Hethor, Descartes and the "paracoita"

James Machin · 21 Mar 2006, 16:19 · from 2006-March.txt.gz

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From: jfmachin at hotmail.com (James Machin)
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2006 16:19:46 +0000
Subject: (urth) Hethor, Descartes and the "paracoita"
Message-ID: <BAY101-F4F58D483C4AE14A09AA84C3D80 at phx.gbl>

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...?

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