Customer Reviews

The Joyous Cosmology: Adventures in the Chemistry of Consciousness

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This classic by Alan Watts is one of my favorite books for remembering the elevating side of the psychedelic experience. It
was sensitively written during the period when psychologists were
more optimisitic about lsd psychotherapy: after all, it gets the
patient to talking, and that is what pays, especially if the result is elevating fascination. Furthermore, many of
the effects were memorable and salutory. Of course, since those
days it has become evident that lsd-25 is not entirely foolproof, and that frequent use at unknown dosages using material of unknown quality can easily lead an explorer to a hospital where he may have to recover from an induced nervous
breakdown. The reveries of Alan Watts concerning his experiences are agreeable and have a sacred quality to them. However, Interested investigators would be well-advised to read LSD: MY PROBLEM CHILD by Albert Hofmann, the chemist who discovered lsd-25. This book is less sanguine, more medically realistic, and contains specific information about disagreeable effects at high dosages, information on specific toxicity, other accounts of pharmaceutical industry professionals regarding the useful
properties and post-use side-effects, scenarios for safe usage,
and so on. All that will be left is a hunt for some blessed land of freedom where men may still take lsd once in a while without the hauting side-effects of police pursuit, imprisonment, and jailhouse blues.

The Joyous Cosomology is one of the most powerful and at the same time fun books I've ever read. It is unfortunate that it is out of print because it has much to show readers concerning the imaginative construction and deconstruction of this universe. This is perhaps Watts' most direct and creative work and it has the potential to open up many doors in the readers mind. The photography in the book is a wonderful addition and works well to spark the imagination into re-creating our perceptions of reality.

My best friend let me borrow 'The Joyous Cosmology' and I read it in 2 hours. An intellegent perspective of such things was very interesting to read because most of the time when you hear about Acid, Mescaline, and shrooms, all you hear is a bunch of incohearent praise with nothing to back it up. With a scientific understanding of it, I would feel a lot safer doing such things. A super book!

This is a quick and wonderfully inspiring read. In it seems to be the buds that blossom throughout the rest of Alan's amazing works. This book conveys the power and immensity of that unified ground of being from which all the patterns of the world spring, without dissociation or apprehension, but with identification and joyous exuberance. Great book. Highly recommend it to anyone.

A psych. library is not complete without both: Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley, and The Joyous Cosmology by Alan Watts. I have extensive psych. selection of books, magazines, and digital works, and nearly all of these fail to deliver an articulate and immediate sense of the psych. experience. The Joyous Cosmology wastes not one word, and delivers a insightful and powerful sense of the revelations possible within our mind. Thank you Alan Watts...

"The Joyous Cosmology" has been selected for listing in "Religion and Psychoactive Sacraments: An Entheogen Chrestomathy." http://www.csp.org/chrestomathy

I read Alan Watts' book "The Joyous Cosmology: Adventures In The Chemistry Of Consciousness" last night and later I entered my deepest meditative state. I realized that my spiritual reality is always characterized by desolation; mental imagery of desolate streets, empty rooms, deserted ruins, isolated landscapes, etc. My soul inhabits a desolate universe which lacks the desire to communicate itself because there can be no other. My spiritual reality is also unreal in that it encourages a complete acceptance of its mystifying, otherworldly character. It is a supernatural reverie that never becomes a dissociative state. I have always found it to be thus and I have consistently described it thusly.

However, this is not the spiritual reality described in "The Joyous Cosmology". What Alan Watts describes is a spiritual reality that is not unreal. Rather it is a spiritual reality that is a very intense awareness of physical reality fully present to consciousness. He also describes a wonderful sense of communion with his fellow psychonauts and this is definitely contrary to my sense of spiritual isolation.

Therefore I have come to the conclusion that I do not experience the definitive spiritual reality but rather my particular spiritual reality. In order to know the joyous cosmology I would need the assistance of an entheogen but even that might merely provide a confirmation of my spiritual reality because entheogens allow one's essential nature to be expressed. They do not provide a consistent experience to all users. They do not bring about the same realization for all users. For the same reason Zen may prove to be useless in the face of my spiritual reality. Zen may seem to point the finger elsewhere but its practices, concepts, precepts, koans, and community will merely lead me to my usual destination which I will assume is where the path was meant to lead me. Zen is not a dogmatic religion. It merely asks you to go beyond thought and experience for yourself the essential aspect of your true nature. Zen is slippery and does not even presume to know where its finger is pointing.

Please note that I am only making some observations. I am noncommittal on absolute truth. I do not judge my desolate unreality. I do not accuse it of being delusional. I do not judge the use of entheogens or Watts' joyous cosmology, although it clearly contradicts my inner experience. I do not judge Zen and its practices.

I haven't read this Alan Watts book but how can you criticize Alan Watts for possibly, (I'm not going to take your word for it and I have little interest in whether this great man may have been an alcoholic at one point), having been a drunk in his youth when in another review you call Charles Bukowski, one of the world's most renown drunks, the greatest writer ever. Bukowski is known for having written great poems and being a complete alcoholic, I like his poetry it's good, but Alan Watts almost single handedly BROUGHT EASTEN RELIGIONS TO THE WEST! Watts was a Zen Buddhist and Taoist master. Alan Watts in one of the great heroes of humanity for opening up the close minded consciousness in America during a time when it was readily accepted by the masses to the loving heart of the Buddha's teachings and The Way of Kindness. Stop blaming others for your failings Ace and start being accountable for your own life choices. I don't care if being homeless was a purposeful decision or an accidental one but it's not Alan Watts, Abbie Hoffman, Timothy Leary, or Terence Mckenna's fault. You are trying to help people with your how to be homeless book just as those men tried to help the world to be a better place during very troubling times. I feel your negativity is misguided, if you really want to blame somebody for the world being so difficult and unfair I suggest you aim your resentment at corrupt power hungry close minded money grubbing greedy politicians, dictators, fascists, and CEOs of corporations and others among us in this global community that would take more then their share without ever any concern for if or how others survive if they can and not harbor anger at those who tried to create and/or maintain freedom in this country while increasing awareness and intelligence.