PKD's Precognition - was he a "PreCog"?

[Anthony Peake]

A term that can be found in many of Philip K Dick's novels and short stories is a "PreCog". You may recall that one of these is featured in the Stephen Speilberg movie of Dick's "Minority Report". For Dick "PreCogs" were human beings who showed an ability to monitor the immediate future - they had precognition of events yet to take place.

I consider that PKD wrote fictionalised accounts of things that he actually experienced. It has long been considered that the "illness" that he referenced many times with regard to himself was possibly Temporal Lobe Epilepsy (TLE) or extreme bi-polarity (both of which are crucial elements of my "Scale of Transcendence"(op cit)). This "illness" opened not only channels of communication between PKD's Eidolon and his Daemon (which he called VALIS or SOPHIA) but also manifested itself as "The Diviner's Disease" - precognition.

I believe that I have discovered evidence that his Daemon gave Phil an image of his own final moments.

Quite by chance I have aquired copies of a thus far unpublished treasure trove of letters sent by Phil to a pen pal in the early 1970s. One written on February 25th 1975 particularly caught my itladian eye. This letter carried the following fascinating postscript:

'I was up to 5 a.m. on this last night. I did something I never did before; I commanded the entity to show itself to me – the entity which has been guiding me internally since March. A sort of dream-like period passed, then, of hypnogogic images of underwater cities, very nice, and then a stark single horrifying scene, inert but not still; a man lay dead, on his face, in a living room between the coffee table and the couch.'
P K Dick, Letter to Claudia Krenz - 25th February 1975.

On February 18th 1982 Phil’s neighbours become concerned that they had not seen him that day. They knocked on his door then forced their way into the apartment. They found Phil lying unconscious in the living room. This was a place that Phil in 1975 would not have recognised. It is likely that he would have been found in exactly the position and location described so clearly in Phil’s Daemon-evoked hypnogogic almost exactly seven years before. Phil was not dead at this time but clearly in his dream-vision Phil could not have known if the man was actually dead or unconscious. He was to die about a week later without really gaining consciousness.

Now please note that Phil was quite precise in his command to his Daemon – he requested that it show itself. I believe that that is exactly what the Daemon did. It showed a future Phil in the last few moments of his conscious awareness before the stroke severed his links with ‘reality’ as he perceived it. In doing so the Daemon implied that it was Phil himself in the final moments of his life – existing in the half-life described in his novel Ubik and explained in my first book, Is There Life After Death - The Extraordinary Science of What Happens When We Die.

Could this be another Daemonic clue that we do, indeed, Cheat The Ferryman?

[etruscan33]

Hi Anthony,
Are you aware of any of Dan Winter's work?. He talks allot about leucid dreaming and putting yourself in a position to pass into the next world or realm in the best possible shape much like native peoples try and achieve via some of their practices, native American Indians etc. He makes allot of sense and backs it up with peer review and real science. Thankyou for your great forum. Keep up the good work. I heard you on red Ice recently, another great website. I am having a wrestle with Neo over on another thread right now , I think he should go back to the Matrix swallow the right pill and have a good look.

Regards
Chris

[Anthony Peake]

Chris,

Welcome aboard!!!!

When I have a few spare hours I will check out the Winter book. For the moment I have so many events to deal with, and prepare for, that I am really running out of time!

[David Campbell]

As I noted in my brief review of Philip K. Dick: The Pentultimate Truth, I think PKD's statements at the 1977 Metz Science Fiction convention concerning multiverses, reality as a computer simulation and even his statements on deja vu rate as precognitions.

[Hypnoshaman]

I can add another writer that can almost class as a 'precog', Alan Moore. The creator of the character John Constantine based his character on the visual appearance of Sting in the 80s and dressed him in a pin striped suit and long tan coloured trench coat.

I read an article by Alan in which he stated he was sitting in a coffee shop in London some time ago, many years after creating the character, and he looked up and saw a man enter, the image of his character, who looked over at him, winked and moved on.

I have often thought that some writers may not be aware of how their stories come about, that they 'tune in' to vibrations or energies which then tranlate into stories and concepts. The above story ties in with the stories mentioned in 'The Daemon'.

[A Dark Philosopher]

Hypnoshaman: Seb, I wasn't aware that much of Moore's work was precognitive, having only myself really read his "From Hell", "Voice Of The Fire" and some of his Lovecraftian short stories. Perhaps it may be worthwhile starting a thread to his work in the ITLADian LITERATURE section?

[mikegrove4]

I like that story, but I bet he never winked!

[A Dark Philosopher]

I read an article by Alan in which he stated he was sitting in a coffee shop in London some time ago, many years after creating the character, and he looked up and saw a man enter, the image of his character, who looked over at him, winked and moved on.

I like that story, but I bet he never winked!

Why do you bet the character/man never winked? Am I missing something? Having spent all morning watching Tony Blair at the IRAQ inquiry and then translating his major points into Russian for a Newspaper I write for over there I may, of course, be somewhat frazzled in this break!

[mikegrove4]

Some people think I'm Russian. I'm not, I just walk fast...

Why do you bet the character/man never winked?

It may well have happened that way. Just sounds like an embellishment too far, tis all, like an urban myth type scenario, perhaps he did see such a thing even, but it could have been a trick of the mind.
Just that final detail sounds too perfect for my cynical mind.

[A Dark Philosopher]

Why do you bet the character/man never winked?

It may well have happened that way. Just sounds like an embellishment too far, tis all, like an urban myth type scenario, perhaps he did see such a thing even, but it could have been a trick of the mind. Just that final detail sounds too perfect for my cynical mind.

Ah! In that case, yes I tend to agree. Retrospective confirmation bias being even stronger than ordinary attention bias. Thanks for the expansion! I'm heading back to the translating as the afternoon session is starting, thanks Mike.