All Voices
From postmodern philosophy, to existentialism, 20th-century paganism, and LSD, underground writer Robert Anton Wilson is interested in more than just occult spy fiction.
Self-described as a transcendental Agnostic, he is widely known in New Age circles as a poet, playwright, and futurist-a high-technology enthusiast involved with, among other things, the scientific search for immortality.
Having written several books on the paranoid, schizophrenic subject of secret, underworld conspiracies, Wilson has carved a niche for himself within American popular culture as an "alternative" expert in the areas of esoteric history and political intrigue.
Speaking with me via telephone Feb. 1, 1994, from his home in Santa Cruz, California, Wilson discussed his books, his beliefs, and a mind-bending history of the world you never heard in state schools. Following are excerpts from that conversation.
Kooks, Conspiracies and Critical Thought
Boyte: In the Illuminati Trilogy, a friend of mine understands your point to have been that theorizing about conspiracies is pointless. Is this correct? If not, what is your opinion about conspiracy theories?
Wilson: I certainly didn't intend to convey the idea that it's pointless. My idea was, and still is, that theorizing should be recognized as theorizing... But people who build accusations around wild speculation should be recognized as being dangerous.
Back in the 1950s, we all learned how dangerous that could be from Senator McCarthyMcCarthyMcCarthyMcCarthy. Somehow we seem to have forgotten that lesson. And people who have made a career out of slander, libel, and wild accusations have become heroes. They're not heroes to me.
On the other hand, if you do theorize about conspiracies and admit that you're theorizing, I think that's perfectly legitimate.
Boyte: So you think there is some value in theorizing about conspiracies? And when you answer, define 'conspiracies.'
Wilson: I think there's value in theorizing about conspiracies because nobody but professional historians deny that there are conspiracies. The laws of every country I know about recognize conspiracy as a crime. We have quite a few laws against conspiracies in this country-conspiracies of all sorts.
Conspiracies under law occur when people get together and collaborate to commit an illegal act, and cover up what they're doing. The heads of General Electric and Westinghouse were convicted for conspiracy back in the '60s for price fixing. Conspiracies go on all the time, and they're regularly brought into court and frequently proven.
The Illuminati as Metaphor: How do we Know What's Real?
Boyte: Pretend that I don't know anything about conspiracy theories. Who is the Illuminati?
Wilson: If I had a dollar for every time I've been asked that question, I'd be rich now. And I never know how to answer it. The Illuminati in my books is a metaphor for the basic problem of philosophy-which is how can we tell what's real-and the basic problem of ethics-how can we tell what's good?
Various groups known as the Illuminati have existed at various times in history. Various theories have claimed that all the different groups called the Illuminati are the same group, which has existed throughout history since the dawn of life. Maybe the first amoeba who double-crossed another amoeba was the founder of the Illuminati.
A reverse theory, however, is that this is all paranoid fantasy, and the Illuminati doesn't exist at all. Trying to choose between these theories when you get bombarded with the evidence, in the way I bombard my readers, is intended to make you realize how unsure you are of everything, and how hard it is to be certain of anything.
Then there's the problem: if the Illuminati exist, are its members really the bad guys, or have they just gotten the bad press? Could they be the good guys? And I have scattered a lot of evidence around in my books that they could be the good guys.
So, in confronting readers with a kind of 'occult spy fiction'-or a parody of 'occult spy fiction'-I am confronting them with the basic problems of modern social science and philosophy: Who can be trusted? What can I believe?
Boyte: Based on your research, do you think that members of the Illuminati have any spiritual allegiance to some deity?
Wilson: It depends on whose theory of the Illuminati you want to believe. I don't believe any of the theories about the Illuminati.
Boyte: What do you believe about the Illuminati?
Wilson: I believe that various groups have called themselves the Illuminati at various times, and people with lively imaginations have constructed some really extraordinary theories about them.
Boyte: Are you familiar with a person named Joseph Weishaup? Based upon my reading, he was a 17th-century Jesuit priest who was excommunicated by a pope in the 1600s, and he swore to eradicate Catholicism. He later formed a group called the Illuminati, which tried to overthrow the Bavarian government in Germany. But he was caught, and the members of the Illuminati scattered in exile across Europe. Are you familiar with this 'version' of historical events?
Wilson: Nope. I've never heard that before. But it is pretty close to orthodox historical accounts Adam Weishaupt, who was a Jesuit who resigned from the order but went on teaching at a Jesuit college as a lay teacher. And he founded a group called the Illuminati, which was made up only of thirty-third-degree Freemasons.
They infiltrated Masonic lodges all over Europe, and some say in the United States, too. That was in 1776. In 1786, the Bavarian government suppressed the Illuminati and claimed to have evidence that the Illuminati was plotting to overthrow every monarchy in Europe and the Papacy to boot. And if that's true, I say, "Hey, that was a pretty good idea.'
As Thomas JeffersonThomas JeffersonThomas JeffersonThomas JeffersonThomas JeffersonThomas Jefferson said, if Adam Weishaupt would have lived in the United States, he wouldn't have needed to run a secret society. He could have published this all openly and recruited on the street corners.
The Illuminati was secret only because you couldn't plot against kings and popes in Europe at that time without landing in jail or worse.
Boyte: Why do you think it's so hard for people to talk about conspiracy theories? Why do people want to dismiss conspiracies as fanatical fantasy?
Wilson: There are a variety of reasons. People of my generation-the geriatric set-all remember Hitler, who believed the world was run by a secret cabal of Jewish bankers. Because that conspiracy theory led to so much harm for so many innocent people-the Holocaust-a lot of people of my generation just don't want to hear any talk about conspiracies; they think that almost anybody who talks about conspiracies is as paranoid and dangerous as Hitler. That's a very strong prejudice. I had to overcome that prejudice in order to begin thinking about conspiracies.
Another reason people don't like to think about conspiracy theories is because most of them prefer self-soothing theories instead of theories that make them nervous or uncomfortable. And it's a self-soothing theory to think that we're never deceived, that our rulers are never crooked, or that nothing evil ever happens in our corporations or government. Believing in that sort of thing keeps people happy and chugging along, as well as anyone can in a world like this.
Once you realize that the government is full of thieves, murderers, scoundrels-and the corporations are just about as bad-you're living in a much more uncomfortable universe, especially if you talk about it, because you get a reputation as a nut.
Boyte: When did you first become interested in conspiracy theories?
Wilson: Around the time a friend of mine was named by Jim Garrison as one of the conspirators in the Kennedy assassination. I was convinced that Garrison was and unscrupulous demagogue, like Senator McCarthy, who was throwing accusations around wildly.
And I started thinking about the psychology of conspiracy buffs. And I started investigating, and I became convinced of two things: There are conspiracies, but most conspiracy buffs are so psychologically warped that they are incapable of presenting a reasonable case because they don't know how to investigate.
They don't know how to be skeptical of their own theories. They don't know how to check prejudices against facts. So even when they do stumble upon part of the truth, it sounds crazy once they've put it through the system of their semantics.
Linguistics, Loaded Words, and Objectivity
Boyte: Linguistically speaking, do you think that the term 'conspiracy theory' has become a loaded phrase and that-in order to talk objectively about 'whatever's going on'-we need to create a new word?
Wilson: Yes. Definitely. I don't know why I haven't thought of that myself. I frequently coin new words because I think the old words are loaded. I haven't coined a new word for this field because I'm a congenial idiot. And it takes me a long time (sometimes) to figure out the obvious. Thank you very much.
New Age Gurus and American Popular Culture
Boyte: Terrence McKenna and Timothy LearyTimothy LearyTimothy LearyTimothy Leary seem to 'get off' on being New Age gurus. How do you view yourself in terms of your role in American popular culture?
Wilson: Well, in the first place, Leary has several times denounced the idea of a guru and said he's not a guru. So I don't think you should blame him if some people treat him like a guru because he tries to avoid it.
And I also try to avoid it, for the same reason: I think the world has had too many perfect masters, and popes, and mahatmas, and other such pretenders. Finding a perfect master is ideal only if your desire is to become a perfect slave.
Postmodernism, Paranoia, and the Creation of Art
Boyte: Your work on conspiracies impresses me as being scholarly. Tell me about the research methodology involved in exploring 'conspiracy theories.'
Wilson: I have never written about conspiracies in any of my non-fiction books, except for one essay on P2 and a non-fiction book called Coincidance.
I've written about conspiracies only in my novels. And in my novels, my system is very simple. It's based upon a principle that's more-or-less general in post-modernism, which is that you shouldn't present your art as something for people to believe. You should present it as a challenge to them.
So I incorporate a great deal of evidence that seems quite legitimate to me from quite reputable sources. And I also include a great deal of what seems to be paranoid ranting by unbalanced minds. And I include a great deal of my own humor and satire. I leave the reader to figure which part is which...
People argue about what my novels mean, which is the effect I want. I don't want anybody to think that I know the truth.
Boyte: Are you interested in challenging our thoughts to get us to critically examine politics, or are you more interested in advancing a particular point of view?
Wilson: As I say, I identify with Post-modernists in general, but I also have been heavily influenced by Garfinkel's ethno methodology-which uses social science to cast doubt on social science-and by Korzybski's general semantics-which cast doubt on any kind of verbalization we can make.
Korzybski teaches us to be a lot more a lot more careful about the words we use and the concepts we accept.
So, between Post-modernism in general-especially the deconstructionists, Derrida, etc.; the ethno methodologists, Korzybski, the founder of general semantics; and LSD-my general attitude is that anything I can believe, I can only believe for a short while, and then I start thinking of alternatives. I just don't believe in my own perception, or in anybody else's.
I've conducted hundreds of experiments in my seminars to demonstrate that everybody perceives differently, and that there is no one, ideal perceiver. And if our perceptions are indeterminate, uncertain, or relative, then our deductions from them must contain some indeterminacy or relativity. And that is my viewpoint.
Creativity and the 'Unconscious Navigator'
Boyte: In your book Masks of the Illuminati, you team up Albert EinsteinAlbert EinsteinAlbert EinsteinAlbert EinsteinAlbert EinsteinAlbert Einstein and James JoyceJames JoyceJames JoyceJames JoyceJames Joyce as drinking buddies who meet a man claiming that he's being chased by demons. Where did you get the idea to bring Einstein and Joyce together in a book about the Illuminati?
Wilson: I wrote that in 1979, and you ask me where I got the idea. Hell, I don't know. Creativity is more mysterious to the creators than it is to the people who write books about creativity. I don't know how to do it. The idea just comes to me.
Faulkner said there was a demon that guides writers, which he spelled with an 'a' so it had the Greek meaning of a spirit who just hangs around and helps you, not an evil spirit.
Blake said the prophets Ezekiel and Elijah came and dictated his works to him.
Robert E. HowardRobert E. Howard, to descend to a different plain of literature entirely, said he felt as if Conan the Barbarian was standing beside him dictating the stories about Conan.
Norman Maller says writers have a navigator in the unconscious who tells them where to go. I like all those metaphors, but I prefer the Irish metaphor. It's a six-foot-tall white rabbit from County Kerry called the Pookah.
Transcendental Agnosticism
Boyte: You've described yourself as being a transcendental Agnostic. Can you explain how you arrived at this position?
Wilson: The word 'Agnostic' was coined by Thomas Henry Huxley in the last century to mean 'somebody who doesn't know,' as distinguished from all the people who they do know.
His Agnosticism was heavily anti-religion, anti-Christian specifically. He was a Darwinian. Because of the opposition of the churches to Darwin and to a lot of other scientists, Huxley was pretty much opposed to the churches, like most scientists still are.
So I felt the word 'Agnostic' was very congenial to me-until I started having mystical experiences. And I realized that I just haven't come to any definite opinions about these experiences, except that they're very interesting. They give you a whole new slant on life. In fact, they give you several new slants on life.
So it seems to me that the best description of my mentality is 'transcendental Agnosticism,' as distinguished from Huxley's materialistic Agnosticism. And I find that I'm not the only transcendental Agnostic. If you read carefully enough, I think you'll find that the Buddha was a transcendental Agnostic; so was Lao Tzu, and Aleister Crowley. I think Tim Leary is a transcendental Agnostic. Though I don't think he's ever used these words, I think he would accept them.
Becoming One with God
Boyte: Tell me about some of the mystical experiences that you've had.
Wilson: Well, here's where my Agnosticism comes in. I have become one with God, I think, I don't insist on it. I have had the experience of feeling like something like that was happening.
I've had what appear to be out-of-body experiences. In training in various forms of yoga, I have had a great deal of what seems to be ESP, although it can be explained as just coincidence by the dye-hard enemies of ESP theory. I don't insist that it was ESP. It just seems a hell-of-a-lot like it.
Boyte: You said you feel like you've become one with God. What does that feel like, and what is God like?
Wilson: Every mystic since the dawn of history has agreed that it is ineffable, that words simply cannot convey it. It seems to me that the best way to describe it is to say every possible metaphor you can think of, to some degree, fits this experience. But the experience transcends any finite series of metaphors.
You can say it's joyous. You can say it's cosmic. You can say that it's the solution to all philosophical problems, or at least temporarily so. You can make all sorts of metaphors, but any finite series falls short because the experience the experience itself has the quality of infinity.
Boyte: If you felt like you've become one with God, can I assume that you believe in God?
Wilson: No, most of the time. I don't like the word 'God.' And I don't like the word 'believe.'
I tend to believe that I have been forced to accept the existence of a higher intelligence. But this higher intelligence may or may not exist. It may just be my most complicated error to date; however, I don't think so.
I think it does exist, but it has nothing in common with what most people mean by "God,' which is a grouchy old man who sits on the clouds watching to see which kids are masturbating so he can burn them in hell later on. It has nothing to do with that at all.
Boyte: What does God have to do with?
Wilson: Joyous creativity. But that's just another metaphor.
High Technology, Morality, and Mysticism
Boyte: You've been an enthusiast for high technology. What would you do to ensure that technology contributes to a better world, as opposed to contributing to a worse world?
Wilson: That's a very good question. As corny as it sounds, I think there are some legal steps that can be taken. For instance, if agents of our government actually conducted experiments on American citizens with radioactive elements over a period of nearly 40 years, then I think a great many of them should be convicted of 'crimes against humanity,' which I believe was the term used at Nuremberg.
In addition to punishment and other means of deterrence, I thin science should change. Actually, science is changing. For example, I know a lot of scientists who are more mystical than I am and think I'm rather cranky and old fashioned. But that's OK because it shows that science is changing.
I think there are more scientists today who realize that you can't be a cold, detached intellect like Sherlock Holmes. That's a very inhuman state of mind. You are an emotional being if you are human. And you've got to recognize your emotions. And you've got to recognize a code of morality.
So, the very image of the scientist has got to change, back to the Middle-Ages idea of the alchemist. To be an alchemist, you had to first improve your emotional and moral nature in order to clarify your intellectual nature. And I think more and more scientists understand that now. So that will help mutate science and technology.
But the main thing is to get rid of all these damn fool laws that prevent scientists from doing the more interesting fast-acting experiments on consciousness alteration involving chemicals like LSD.
Existentialism and Modern Science
Boyte: What advances in modern science might help us answer the questions: Why are we here? Where did we come from? And where are we going?
Wilson: I don't think we can answer those questions, except temporarily. I think we can find an answer that works for a lot of people at a given time, which becomes the paradigm of the age. But there will always be some people, often creative and intelligent people, who don't like it and have their own answers.
Aleister Crowley and the Pagan Revival
Boyte: Earlier you referred to Aleister Crowley, and you've even used him as a character in two of your books. For those people who don't know who Aleister Crowley is, who is he?
Winston: Aleister Crowley was the most controversial occultist of the early 20th century. He was a poet, a novelist, a short-story writer, a champion mountain climber, an explorer. He took a degree in organic chemistry. He was one of the first researchers to study who drugs relate to altered consciousness and mysticism.
He was initiated into a couple of dozen occult lodges in Europe, into Sufism in North Africa, and into Hinduism and Buddhism in Asia. He also was one of the great practical jokers of all time. He was a premature Post-modernist.
Boyte: I've heard him described before as a 'wizard.'
Wilson: (sings) If ever, if ever a wiz there was, old uncle Aleister was one because, because, because of all the wonderful things he does.
Boyte: How has Aleister Crowley influenced the modern world?
Wilson: Enormously, even though most people don't realize it, except for a few fundamentalist Christians. Crowley wanted to revive paganism. There's quite a lively neo-pagan movement all over the western world now.
Boyte: As a result of Crowley's actions?
Wilson: He played a large role in getting it started. One of the largest parts of it is Gardnerian witchcraft, for which Crowley wrote the sacred scriptures. That no longer is a secret.
Crowley thought that there should be a revival of an interest in divination as a discipline, not just prying into the future, but learning how to exercise precognition without prejudice. The idea's that if you can look at the future without imposing your wishes or your fears on it, then you're getting rid of your wishes and fears.
He also tried to arouse interest in the Tarot, which was almost forgotten, and in the I Ching, which was only known to Orientals. And now we live in a world where almost everybody-at least everybody intellectual-knows something about the Tarot and the I Ching. And both of them have had a major influence on modern psychology
Crowley also thought we should study mysticism by using various consciousness-altering chemicals and comparing the results. He was all for the scientific study of mysticism in general, which we see a lot today as scientists strap yoga and Zen masters to brain-wave machines and so on.
In general, a hell-of-a-lot of what's going on today are things that Crowley helped get started back around 1900, 1910, 1920.