One of the major contributors to early versions. Then they did the math and figured out it was a dead end. Yes.

Also one of the other contributors (weizenbaum i think?) pointed out that not only was it stupid, it was dabgeroys and made people deranged fanatical devotees impervious to reason, who would discard their entire intellect and education to cult about this shit, in a madness no logic could breach. And that's just from eliza.