Prometheus Rising

PROMETHEUS

RISING

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PROMETHEUS

RISING

Robert Anton Wilson

Introduced by

Israel Regardie

NEW FALCON PUBLICATIONS

TEMPE, ARIZONA U.S.A.

COPYRIGHT © 1983 ROBERT ANTON WILSON

All rights reserved. No part of this book, in part or in whole, may be

reproduced, transmitted, or utilized, in any form or by any means,

electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any

information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing

from the publisher, except for brief quotations in critical articles, books

and reviews.

International Standard Book Number: 1-56184-056-4

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 83-81665

First Edition 1983

Second Printing 1984

Third Printing 1986

Fourth Printing 1987

Fifth Printing 1989

Sixth Printing 1990

Seventh Printing 1992

Eighth Printing 1994

Ninth Printing 1997

Second Revised Edition (Tenth Printing) 1997

Eleventh Printing 1999

Twelfth Printing 2000

Cover by Stan Slaughter

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of

the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed

Library Materials Z39.48-1984

Address all inquiries to:

NEW FALCON PUBLICATIONS

1739 East Broadway Road Suite 1-277

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website: http://www.newfalcon.com

DEDICATED

To

Timothy Leary

&

William S. Burroughs

dove sta memora

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The eight-circuit model of consciousness in this book and much

of its future-vision derive from the writings of Dr. Timothy

Leary, whose letters and conversations have also influenced

many other ideas herein. I also owe great debts to Dr. O.R.

Bontrager, for introducing me to semantics and communication

sciences generally; to R. Buckminister Fuller, for general sociological

technological perspectives on current problems; and to all

of the following: Barbara Hubbard, Alan Harrington, P.M.

Esfandiary, Dr. Paul Watzlavik, Dr. Eric Berne, Dr. Paul Segall,

Dr. Israel Regardie, Alvin Toffler, Phil Laut, Dr. Sigmund Freud,

Dr. Carl Jung, Alan Watts, Alfred Korzybski, and Aleister

Crowley. The members of the Physics/Consciousness Research

Group (Dr. Jack Sarfatti, Dr. Nick Herbert and Saul Paul Sirag)

have contributed more than is indicated by my few brief references

to quantum theory in these pages; they clarified my whole

comprehension of epistemology.

None of these persons are responsible for my mistakes or

over-statements.

CONTENTS

Preface to the Second Edition 11

Introduction 17

1. The Thinker & The Prover 23

2. Hardware & Software: The Brain & Its Programs 33

3. The Oral Bio-Survival Circuit 45

4. The Anal Emotional Territorial Circuit 61

5. Dickens & Joyce: The Two-Circuit Dialectic 85

6. The Time-Binding Semantic Circuit 93

7. The Time-Binding Dialectic: Acceleration & Deceleration 105

8 The "Moral" Socio-Sexual Circuit 121

9. Mindwashing & Brain Programming 149

10. How To Brain-Wash Friends & Robotize People 161

11. The Holistic Neurosomatic Circuit 177

12. The Collective Neurogenetic Circuit 195

13. Introduction to the Metaprogramming Circuit 207

14. The Meta-Programming Circuit 217

15. Different Models & Different Muddles 227

16. The Snafu Principle 239

17. Quantum Evolution 253

18. The Non-Local Quantum Circuit 265

19. Prometheus Rising 271

Appendix 283

PREFACE

TO THE SECOND EDITION

Screw the government!—

Legends of the Fall

Screw the middle class!

—
Evita

Like most of my books, this text emerged only partly from my

conscious design and partly from suspicious accidents. It actually

began as a Ph.D. dissertation called "The Evolution of Neuro-

Sociological Circuits: A Contribution to the Sociobiology of

Consciousness," which I wrote in 1978-79 for an alternative

university called Paideia. At that time, Paideia ranked as State

Approved, the highest rating given to alternative universities in

California, where we have alternatives to everything and the

state feels required to classify the alternatives on a scale of

"experimental" to totally bonkers. Alas, Paideia, having achieved

relative respectability as an "alternative," later joined with a

much more radical and Utopian outfit, Hawthorn University, and

lost its top rank among counter-culture educational contraptions

in California, falling from Approved to Authorized, a much

lower rating. The whole megilla then joined into several flakey

outfits loosely allied, none of which were recognized at all by the

state, which suited the new honchos perfectly, since they did not

recognize the state either.

In Ireland in 1982, stuck with a dissertation which I liked a lot

and a Ph.D. diploma which, due to the collapse of Paideia,

looked less impressive, I decided to rewrite the manuscript in

more commercial form. The first change consisted of removing

all the footnotes (about two of them per sentence) which gave the

original a truly academic stink but would annoy the average

77

12 Prometheus Rising

reader. Then I expressed myself a little more bluntly (and

perhaps snidely) in many places, adding much to the humor and

nothing to the good taste. I also wrote a few more chapters,

created all the exercizes, and sketched out diagrams for the

illustrations.

I then, with craft and cunning, removed most of the references

to Dr. Timothy Leary from the early parts of the book and only

let his name begin to appear frequently after about the middle. I

had good reason, based on experience, to feel rather strongly

that, just as Dr. Tim was blacklisted by Establishment publishers

at that time, any book openly and blatantly based largely on his

ideas would also get thrown in the junk heap.

I thought I now had a "popular" book, and maybe I almost

did. The first publisher to whom I submitted it, Jeremy Tarcher,

held it for a full year of meditation before rejecting it; his only

explanation for the rejection concerned the mixture of technologese

and "counter culture" slang that has since become my most

frequent style in nonfiction. (It's based on the way I actually

speak.) When I tried Falcon next, they accepted it within 48

hours, and I received the advance check within the next 48 hours.

"Oh frabjous day!"

A month later, I heard from Tarcher again: he had changed his

mind and decided he wanted the book after all. I was in one of

my periods of acute poverty then (something that happens periodically

to all freelance writers) and it was with great effort that I

refrained from telling Mr. Tarcher to go fuck himself. I just told

him I had a contract with another publisher.

With Falcon as publisher, I then inserted the acknowledgments

page, giving Leary the credit he deserved right up front,

and added a dedication to him. Falcon, as I expected, did not

object. Falcon has always served as an alternative to Establishment

publishing, just as Paideia once served as a similar alternative

to the academic Establishment.

Prometheus
was one of Falcon's first books and, I think, the

first done with computerized typesetting; as usual with such

pioneering efforts, it emerged with a phalanx of typos that have

embarrassed me considerably over the years. (When the San

Francisco
Chronicle
first computerized they had similar problems.

I remember one story in which the Chief of Police,

Prometheus Rising 13

denouncing drugs, rambled off into a sentence about the thrill of

meeting Mickey Mouse and Goofy. I assume that line came from

another story but it made the Chief sound as if he had gotten into

some weird chemicals himself.) In this edition, I have corrected

these errors, where I could find them; I know too much now to

think I found all of them. (Wilson's Tenth Law: no matter how

many times a writer proofs a book, hostile critics will always

find at least one error that he missed.)

I have also updated every place where I thought updating

seemed necessary. I even added a few new ideas (which, of

course, seem brilliant to me just because they are new) and some

new jokes and generally gave the text a badly-needed face-lift. It

is still one of my favorite books, and seems to rank high in the

estimation of most of my fans.

In Germany-Switzerland-Austria in the late 1980s, three

German versions existed simultaneously—a deluxe edition from

Sphinx Verlag of Zurich, a mass-market paperback from Rowalt

Verlag of Hamburg, and an even cheaper pirate edition from the

busy troglodytes of the
unterwelt.
The last, of course, paid no

royalties but, by indicating that I had three audiences at three

economic levels, persuaded me feel like a very popular writer in

Mitteleuropa.

As I contemplate this tenth printing of a "far out" or "freaked

out" book that began its career back in 1978, I feel only mildly

embarrassed by the predictions that proved over-optimistic. (I

have revised them, of course, in keeping with my current knowledge

and best guesses). I feel much more astonished, and

pleased, that many of the predictions now seem much less shocking

than when I first published them. Indeed, the wildest and

most "Utopian" future-scans in here are precisely the ones that

have had the greatest scientific support in the 1990s. To see two

decades ahead, even in a few areas, counts as some sort of success

in the Futurism game. And every bulletin from the embattled

MIR space station reminds me that if my space forecasts

projected "too much too soon," part of what I expected does in

fact already exist and the rest is obviously evolving.

I feel more chagrined about my lyrical evocation of Intelligence

Intensification. In the 1970s, I simply did not recognize

the extent to which the 1960s "youth revolution" had terrified

14 Prometheus Rising

our ruling Elite, or that they would try to prevent future upsurges

of radical Utopianism by deliberately "dumbing down" the

educational system. What they have produced, the so-called

Generation X, must rank as not only the most ignorant but also

the most paranoid and depressive kids ever to infest our Republic.

I agree with outlaw radio star Travis Hipp that the paranoia

and depression result inevitably from the ignorance. These kids

not only don't know anything; they don't even want to know.
1