But once something false gets deeply into the canon they're pretty much stuck with it, since their dogma informs all of their subsequent intuitions.

Actually I guess all systems of thought have a similar kind of positive-feedback problem. Even science will fail for anything where self-confirming experiments are possible. But religious intuition is the area where this issue has come up in the biggest way in my life.
This does seem to be how religious and spiritual dogma is formed. Some initial mystical experience spawns a slew of mental beliefs which carry on long after the experience fades. Ideally the mind should be allowed to reset frequently, discarding all beliefs - even those created from such experiences - to allow fresh, new inspiration.

People sometimes think of our world as one unified whole, and of 'parallel worlds' as being countless, distinct alternative worlds. But our world isn't really one globally well defined thing. Its more like a vast number of very, very similar and not completely defined worlds packed close together
I wonder how much all these worlds really synchronize? One world may have its own probable pasts and futures, weaving in and out of the global reality and sharing its rules, yet carrying its own destiny. I perceive all beings as being their own parallel world in a sense, whether it be a human being or an atom. What you see of others and the world is where their realities and yours intersect.

Since you brought up parallel worlds I can't help but throw in frequency here. All interaction is energy exchange. All energy is self aware. The parallel worlds, intersecting each other, are awareness intersecting with itself. The rate or speed at which this occurs could be called frequency.

When we say things like "physical events are manifested thoughts", I think we use the word "thought" here because its the closest idea we have to something like that. But I think that what we call "thoughts" are actually manifestations too, for the most part. And the spirit-like soup that the physical world is embedded in is not primarily made up of human thoughts. Human thought is one part of a much greater class of thought-like things which also includes objects.
Yes. When I make phrases stating that physicality is thought manifestation, thought is a poor choice of words but the best we have in our vocabulary. Consciousness comes close as well. It points towards a level of awareness and intelligence far beyond the thoughts spawned from the brain, but the word serves as an indicator to the immaterial and self aware nature of that which creates the physical universe (the brain being part there of.)

Imagine a 'lower' spiritual realm that is a big, complicated mess of wrestling desires. (A 'higher' realm would be less chaotic and not as close to manifestation maybe.) Here desire isn't the right word, but I lack a better one. When you get a premonition that something will happen, its what will happen due to the existence of some portion of that mess of desire. You don't know the whole mess of desire though, because of the limitation of your individual perspective. And what actually will happen is an outcome of all of the relevant desire. So what you see in your premonition might not ever have been possible. Its not that you misinterpreted it, or that something changed. The vision is real in the sense that the causes are there, even though you can not see all the relevant causes. Its a little bit like seeing that a lot of parallel worlds look a certain way soon, but with no way to verify whether those worlds are even potentially connected to the one you're in now. And the existence of these worlds isn't just extrapolated from the present state of our world. The future caused somehow, it unfolds according to some kind of a plan, constrained by considerations that we have almost no understanding of. In other words, that churning mess of desire is conscious and highly intelligent.
I see such realms as not something we are caught in, as small debris to be tossed around by the waves, but as our mass mind. A human being extends up into, or more precisely is these higher dimensions. The physical self being akin to a protrusion or bud of a larger entity. The non-physical consciousness of humans also coalesces into a mass consciousness, which is a being of its own. If the components which make it up change their desires it will reflect that as much as we are influenced by it.

In most eastern teachings, its a mistake to project your feeling and identify yourself as being some particular person or object. I think that teaching is a mistake, that this capacity to move around and become different things is natural and good, and if you were able to stop doing it somehow that would have bad results.
From my experience its not that this is a mistake, its simply comes from a certain perspective needed to operate within this dimension. It is the lack of ability to expand beyond that perspective which causes difficulties. Its not that the individual self must be replaced by non-self or unity, but rather that both experiences are available. Without the larger connection the individual builds up fear stemming from mortality, which is the root many painful thought patterns and actions.