Since this was over 30 years ago, he was referring to a different group or generation of "rationalists." Some of the details are different now, and of course they may vary from person to person. But the fundamentals of Wilson's description still seem pretty accurate.
I give a pass to psychedelic hippie libertarians, since they don't do any harm on their own, and if we're being honest, it's not like they'd be making massive contributions if they were on the other side, so nobody is missing out on anything.
Robert Anton Wilson is really impressive, if you dropped out of
college because you couldn’t bother showing up to classes, getting high
all day, but still feel like you’re a genius for seeing through the sham
of respectable society or whatever.
The only dude I met in real life who loved Wilson had a huge ICP
tattoo on his arm and thought mental health was relative.
Have you read *The Illuminatus! Trilogy*? It's fiction, you don't have to absorb the man's philosophy to enjoy his imagination.
Something similar goes for this quote.
I dunno, RAW could kinda be considered a forebear to some parts of
the modern rationalist community. He was very much into transhumanism,
like a lot of people, and also believed in drugs enhancing human
potential, like gwern.
Since I know that you know you way around this kinda of stuff, what do you of this paper:
https://www.sss.ias.edu/files/papers/paper35.pdf
http://gen.lib.rus.ec/book/index.php?md5=75D273AAB48C8C32BC5EB58795D4710F
Susan Oyama's stuff:
http://gen.lib.rus.ec/book/index.php?md5=FB78871EFA2B3DFE141BF0B2F0289F43
http://gen.lib.rus.ec/book/index.php?md5=4AA29008F5AE4024DF827075E7BCED35
“None of them ever says anything skeptical about establishment science.”
If anything, Yudkowsky is a pseudoscientific crank, not a dogmatic Science-worshipper. (See: cryonics, AI foom, many-worlds…)
I love RAW but he was a libertarian, and Discordianism can be just another Internet clique.
With some minor changes, it could just be another rationalist rant about how Real science is being suppressed.
Man rationalists love RAW. Dude was an MRA libertarian. he’s their kinda person
Robert Anton Wilson is really impressive, if you dropped out of college because you couldn’t bother showing up to classes, getting high all day, but still feel like you’re a genius for seeing through the sham of respectable society or whatever.
The only dude I met in real life who loved Wilson had a huge ICP tattoo on his arm and thought mental health was relative.
I dunno, RAW could kinda be considered a forebear to some parts of the modern rationalist community. He was very much into transhumanism, like a lot of people, and also believed in drugs enhancing human potential, like gwern.
I agree with him so whole heartily.
I got a hot grave!