Subject: (urth) Hethor, Descartes and the "paracoita"

From: James Machin <jfmachin at hotmail.com>
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2006 16:19:46 +0000

I'm a new poster, so please ignore if I'm covering old, old ground. I've 
searched the archives but can't find any previous reference to this...

I recently came across a passage in a book I'm reading (a biography of Kant) 
about Descartes’ personal "automaton". The following excerpt from an article 
in the Daily Telegraph gives a good summation of the story:

The great philosopher went on a sea voyage to Sweden, telling people he was 
travelling with his daughter Francine. As the journey went on, the girl 
never appeared, and curious sailors finally entered Descartes’ cabin. They 
found only a mechanical doll, which horrified them so much that they threw 
her overboard. 
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2002/03/05/bodoll02.xml)

Of course, this scenario of the mechanical doll stowed in a cabin instantly 
reminded me of Hethor's lost "paracoita". Presumably, this is intentional on 
Wolfe's part...

---

From: Duncan Truter <dtruter at gmail.com>
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2006 16:23:49 +0000

this reminds me a lot of the story in 'the island of doctor death and
other stories and other stories'. can't remember the name, it's the
one about the puppeteers, with human-sized puppets.

the protagonist seems to be a puppet/have some kind of relationship
with his own puppet/all of the above, and there's a part where he
meets somone who may be a puppet herself.

On 3/21/06, James Machin <jfmachin at hotmail.com> wrote:
> about Descartes' personal "automaton". The following excerpt from an article
> never appeared, and curious sailors finally entered Descartes' cabin. They
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