I read this in about a day, it grabbed me so much. Gotta love a book that dares to stick up for both Timothy Leary and Aleister Crowley. Maybe the 60s weren't such a bad time after all, a time to be maligned and certainly never emulated. This book dispels the scare-mongering and shows you a historical road not travelled that I kinda wish we had!

”I Do Not Believe Anything.”

”It seems to be a hangover of the medieval Catholic era that causes most people, even the educated, to think that everybody must believe something or other, that if one is not a theist, one must be a dogmatic atheist, and if one does not think capitalism is perfect one must believe fervently in socialism, and if one does not have blind faith in X, one must alternatively have blind faith in Not X or the reverse of X.
My own opinion is that belief is the death of intelligence . As soon as one believe a doctrine of any sort or assumes certitude, one stops thinking about that aspect of existence. The more certitude one assumes the less there is left to think about, and a person sure of everything would never have any need to think about anything, and might be considered clinically dead under current medical standards where the absence of brain activity is taken to mean that life has ended.”

The above quotes are the essence of Cosmic Trigger. They are what I remembered and retained across the thirty plus years since I last read this book. These quotes, that appear in the very first pages, tell you the book’s true theme and purpose: to break your rigidity of thought, to divorce you from the the disease of dogma, cure you from the curse of certitude.

Wilson front loaded his book with his intent, knowing that many would become lost in the flash bang whizz of the frankly fringe ideas that he goes on to explore. This is high octane weirdness and crackpot crazy, investigated and considered seriously. The Illuminati, UFOLOGISTS, dancing peyote nature spirits, astral pancakes from space, Wilhelm Reich’s Orgone, Alister Crowley Sex Magick, interstellar messages from the Dog Star Sirius — these and so many more ideas our consensus reality considers insane and not worth serious study — Wilson studied them, experimented with them, and presents them here for our examination. He writes:

”What my experiments demonstrate, what all such experiments throughout history have demonstrated, is simply that our models of reality are very small and tidy, universe of experience is huge and untidy, and no model of reality can ever include all the huge untidiness perceived by uncensored consciousness.”

This book blew my mind when I first read it over 30 years ago. Wilson became my guide through “Chapel Perilous” (that place from which you emerge either a stone cold paranoid or an agnostic) and forever changed the way I would perceive consensus reality. It was from Cosmic Trigger that I first discovered the Copenhagen Interpretation which Niels Bohr proposed to explain quantum mechanics, and which can be expanded into a general view of reality as Model Agnosticism. (Alan W. Watts popularized Model Agnosticism with his phrase “The Menu is not the Meal.”) This book profoundly changed the way I went on to view the world and reality.

Reading it now, after decades of practicing the no belief necessary model of looking at the world, it didn’t pack the same punch. Radical revelations are only fresh when they are new. So this time I noticed the scatter shot structure of the book, picked out how some parts were far less effective than others. But Wilson’s trickster wink and a grin humor was still sharp, and I still heard the echo of the thunder that so resonated in my younger mind.

Cosmic Trigger is a book that will be most effective for the young. Past a certain age it’s likely that a rigidity of mind has set in that will make you incapable of appreciating it. Yet, if you are honestly struggling to keep your mind open to possibilities, if you are actively resisting become that old, “Stay off my lawn!” guy, you could do worse that expose yourself to the shenanigans that Wilson here presents.

Robert Anton Wilson is the quintessential agnostic, highlighting on page one in all-caps "I DO NOT BELIEVE ANYTHING" before he seemingly gives you reason to believe in synchronicity, the 23 enigma, yoga, the occult, the miracle at Lourdes and Guadalupe, tantric sex, psychedelic drugs, a worldwide global conspiracy, UFOs, quantum physics, and a lot of information about the connection of Egyptology to the "Dog Star" Sirius. But he continues to question these things and gives the reasons one might also question these things, even as he tells you reasons why one might also believe them.

A fun read, but by no means a doctrine or lesson in any belief. More of a guide to seeing the world through different eyes than we're "programmed" with.

And I finished it during the dog days, the time Sirius is closest to earth. And on August 31st.

31 - 8 = 23

How 'bout that?

I’m a big fan of everything that I’ve read of Wilson‘s so far, I think he has a peculiar point of view and his style of writing makes the material in cosmic trigger much more readable. The way that he talks about people of all races and cultures not his own is extremely 1970s but if you can get over that (it’s this awkward vernacular, nothing racist or anything just... out of date) it’s a good read. I’ll be digging into the sequel, to be sure.

5 star for a guerilla high-weird epistemology (GHWE), some interesting autobiographical notes and touching moments.

1 star for a TON of crackpottery. I know that is partially the aim of GHWE, but actually I think RAW has way toooo low standards. The Signal to noise is painfully low, but the underlying principles are intriguing...

I used to refer to Robert Anton Wilson as a "crackprophet"-- his writings are totally off the wall and indiscriminate, embracing both silly ideas and deeply profound ones, trying to unify scientific, historical, metaphysical, and, well, downright psychotic concepts. What this book challenged me to do, way back when, was to approach things with as open a mind and as little "contempt prior to investigation" as I could muster. I must have assembled and read several dozen books as the result of reading this, everything from "Tao of Physics" and "Dancing Wu-Li Masters" to "Journeys Out of the Body" and "A History of Secret Societies." Wilson spurred me to investigate Alan Watts and Gurdjieff, Buddhism and Hinduism, particle physics and Einstein, early Christianity and the Knights Templar, Colin Wilson and David Foster... and that just scratches the surface. Wilson's books are a good test-- as he himself often stated-- of just how willing the reader is to explore and be challenged. And yes, he was nuts. But God bless him for being nuts as well as so deeply full of humanity.

One of the first books by R.A.W. I read years ago and one of the main drivers behind my perpetual and never ending fight to change my reality tunnel (succeeding and failing in the process many times) to properly accomodate myself in the crazy and inhumane contemporary world ruled by the Totality of the Spectacle and mediated experience, where people hungrily consume artificial products and maintain a prothesis of relations via Facebook and other social media. The world in which buying a new iPhone, iPad or other iCrap has become the absolute peak experience for millions of people. I despise you, but at the same time I pity you, because I know that this is not all your fault. Your blindness has been induced. It's high time to regain your sight!

Sorry for this rant, but this is exactly what reading of R.A.W.'s mind candies does to you. Go for it people! You'll find lots of great ideas and concepts for your brain to use. It's good for your mental health.

Chronicling Wilson's attempts at undergoing a "self-induced brain change," the first volume of the Cosmic Trigger trilogy offers a funny and thought provoking trip through Wilson's attempts to understand his experience of alien contact from the star Sirius. Or was it alien contact? Wilson attempts at explaining the experience from a variety of different angles that touch both the occult (yoga; Crowlean magick) and the pseudo-scientific (ESP), without firmly holding to any one explanatory framework or model. This is what Wilson calls his model agnosticism, or as he puts it in the introduction: "I do not believe anything!"

Overall it was a joyful read, with Wilson encouraging the reader to consider different perspectives while also maintaining a level of skepticism about their "truthfulness." The book is also touching, as Wilson recounts the violent death of his daughter and his coming to terms with that loss that helps him understand "the final secret of the Illuminati."

My only reservation about the book itself is that it would be helpful for the potential reader to check out some of Wilson's other works first, particularly the Illuminatus! Trilogy, and have some passing familiarity with 60's occult/hippy pop culture icons (e.g. Timothy Leary). Otherwise, one can become baffled by the overwhelming amount of speculation and theories that Wilson offers, and would likely be turned off by it or wonder how it all ties together.

The RAW And The Cooked (well fried!)
robert anton wilson frazzled his brain so you don't have to! the A-Z (or the 5 - 23 via 33 and 666) of mind expansion in the 70s, and where it was supposed to lead to by now! it's not here, not even faintly! but, although raw's predictions are short (by mibbe a century), that takes away none of my appreciation for this book and the processes and explanations put forward for our information. his research was thorough, his conclusions startling, not his fault science didn't take the trajectory he predicted! as well as all that, this is a vastly entertaining read laced with as much humour as there are conspiratorial matters, although i did have to use all eight circuits of my brain to get my head around some of the concepts tackled, which, it has to be said, are beautifully explained!
i've only been a RAW recruit for little over a year, but am enlisting for the long haul! after all, one day the trigger will be pulled!

Well, maybe not

But still, reams of delightfully stimulating nonsense from the co-author of the magnificent Illuminatus trilogy. For all of the hyperbole There are still some serious points and important questions scattered throughout. And jarring personal tragedy. Worth a read. Can we ever really change ourselves in any serious way or we just stuck as we are? Who opposes this? Who exactly, and why?

This is a book I read often. It is as eye-opening as a great hit of acid, without that annoying nebulousness that keeps you from expressing all the things you've learned when you touch back down on the runway.

This is the natural partner to his trilogy Illuminatus! (which I suspect is far more fact-based than it appears, based on the parallel tale of its creation told within this book), and this is where my acquaintance with RAW began. Though he was not actually my contemporary (older than my older brother, who was actually my "bad" influence at the time and introduced me to things like The Mothers of Invention and Conan the Barbarian novels when my older sister was listening to AM radio and swooning over the Monkees), I am a child of the '60s and was influenced heavily by this book.

Yes, he was one of a group of people leading the way to mind expansion (Leary the one people always think of because he was more of a celebrity, but he also became a sell-out and somewhat of a caricature), but Wilson was the one who best communicated it--not just as an intellectual giant, but because he didn't take himself too seriously. He was flying by the seat of his pants, making it up as he went, open to new revelations, and just plain having a blast figuring out the WHY of it all--if that is even possible. He can tell a tale, and I suspect even he couldn't keep straight where reality ended and fantasy kicked in. Indeed, I suspect he considered them flip sides of the same coin. It's all about perception and expectations, right?

Though this is autobiographical (and not always funny), there is still his sense of fun, ridiculousness, paranoia, and freewheeling willingness to try anything and everything. . . and then take what he liked and move on to the next thing. Who else would think to embrace everything from acid to the OTO to meditation and telepathically communicating with aliens from Sirius and simultaneously support himself by writing for Playboy?

There is a treasure trove of RAW quotes out there and he is famous for asserting that "I don't believe anything, but I have many suspicions," "Certitude belongs exclusively to those who only own one encyclopedia," and "There is no complete theory of anything." I think that sums up his appeal for anyone who is a perpetual student.

This book pretty much details what was going on behind the scenes of the era when Leary told us all to "Turn on, tune in, drop out," and popular culture was trying to figure out what he meant. The drugs were only one means of that and a lot of what these pioneers were groping around in is still unfolding. Jailing them didn't stop it and the weirdness of the aging Baby Boomer generation can't undo it. I, for one, am curious to know what's to come from the Starseed Transmissions and if Leary and Wilson are laughing their arses off now that they have a better vantage point. I suspect if they're looking in, it's only briefly because they're gleefully flitting off to the next step in their evolution and seeing what other answers are out there for questions that haven't even occurred to them yet.

"Only the madman is absolutely sure." --RAW

Wilson's memoir of his growth into one of the most public occult-adjacent personalities of the 60s and 70s is engaging on nearly every page. At times it leans heavily on name dropping so the reader gets a sense of the high-level crowd Wilson is moving with. At other times the narrative drops down to tell a sweet or innocent story to balance all the craziness. The writing is always cogent, even when the perspective shifts rapidly through events.

A must-read for fans like myself for whom Illuminatus! is a doorway into a larger vision of the world.