Remembering Robert Anton Wilson

Robert Anton Wilson died today, resolutely cheerful during the last years and months, even as his failing body announced that death was creeping up. It's hard to imagine someone starting a blog, knowing that he would probably be abandoning it very soon. But he did, one last wave to the world from a man who specialized in a profoundly sane form of craziness.

A few tidbits from The Illuminati Papers:

"Stupidity is a contagious sociosemantic disturbance which afflicts all of us. Stupidity murders geniuses, burns books, slaughters populations, blocks progress."

"There is nothing rationally desirable that cannot be achieved if rationality itself increases."

"Help conquer the IQ shortage: worry less and think more."

"We're living on the Planet of the Apes. Is that funny or serious?"

Ten Good Reasons to Get Out of Bed in the Morning
"This is for all you people who lie in bed every morning and wonder if it's going to be worth the trouble to get up. So the job is a drag, your friends let you down, and the price of coffee is outrageous. Listen to me. I have survived two bouts of polio. One of my daughters was gang-raped by three hoods in 1971; another, my youngest, was brutally murdered in 1976. Yet, to quote Faulkner's Novel Prize address, I still 'decline to accept the end of man.' I firmly believe that we are entering an age that will make the Renaissance look like a tempest in a teapot, and that each of us can play a role in turning man into superman."

We are entering the age of global warming. Is there still any way to prove RAW right? I think it's a challenge he would be glad to see everyone take up. At least it's a good reason to get up in the morning.