Psychaestenia

Abstract

At the end of the eighteenth century, as the French Revolution challenged Europe’s political order and the Industrial Revolution transformed the world economy, an English merchant and political activist named James Tilly Matthews became convinced that his mind was being controlled by a machine. According to Matthews, a gang of radical French Jacobins had infiltrated England, bringing with them the knowledge and means to construct a mechanism called the Air Loom. By producing invisible gasses and magnetic fields, the machine could manipulate a victim’s mind and body from afar. Matthews described the Air Loom’s effects and inner workings to anyone who would listen, detailing how it could make him speak like a puppet, or force his brain to accept an idea, all with the simple pull of a lever. Psychologists have since reported that schizophrenics and autistic children often employ mechanistic imagery to articulate basic psychic experiences seemingly outside of their control (James Tilly Matthews, The Airloom).