As for the essay you linked in the OP: I started reading it but gave up as I'll be honest I couldn't make heads or tails of what he was saying. I haven't done much hard philosophical reading in over 15 years so I'm not sure if its just technical philosophical lingo I'm not getting, if he's just not a clear writer, or if he's writing gibberish!
I'll share my view, because I found this to be quite a valuable writing. It has even motivated me to start looking for Wilson's books. I identify closely with what he writes, and I have never seen it articulated in this way before. Also, I have to agree that some of the terms he uses are not fully explained when he uses them.
For example when he talks about the Real universe, with a capital R, he is describing an individual's simplified model of the universe. Most people believe completely in their simplified model, which is necessarily smaller than the true universe. It may not even reflect true reality - it is necessarily an interpretation of what is received by the senses and then processed by the intellect. Understanding this fact alone will (I think) lead one to be less dogmatic in their views. This quote is a good example:
Every “Real” Universe is easy to understand, because it is much simpler than the existential continuum. Theists, Nazis, Flat Earthers, etc. can explain their “Real” Universes as quickly as any Fundamentalist Materialist explains his, because of this simplicity of the edited object as contrasted with the complexity of the sensory-sensual continuum in which we live when awake (unhypnotized).
This ties into Timothy Leary's idea of the "Reality-Tunnel" - so now an individual has created an internal model of the "Real" universe, which is usually believed completely without question. This belief system creates a subconscious set of filters through which new sensory input will pass. This becomes their reality-tunnel, although they are almost never aware of its existence. They only see the "One True Reality", and often don't understand why someone else can't see the obvious truth. So we can talk about, for example, a Christian reality-tunnel, a Hindu reality-tunnel, a materialist reality-tunnel, a flat-earther reality tunnel, etc.
Our ability to communicate effectively is due to there being a large overlap between our reality tunnels. Even so, Wilson describes each person's reality tunnel as being a unique creation of that individual, as he describes here:
Nonetheless, the process of socialization or acculturalization—the Game Rules by which Society imposes its group reality-tunnel on its members—is only statistically effective. Every individual seems to have a few eccentricities in her or his private reality-tunnel, even in totalitarian states or authoritarian churches. The alleged conformist—the typical “bank-clerk,” say—will reveal some astonishing creative acts in his or her private model, if you talk to such a person long enough.
Another term that needs defining - the idea of the Right Man, described here:
Elsewhere in The New Inquisition, Wilson describes “The Right Man” and one variant, “The Violent Male” as one who “seems to be a man who literally cannot, ever, admit that he might be wrong. He knows he is right; he is the total psychological opposite of the agnostic, in claiming absolute gnosis, total certitude about all things.”
Wilson describes someone fully committed to their model of the universe as "modeltheistic"
A “modeltheist” is a person who is completely committed to a single model of the “Real” Universe, and for whom all other modes are, by definition, false. According to Wilson, “modeltheism underlies the intolerance which perpetuates most of the violence and wars on this backward planet and creates the violent Right Man personality.” A modeltheist has all but stopped thinking and perceiving, whereas a model-agnostic encourages continual thought and perception.
His vision is that as a society, we have largely accepted materialism as our reality-tunnel. That is the accepted paradigm of our time. Like most accepted paradigms, it isn't seen by its adherents as a reality-tunnel. It is accepted as the One True Reality.
This is the self-image of modern humanity: of the Right Man in particular, but also of masses of ordinary men and women who have internalized the Fundamentalist Materialist3 metaphor and made it the New Idol.
Footnote 3. Wilson thinks of “matter” as a metaphor. He defines a “liberal materialist” as “one who holds that materialism is a ‘relative best bet’ among competing philosophies, or the most plausible model around, whereas the fundamentalist materialist—either out of ignorance or philosophy or out of sheer bravado or out of blind faith—proclaims that materialism is the One True Philosophy and that anyone with doubts or hesitations about it is insane, perverse, or a deliberate fraud. This One True Philosophy is the modern form of the One True Church of the dark ages. The Fundamentalist Materialist is the modern Idolator; he has made an image of the world, and now he kneels and worships it.”
I hope this helps to parse the essay, I think it is quite insightful. Or maybe it just fits into my reality tunnel ;)