Now let us consider the following kind of machine as an aid to the physician. We might call this kind of machine a _psychological trainer_, for in many ways it is like the training machines used in World War II for training a pilot to fly an airplane. The psychological trainer would have the following properties: 1. The machine is able to show sound movies—produce pictures and utter words. 2. It is able to put before the patient: situations, problems, questions, experiences, etc. 3. It is able to take in responses from the patient. 4. It is able to receive a program of instructions from the physician. 5. Depending on the responses of the patient and on the program from the physician, the training machine can select more material to put before the patient. 6. The training machine produces a record of what it presented and of how the patient responded, so that the physician and the patient can study the record later. What sort of films would the machine hold? The machine could be loaded with a number of films which would help in the particular type of neurosis from which the patient was suffering. What sort of responses could the patient make? The patient might have buttons in front of him which he could press to indicate such answers as: Yes I don’t know Repeat No It depends Go ahead Also, the patient might hold a device—like a lie detector, perhaps—which would report his state of tenseness, etc., and so report what he really felt. Where would the machine’s questions come from? From one or more physicians very clever in the treatment of mental illness. Suppose that the patient is inconsistent in his answers? The machine, discovering the inconsistencies, could return to the subject and ask related questions in a different way. As soon as several questions related to the same point are answered consistently, the machine could exclude groups of questions that no longer apply and could proceed to other questions that would still apply. Patients would vary in their ability to go as fast as the machine could. So from time to time the machine would ask questions to test the effect of what it had presented; and, depending on the answers, the machine would go faster or would bring in additional material to clarify some point. This machine might have a few advantages over ordinary treatment. For example, with the machine, treatment does not depend on the physician’s making the right answer in a split second, as it may in a personal interview. Also, the patient might be franker with the machine than with the physician, for it might be arranged that the patient could review his record, and then decide whether to confess it to his physician.