Maximum Overdrive revisited: Could Machinery Already Have Basic Consciousness?

This is a far out theory that I'd like to float out there for everyone, based on some personal experience. Have you ever had a car, or a bike, or a boat, that almost seemed like it had a personality?

I've been working as a diesel truck mechanic for the last 15 years. Spending 40-60 hours a week all those years has me knowing semi trucks pretty well. They are complicated machines of steel, copper, and rubber, with elaborate systems of intake, waste, motion, regulation, consumption - systems similar to a living body.

There are belief systems out there that postulate that all the natural world has basic consciousness. That stones, at a very basic and primitive level, have some kind of sense of basic awareness, as a vibrating entity, full of energy, arising from the quantum field the same as any living thing. Metals could similarly have a rudimentary consciousness. I believe its possible that plants and insects have a rudimentary awareness - maybe it extends to even simpler physical matter.

So I have a couple of reasons to question whether something like a truck could have rudimentary consciousness. There is a phenomenon I've noticed in my extensive experience working on trucks. I call it "the neglected workhorse". This is a truck that has been toiling away hard at work, but the maintenance has not been done, and the truck has a lot of issues. I'll get the truck in for a Preventative Maintenance, find and repair 20 different problems, and send it back to the customer. You'd think it would be a happy truck, right?

A truck like this will often come back with an unrelated catastrophic failure within 1 to 3 days. Something I didn't touch. Something that wasn't obviously broken before. Something that had not failed in all the months leading up to the PM. It's as if the neglected truck, noticing it has gotten a bunch of repairs done, then says "Hey! You should know about this! While you're fixing me, don't forget to take care of these other problems!" It has happened quite a few times in my career, and seems to be a pattern.

My other reason: mechanics often yell and swear at the trucks they are working on. "You rusty old piece of crap, I should just light you on fire! G#dd##n m#th## f##k##g piece of s##t!" Anyone who has worked in a garage knows this phenomenon. And the trucks fight. The parts break coming apart. It goes with difficulty.

I decided to experiment with a new strategy. I decided to sweet talk the truck. "I know you're feeling rough, I'm here to make it all better. It'll be all right." Like soothing an animal. And the jobs invariably go smoother.

I know it sounds crazy, but I'm just experimenting with the idea, and wonder if anyone else has any truck personality stories or the like that they would like to share.

Who's to say these pieces of machinery, made out of natural materials, the stuff of God if you believe in such; that they don't have a basic identity consciousness? That maybe any organized system of natural material has some kind of very rudimentary awareness?

I wouldn't think so, if it weren't for any computer I'm using having the uncanny ability to sense my impatience.

They always know, and they always exhibit passive-aggressive behaviour when they know I'm in a hurry.

How do it know?

The thing about machines are, is that they break down and grow weaker after use compared to humans and other biological creatures our structures are designed to actually grow stronger with use. I don't think that machines can ever obtain consciousness to an awareness level as we do. But I do like the premise of this thread, it is certainly interesting and I like your perspective.

Right on!!

I guess you could say I sweet talk the car/truck I'm working on a bit when I'm having trouble with a tough spot but that's really more to calm myself down because bad things happen when I'm frustrated & in a hurry.

Cars do seem to have good days & bad days...have noticed that before...not sure if it's just a temperature thing or humidity or the gas/diesel, etc.

ETA:

I have also noticed that problems seem to come in groups (and that observation doesn't just relate to cars by the way)...even when they're not necessarily related parts

Could be because changing a part in one area altered the system somehow in another area...after all even if it's not a directly related part, the whole system is all actually connected in one way or another

reply to post by TwoTonTommy


Hello and cheers,

Yes I have experienced this, I used to work on aircraft engines the T56-LFE (with turbo prop) and everything down from that lol, I like to tinker. Was run up qualified for years...

I think it is similar in skills in listening like when you are visualizing a space you are working on and can't ever see...some folks can pick it up and others not so much.

I guess it can be likened to blessing that with which you work with, to gain a better and faster outcome, if energy is something you are conscious of than this is natural.

inanimate object's may not necessarily be unable to record happening in some obscure fashion....even rock crying out and so forth....lol

reply to post by TwoTonTommy


A person acting with anger will see anger in the things they direct it at.

reply to post by TwoTonTommy


I think that there is interaction between a user and the tool used. Whether you are using a computer, driving a car or repairing a truck.

Basically, the truck is made up of the same 4 elements as a human (Water, Earth, Fire and Air). Any disfunction in a vehicle is due to an imbalance in the elements rather than the truck having some kind of consciousness. It is more a case of the user transferring their own "chemistry" to the vehicle and causing the problem.

I had an interesting experience once. I had an engineer fix a boiler at home. After paying him a lot of money to repair the boiler, a few days later the boiler started to behave funny and was making rattling noise and seemed about to give up. Out of frustration , I decided to 'connect' to it. I closed my eyes and tried to transfer my consciousness to it . Suddenly, I felt like I was inside the machine and was not sure what to do next. Luckily I knew a ritual that restores balance between the elements and recited it.

It was a true out of body experience and when I came back I paused for a while. Then I listened out and the noise was now a healthy sound that boilers are supposed to make.

Therefore, it might be worth getting a truck repaired by a witch-doctor type of mechanic.

The problem is the Truck owner.
The owner has been mollycoddling the truck for many months, knowing full well it needs maintenance.
You've just done that maintenance, and now the owner thinks he can treat it like a new truck, he overloads it and puts his foot down and he now finds the weaknesses that were hidden by his previous careful driving.

reply to post by TwoTonTommy

That stones, at a very basic and primitive level, have some kind of sense of basic awareness

The problem with this concept becomes apparent when you break the stone up into smaller pieces. If you do so, have you "killed" the stone or merely created multiple new stones with some basic awareness? Clearly you have done neither, because the stone was never aware to begin with.

If you want to think along these lines then you'll eventually get down to smaller and smaller levels... and you'll end up asking whether dust particles have some awareness, which is clearly an absurd thing to believe. Stones and dust particles are not aware, and if you break them into smaller pieces they wont know.

reply to post by TwoTonTommy


Awesome thread. This is something I've thought about a few times as well. As a child, my uncle had an old Chevette. It looked good, but it was a nightmare under the hood. My uncle literally had to "boost it's ego" by sweet talking it to start up. Sometimes in a hurry, he'd forget or curse the thing for not starting only to say, "Come on baby, I know you can do this!" and it'd sure enough start up.

He had the all kinds of things replaced on it like the starter, spark plugs and a few other things. But even though, it wouldn't start without being sweet talked into starting. Later on, we'd joke that even though the car was supposedly fixed and should start up, it got used to being coddled and wanted to be praised before turning over.

Was this really the case though? Probably not. (Maybe faulty wiring for all I know) Bbut it was a neat experience and I'll remember that car for the rest of my life.

I have experienced something similar to what you are talking about!

I used to work in the bush, many hours drive from the nearest people and in the era before cell phones, with a well loved old ford ranger. Over many years, it never broke down out on the logging roads because the whole time, if I sensed a problem in the force, I would draw energy from the universe to myself, then run it through my hands to the truck. Like reiki.

Guaranteed it would break down on my way into our town or at the first gas station I'd come to but at least I was where I could get help/parts/hitch hike. I've done it when extremely low on gas too by just asking the truck to work with me on it and find extra energy from elsewhere.

I was never more than a few hours off schedule rather than a few days walk out of the bush. Maybe trust pays off. Never failed.

coldkidc


Could be because changing a part in one area altered the system somehow in another area...after all even if it's not a directly related part, the whole system is all actually connected in one way or another

edit on 14-12-2013 by coldkidc because: (no reason given)

I think that's what I'm trying to examine - how far does the interconneced-ness go? In a connected system, you expect that kind of down-the-line cause-and-effect type stuff. But how much is the engine connected to the wheel seal? Or the brakes to the belts? It's interesting to try and figure out.

crowdedskies
reply to post by TwoTonTommy

 

I think that there is interaction between a user and the tool used. Whether you are using a computer, driving a car or repairing a truck.

Basically, the truck is made up of the same 4 elements as a human (Water, Earth, Fire and Air). Any disfunction in a vehicle is due to an imbalance in the elements rather than the truck having some kind of consciousness. It is more a case of the user transferring their own "chemistry" to the vehicle and causing the problem.

I had an interesting experience once. I had an engineer fix a boiler at home. After paying him a lot of money to repair the boiler, a few days later the boiler started to behave funny and was making rattling noise and seemed about to give up. Out of frustration , I decided to 'connect' to it. I closed my eyes and tried to transfer my consciousness to it . Suddenly, I felt like I was inside the machine and was not sure what to do next. Luckily I knew a ritual that restores balance between the elements and recited it.

It was a true out of body experience and when I came back I paused for a while. Then I listened out and the noise was now a healthy sound that boilers are supposed to make.

Therefore, it might be worth getting a truck repaired by a witch-doctor type of mechanic.

I like your take on the elements. We are definitely dealing with elemental physics with things like high-compression combustion stresses, metal and fire and air, water swirling through the passages - looking at it that way, it is a real swirl of basic elements.

As far as psychic mechanics, the claimed psychic Gordon Michael Scallion was an electronics technician, who was pretty normal & straight minded, who began sensing what was wrong with the electronics through the aura. He became quite the repairman, by his own claims. I'm not a huge GMS guy, but the story fits in here.

VoidHawk
The problem is the Truck owner.
The owner has been mollycoddling the truck for many months, knowing full well it needs maintenance.
You've just done that maintenance, and now the owner thinks he can treat it like a new truck, he overloads it and puts his foot down and he now finds the weaknesses that were hidden by his previous careful driving.

I really like what you've pointed out here. The driver who thinks a PM and some repairs means he's gonna get extra horse, decides to see if he can push it. Definitely a possibility in some cases.

The drivers I deal with now are mostly older, 50+ types, who probably drive the same every day and don't get too excited about it. But definitely a relevant point, and I'm a big fan of logical conclusions.

Auricom
reply to post by TwoTonTommy

 

Awesome thread. This is something I've thought about a few times as well. As a child, my uncle had an old Chevette. It looked good, but it was a nightmare under the hood. My uncle literally had to "boost it's ego" by sweet talking it to start up. Sometimes in a hurry, he'd forget or curse the thing for not starting only to say, "Come on baby, I know you can do this!" and it'd sure enough start up.

He had the all kinds of things replaced on it like the starter, spark plugs and a few other things. But even though, it wouldn't start without being sweet talked into starting. Later on, we'd joke that even though the car was supposedly fixed and should start up, it got used to being coddled and wanted to be praised before turning over.

Was this really the case though? Probably not. (Maybe faulty wiring for all I know) Bbut it was a neat experience and I'll remember that car for the rest of my life.

I've had success with the sweet-talk technique, it's hard to deny it. Whether it is just a way of calming yourself and bringing calm energy in, or possible something bigger, remains to be seen.

One word.

CHRISTINE!!!

I don't think so. Even the most basic of life has a survival instinct. If machinery did they would let us around.

reply to post by TwoTonTommy


Automobiles are people too, and sometimes they need some lovin'

reply to post by weirdguy


An effin Monte Carlo that dude would have an orgasm if he saw my GTO I am not going to lie to you though that was a whole 2:20 of WTF and I havent had a whole WTF moment that lasted more then mere secounds. You sir and the guy that ##cks his car video achieved a new level of WTF'S damn I am starring that now.