Mind Control from 1796 to the Internet:

1
Mind Control from 1796 to the Internet
Implications for the
Diagnosis of Delusions
Vaughan Bell, Cara Maiden Antonio Muñoz, Venu
Reddy
Vaughan.Bell_at_iop.kcl.ac.uk
Dept of Psychology, Institute of Psychiatry
2
Outline

• Delusions and the history of influencing
  machines.
• Do reports of mind control on the internet show
  any evidence of psychopathology ?
• Do these reports show evidence of an underlying
  social structure? A social network analysis.
• Implications for diagnosis of delusions.
• A note on the influence of the internet on
  psychopathology.

3
What is a delusion ?

• The DSM defines a delusion as a belief that is
• False, based on incorrect inference about
  external reality.
• Firmly sustained, despite what almost everybody
  else believes...
• and despite what constitutes incontrovertible
  and obvious proof or evidence to the contrary
• The belief is not one ordinarily accepted by
  other members of the persons culture or
  subculture.

4
Criticisms

• Falsity Delusions may not be false (Jones, 1999)
  or even falsifiable (Young, 2000)
• Firmly sustained Conviction in delusional
  beliefs may vary day-to-day (Myin-Germeys et al,
  2001)
• Despite obvious evidence to the contrary Many
  normal beliefs show this pattern (Kuhn, 1962)
• Not held by culture or subculture No clear
  criteria for determining this (Bell, Halligan and
  Ellis, 2003).

5
Cultural / Sub-cultural Beliefs

• Leeser and ODonohue (1999) suggest it is
  possible that sub-cultures could be based on
  delusional beliefs, citing cases like Charles
  Manson and Jim Jones.
• These sort of quasi-religious beliefs are quite
  weak examples and would rarely be considered
  delusional by working clinicians.
• Is it possible to find a sub-culture based on
  distinctly delusional beliefs, against the stated
  DSM criteria?

6
Camberwell Grove, 2006
7
Camberwell Grove, 1776
8
James Tilly Matthews

• 1796, Matthews, a Welsh tea merchant, resident in
  Camberwell, interrupts a speech by Lord Liverpool
  in the House of Commons,
• is arrested, and taken to Bow Street Magistrates.
• He claims that he is on a top-secret mission to
  secure peace between France and Britain.
• That the authorities were out to stop.
• And in particular, he was under assault by teams
  of magnetic spies using an air loom to
  control him.

9
James Tilly Matthews

• I am brain-connected to a machine that can
  broadcast pictures to my eyes and voices to my
  mind, and I experience being fully controlled
  from head to toe frequently.
• Matthews was admitted to Bethlem Hospital as a
  pauper.
• Much legal wranglings ensued as his family tried
  to get him released.

10
Just because youre paranoid
11
Illustrations of Madness
12
The Air Loom
13
The Influencing Machine

• Tausk (1933) wrote a seminal paper On the Origin
  of the Influencing Machine in Schizophrenia

• He noted that such delusional devices take the
  form of a diabolical machine, just outside the
  technical understanding of the subject.
• Always operated by the subjects enemies who set
  out to persecute them.

Victor Tausk
14
Modern day Air Looms

• Jay (2003) has noted the similarity between
  historical accounts of influencing machines and
  many which appear on the internet.

It feels like the people who assault me have
some replica of myself, electronically connected
to me. By remote control, they are able to hurt
me - in various ways - by doing something to
their replica (or electronic doll) of me. They
also use 'voice-to-skull technology, emf, elf,
microwave radiation and other similar bodily,
brain-invasive abuse technology.
taken from Internet, 2003
15
Online Communities

• People describing such experiences are often part
  of an online mind control community.
• Which would be at odds with the DSM definition.
• We conducted a study which set out to test this
  by
• Rating text to establish the presence of
  psychopathology.
• Testing for a social network to establish the
  presence of a community based around potentially
  delusional beliefs.

16
Data Collection

• Used the web to collect source material.
• 10 independently published personal accounts of
  mind control experiences were collected from the
  internet.
• These were compared with a same number of
  independently published accounts of depression,
  cancer and being stalked.
• To control for mental illness, clinical
  involvement / trauma and persecution.

17
Content Analysis

• Each account was blind-rated by three independent
  psychiatrists for presence of

• The raters had full agreement (Kappa 1) that
  mind control accounts reflected delusional
  beliefs.

18
Attributions

• Ex-military neighbours and husbands cohorts
  using recently declassified technology
• Rings of sex deviates (sic) using high energy
  radiation technology
• Royal Canadian Mounted Police using a telepathic
  amplifier that works with microwaves
• Freemasonic intelligence agencies using
  frequency weapons
• Police using a brain implant
• Implantable controlling chip
• Dutch government using a network of
  transmitters
• Politicians and journalists using satellite
  surveillance and harassment technologies
• Bad Guys using psychotronics and microwaves
• Warsaw Pact Military Research using hypnosis
  and electromagnetic waves

19
Self-report services contact
Mind Control
Being Stalked
Cancer
Depression
Contact with Psychiatric Services
7
10
4
2
20
Further Questions

• This suggests that mind control accounts are
  associated with psychosis-like experiences.
• This may be interesting in terms of anthropology
  but has no implications for psychiatric
  diagnosis.
• But, according to the DSM, people with delusional
  beliefs should, by definition, not belong to a
  community based on the content of those beliefs.
• Can we find evidence of a community based upon
  potentially delusional beliefs on the internet ?

21
Social Network Analysis

• SNA is a tool for identifying structures in
  social networks based on relations between
  components.
• An SN is conceptualised as a set of nodes and
  links, representing social actors and
  relationships - such as affiliation or
  information exchange.
• Jackson (2004) and Wellman (2001) have argued
  that web links are likely to reflect underlying
  social structure.
• A view which has been supported by reviews of the
  hyperlink analysis literature Park (2003) and
  Park and Thelwall (2004).

22
Network Construction

• The network was sampled by the use of snowball
  sampling (Goodman, 1961)
• Each initially identified report was designated
  as a node in the network.
• Each link to an external site was designated as a
  network connection.
• Each external site was also designated as a
  network node.

23
Comparisons

• Compared sampled mind control network to...
• A randomly generated network with the same number
  of nodes and connections (Lusseau, 2003).
• Known social networks from the literature
• Computer conf (Freeman Freeman, 1979)
• Ham radio (Killworth and Bernard, 1976)
• Karate club (Zachary, 1977)

24
Random Network
Layout using 3D Fruchterman-Reingold algorithm
25
Mind Control Network
Layout using 3D Fruchterman-Reingold algorithm
26
Network Distance

• Distance (d) the mean length of shortest path
  through the network.
• Wasserman and Faust (1994) Smaller d indicates
  quicker information transfer between individuals
  and greater group cohesion

27
Network Clustering

• Clustering coefficient (C ), a measure of the
  likelihood that two associates of a node are
  associates themselves.
• Watts and Strogatz (1999) A higher C indicates a
  greater cliquishness.

28
Group Degree Centralisation

• Group degree centralisation (CD), measure of
  group dispersion or how network links focus on a
  specific node or nodes.
• Freeman (1979) High CD thought to be an
  important structural attribute of social networks.

29
Network Results Summary

• The mind control network looks very similar to a
  real social network.
• Particularly, the smaller distance / higher
  clustering than random network implies it is a
  small world network.
• The effect of this can perhaps be seen in common
  themes which permeate the content of the sampled
  accounts.

30
Common Themes

• For example, Frey (1963) is frequently cited

Journal of Applied Physiology, 17(4), 689-692.

• As is the CIAs MKULTRA programme

31
Common Themes

• Usually cited as evidence for the reality of the
  authors experiences.

32
Common Themes

• Indeed, several authors identify with anti-mind
  control campaigns and lobby groups.
• Importantly, it is not being suggested that
  everyone with such interests is psychotic.
• Although the authors sampled here are likely to
  be.

33
Conclusions

• The sampled reports of mind control experiences
  are likely to be significantly influenced by
  psychotic experience.
• The organisation of these web sites suggests the
  existence of a community based on these beliefs
  which directly challenges the diagnostic criteria
  for a delusion.
• The internet is likely to have an increasing
  effect on the presentation, aetiology and
  prognosis of psychopathology.

34
Internet and Psychopathology

• As well as psychosis, the internet is now
  becoming recognised as an influence on
• Suicide (Rajagopal, 2004)
• Anorexia / bulimia pro-ana etc (Fox et al.,
  2005)
• Suggesting it should be of increasing interest to
  researchers and clinicians.
• And could mediate how people engage with services.