There also seems to be a sort of basic, fundamental continuity even in a non-dreaming state. (There may be some exceptions to that observation, such as deep anesthesia or coma.
Exactly. I have been under total anesthesia twice, once as a child, when being anesthetized occasioned odd dreams and a sort of drifting through the dark, and the other time a few years ago. As they were beginning the operation, I looked up at the light and wondered if it would turn into butterflies, or I would get some other show. Instead, after a few seconds, it seemed, I was waking up in a darkened room where people were coughing. It was two and a half hours later and I was in the recovery room. I didn't know what had happened; someone told me the operation was long over. In a sense I had been nowhere. This gave me Buddhistic things to think about -- "the self is empty", etc. -- but later Buddhists told me a didn't know what I was talking about, which seems to be a feature of the Buddhists in my life.
There seems to be a kind of consciousness that occurs in sleep. Possibly also in certain induced states like meditation.
There also seems to be a sort of basic, fundamental continuity even in a non-dreaming state. (There may be some exceptions to that observation, such as deep anesthesia or coma.
Exactly. I have been under total anesthesia twice, once as a child, when being anesthetized occasioned odd dreams and a sort of drifting through the dark, and the other time a few years ago. As they were beginning the operation, I looked up at the light and wondered if it would turn into butterflies, or I would get some other show. Instead, after a few seconds, it seemed, I was waking up in a darkened room where people were coughing. It was two and a half hours later and I was in the recovery room. I didn't know what had happened; someone told me the operation was long over. In a sense I had been nowhere. This gave me Buddhistic things to think about -- "the self is empty", etc. -- but later Buddhists told me a didn't know what I was talking about, which seems to be a feature of the Buddhists in my life.