Can we consider the universe real, and if so, in what way?

Science fiction writers, I am sorry to say, really do not know anything.

Are we to assist it in gaining power in order to save our lives? Is that the paradox of our earthly situation?

(Insanity) is not hubris, not pride; it is inflation of the ego to its ultimate - confusion between him who worships and that which is worshipped. Man has not eaten God; God has eaten man.

It did not seem possible that Wendy Wright had been born out of blood and internal organs like other people. In proximity to her he felt himself to be a squat, oily, sweating, uneducated nurt whose stomach rattled and whose breath wheezed. Near her he became aware of the physical mechanisms which kept him alive; within him machinery, pipes and valves and gas-compressors and fan belts had to chug away at a losing task, a labor ultimately doomed. Seeing her face, he discovered that his own consisted of a garish mask; noticing her body made him feel like a low-class wind-up toy.

Where there's dope, there's hope!

Those who refused to respond to the new stimulus would perish. Adapt or perish.