Photo stock.xchng
Are dreams really just the product of brain circuitry being ‘stabilized’
during sleep, as evolutionary biologists contend? Or something more …
An ‘impossible’ dream—for an atheist
by David Catchpoole
By the third time that I’d had this dream (in my early twenties), the details
were very firmly etched in my mind. It was always the same. In the dream I was walking
on a hot day along a dusty rough vehicular track, dodging the muddy potholes—evidence
of past rain (I guessed), though not for a while it seemed, as the sides of the
potholes had dried out and caked hard. The air smelt of a curious mixture of dry
dust and drying mud.
Apart from the bare wheel ruts, the track was overgrown with weedy plants, many
of which were in flower—their fragrance along with the smell of mud and airborne
dust was unforgettably distinctive. It was obviously a rural area, as to my left
and right, i.e. on the other side of each of the barbed wire fences lining the road,
cattle—a beautiful chestnut-coloured type, with white legs, which I’d
never seen before—were grazing. The air was so still and quiet in the midday
heat that I could very clearly hear the cattle crunching on the stubble they were
grazing.
At that exact moment, a cloud suddenly provided me with some welcome shady respite
from the fierce heat of the midday sun directly overhead. At this point in the dream,
I remember noting:
- the sun was indeed directly overhead—something I’d never seen
before, having spent all my life (up to that point) at southern latitudes (I grew
up in Adelaide, South Australia, which is where I had this recurring dream)
- the cloud was obviously very small and the only cloud in the sky, because
the land just a short distance away from me (in all directions) was still bathed
in sunlight, including in front of me just off to my left a cluster of small greyish
white concrete buildings constructed in a style I’d never seen before.
While I was absorbing all this, the silence was suddenly broken by the sound of
a chainsaw, coming from a distant stand of trees off to my right.
After all (I reasoned at the time), we’re just a collection of chemicals.
It was always at this point in the dream that I woke up to find it was morning,
in Adelaide, and time for me to go off to school/university. Given that I was an
atheist at the time, I simply dismissed the recurring ‘dream’ as an
involuntary product of my brain doing whatever it is that brains do to process and
file away information picked up from what our eyes, ears, etc., saw, heard or read
during our waking hours. After all (I reasoned at the time),
we’re just a collection of chemicals, and our brain is really just a bunch of chemical
reactions—so our sleep is an opportunity for the body to reorganize/reverse
the brain’s chemical reactions ready for a new day—akin to recharging
batteries overnight.
Or so I thought—back then. (Today, as a Christian, I have a very different
view.)
Photo stock.xchng
Journey to Indonesia
Time passed, and at 23 years of age I accepted an opportunity to work in Indonesia
on an intergovernmental (Australia–Indonesia) cooperative agricultural research
project.
Photo by David Catchpoole
Photo by David Catchpoole
I was based at a research station in a rural district about 30 km from Makassar,1 in South Sulawesi, arriving
there towards the end of the wet season in early 1983.
I’d never been to the tropics before, and I’d certainly never seen a
true ‘wet season’—Adelaide’s winter of drizzling ‘rain’
was nothing like this torrential rain I was now seeing bucketing down from the sky!
The 700 metres or so of unformed ‘road’ that I used to walk each day
from my living quarters to my field research site was completely sodden—the
occasional few vehicles which used the road (to take goods to and from the local
‘kampung’ (village)) often became bogged in the mud.
Photo by David Catchpoole
Part of the research station land at Gowa, South Sulawesi, Indonesia, where the
author worked from 1983-1986. A portion of the public ‘road’ (at that
time it was really just a vehicular track) traversed by the author each day is just
visible in the background at left (i.e. on the other side of the fence); the fringe
of the author’s research plots is just visible in the background at right..
But over the subsequent weeks, as the wet season began to ease, giving way to afternoon
storms, then to mostly fine weather, the road began to dry out.
So too did the surrounding land under its crops (predominantly maize)
and it wasn’t long before dozens of workers dotted the local fields, as they
laboured to bring in the harvest (by hand—the old-fashioned way!).
The author standing among his field research site plots in late 1983, addressing
a group of agricultural science students from Makassar’s Hasanuddin University.
(For a more recent photo of the author, see his biography
here.).
One day, after I had spent a particularly hot morning working at my field research
site, I headed back to my living quarters for the midday meal. I felt somewhat weary,
and was really looking forward to lunch and a nice cool drink.
The road was now almost dry, apart from the deeper potholes which were still muddy
at the bottom, but it obviously wouldn’t be too much longer before they dried
out too. Just as well only a few vehicles used this road, I thought, because every
time a vehicle went past (as one had done only about 20 minutes earlier), it stirred
up clouds of very fine dust, which hung in the air for ages afterwards.
Photo by David Catchpoole
Typical ‘kampung’ house in Sulawesi, Indonesia..
With the fierce tropical sun blazing overhead out of a cloudless sky, I deftly skipped
around a couple of the deeper potholes as I hurried home for lunch.
But quite suddenly, the sting went out of the sun—I was in shadow! I glanced
up and saw that ‘out of the blue’ a small cloud had formed exactly between
me and the sun directly overhead—and I stopped dead in my tracks. Because
(as you’ve probably guessed), I immediately recognized that I’d been
here before.
Photo by David Catchpoole
The author grew very familiar with this road, but did not recognize he had ‘seen’
it before, until one particular moment ….
Of course, I don’t just mean that I’d been at that point of the road
before—having walked this way several times a day for months I now knew this
700-metre stretch of road like the back of my hand. What I mean is, I’d been
at that moment before. And I was shaken to the core.
Because everything fitted with the recurring dream of years earlier. The distinctive
fragrance of the flowering weeds along the road mixed with dust and the smell of
drying mud, the cloud between me and the sun in an otherwise cloudless sky, the
sun illuminating the ‘strange’ buildings off to the left in front of
me—but of course the greyish-white concrete buildings were no longer strange
but very familiar to me, because they were the buildings on the government research
station, and I now lived in one!
The author photographed with ‘Sapi Bali’ (Bali cattle; a type of Bos
javanicus) in 1983 in rural Gowa, South Sulawesi, Indonesia..
What’s more, the cattle were now here too. This was the first time since my
arrival that cattle had been allowed into the cropping land alongside this road.
With the harvest only finished yesterday, today the distinctive ‘sapi Bali’
(Balinese cattle—specifically a breed of Bos javanicus) had been
brought in to graze the stubble.
And as I stood stock still listening to them crunching on the stubble on this windless
day, I was in deep shock. Because I was trying to work out how it could possibly
be that my brain could have known years in advance of this exact moment.
Photo by David Catchpoole
The contrast between the local kampung dwellings, and the concrete buildings on
the government research station, was stark..
And my shock was further magnified when the rural quiet was shattered by the sound
of a chainsaw starting up (just as in the dream), coming from a distant stand of
trees which I now knew (from having explored the area at weekends) concealed another
local kampung. (This was the first time I’d heard a chainsaw in Indonesia,
but I soon learnt it was a common sound in that area during the dry season—the
time of year for cutting regrowth from teak tree stumps.)
I must have stood rooted to that spot for at least ten minutes, absorbing it all
in absolute amazement, and trying to make sense of it. At length, the cloud moved
(or dissipated—I was too preoccupied to note which), and, reluctantly driven
by the stinging heat of the tropical sun, I ambled very slowly towards my living
quarters, deep in thought.
An experience too confronting to confront
As I neared my building, a neighbouring staff resident came out to meet me, looking
at me very curiously, and asking if I was all right. I replied that there was no
problem—but the truth was that I was very badly shaken, and trying to find
a rational answer for what I’d just experienced. A ‘rational’
answer, that is, that fitted with my atheistic worldview, a worldview that is dismissive
of anything that might hint at the existence of a spiritual realm, or supernatural
occurrences. Going through my head at that moment were claims I’d heard about
ESP, horoscopes and fortune-telling—but I dismissed them all. Nevertheless
I continued to mentally wrestle with all this for some hours, until at about three
o’clock in the afternoon, I simply put it all out of my mind and got on with
my life.
In other words, I simply forgot about it. Totally. Don’t ask me how—I
just don’t know.
Photo by David Catchpoole
View of the road from the author’s research site back towards his living quarters—at
far right of the cluster of buildings in the background. The road bends and passes
to the right of those buildings, eventually connecting to the main southern road
to Makassar (capital city of South Sulawesi), about 30 km away..
Even though I traversed that road who-knows-how-many times during the following
three years, I never (i.e. for the duration of my stay in Indonesia) had the slightest
recollection of what had happened to me that day. (Nor have I ever had that dream
again.)
In hindsight, I think my putting it ‘out of mind’ is similar to what
has happened on occasion in the scientific community. From time to time, certain
findings which contradict scientists’ expectations are set aside (dismissed)
as ‘outliers’, i.e. regarded as one-off aberrations due to some fault
in the experimental set-up or similar factor. Eventually, after many such ‘outliers’
are observed, the scientific community will change their paradigm to fit the new
evidence (though often reluctantly, and not without stubborn rearguard resistance
from diehard supporters of the old paradigm—see box: Science’s
blind side).
In my case, my ‘dream-come-true’ did not fit with my evolutionary there-is-no-spirit-realm
paradigm, and I conveniently forgot about it. Until, that is, I had a complete change
of worldview—I abandoned atheism and became a Christian—and read something
in the Bible that I believe relates directly to my dramatic moment on that Indonesian
road when the recurring dream of my youth became reality.
Photo by David Catchpoole 
Makassar from the air, wet season 1984. Muddy water streams from the twin mouths
of the Jeneberang River. Silt deposited like this extends the coastline such that
fishing villages along the estuary need to relocate several kilometres downstream
every few years, to retain navigable sea access. This is yet another example of
how claimed millions-of-years ages for the earth’s topography just don’t
stack up—see, e.g., Eroding ages,
Vanishing coastlines, and The earth—how old does
it look?.
Note that my experience was not a factor in my conversion—which happened
a bit over two years after that cloud shaded me at that spot on the road (i.e. while
I was still in Indonesia, but that’s another story). As I said, I had completely
forgotten about my ‘fulfilled dream’ until I happened to be reading
a certain passage in the Bible a full 16 years after the experience, and 14 years
after I received Jesus Christ
as my Lord and Saviour.
That passage is in the Apostle Paul’s famous address to the people of Athens
at the Areopagus, where he says:
‘From one man he made every nation of men, that they should
inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact
places where they should live.’ Acts 17:26, NIV
It hit me like a bombshell: ‘and he determined the times
set for them and the exact places where they should live’.
God knew not only the exact place where I would be but also the precise
time as well! There’s no other way that I could have dreamed such
a dream: the appearance of the cattle, buildings, the fragrance of the flowering
weeds, the sun directly overhead—I could not have known such details on the
basis of my own experience and knowledge prior to going to Indonesia (i.e. years
after the recurring dream). And note that despite my walking several times each
day over that exact place on the road for some months beforehand it was
only when the precise time matched with the scene in my dream that I recognized
it.
Why would God have done such a thing? For me, I have no doubt—I believe the
Apostle Paul explained why in the very next thing he said to the Athenians:
‘God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach
out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. “For in
him we live and move and have our being.”’ Acts 17:27–28a,
NIV
Just look at that: so that men would seek Him and perhaps
reach out for Him and find Him.
Today, I look at those words with a mixture of gratitude and yet quite some sadness.
Because at that time I did not seek Him, nor reach out for Him—I made no effort
to find Him whatsoever, despite the fact that, as I now recognize, He is indeed
‘not far from each one of us’. (Perhaps if I had sought Him at that
time, I would not have had such a difficult time of things during the following
two years.)
Consequently, despite my ‘impossible’ dream-come-true having left me
profoundly shaken, I ignored it, and therefore at that time was none the wiser for
having had the experience.
All experience must be interpreted by the light of Scripture, not vice versa.
But today, I’ve put this into print so that hopefully anyone reading this
who has not yet taken to heart Jesus’ promise that ‘seek and you shall
find’ (Matthew 7:7), might learn from what happened to me. Because,
as the Apostle Paul said, it really is true—it’s only in
God, our Creator, the One Who gives us life and breath
and everything else (Acts 17:25), that we live and move and have our being.
Apart from God, any dreams we might have are meaningless. He has revealed in His
written Word, the Bible,
everything that we need for salvation (2 Timothy 3:15–17). All experience must be interpreted
by the light of Scripture, not vice versa.
Science’s blind side
by Jonathan Sarfati and
David Catchpoole
The public perception of science is often that ‘science is neutral’,
but in practice, the ruling ‘paradigm’ can be so strong that conflicting
data and anomalies are often ignored.
Of course, when this is pointed out, there is frequently denial and resistance from
certain quarters in the scientific community (especially in relation to
the origin-of-life issue). It has been reported that: ‘Kuhn2 aroused the ire of many scientists when he argued
that paradigms have philosophical and psychological components and are not readily
discarded in the face of anomalous evidence.’3
One such scientist who, in the context of the creation/evolution debate, would like
the public to view science as being truly objective is
renowned anti-creationist Ian Plimer. He has written:
‘If new evidence disproves a scientific theory, then the existing theory is
rejected or undergoes revision in the light of the new evidence.’4
If Dr Plimer actually believes that, then his view is naïve in the extreme.
In reality, scientists are often in the grip of the prevailing paradigm
(i.e. belief system) of the day. (Something that, as one of the few voices railing
against the current global
warming alarmism paradigm,
Ian Plimer has recently experienced first-hand.)
The philosopher of science Thomas Kuhn (mentioned above) demonstrated the stifling
hold that the prevailing ‘accepted’ view can have on researchers in
his influential book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. He described
true scientific revolutions as being nothing less than wholesale paradigm shifts.
But these are rare, and Kuhn described how science in the grip of a widely-accepted
paradigm tolerates anomalies and some contrary evidence
for some time in the hope of solving them within the paradigm.5
Also noteworthy is the fact that, as Professor Evelleen Richards, a non-creationist
historian of science at the University of New South Wales, Australia, has pointed
out, scientists challenging the ruling paradigm find it hard to get published or
receive research grants—see this
quote.
And here’s another key observation from a non-creationist, Hubert Yockey,
regarding the stranglehold a paradigm can have, especially in the absence of any
known alternative:
‘The history of science shows that a paradigm, once it has achieved the status
of acceptance (and is incorporated in textbooks) and regardless of its failures,
is declared invalid only when a new paradigm is available to replace it.’6,7
Another philosopher of science, Imre Lakatos, pointed out that the ruling paradigm
can be further protected with auxiliary hypotheses. Any contrary evidence
is blamed on the failure of one of these hypotheses, which is then sacrificed to
protect the core theory. See how this works in practice with the
big bang paradigm.
|
Related articles
Recommended Resources
References
- Makassar has also been known by the alternative name ‘Ujung
Pandang’. Return to text.
- Kuhn, T., The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (3rd
edition), University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1996. Return to text.
- From an essay by Jonathan Wells in: Dembski, WA, ed., Mere
Creation—Science, Faith & Intelligent Design, with Contributions by Michael
Behe, David Berlinski, Phillip Johnson, Hugh Ross and others, InterVarsity Press,
Downers Grove, Illinois, p. 66, 1998. Return to text.
- See:
More nonsense from Ian Plimer Return to text.
-
David Catchpoole comments: ‘That’s clearly what I was trying to
do until about 3pm on the day of the “dream-come-true”—i.e. I
was trying to solve the obvious anomaly from within the atheistic/evolutionary paradigm.’
Return to text.
- Hubert P. Yockey, Information Theory and Molecular Biology,
Cambridge University Press, UK, 1992, p. 336. For a longer extract see:
Quotable quote: Primeval soup failed paradigm Return to text.
-
David Catchpoole comments: ‘So, despite my dream experience [main text],
in the absence of a new paradigm that did not invoke a spiritual realm, I simply
tolerated (ignored) the anomaly, and did not seriously question my atheistic/evolutionary
paradigm.’ Return to text.
Published: 15 August 2008(GMT+10)
| The article you just read is free, but the staff time working on it … isn’t. Consider a small gift to keep this site going.  | | |
|
