from you, 2011; Engin Bozdag and Jeroen van den Hoven, Breaking the filter bubble: democracy and design. Ethics and Information Technology. 17, 2015 4). It is however also the case that each such bubble effectively designs out communications from other sources -- communications threatening to the coherence of that world. The bubble metaphor may also be usefully explored as indicative of complacency (Pricking the Bubble of Global Complacent Complicity: hyperdimensional insights from the physics of bubble blowing, bursting and collapse? 2017).

Language use as framing a world: There is considerable concern with enabling language use as a means of sustaining cultural identity. This extends to concern regarding endangered languages and loss of the associated world view.

Of related interest is the deliberate construction of artificial languages -- effectively creating a world within which people may interact. Some, such as Esperanto, have been designed in the expectation that they might constitute a world language. The proliferation of mutually incomprehensible specialized jargons associated with the multipicity of disciplines can be recognized as a form of world building.

Virtual contacts and virtual friends: Clearly the social media environment engenders and enables an extensive pattern of virtual contacts -- friends of a kind. This is an extension of a process pre-dating such development (Diana Crane, Invisible Colleges: diffusion of knowledge in scientific communities, 1972). Quite distinct, but of some relevance is the extensive study of the phenomenon of "imaginary friends" whereby a friendship or other interpersonal relationship takes place in the imagination -- even in a dram -- rather than as an external physical reality (M. Taylor, Imaginary Companions and the Children Who Create Them, 1999). Also of relevance is the widespread recognition of spirit guides variously understood.

Model-making and hypotheses as "world-making": An obvious connotation of world-making is the manner in which construction of a conceptual model or hypothesis can constitute a world -- one which the like-minded may share and effectively "inhabit". A belief system can be understood in this light. Engagement with that world may be cultivated through creating an organization for that purpose -- or simply through the organization of occasional or periodic meetings. Such contexts may call conventional assumptions into question in a quite unconventional and radical manner. This may be held to justify the confidentiality of such contexts -- even the secret of their existence or of the nature of the world which is cultivated. Clearly many cults may be understood from this perspective.

Dreaming rights and unsought dreams

Varieties of dream and dreaming: Clearly extensive reference to "dreams" focuses on those emerging in the course of sleep -- as "dreaming". Such dreams, whether welcome or unsought have long been appreciated as a source of insight (Christopher L. Edwards, et al., Dreaming and Insight, Frontiers in Psychology, 4, 2013). Such insight may be of a quite radical nature, whether valued or a source of deep concern (S. D. Chrostowska (Trajectory of a Dream, The Hedgehog Review, 21, 2019, 2). Such dreams can be readily recognized as metaphors through which events of daily life are reframed (J. S. Antrobus, The Dream as Metaphor: an information-processing and learning model. Journal of Mental Imagery, 1, 1977, 2). Much attention has been given to the interpretation of dreams, whether by psychoanalysts or otherwise -- notably when framed as "dreamwork".

"Dream" may however also be used as a metaphor, as in the references above to "having a dream". This is a recognized feature of innovation and leadership (Shane Cubis, The Importance of Having a Dream, The CEO Magazine, 6 August 2018; Jean-Marc Emden, No Longer a Pipe Dream: innovation in dreaming tech allows us inside our heads, Wired, October 2014). People and groups are recognized as being "driven by a dream" or "pursuing dream" (Troy Borden, You Gotta Have a Dream!: a complete guide to pursuing the dream that will enable you to achieve your destiny, 2009; André Cox, Pursuing the Dream, The Salvation Army, 13 February 2014; Driven by a Dream, Global Christian Center). The metaphor is central to the American Dream and to the dream of many migrants seeking a better life elsewhere (William A. Schwab and G. David Gearhart, Right to Dream: immigration reform and America's future, 2013).

The "right to dream" is variously promoted (Eduardo Galeano, The Right to Dream, New Internationalist, 13 April 2015; Jean-Louis Lamboray, The Universal Declaration ?on the Right to Dream, The Constellation; Voices from the World Social Forum: For the Right to Dream!, Entreculturas, 23 February 2009) -- as well as with respect to football by the Right to Dream Academy. It has been succinctly clarified by Chiara Condi (The Right to Dream and the Right Dream, The Huffington Post, 30 November 2016):

We are all born with an equal capacity for dreaming, which ensures that when we are children we all grow up wanting to be something we will probably never become. With time our interactions with our parents, our environment and our own confrontations with reality redefine, or rather fine-tune our dreams. Our imagination loses flexibility, as we become what our world wants us to become. While this process forces some individuals to adapt their dreams to follow the conventions imposed by society, others find themselves deprived entirely of the ability to dream. Slowly life circumstances begin to define people's identities in their own eyes and in the eyes of those around them, creating a new definition for them of what is possible. As a result some people continue dreaming, only they dream in a different direction, while others stop entirely. In the process they lose freedom and choice over their own lives.

Incorporating otherness: As implied above, much is made of the Right to Dream. The question is the form and nature of any such dream -- and how to embody it, namely how to Live the Dream in whatever manner proves fulfilling. The peculiar mystery of that mode is how others are incorporated into the dream -- from the perspective of the dreamer. This avoids any implication that others need even to "exist" or to be aware of how they are imagined to feature in the dream. The modality has the further advantage that otherness more generally -- whatever is otherwise held to be external reality -- can also feature imaginatively in such a dream. Such incorporation of otherness is necessarily subject to constraints -- as experienced by an artist in moulding recalcitrant materials at hand -- namely potentially a challenge to the creative imagination.

The New Deal of the Century then lends itself to being imagined -- constrained only by creativity in response to whatever is recognized as having been "dealt" -- as a "hand" of cards. In this sense individually, if not collectively, what are otherwise assumed to be the rigid realities of the times can be moulded and interpreted however one wills. Every individual can then imagine themselves to be at the nexus of a process whereby they have been dealt a hand -- a set of "cards" -- enabling them to engage in a game whose nature and rules they are free to imagine or discover, to the extent they find that meaningful.

Questionable externalities: The novelty of this deal -- as a "New Deal" -- derives from the context of the times in which the rigidities of what have been too readily assumed (and declared) to be externalities have all been called into question. Authorities of every kind have been shown to have feet of clay, with many of the most eminent indicted for behaviour in dramatic contradiction with their declared role -- with few surprises in that regard, most notably the recognition that any such accusations will be denied, leading to impunity even if substantiated .

Fake news, in one form or another, has taken precedence over what could otherwise be considered unquestionable (Varieties of Fake News and Misrepresentation: when are deception, pretence and cover-up acceptable? 2019). How is advertising, and claims in that regard, to be distinguished from fake news? Clearly advertisers give themselves a right to dream -- and to offer the possibility of dreaming to consumers of their products. Ironically even the rigidly defined height of mountains is called into question by rising sea levels -- thereby causing the mountains effectively to sink.

Most obvious is the manner in which every collectivity defines itself to be right and, in the light of that righteousness, is justified in framing those who fail to subscribe to that perspective as being necessarily wrong. Most obvious at the time of writing is the respective righteousness and lack of doubt characterized by the G7 gathering and the simultaneous Anti-G7 conference (Anti-capitalist campaigners host 'G7 Alternative' in France's Basque Country, RFI, 22 August 2019; Arrests and injuries as anti-G7 protesters clash with French police, RFI, 24 August 2019). This is the same dynamic as that between the World Economic Forum and the World Social Forum (All Blacks of Davos vs All Greens of Porto Alegre: reframing global strategic discord through polyphony? 2007).

None now have the authority to call that process into question, other than through defining themselves to be right -- thereby becoming indistinguishable from others making such a claim, irrespective of any contradictions. The pattern is exemplified by leaders such as Donald Trump. The ability to propound any view more widely and forcefully is significant only to the extent that others are listening -- choosing to listen -- rather than being deeply absorbed in their own dream. The novelty of the New Deal then derives primarily from the innovative reframing in which those exposed to such externalities can engage in the moment.

Engaging otherwise with time: Framed as the deal "of the Century", this opportunity invites creativity as to the manner in which the engagement with time can itself be imagined otherwise -- whatever time can be imagined to be. Rather than the linearity of calendar time (in a 100-year context), characteristic of deals as normally proposed and made, the question is how the individual imagines being as an identity in the present moment and in whatever is understood to be the flow of time. Some may draw on imagination of an after-life and reincarnation. Others can frame themselves as time travellers -- for which science fiction continues to frame possibilities.

Aesthetics of various kinds offer other modes of engaging with time -- music, poetry, dance. Such possibilities call into question the box-like framing offered by spaceships, suggesting that the nature of timeships merits exploration (Embodying a Timeship vs. Empowering a Spaceship, 2003; Timeship: conception, technology, design, embodiment and operation, 2003). The unresolved mysteries of time are evident in the fantastic speculation in which astrophysicists and cosmologists already have a mandate to indulge -- constrained only by disciplines of their own imagining.

It has been recognized that individuals frame their lives through metaphor (George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Metaphors We Live By, 1980). Everyone is however also faced in some manner with death. The question is with what imagination this equally mysterious reality -- if such it is -- is then fruitfully reframed, as can be variously explored (Metaphors To Die By: correspondences between a collapsing civilization, culture or group, and a dying person, 2013). Online gaming notably offers its own simulation of death and reincarnation.

Any sense "of the Century", whose conventional end few will normally experience, can then be imagined in non-linear terms -- circular or otherwise. There are of course documented accounts of experiencing extensive time intensively, whether through revelation, sexual consummation, drugs, or the experience of nature ("Human Intercourse": "Intercourse with Nature" and "Intercourse with the Other", 2007). There is therefore every possibility of exploring contrasting senses of identity and locus (Global implications of "betwixt and between" and liminality, 2007). Examples are notably offered through the drama of identity politics and the empowerment to imagine oneself otherwise than society endeavours to oblige one to be.

Paradoxical nature of the dealer: Especially fundamental to this New Deal of the Century is imaginative recognition of who is proposing the deal -- namely who is to be recognized as the dealer. As implied by the argument to follow, the challenge is how the individual embodies both receiving the hand of cards that is dealt and recognizing the nature of the paradoxical personal implication in the role of dealing that same hand. This implies a strange form of mirroring clarified in other contexts by reference to the Mobius strip or the Klein bottle (Stepping into, or through, the Mirror: embodying alternative scenario patterns, 2008). Conventional understanding of the dealer as an externality is then reframed as a feature of the dream -- a figment of the imagination -- a shadowy form to be recognized through a strange form of mirroring.

Making things whole -- imaginatively?

Fragmentation: A major characteristic of the current times is the fragmentation across many domains. This is curiously matched by claims to the contrary from particular perspectives, whether of particular religions anticipating resolution through divine intervention, techno-optimists, positive movements of various flavours (New Age, etc), or the salvatory revolution anticipated in some political ideologies. For William Davies:

It's not about foreign trolls, filter bubbles or fake news. Technology encourages us to believe we can all have first-hand access to the 'real' facts – and now we can't stop fighting about it. (Why can't we agree on what's true any more? The Guardian, 19 September 2019)

Clearly both science and religion have variously demonstrated complete and total inadequacy in "making things whole" and framing a richer understanding of unity for which many appeals are made -- despite dubious claims to the contrary. The inadequacy of science is demonstrated by the deprecation of interdisciplinarity (or transdisciplinarity) in academia -- other than for token purposes of self-celebration. The need for any such integration is essentially unrecognized by disciplines committed to their particular cognitive modalities.

The same pattern is evident between religions and in the deprecation of interfaith initiatives -- other than for token purposes, again. This is exemplified by the total lack of investment of the Abrahamic religions in any effective resolution of their historic differences -- long a major driver of international conflict -- a pattern reflected in the relation between the denominations and sects of each of them.

Creative imagination: Both science and religion voice the need for imaginative "new thinking" to address this disarray -- without necessarily treating such appeals as other than exercises in tokenism by the few, unrepresentative of the many, The pattern is similarly evident in political discourse where there is a heavy investment in binary decision-making -- with a majority of 1% held to exemplify the "will of the people", irrespective of the degree of commitment to alternative perspectives. Curiously the implication is that any integrative perspective is a matter for the individual, unsanctioned (if not deprecated) by the collective.

The role of the imagination, and the calls for it, have been widely recognized:

There is an intriguing pattern of appreciation of imagination through the role of angel investors in support of innovative dreams whether in business or the arts.

Having a dream: What scope is there for the individual to "make things whole" -- and for whom? Expressed otherwise, what are the constraints on any individual engaging in this process -- as a personal act of imaginative creativity? To what extent does any such creativity need to be communicated to "others" -- especially given that otherness may be refamed by the creative process such that any communication of that kind is unnecessary, if not impossible? To what extent is there a requirement for "peer review" -- justified from what perspective? Those promoting the peer review process at this time would have the greatest difficulty in establishing its contribution to "making things whole".

More recently Johan Galtung has echoed use of the dream metaphor:

I have a dream. Like an American from Atlanta, Georgia, MLK Jr. Imagine West and Islam focusing not on the worst, like Western violence for prevention and Islamic for retribution, but on the best. Like the capacity for innovation and freedom in the West, togetherness and sharing in Islam. Imagine them dialoguing publicly at a high level "how can we learn from each other"? (Violence In and By Paris: Any Way Out? Transcend Media Service, 23 November 2015)

In conflict-torn societies, "peace" may indeed be readily framed by many in terms of an especially desirable dream. Conflict is then to be understood as a "bad dream". World peace is frequently the focus of collective aspiration, notably articulated in cultural events designed to enable that dream and give it credence.

What is the "cognitive twist" which enables the individual to take personal responsibility for this disarray and to imagine coherence otherwise -- if that is meaningful -- through framing "outside" as "inside"? How does one see the set of disciplines as a knowledge ecosystem -- with whatever degree of complexity is appropriate? How does that approach apply to the array of religions -- taking account of the criticism of syncretism, for example? How might an ecosystem of religions be understood -- given the arguments for exclusivism and the perceptions of blasphemy? What imaginative capacity is there to interweave the quarrelsome arguments of contrasting political ideologies, without the faintest desire for any form of unity, other than on their own terms?

Given the challenge to comprehension of unity in any sphere, there is a case for recognizing otherwise the role of diversity -- as exemplified by natural ecosystems. Unity, to the extent it exists, is then transcendental and beyond the scope of conventional definition and comprehension. Again, as exemplified in nature, such "unity" may call for comprehension in systemically dynamic terms rather than in conventional static terms. Alien to the disciplines rejoicing in their fragmentation, such comprehension may be facilitated by aesthetics, as exemplified by music, song and dance -- by movement (Maxine Sheets-Johnstone, The Primacy of Movement, 2011; Mark Johnson, The Meaning of the Body: aesthetics of human understanding, 2007).

How are the fragments to which one is exposed to be conscripted into a larger aesthetic form -- of appropriately epic form for example? Can such a magnum opus frame the "voices", "actors" or "instruments" with suitable "orchestration"? Is that what Shakespeare did?

The question is given particular form in that there is neither insight nor curiosity as to the dialogue at the Last Supper or at the archetypal Arthurian Round table created in emulation of it. What do the 12-fold set of deities of Greece and Rome have to say to each other -- especially at the prospect of their declining civilizations? For an individual, are these to be understood as sub-personalities or functions whose integration is the challenged framed by some schools of psychoanalysis?

More intriguing is the extent in which the iconic personalities, so frequently framed by the media, are the contemporary analogues to such pantheons of the past. How to integrate Trump, Johnson, Putin, Bolsonaro, Duterte, Netanyahu, MBS, and the like -- each with their dreams -- as configured at the G20 or at the G7? What to make of movements such as Christian fundamentalists, Zionists, the Taliban, radical nationalist?

Dream marketing and dream theft: The passionate declaration to the UN Climate Summit (as cited above), highlights the challenge of "dream stealing" and "dream theft": You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words (Greta Thunberg to U.N. climate summit: 'you have stolen my dreams', Reuters, 22 September 2019 -- video). Clearly there is an argument for exploring many dream-inspired strategic initiatives in this light -- especially when the consequence is the contrary of that suggested by the dream, as argued with respect to Christianity, Communism, and the like. Are Israel and Palestine to be recognized as having stolen each others dreams?

Marketing, whether at its best or at its worst, may be understood as the creatively persuasive dissemination of dreams. The focus is on ensuring that people "buy into" a particular dream -- possibly recognized as propaganda and misrepresented in the form of fake news. Many can be recognized as "selling dreams" in the hope of pesuading others to "buy" them. Many face the challenge of being "sucked into" the dream of someone else -- denying the greater significance of their own, thereby "crushed". This perspetive calls for rethinking of "purchasing power" as it may relate to buuing into a dream.

Radical appropriation of otherness -- as "mining"

Possessing otherness: Through the conventional degree of objectification and reification, otherness necessarily takes the form of an object. The latter may be perceived as a threat to be dominated in some way or as an opportunity to be exploited, if it cannot be acquired. The history of colonization has followed this pattern. Otherness claimed by others as their property, intellectual or otherwise, is an invitation to encroachment in various forms (Varieties of Encroachment, 2004). Current patterns of exploitation are exemplified by "mining" -- ironically recognizable as a "process of making mine". The renewed space race can be readily understood in such terms.

The process extends to extremes of possessiveness in relation to intellectual property and human relationships. Arguably cognitive modalities such as religion and science can be seen as endeavouring to "grasp" and appropriate reality in a manner consistent with that pattern (Beyond Harassment of Reality and Grasping Future Possibilities: learnings from sexual harassment as a metaphor, 1996; World-making and possession of property, 2012). Ironically religions can each be seen as highly possessive of "their divinity" -- with little ability to dissociate that exclusive pattern from the transcendent subtlety they would vigorously claim to attribute to any such universal entity. Their righteousness in that respect is necessarily beyond question. The pattern is echoed in the incarceration of knowledge under copyright, most notably by corporations -- hopefully to hold the world to ransom for any use thereof, however desperate the need.

Such possessiveness is intimately related to the assertion of identity, potentially to be understood as a "frame of reference" -- recalling the sophistication with which this is understood by physics ((Einstein's Implicit Theory of Relativity -- of Cognitive Property? Unexamined influence of patenting procedures, 2007).

Naming and claiming: The process of naming is of course a subtle means of  establishing a claim to a degree of possession of an identity associated with a distant form -- currently exemplified by the attribution of names to distant objects in space, "marking" them in ways only too reminiscent of the behaviour of dogs in their environment. Clearly every identity is potentially free to name the features visible from its own worldview, without subscribing to those attributed by others.

This recalls the process of psychosocial appropriation of a space at the collective level described as land nam, a term coined by Ananda Coomaraswamy to refer to the Icelandic tradition of claiming ownership of uninhabited spaces through weaving together a metaphor of geography of place into a unique mythic story (The Rg Veda as Land-Nama Book, 1935). This territorial appropriation process, notably practiced by the Navaho and the Vedic Aryans, was further described by Joseph Campbell (The Inner Reaches of Outer Space: metaphor as myth and religion, 2002):

Land nam ("land claiming or taking") was [the Norse] technical term for this way of sanctifying a region, converting it thereby into an at once psychologically and metaphysical Holy Land.... Land nam, mythologization, has been the universally practiced method to bring this intelligible kingdom to view in the mind's eye. The Promised Land, therefore, is any landscape recognized as mythologically transparent, and the method of acquisition of such territory is not by prosaic physical action, but poetically, by intelligence and the method of art; so that the human being should be dwelling in the two worlds simultaneously of the illuminated moon and the illuminating sun.

Colonization has typically seen the replacement of traditional names by those of the colonizing culture -- as well as the language which engendered them. There is a strange sense in which this recalls the digestive function of the colon in appropriately extracting nourishment from otherness by its consumption. Should the behaviour of hypothetical extraterrestrials be expected to be otherwise (Writing Guidelines for Future Occupation of Earth by Extraterrestrials -- Be done by as you did ? 2010). The reaction of ET to the naming of objects in the universe with which humans have only indirect experience, will be instructive for all.

Appropriation through language: In this light, there is clearly every possibility to reframe and rename the world as experienced -- even to the point of inventing a language through which to articulate reality as imagined. The variety of constructed languages points to this possibility, as does enthusiasm for recovering the experience of languages in danger of extinction. Some, such as Leonardo da Vinci, have chosen to invent languages or modes of writing.

The threat to dominant world views of minority languages serves to clarify the argument further. Typically colonizing powers, with the complicity of state religions, have sought to repress use of such languages, often by the most violent means -- even in living memory. Thinking "otherwise" tends to be framed as highly problematic. This pattern is reflected in the hostile response to the imagination of socio-political "alternatives", exemplified by the slogan of Margaret Thatcher: There Is No Alternative (Considering All the Strategic Options -- whilst ignoring alternatives and disclaiming cognitive protectionism, 2009).

Radical paradox and perversity: The pattern has been extended to encompass any creative approach which would otherwise be appreciatively framed as "radical" or noteworthy as being "extreme". Despite the obvious ambiguity, thinking radically, or behaving in an extreme manner, is increasingly conflated with terrorism as a fundamental threat to society (Radical Innovators Beware -- in the arts, sciences and philosophy, 2016).

There is a curious perversity to the characterization of what is most valued, namely "creativity", with what is most deprecated, namely "terrorism", by use of the same qualifier -- "radical". This perversity extends to the criminalization of radicalization, without addressing this conflation of understanding, its exploitation and the manner in which both are associated with possessive reframing -- "mining".

Similarly perverse is the uncritical effort to possess the world by capturing it through photography -- associated with a desperate quest for the idyllic places to be grasped and held in this way. That the quality sought is rapidly eroded by that process, and the many engaging in it, is not considered. It bears comparison with rape -- especially gang rape. Potentially caricatured as "vaginal tourism", this recalls the extent to which a very significant proportion of tourism is inspired by sexual opportunity -- recognized as sex tourism -- but divorced from any responsibility for consequences.

Possession by "aliens": The above-mentioned hypothetical engagement of extraterrestrials with humans invites comparison with regard to their comprehension of possession, whether of Earth as a whole but more specifically in their interaction with humans (as variously envisaged in fiction). This could exceed by far the preoccupation of MeToo and others, especially if the motivation of ETs proved to be primarily psychological and unfathomable -- as characterized to a degree in urban jargon by "mind-fucking". The skilled cultivation of narrative for political and commercial purposes anticipates such a possibility -- whether or not it is deprecated as cultural violence -- if not spiritual violence.

The desperate quest for alien life is especially ironic given the immense difficulty of engaging with humans on the planet who are readily defined as "aliens"(ironically including teenagers) -- whether or not they could be appropriately considered to be "terrestrial extras". The cognitive challenge is then more generically understood as encompassing the alien in whatever form -- anticipated to a degree by the incorporation of monstrous entities into fictional drama and online video gaming. The ability to create avatars with alien characteristics can be seen as anticipating the wider capacity to "makeover" the world as imagined -- a capacity to which individuals already have access in "reinventing" themselves. This can be extended to identification with ETs -- and joining a wider galaxy of life, however imagined.

Annexing the world?

Whose world is it? The arguments above frame the question as to whose world it is -- as I experience it. In a very real sense it is "my world" with whose reality I am confronted, unless I imagine it otherwise or accept the claims of others unquestionably. Nation states variously lay claim to it -- whatever their disputes. Some extend this notion through claims to spheres of influence. However others clearly also lay claim to it in some measure and in a variety of other ways. These include religions, organized crime, multinational corporations, and diasporas -- notably framing their claims via the media.

The extensive pattern of US military bases across a 70 countries (or more) is indicative of another form of possession, as with the pattern of surveillance satellites and the recent reactivation of a US Space Force and the Russian Space Forces. (David Vine, Where in the World Is the U.S. Military? Politico, July/August 2015). These are consistent with aspirations to full-spectrum dominance -- seemingly a formal commitment to dominating the world by 2020 in the case of the US (T. J. Coles, Countdown to "Full Spectrum Dominance"e;, CounterPunch, 20 March 2019).

Some would argue that the world is that of their preferred deity -- God's world, for example -- in the light of scriptures of particular religions justifying their own claims in that regard as a specific mandate from deity, namely a form of divine right. Others again would see it as otherwise "possessed" -- independent of humanity, exemplified by the Gaia hypothesis.

Hypothetically, given recent military confirmation of UFO sightings, it could be imagined that Earth is a "possession" of extraterrestrials in a larger context (UFOs Are Real -- and You Were Never Supposed to See Them, Military Official Says, LiveScience, 18 September 2019; Those UFO videos are real, the Navy says, but please stop saying 'UFO', The Washington Post, 18 September 2019). Is there then a sense, from a larger perspective which the future may come to acknowledge, that all are free to understand the world as Terra Nullius?

In such a complex context, I am free to imagine that "my world" has been variously colonised (largely due to both my ignorance and negligence) and that, according to that metaphor, I am free to endeavour to reappropriate it, however I consider that to be meaningful. I can then frame other claimants as having variously encroached upon "my world" (Varieties of Encroachment, 2004).

Forms of "annexation" through connectivity: From the perspective of international law, annexation is an illegal act, typically as a consequence of military occupation. The concern here is with how I may empower myself to annex the world, however that is understood as meaningful. As suggested by the varieties of encroachment, annexation can be understood in more subtle terms which do not interfere with the preoccupations of other claimants.

A clue to such possibilities is through connectivity, namely extending a pattern of connections such as to form a richer and more meaningful "pattern that connects" -- according to the insight of Gregory Bateson, as discussed separately (Enactivating "the pattern that connects", 2006; Hyperspace Clues to the Psychology of the Pattern that Connects, 2003). Arguably this process should be exemplified by the increasing connectivity of science or religion, separately or together. Neither offers especially fruitful clues in this respect, following the failure of initiatives towards the "unity of science" through interdisciplinary discourse, or the continuing problematic relations between religions following the many efforts at interfaith discourse.

A more obvious clue is offered by the connectivity engendered by intergovernmental organizations, as visually illustrated by the seating arrangements of their plenary assemblies.

Contrasting caricatures of "harmonization" in governance?
Reproduced from Governing Civilization through Civilizing Governance: global challenge for a turbulent future (2008)
Pope addressing European Parliament Caricature of EU non-Constitutional Reform Treaty Eurovision Song Contest Winner
European Parliament hemicycle (EP-012763 EU anthem (Beethoven's Ode to Joy) Eurovision Song Contest Winner (Athens, 2006)

Combining Fibonacci spirals cccc (Adaptive Hypercycle of Sustainable Psychosocial Self-organization, 2010) ***

Schematic representation of hemicycle of plenary assembly Superimposition of "clockwise" and
"counter-clockwise" rotation		 Typical graphic rendering of Fibonacci pattern,
notably found in the sunflower seed arrangement
Indication of composition of the European Parliament Superimposition of clockwise and counter-clockwise spirals Superimposition of clockwise and counter-clockwise spirals in a Fibonacci pattern
     

Any possible extension of the seats of representation indicated in the image (above left) raises fundamental questions about the degree of connectivity both with any nexus of integration and between the seats in support of that process. It is somewhat ironic to note that the second bears some similarity to the most efficacious distribution of florets on a sunflower. As variously studied the latter, follows a Fibonacci pattern as depicted in the central image and that on the right.

In systemic terms the fundamental question is how increasing number of cognitive perspectives ("seats") can be positioned to optimize the requisite communication -- noting that the pattern of the European Parliament could be considered far from exemplifying the principles of democracy and representativity -- however this is compensated by electronic communications (potentially inspired by the same pattern).

"Global annexation": The challenge is all the greater as the number of perspectives to be assembled increases, as might be imagined with various proposals for more democratic representation through a peoples' assembly, possibly as an extension to the UN General Assembly (For a Global Peoples' Assembly, Global Policy Forum, 14 November 1997; Launching the Global Peoples' Assembly, Unity and Diversity World Council, 23 April 2019; International Peoples' Assembly inaugurated in Caracas, 26 February 2019). However, with respect to any argument for "annexation", the problem can be imagined otherwise with respect to any implication of global integration -- appropriate configuration of all the locations and perspectives of the world, whatever that could most appropriately involve. Spherical allocation of seats has been imagined and depicted in science fiction -- notably employing virtual reality. Somewhat ironically, the issue is potentially evident in comprehension of the global distribution of US military bases.

It is intriguing to note that the criterion of equal distribution -- exemplifying one aspect of distribution -- is explored as a spherical extension of the Fibonacci pattern. The question of how to distribute points on the surface of a sphere as evenly as possibly is an extremely important problem in mathematics, science and computing:

Of some relevance to global cognitive "annexation" is the possible organization on a geodesic sphere, This is an approach extensively developed by Buckninster Fuller with respect to the global distribution of resources (Synergetics: Explorations in the Geometry of Thinking, 1975/1979), as illustrated below. However, as discussed separately, his arguments did not extend -- as they might have done -- to any understanding of "democratic communication resources" in cognitive terms (Geometry of Thinking for Sustainable Global Governance: cognitive implication of synergetics, 2009).

As a simple exercise in representation on a sphere, the images below left were produced, with an animation of phases in various morphing methods between the geodesic polyhedron and its dual. An equivalent torus was created from it in the images on the right (as discussed below).

12-frequency geodesic icosahedron Animations of morphing between torus and dual
(1442 vertices) Animation of phases in various morphing methods between polyhedron and its dual Solid variant Wireframe variant
12-frequency geodesic icosahedron Phases in morphing of 12-frequency geodesic icosahedron Animation of morphing between torus and dual Animation of morphing between torus and dual
Images and animations created with Stella Polyhedron Navigator

Appropriate geometry for governance (through connectivity and "annexation"): There is continuing reflection on the possible need for "variable geometry" in the organization of governance, notably that of Europe (Experimental Visualization of Dynamics of the European Parliament in 3D, 2019). Given the simplicity of seating arranagements in plenary assemblies -- and their inadequacy for global challenges -- it could then be asked what "geometry" would be more consistent with what are otherwise upheld as democratic principles of appropriate communication, and of any understanding of "global annexation". How is the nature of more appropriate "containers" for governance to be understood?

There is the probability that distribution on a sphere fails to responds to another criterion of appropriate representativity -- potentially better explored through the torus and toroidal polyhedra, as argued separately (Coherent mapping possibilities on the simplest torus? 2019; Imagining Toroidal Life as a Sustainable Alternative: from globalization to toroidization or back to flatland? 2019). One valuable indication of this possibility is offered by the proposal by Sabrina Presti for a Torus Governance Network (P2PWiki, 2015; Torus Network: evolución social humana basada en tecnología y geometría, 2015). The animations (above right) are a preliminary exploration of the projection of a torus derived from the spherical representation -- illustrating the transformation between the toroidal form and its geometric dual through a particular morphing process. There are many possibilities related to torus duality (to be indicated in a future document). Noteworthy is its importance in theoretical physics through T-duality.

The following are then suggestive of potential relevance:

Why indeed is it so readily assumed that appropriate "global" governance is possible through 2D arrangements, when ungovernability may be guaranteed and reinforced by simplistic 2D forms of organization (Ungovernability of Sustainable Global Democracy? 2011). Provocatively, from a toroidal perspective, is a "global life" worth living?

Of relevance to that possibility is the complex organization of computer memory geometry through torus interconnect -- suggestive of challenging use of artificial intelligence to determine optimum organization of any "global brain" relevant to integrative future governance -- and the "annexation" of disparate elements (electors, issues. and the like).

Also of relevance is the dynamic implicit in "variable" geometry, to the extent that this is other than a step-wise shift between alternative configurations. In cognitive terms, "annexing" may then imply (and require) a more fluid process of alternation between different degrees and patterns of bonding, including the lack thereof, as can be argued with respect to development itself (Policy Alternation for Development, 1984). The transformation between global and toroidal organization is remarkably illustrated by the animation on the left below, recalling the seemingly improbable process of sphere eversion on the right, whose phases are separately depicted in that Wikipedia entry (Turning your World Inside Out, Space Symmetry Structure, 28 July 2007; José L. Ramírez and Gustavo N. Rubiano, A Generalization of the Spherical Inversion, International Journal of Mathematical Education in Science and Technology, 48, 2016, 1). As a visual metaphor, tThis suggests a very powerful way of engaging with annexation of the world.

Indicative transformations of a sphere
Ring torus becomes a horn torus, then a spindle torus, and finally degenerates into a sphere. Eversion of a sphere
(click for animation)
Animation of torus-sphere transformation Eversion of a sphere
User:Kieff [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons Adam Bednorz and Witold Bednorx (Analytic sphere eversion with minimum of topological events, 2017)

Higher dimensionality of annexation? Rather than assuming that cognitive "annexation" of the variety of global perspectives can be achieved in 3D (rather than 2D), there is a case for exploring the criteria for appropriate democratic annexation in higher dimensions (Luc Devroye and Linda Farczadi, Connectivity for line-of-sight networks in higher dimensions Discrete Mathematics and Theoretical Computer Science, 15, 2013, 2; Tomohiro Inoue, The 6D Mesh/Torus Interconnect of K Computer, Fujitsu, 2016, video; Yuichiro Ajima, The Tofu Interconnect D for Supercomputer Fugaku, Fujitsu, June 2019; K supercomputer). "Tofu" stands for "torus fusion".

The challenge of higher dimensionality is usefully illustrated by the circular animations below based on the hyperbolic plane (provocatively to be imagined as the red cross-section of the torus in the animation on the left above). The hyperbolic plane cannot be metrically represented in the flat Euclidean plane. Poincaré described ways that it can however be conformally represented in the Euclidean plane -- known as the Poincaré disk (see also Poincaré Hyperbolic Disk, Wolfram MathWorld). It is one of the most common models used to visualize hyperbolic geometry (and to print it in 2D). As such it is potentially suggestive of how cognitively annexing the infinite complexity of the world could be otherwise understood.

As discussed separately (Global communication patterns in a hyperbolic space of negative curvature, 2016), the disk is a 2-dimensional model of n-dimensional hyperbolic geometry in which the points of the geometry are inside the unit disk and the straight lines consist of all segments of circles contained within that disk that are perpendicular to the boundary of the disk, plus all diameters of the disk. A straight line in the hyperbolic plane is thus represented as the part (in the disk) of a circle that meets the boundary of the disk at right angles.

The Poincaré disc maps the point at infinity of a hyperbolic space to a circle where hyperbolic lines are represented as arcs of circles intersecting the éé disc at 90 degrees. As we move away from the origin of a hyperbolic space, the space itself expands due to negative curvature, so as the perimeter of the Poincaré disc is rached, the scale of the space changes dramatically, subdividing into an infinite number of pieces.

Animations of the hyperbolic plane based on the Poincaré disk
Animation of set of quasiregular tilings Animations of the hyperbolic plane based on the Poincaré disk Animations of the hyperbolic plane based on the Poincaré disk
Adapted from David E. Joyce (Hyperbolic Tessellations: some printable tilings, 2002) Reproduced from W. Goldman (Ultraideal Triangles, 2004) Adapted from Wolfram Demonstrations Project

"Dream catching"? Ironically there is a curious formal resemblance of the above patterns to those of the traditional dreamcatchers adopted in the Pan-Indian Movement of the 1960s and 1970s. The resemblance merits further attention in the light of a thesis by M. C. Siegel, (Conservation of Singularities in Functional Equations Associated to Collatz-Type Dynamical Systems; or, Dreamcatchers for Hydra Maps, 2019). This includes a section on Meromorphic Dreamcatchers and Singularity Conservation Laws for Hydra Maps.

This raises the question as to the manner in which dreams can be "caught" -- given their elusiveness. How might this relate to the challenge of detecting and holding the insights variously generated by humanity? At one extreme these take the form of collections of aphorisms (Andrew Hui, A Theory of the Aphorism: from Confucius to Twitter, 2019). There is little attention to how aphorisms might be fruitfully ordered, as potentially implied by the animations above. The challenge is all the greater in the case of dreams articulated to a greater degree (William Irwin Thompson, Nine Theses For A Gaia Politique. In Context, 1997). How might a collection of dreams be usefully configured in my world? How do I position myself such as best to "annex" them? This is the challenge of the collection of 48 Chan (Zen) koans of The Gateless Gate (Configuring a Set of Zen Koan as a Wisdom Container, 2012).

Orgnization of governance in my world could be organized as a dream catcher -- rather than as a dream crusher or a dream thief. In nourishing dreams, this would then contrast with the confidence games associated with political manifestos.

Global sustainability as a "Holy Grail"? It is appropriate to note that the collective quest for sustainability can be recognized as bearing some resemblance to the ultimate dream of locating the mythical Holy Grail (In Quest of Sustainability as Holy Grail of Global Governance, 2011).

It is then curious to note the potential formal resembance between the cup-like dual of the torus (as presented above) and the shape traditionally assumed for the chalice cup with which the Holy Grail is associated. Any understanding of insight into integrative cognitive "annexation" of the world then merits exploration in such terms, especially to the extent that a cognitive dynamic is inherent in that comprehension (In-forming the Chalice as an Integrative Cognitive Dynamic: sustaining the Holy Grail of global governance, 2011; Interrelating Cognitive Catastrophes in a Grail-chalice Proto-model: implications of WH-questions for self-reflexivity and dialogue, 2006).

Connectivity and bonding: In the developing understanding of "global citizenship", at least from the perspective of the individual, people are increasingly free to consider "home" wherever they choose. This capacity may be enhanced by having residences in several countries to which they variously travel -- notably according to the seasons, for those with the resources to do so. The "residences" need not be owned. They can be rented periodically, or any accommodation may be used on the occasion of periodical visits to a country with which a bond is cultivated.

More curious is the degree of bonding experienced and to be distinguished -- even for those who do not travel physically to a country with which they identify, and with whatever illusions are cultivated in that regard. Clearly the identification claimed by members of a diaspora, to a lesser degree than those with no such historical relationship, may be considered questionable (if not highly questionable) by those who currently inhabit it -- and may have done so or generations. Thus the inhabitants of Scotland, for example, would consider irrelevant the views of those elsewhere who especially value that culture -- other than for commercial purposes (as in the marketing of whiskey). Ironically however, a significant proportion of Scotland is owned by non-residents (Report calls for reform of 'unhealthy' land ownership in Scotland, The Guardian, 20 March 2019; Who owns Scotland? The changing face of Scotland's landowners, BBC News, 20 March 2019)

In this context individuals are of course free to imitate the process by which one country may "annex" another or "colonize" it in some way. Anyone can lay claim to Scotland -- much as Captain Cook claimed Australia for the Crown of England, and as did Burnum Burnum, an Aboriginal activist in planting the Aboriginal flag on the white cliffs of Dover on the Australian Bicentenary Day of 1988 (Aborigine Stakes a Claim to England, Los Angeles Times, 27 January 1988). Indigenous peoples may notably cultivate claims to lands occupied by colonizers, as is a feature of continuing treaty disputes in some countries. There is however little if any need to publicize such claims as they feature in one's dream.

What are the constraints on "annexing" the world in one's dream -- if one so chooses? What is "possessed" through any such claim -- and what external authority need be sought to legitimate that claim, and why? There is also the strange possibility that in recognizing the world, and assuming one's place in it, one has anyway effectively "annexed" it in some very profound manner whose nature remains to be more fully comprehended.

Of course, especially given the arguments for quantum reality, there is little need (if any) to recognize any annexation of parts of the world by others. Perhaps this is better understood in terms of the electromagnetic spectrum. The process of annexation might then be compared to tuning to a particular broadcast channel (or website), thereby excluding exposure to any other, and without precluding access to that channel by others. There is also clearly a counterpart to multiple passport holding by an individual in that a country may be the focus of multiple claimants to its ownership -- if not myriads -- without any need to formally recognize that. The metaphor does however evoke the problematic implications of "jamming", bandwidth throttling, and the like.

More intriguing is any responsibility one has with respect to any place annexed in this way. Having "annexed" the USA -- especially in this current period -- what to do about the chaotic processes it has engendered in "my" world? What to do about having cast "Donald Trump" as its leader? In the quest for full-spectrum dominance -- in which all can engage -- how to "manage" fruitfully the impacts on the other parts of the world annexed in this way?

Engaging with aesthetic and design constraints

Biomimicry and technomimicry: One possible approach is to recognize the extent to which one has acquired what amounts to a wreck -- a planetary society in the messiest of conditions, namely one's very own world (Having Bought into a Wreck -- What Now? Cognitive challenges of embodying reality otherwise, 2018). The wreck lends itself to description with Donald Trump's own adjective (Earth as a Shithole Planet -- from a Universal Perspective? Understanding why there are no extraterrestrial visitors, 2018).

In the innovatory spirit imposed on Cuba, how can one then use the components of the wreck to fashion a more viable vehicle? A valuable clue is provided both by biomimicry and technomimicry:

Rather than focusing on the goal of flight, as was the case of biomimicry in the development of aircraft -- the development of those same aircraft (as a pattern) can itself provide a source of inspiration, as was the case of the helicopter (Engendering a Psychopter through Biomimicry and Technomimicry: insights from the process of helicopter development, 2011). Rocketry can provide similar inspiration (Towards an Astrophysics of the Knowledge Universe: from astronautics to noonautics? 2006). The approach has been most notably elaborated by Douglas Hofstadter and Emmanuel Sander (Surfaces and Essences: analogy as the fuel and fire of thinking, 2013). That focus on analogy is complemented by that on correspondences (Theories of Correspondences -- and potential equivalences between them in correlative thinking, 2007)

Rocketry, and getting into orbit, offer similar inspiration -- as with going to the Moon. These are effectively exploited in the image building justification for the space race as an indicator of "being great again". In a world obsessed with sex, recognized as fundamental to marketing, the Freudian connotations merit recognition as recently recalled with respect to the views of the poet W. H. Auden (Edward Mendelson, 'So Huge a Phallic Triumph': Why Apollo Had Little Appeal for Auden, New York Review of Books, 12 August 2019).

In a period of widespread concern with sexual harassment and rape, the current enthusiasm of the USA, Russia, China, France and India for a "space force" by male-dominated institutions merits similar consideration. The drama of the process is attractive and enthralling. More provoccative, there is much justification for recognizing the role of impotence in driving the demand for aphrodisiacs in some cultures resulting in the tragic loss of iconic species. Is rocketry to be recognized as a form of aphrodisiac for the "existentially impotent", however that might be understood?

Patterning inspiration: Given the characteristic difficulties of handling binaries -- right-wrong, positive-negative, and the like -- another valuable source of inspiration are the remarkable insights of Nikola Tesla into the rotation of magnetic fields (Reimagining Tesla's Creativity through Technomimicry: psychosocial empowerment by imagining charged conditions otherwise, 2014). Related insights can be sought from the design constraints of the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor currently under construction (Enactivating a Cognitive Fusion Reactor: Imaginal Transformation of Energy Resourcing (ITER-8), 2006).

Essentially the imaginative challenge seems to be fruitfully recognized in terms of patterns -- this follows from the early inspirations of the Society for General Systems Research. Rather than being entrapped by intractable nature of tangibles -- the specifics -- it is a case of recognizing patterns, analogies and correspondences, namely intangibles. This follows from the emphasis of Douglas Hofstadter and Emmanuel Sander (Surfaces and Essences: analogy as the fuel and fire of thinking, 2013). The art would appear to lie in the recognition of correspondences (Theories of Correspondences -- and potential equivalences between them in correlative thinking, 2007). There is a peculiar form of intuition to be honoured (Patterning Intuition with the Fifth Discipline, 2019).

The major innovation in this respect has been the work of Christopher Alexander in identifying patterns that frame the "quality without a name" with which a "place to be" is associated ( (Pattern of transformations as a dynamic quality without a name, 2012). For him, a "place to be" in a building or a town is only viable to the extent that it is governed by the "timeless way" (The Timeless Way of Building, 1979). Alexander (and his team) identified 254 interlinked patterns as providing a language by which it could be framed. The approach could be extended to cognitive environments, as argued separately (5-fold Pattern Language, 1984).

Engaging with constraints of the dealer

Recognizing "bullshit": Faced with the externalities of having to deal with a "wreck" which one has acquired, combined with devious pressures from a "dealer" -- especially given one's own complicity -- the dynamics of the situation call for reframing with aesthetic skills, informed by martial art philosophy (Ensuring Strategic Resilience through Haiku Patterns: reframing the scope of the "martial arts" in response to strategic threats, 2006). In aesthetic terms, this could be understand as gardening -- an inner game of gardening -- strategically marshalling and applying one's resources, even juggling them (Governance as "juggling" -- Juggling as "governance": dynamics of braiding incommensurable insights for sustainable governance, 2018).

Expressed otherwise, and more succinctly, it is a case of dealing with bullshit which one has variously engendered -- but is most readily blamed as the responsibility of others. That the term is deprecated in a context of political correctness is potentially an indicator that it obscures a reality meriting creative thinking (Harry Frankfurt, On Bullshit, 2005). Clues are evident in the focus on "bulls" in the Zen philosophy associated with martial art engagement with an opponent (Zen of Facticity: Bull, Ox or Otherwise? Herding facts and their alternatives in a post-truth-era, 2017). They are also evident in bull-fighting and the hisotical ignifince of bull-related symbolism (Viable Global Governance through Bullfighting: challenge of transcendence, 2009).

Given that bullshit could be recognized as a feature of an "ecological footprint", namely as the failure to recycle engendered waste effectively, a cognitive variant can be explored with respect to arguments for recognition of a complementary "ecological mouthprint" (Ecological Mouthprint versus Ecological Footprint, 2019).

Confidence games: The deal is then best understood as one involving a degree of antagonism and subterfuge, rather than being an innocent neutral process framed naively by win-win arguments from which none will lose. The dealer is out to profit from the process in ways which are a challenge to determine -- especially in whose interests it is being proposed and undertaken. Dramatically framed, it can be understood as a deal with the devil as variously imagined -- namely with the epitome of otherness (Taylor Caldwell, Dialogues with the Devil, 1967; Ingmar Bergman, The Seventh Seal, 1957; Tom Graneau, The Devil in Modern Eden, 2015; Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, 1790).

Given a degree of obligation to engage with the dealer, a further complication is advice by eminent authorities not to engage at all (Pope's Morning Homily: Don't Dialogue With Devil, Keep a Good Distance, Zenit, 8 May 2018). Can engaging with the dealer be avoided in this light -- or do efforts at such avoidance exacerbate the condition the deal is claimed to address? Given the tradition in that regard, is the dealer to be understood as essentially as trickster? Given the source of that advice, to what extent is it to be considered trustworthy (Frédéric Martel, In the Closet of the Vatican: power, homosexuality, hypocrisy, 2019).

Authoritarianism: Even more challenging is any cultivation by the dealer of a Messianic role in responding to the experience of disaster -- effectively constituting a riddle of the most fundamental nature (Global Governance as a Riddle: but is a solution the answer to the question? 2018). This can be variously clarified on the basis of complementary professional insights from preemptive news and image management (Strategic Briefing for Satan, 1999; Strategic Briefing for the Messiah, 1999).

Radical imagination of possibilities is appropriate (despite reservations in that regard), including:

Living "outside-inside": embodying the dream

Embodying the dream: Arguments of a range of authors can be presented for the transformation of worldview from "inside-outside" to "outside-inside", with reality to be recognized as being as much "inside" as "outside" (World Introversion through Paracycling: global potential for living sustainably "outside-inside", 2013; Existential Embodiment of Externalities: radical cognitive engagement with environmental categories and disciplines, 2009). This can be explored as an analogue to the interface challenge of form of of osmosis (Cognitive Osmosis in a Knowledge-based Civilization; interface challenge of inside-outside, insight-outsight, information-outformation, 2017).

Notable in such arguments are the theories of constructivism in philosophy and theology, and in the philosophy of education. More radical are the arguments for enactivism whereby the world is enacted -- succinctly expressed through the metaphor of "laying down a path in walking" (Francisco Varela, Laying Down a Path in Walking: essays on enactive cognition, 1997). This can be expressed otherwise in aesthetic terms (Walking Elven Pathways: enactivating the pattern that connects, 2006).

Especially intriguing is the scope for embodying cognitively the totality of experience otherwise framed as external (Psychosocial Implication of Without Within: enjoying going solar for oneself, 2013; ) Being the Universe: a metaphoric frontier, 1999; Towards an Astrophysics of the Knowledge Universe: from astronautics to noonautics? 2006)

Provocatively and succinctly framed, this possibility follows from the innovative Renaissance insights of Marsilio Ficino regarding the "planets within" (Composing the Present Moment: celebrating the insights of Marsilio Ficino interpreted by Thomas Moore, 2001). It is also potentially consistent with the work of Joseph Campbell (The Inner Reaches of Outer Space: metaphor as myth and as religion, 1986) and of ecophilosopher Henryk Skolimowski (The Participatory Mind: a new theory of knowledge and of the universe, 1994). The argument has many affinities with Plato's Allegory of the Cave.

The possibility has previously been explored otherwise (En-joying the World through En-joying Oneself: eliciting the potential of globalization through cognitive radicalization, 2011; World Introversion through Paracycling: global potential for living sustainably "outside-inside", 2013; Personal Globalization, 2001; Existential Embodiment of Externalities: radical cognitive engagement with environmental categories and disciplines, 2009; Degrees of Cognitive Engagement with Interrelated Global Categories, 2009). The latter document relates the approach to a range of specific issues in the global problematique: hunger, pollution, disease, unemployment, etc.

Enacting the dream? Whilst it is indeed possible to orchestrate such dreams as a "dramaturge", even more intriguing are the opportunities to enact them through designing oneself into the dream in some way. Each is free to dream of their ideal home as a personal "Jerusalem" -- even elaborating that dream as "Heaven on Earth", with all its ideal subtleties.

Given the complex subtlety of physical reality now indicated by fundamental physics, where might "Jerusalem" be and what indeed is it? Might "it" be better understood as a dynamic rather in the static structural terms by which a city is typically imagined?

As indicated above, and however one chooses to name it, it can be fruitfully understood as a singularity whose nature is a fundamental challenge to comprehension (Jerusalem as a Symbolic Singularity: comprehending the dynamics of hyperreality as a challenge to conventional two-state reality, 2017). This challenge is potentially consistent with the theology of mysticism (Mathematical Theology: Future Science of Confidence in Belief, 2011).

Understood in this way, each is free to reframe themselves as a "Zionist" in some way -- whatever the label (Generic Reframing of the 12 Tribes of "Israel": "We have met the Zionists and them is us", 2009). Even more specifically, and however "manipulative", each is free to recognize their own systemic role in the dream as a "Benjamin Netanyahu" or a "Jared Kushner" -- and why not "Mossad"? No one needs to know.

The opportunity is to coopt for one's own dream those figments defined as externalities -- in whose "existence" people are urged so strongly to believe by authorities of unquestionable legitimacy. Such externalities, in their current condition, can be readily understood as together constituting a "wreck" -- but one potentially capable of being adapted to one's own purposes, according to one's resources and ingenuity (Having Bought into a Wreck -- What Now? Cognitive challenges of embodying reality otherwise, 2018).

Both "Israel" and "Palestine" can be usefully seen as metaphors in this process of reframing arbitrary boundaries.

Designing and governing my world -- Heaven on Earth?

Having annexed the world in some way -- or recognized one's possession of a wreck into which one has bought (as suggested above) -- how then to redesign and govern it, respecting whatever are acknowleged as design constraints?

Constraints: Whilst dreaming a world may seek to conform to the disciplines of scince, this is a constraint which can be creatively bypssed as science fiction has long demontrated -- irrespective of authoritarian deprecation of whatever is deemed to be psuedoscientific. Who is to know and who needs to care? The belief systems of many cults and secret societies exemplify this -- as with the continuing enthusiasm for Flat Earth societies. The challenge to conventional authorities is that they are unable to distinguish between the advantages associated with their special pleading as "priesthoods" and the veracity which they seek to promote and defend.

The challenge can be usefully compared to:

Dynamics? Such examples could all be seen as aspects of imagining the dynamics of what is promoted as a form of archetypal "Heaven" -- or an emulation of such. Most religions have cultivated an understanding of such a place or condition. Curiously missing is any effort to imagine the dynamics therein in any necessary detail -- especially given requirements for their sustainability for "eternity". A degree of imgination has been accorded to the dynamics of "Hell" -- but with similar restrictions. One response is that any such design is necessarily the primary responsibility of an ultimate authority -- a deity -- and calls for little presumptuous reflection on the part of any individual.

A striking exception is the effort by Dante Alighieri to imagine both Heaven and Hell together in a narrative poem (Divine Comedy, 1320) -- to which the Zoroastrian Book of Arda Viraf can be compared.

Through psychodrama to enantiodromia?

The argument has implied that designing a dream is comparable to social engineering -- even psychosocial engineering -- as has been variously criticized (Aldous Huxley, Brave New World, 1932; George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four, 1949; Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky, Manufacturing Consent: the political economy of the mass media, 1988).

Aesthetics: Another approach, as suggested by the Divine Comedy, is to understand the challenge as primarily aesthetic -- or at least highly dependent on aesthetics to cultivate and sustain coherence. An indication in this respect is the community imagined magnum opus of Hermann Hesse (The Glass Bead Game, 1943). The importance of the aesthetic dimension is also evident in the Damanhur community, as discussed separately (Renaissance Zones: experimenting with the intentional significance of the Damanhur community, 2003).

Arguably epics in poetic or operatic form endeavour to articulate valuable aesthetic dimensions, as with the Mahabharata or the Kalevala. It is less evident how the dimensions articulated can be translated such as to sustain the coherence of a dream. Constraints are evident from the exploration by the poet Robert Graves (Seven Days in New Crete, 1949). The succession of aesthetic creations could be understood as multiple pointers to the possibility of designing Heaven on Earth.

A sobering analysis is suggested by the movie Heaven's Gate (1980), as described by Charles Champlin (Final Cut: dreams and disasters in the making of "Heaven's Gate", Los Angeles Times, 18 August 1985):

It was not the costliest film, nor even the costliest failed film, in Hollywood history, but it remains the most conspicuous failed film in the annals of American movie making...While "Final Cut"e; is centrally about "Heaven's Gate,"e; it's also about the whole context of decision making (other projects, other film makers), travel, corporate anxieties and infighting, of which "Heaven's Gate"e; was the noisiest part... The larger failure of 'Heaven's Gate' is not that the 'golden string' finally stretched an irrecoverable $44 million. . . but that it failed to engage audiences on the most basic and elemental human levels of sympathy and compassion, and this failure is finally cardinal."e;

In aesthetic and cognitive terms, use of the metaphor could be compared to The Gateless Gate, namely the collection of 48 Chan (Zen) koans, as discussed separately (Configuring a Set of Zen Koan as a Wisdom Container, 2012).

"Evil": Especially provocative is the sense in which sustainability calls for aesthetic representation of the problematic -- most notably an "evil" extreme. No "evil" -- not sustainably interesting? This is evident in the design of epics, as with The Ring of the Nibelung of Richard Wagner. It is an obvious requirement in many dramatic plots dependent on the challenge of an enemy readily characterized as evil (Martin Löschnigg and Marzena Sokolowska-Paryz, The Enemy in Contemporary Film, 2018).

The need for an "enemy" has been recognized with respect to systemic sustainability. Efforts to reduce political polarization require recognition that radical divisions may be fulfilling important needs for whose fulfillment otherwise may well remain elusive (Steve Rathje, Do We Need a Common Enemy? Psychology Today, 17 December 2018; Daniel Sullivan, Mark J. Landau, and Zachary K. Rothschild, An Existential Function of Enemyship: evidence that people attribute influence to personal and political enemies to compensate for threats to control, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 98, 2010, 3).

There is a sense in which debate in two-party democratic systems is a curiously neglected exemplification of the confrontation of "good" and "evil", each party associating the former with its own values and the latter with its opposition -- as with Democrats and Republicans (Adam Waytz, et al, Motive attribution asymmetry for love vs. hate drives intractable conflict, PNAS, 111, 2014, 4). Recognition of evil offers a means of staving off a sense of meaninglessneess (Clay Routledge, et al, An Existential Function of Evil: the effects of religiosity and compromised meaning on belief in magical evil forces, Motivation and Emotion, 40, 2016, 5; Nesrine Malik, Why do we cling to the myth of the evil genius? Because the alternative is worse, The Guardian, 15 September 2019).

In systemic terms, to achieve a degree of coherent viability, does "Israel" need a "Palestine", just as the "Nazis" needed the "Jews"? Are "unbelievers" vital to systemic health in some way? The question has been raised with respect to the USA (Why does the U.S.A. always need an enemy? Quora, 2 August 2018; Dominic Tierney, Does America Need an Enemy? The National Interest, 19 October 2016). That the motivating challenge lies elsewhere is readily denied (William H. Overholt, America's Biggest Enemy Is Neither China nor Russia -- It's Us, The Huffington Post, 24 September 2015).

Psychodrama: In any psychodrama there is a desperate need to engender and focus blame through scapegoating -- on those to be framed as "evil" This reinforces a profound need to frame oneself as "good" -- unquestionably the embodiment of the highest values of which one can conceive.

There is therefore a sense in which the design of any homeland or Heaven calls for the design of a psychodrama -- a dream into which one designs both oneself and a threat by which one is framed as potentially heroic. The point is emphasized by anecdotal recognition that intentional religious communities may specifically allow for the participation of a person experienced by most as an obnoxious irritant. The implications for larger collectives -- and any attempt to design a Heaven on Earth, as argued above -- have yet to be explored. Clearly one approach to any dream is to value the irritants by which one's ideal strategy is undermined -- but to what degree, and how?

One aesthetic approach is to frame the psychodramatic engagement with "irritating others" as a form of dance -- as may be exemplified in some operatic performances, and as previously imagined speculatively (Aesthetics of Governance in the Year 2490, 1990). Such a dance can be characterized by a degree of provocative mirroring -- even paradoxical -- through which the partners see each other through other eyes (Stepping into, or through, the Mirror: embodying alternative scenario patterns, 2008).

Thus beyond reframing "Israel" as "Greater Israel" (excluding "Palestine"), or imagining "Palestine" such as to exclude any vestige of "Israel" -- a fundamental provocation in each case -- even more radical provocations could be envisaged in the psychodrama. For example, "Palestinians" could design a set of "gas ovens" to mirror the behaviour to which they perceive "Israel" to be subjecting them, as an extension of any "ghetto" experience. "Palestinians" could ritually enter such environments, suitably exposed to recorded shrieks of the dying. Tourists could be invited to share the experience. "Israelis" could offer tourists the experience of rocket attacks or of the iconic collective suicide at Masada -- and invite "Palestinians" and tourists to share the experience. Processes of this kind are typical of use of psychodrama in psychotherapy -- especially with respect to domestic abuse.

Enantiodromia: Understood as the emergence of the unconscious opposite over time, as explained by Carl Jung, enantiodromia is a characteristic phenomenon occuring when an extreme, one-sided tendency is dominating conscious life; in time an equally powerful counterposition is built up which first inhibits the conscious performance and subsequently breaks through the conscious control. It is considered to be similar to the principle of equilibrium in the natural world, in that any extreme is opposed by the system in order to restore balance. In Jungian terms, a thing psychically transmogrifies into its shadow opposite, in the repression of psychic forces that are thereby cathected into something powerful and threatening, as variously discussed with respect to the future of governance in the work of William Irwin Thompson (From Nation to Emanation; planetary culture and world governance, 1982). This principle of extremes transforming into each other is an explicit feature of in Taoism and yin-yang, as discussed sepaately (Psychosocial Energy from Polarization within a Cyclic Pattern of Enantiodromia, 2007; Toward an enantiomorphic policy, 1983; Stuart L. Hart, Enantiodromia and the New Age of Sustainability, 26 February 2017; David Myatt, Heraclitus – Enantiodromia).

Ironically it is in the best of the philosophy of eastern martial arts that the less fruitful polarizations 'against' an 'opponent' are subtly transcended. It is to such understandings that one can usefully look in reconciling 'dreaming' with 'reality'. The paradoxical quality of the mindset adapted to the dynamic dance with the projections of the mind has perhaps been best articulated by Chuang Tzu [more; more; more]. Robert Cummings Neville says of him: 'Chuang Tzu is among the very few philosophers to admit the world to be as weird as it really is'. How indeed does my enemy become my friend and how do my friends become my enemies?

In that respect it is appropriate that Chuang Tzu is also known as the 'butterfly philosopher' [more; more; more] due to his formulation of the following challenge:

There was in ancient China a Taoist called Chuang Tzu who dreamed of being a butterfly. he suddenly awoke and realized that he was not a butterfly: but then, upon reflection, he was not sure. Was it he who had dreamed of being a butterfly? Or was he a butterfly now dreaming of being he? Thus it was that the butterfly became his companion, in dreaming and in waking, to his life reflections, to his zestful, jestful living. (Kuang-ming Wu The Butterfly as Companion: meditations on the first three chapters of the Chuang-Tzu, 1990)

With respect to any "cognitive annexation" of the world through dreaming, is that annexation of reality a dream or is it one's existence that is but a dream in the reality of the world? So phrased this recalls the continuing debate as to whether reality as experienced could be a simulation imagined by "extraterrestrials" (Are We Living in a Simulation? BBC Focus, March 2013; Matt Stieb, 15 Irrefutable Reasons Why We Might Be Living in a Simulation, Vulture, 8 February 2019).

Succinctly phrased, "do I have the dream", or "am I an evanescent figment of reality" -- or neither, or both? Reference to living with a butterfly as companion is then particularly appropriate -- especially given the implied dynamic. As an exercise, the following are variously illustrative of this confusion.

Indicative interplay between dreaming and realizing
A: Inspiring explicit dreams
Problematic implicit consequence 		Animation of 4 conditions B: Problematic explicit dreams
Inspiring implicit consequence
Interplay between dreaming and realizing Interplay between dreaming and realizing Interplay between dreaming and realizing
Interplay between dreaming and realizing Interplay between dreaming and realizing
C: Problematic explicit realities
Inspiring implicit dream		   D: Inspiring explicit realities
Problematic implicit dream

The four conditions suggest the following understandings:

A: Problematic reality as the confluence of a multiplicuty of inspiring dram, namely that despite the multiplicity of inspiring outer dreams and strategies, the undeclared consequence is problematic -- arguably the condition of a civilization with a heavy investment in denial regarding outcomes and their psychosocial implications
B: Inspiring dream as the confluence of multiple problematic experiences in reality, namely that despite the challenging external realities, these engender significant inner insight -- fruitfully ecognized as indiviual or collective lering
C: Inspiring dream engendering a multiplicity of problematic realities, namely the unforeseen consequence of the quest for fulfilment of a dream
D: Problematic "dark" dreaming engendering a pattern of serendipitous consequences of the opposite intent

The paradoxical subtlety of the relationship is more appropriately suggested with the use of interwoven Möbius strips, as indicated in the images left and right below -- both indicative of the strange continuity between dream and reality. The subtlety of the relationship can be taken further through interweaving the Möbius strips as Borromean rings in the central animation in 3D, discussed separately (Engaging globally with knots and riddles -- Gordian and otherwise, 2018).

Interweaving dreams and realities using Möbius strips
Variant in 2D Suggestive interweaving through a Borromean ring configuration in 3D (animation) Variant in 2D
Interweaving dreams and realities using Möbius strips Borromean rings formed by 3 orthogonal Moebius strips (animation) Interweaving dreams and realities using Möbius strips

Engendering systemically viable narratives -- stories that work

As framed above, the challenge is how notable features of the world -- my world -- can be woven into stories with an appropriate twist of relevance to its governance (Warp and Weft: Governance through Alternation - world governance as a Gandhian challenge for the individual, 2002. In doing so the meaning of "cognitive annexation" is usefully called into question. A necessary preliminary story is therefore annexation itself.

Re-dreaming Israel and Palestine -- in my world?

It is only too obvious that "Israel" and "Palestine" are the focus of many dreamers, whatever the compatibility of their dreams. As proposed here the Deal of the Century is the invitation to a degree of dreaming commensurate with the challenge their dynamics currently represent.

One clue, appropriate for the times, is provided by Alexander Wendt (Quantum Mind and Social Science: unifying physical and social ontology, 2015). As an eminent specialist in international relations he introduces his argument with the hypothetical perspective of extraterrestrials scanning the globe. He makes the point that nations states, however bordered or not, cannot be detected from space. In that sense the distinctions between them are non-existent. With this argument it is obviously questionable as to whether "Israel" and "Palestine" "exist" -- except as rather peculiar constructs of the collective imagination of some. This could be understood as a form of dreaming to which a degree of reality has been variously attached -- to the point that that reality is beyond any conventional question. He uses that insight to justify the fundamental insights emerging from understandings of quantum reality.

Somewhat ironically, but indicative of an unexplored flexibiity in such matters, the city of Bielefeld in Germany recently offered a one million euro award to anyone who could prove that the city did not exist (City of Bielefeld offers €1m for proof it doesn't exist, BBC News, 22 August 2019). This possibilty is matched by the more general argument of the philosopher Markus Gabriel (Why the World Does Not Exist, 2015).

Given the degree to which it is not understood, or is variously understood, should quantum mechanics be considered a form of dreaming? Most people have no understanding of its significance. The understanding by physicists is itself variously considered problematic, famously noted by Richard Feynman: Anyone who claims to understand quantum theory is either lying or crazy. The point has been more recently made (Sean Caroll, Even Physicists Don't Understand Quantum Mechanics, The New York Times, 7 September 2019). Arguably this is consistent with dreaming and the incompatibilty of many dreams.

Consistent with the Deal of the Century, there is therefore considerable freedom to imagining and dreaming about how "Israel" and "Palestine" currently "exist" -- have ever "existed", or may "exist" in the future. This extends to the challenge of imagining their relationship, to the extent that both "exist" at the same time. There is little question that many choose to dream of an "Israel" -- especially a Greater Israel -- in which "Palestine" is merely a figment of the imagination. For many the converse would be true -- with "Israel" but a figment of the imagination.

Such considerations have more general implications, given the point made above about the imaginary nature of boundaries to which legal reality has been questionably attached -- and to the "existence" of other entities which are the dramatis personae of international relations (Does America even exist? 31 December 2011; Does America Still Exist?; Richard Rodriguez, Does America Still Exist? Fudan University, 2012). To what extent do the United Nations, the European Union, or NATO "exist"? The point is especially obvious with respect to the existence of the "international community" to which so many appeals are made, and from which intervention is expected in so many situations -- including the relations in the middle East (International Community as God or Sorcerer's Apprentice? 2015). Intriguingly this is contrasted with an even more elusive entity -- the "world community".

Given the proposed Deal of the Century, how should whomever choose to dream about "Israel" and "Palestine" -- separately or together? How does the credibility of any such dream compare with that of fake news and recognition of the surreality of the times and the possibilty of post-truth frameworks? (Surreal nature of current global governance as experienced, 2016)

Dreaming of Israel alone? Clearly many already have a very heavy investment in this dream, reinforced by revelations to which Judaism attributes fundamental and unquestionable significance. This is the Chosen People dream, especially and particularly mandated by deity. The dream necessarily has a tremendous degree of coherence to it -- many having worked on its elaboration, and many continuing to do so. There are presumably few constraints to this dream, with all the peoples of the world being necessarily subsumed by it -- or considered irrelevant to its realization.

This is an example of spiritually inspired full-spectrum dominance -- recognizable as an ambition (or a "commission") of other religions, most notably the Abrahamic religions. There is of coure a degree of complicity with fundamentalists in the USA (and elsewhere) inspired by shared scriptures.

Central to this dream of Israel is the role of Jerusalem and efforts to make it central to global society -- as the Vatican has endeavoured to do within the Catholic Christian dream, and as Mecca has been positioned within the Islamic dream. Efforts to render this dream into a reality i the case of Jersualem are currently obvious in the pressure on nations states to move their embassies there. The dream can be elaborated further through any proposal to move the HQ of the UN to Jerusalem, as separately explored (Symbolic Relocation of United Nations HQ to Jerusalem Vicinity: revitalization of Middle East peace process enabled by US-Israel initiative, 2017). From the perspective of quantum mechanics, and given the skills in that respect in Israel, the dream can be developed further (Jerusalem as a Symbolic Singularity: comprehending the dynamics of hyperreality as a challenge to conventional two-state reality, 2017).

Within this dream, whatever merits recognition as "Palestine" is readily considered as but a "detail of history", essentially irrelevant to the coherence of the dream as a whole.

Dreaming of Palestine alone? As in dreaming of Israel alone, many dream of Palestine alone -- as it was within the arbitrarily framed borders following World War II. The dream is nourished by a sense of traditional land ownership, irrespective of how this may have usurped the religiously founded claims of Israel.

The dream is reinforced by the dreams of some of sweeping "Israel" into the sea -- as a temporal aberration. The dream is further reinforced for the Palestinians by the sense of injustice of which they consider themselves to be victims through the actions of Israel in pursuit of its own dream.

Fundamental to the dream is the possibility of "Free Palestine" or "Greater Palestine" -- free from the yoke of Israel -- although how that freedom might play out in practice is less than evident given the differences between Hamas and Fatah. However, this challenge of the sustainable dynamics of "freedom" is far from having been rendered comprehensible -- as is evident in the case of many countries for which "independence" has proved to be problematic. Although "freedom" is the core of many dreams, the dynamics remain mysterious -- potentially as mysterious as those of dreams of Heaven.

Dreaming of Palestine and Israel "together"? Some have indulged in a dream in which somehow the dreams of "Israel" and "Palestine" coexist. One variant of this dream is framed as a "two-state" modality, of which the most realistic has been the condominium formula, as articulated by John Whitbeck (The Road to Peace Starts in Jerusalem: the condominium solution, Middle East Policy Council, 3, 1994, 3). Examples of such a modality are Andorra and the New Hebrides. The credibility of this dream has eroded with time -- even though there are now many examples of condominium in the case of real estate, and in the use of time-sharing agreements. These are of far greater subtlety than the crude deal recently proposed by Jared Kuhner on behalf of thr USA.

More intriguing are possibilities in which those subscribing to the dream of "Israel" simply fail to include any vestige of "Palestine" in their dream -- whilst those subscribing to the dream of "Palestine" simply fail to recognize the "existence" of Israel. This mode is curiously consistent with the failure of each to give any credence to the deity of the other, even though both are monotheistic. The multiplicity of religions, with their variety of deities, has long established the viability of this in practice -- whatever the dream of each to convert all non-believers in their dream, or simply to eradicate them. The approach can be seen as consistent with "mutual annexation" -- where each blithely ignores the claims through such annexation, much as with respect to the lands of Australia and the reciprocal claim made by Burnum Burnum (as noted above)..

Boundary issues: The challenge to this dream is the importance attached to "boundaries" within each dream -- even though these are effectively figments of the colletive imagination of some reinforced by fiat from their perspective. However dreaming enables each to give primacy to an imagined fiat as a creative feature of the preferred dream. Fundamentally, as argued by Alexander Wendt, any such boundaries do not "exist" -- beyond the willingness to believe in them, or the ability to impose them on others. Many are recogized as the consequence of arbitrary processes -- effectively created by fiat. This suggests the freedom of everyone to establish boundaries however it seems appropriate.

The questionable nature of boundaries is made obvious by the crisis of international migration with the complementary efforts either to override them or to reinforce them. The dynamics are expressed in a realm beyod the rational -- whether or not the future will offer a degree of comprehension through quantum reality and a more sophisticated understanding of the role of any observer. The challenge has been framed as a dyamic between the "headless hearts" and the "heartless heads" (Symbolizing Collective Remembering Otherwise: encompassing the "headless hearts" and "heartless heads" through their dynamic entanglement, 12 March 2018).

One clue to such coexistence is the understanding of superposition -- from the fundamental perspective of quantum reality. This completely reframes any simplisitic undestanding of a "two-state" solution. Within that dream, the relation between "states" is understood quite otherwise.

Myth-making: Another clue is offered by myth-making, given the current credibility of a range of myths, especially to the younger generation (The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, etc) -- to say nothing of older myths which continue to entance (Mahabharata, Kalevala, etc). Especially noteworthy is the extent to which these myths coexist without any reference to each other. People are free to buy into one or the other. Missing from that emphasis is the freedom that each has to elaborate their own dream -- as is alredy evident to a degree in the elaboration of many online video games -- whether these attract many others or none.

There is little to hinder people in empowering themselves as dramaturges in orchestrating the dynamics between "Israel" and "Palestine" according to their preference -- glorifying or demonising the dramatis personae (Gorbachev: Dramaturge ?! Lessons on social transformation for international organizations from Gorbachev, 1991). A striking element in the success of any such orchestration is the need for an entity which embodies absolute "evil" -- suggesting the provocative possibility that "Israel" and "Palestine" have a fundamental need for each other in order to sustain their sense of identity as the embodiment of the highest values. Any orchestration then needs to explore both alternatives.

A further clue is offered by movements of opinion, readily to be understood as dreams -- which now interweave in a complex manner, most obviously via social media. Although unmapped, the "boundaries" between them are as permeable as weather systems depicted globally on a daily basis in familiar meteorological reports.

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