robert anton wilson _

"do not adjust your mind, it is reality that is malfunctioning"

i read a few RAW books in my early 20s and i remember them having a profound effect on me. sadly, as the intervening years stretch further, that's about all i remember... he wrote the seminal sci-fantasy epic 'the illuminatus trilogy', however i was more interested in his non-fiction work - three of which stand out, 'cosmic trigger', 'prometheus rising' and 'quantum psychology'.

here's a brutal edit from 'cosmic trigger' that gives you an idea of where RAW is coming from - that reality is mutable, flexible and, with that in mind, we ought not to be so rigid and fixed in our opinions / beliefs. we ought to 'reserve the right to change our minds at any time':

Most philsophers have known, at least since around 500 B.C., that the world perceived by our senses is not "the real world" but a construct we create -- our own private work of art. Modern science began with Galileo's demonstration that color is not "in" objects but "in" the interaction of our senses with objects. Despite this philosophic and scientific knowledge of neurological relativity, which has been more clearly demonstrated with each major advance in instrumentation, we still, due to language, think that behind the flowing, meandering, inter-acting, evolving universe created by perception is one solid monolithic "reality" hard and crisply outlined as an iron bar.

... The only "realities" (plural) that we actually experience and can talk meaningfully about are perceived realities, experienced realities, existential realities -- realities involving ourselves as editors -- and they are all relative to the observer, fluctuating, evolving, capable of being magnified and enriched, moving from low resolution to hi-fi, and do not fit together like the pieces of a jig-saw into one single Reality with a capital R.


links _

RAW official site
with an odd 'about' section that baffles more than facilitates. head to the excerpts section to find selected passages from his work

mavericks interview
straight, factual, to-the-point - just the way we like it

dangermedia interview
wide-ranging interview, and a more gentle introduction

interview with r.u.sirius
r.u.sirius is a writer and former editor of the excellent magazine 'mondo 2000'. in this recent(ish) he chats to RAW and puts his work into context

fusion anomaly
an odd 'nodal' collection of introductoy info and links from the fusion anomoly crew

everything is under control
a late entry in the RAW canon, a beginner's guide to conspiracy theories in all their manifestations. hard to find a conspriacy that RAW doesn't cover in this book.


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