"Joyous Cosmology by Alan Watts" - читать интересную книгу автора (Watts Alan)

philosophers, unlettered convicts, housewives, intellectuals,
alcoholics. The leap across entangling thickets of the verbal, to
identify with the totality of the experienced, is a phenomenon reported
over and over by these persons.

Alan Watts spells out in eloquent detail his drug-induced visionary
moments. He is, of course, attempting the impossible---to describe in
words (which always lie) that which is beyond words. But how well he
can do it!

Alan Watts is one of the great reporters of our times. He has an
intuitive sensitivity for news, for the crucial issues and events of
the century. And he has along with this the verbal equipment of a
poetic philosopher to teach and inform. Here he has given us perhaps
the best statement on the subject of space-age mysticism, more daring
than the two classic works of Aldous Huxley because Watts follows Mr.
Huxley's lead and pushes beyond. The recognition of the love aspects of
the mystical experience and the implications for new forms of social
communication are especially important.

You are holding in your hand a great human document. But unless you are
one of the few Westerners who have (accidentally or through chemical
good fortune) experienced a mystical minute of expanded awareness, you
will probably not understand what the author is saying. Too bad, but
still not a cause for surprise. The history of ideas reminds us that
new concepts and new visions have always been non-understood. We cannot
understand that for which we have no words. But Alan Watts is playing
the book game, the word game, and the reader is his contracted partner.

But listen. Be prepared. There are scores of great lines in this book.
Dozens of great ideas. Too many. Too compressed. They glide by too
quickly. Watch for them.

If you catch even n few of these ideas, you will find yourself asking
the questions which we ask ourselves as we look over our research data:
Where do we go from here? What is the application of these new wonder
medicines? Can they do more than provide memorable moments and
memorable books?

The answer will come from two directions. We must provide more and more
people with these experiences and have them tell us, as Alan Watts does
here, what they experienced. (There will hardly be a lack of volunteers
for this ecstatic voyage. Ninety-one percent of our subjects are eager
to repeat and to share the experience with their family and friends).
We must also encourage systematic objective research by scientists who
have taken the drug themselves and have come to know the difference
between inner and outer, between consciousness and behavior. Such
research should explore the application of these experiences to the
problems of modern living---in education, religion, creative industry,
creative arts.