Does a machine have a heart? a nervous system? a soul?
Deus Ex Machina: God from the Machine (literal meaning).
This 5thC dramatic finale to a play, whereby a God would literally be suspended on the stage to resolve an issue, has become a modern motorcycle lifestyle brand & modern translations have taken the meaning a little more literally, often times using the term to explore the notion of AI.
Vehicles & machines form an integral part of the human existence. Millions of humans utilise vehicles & machines daily without a second thought. But what if you considered the heart of the car you use to drive to work every day? The pulse of the commuter train? The blood, sweat & tears of the haulage truck moving your food from field to fork? The brain of your motorcycle making sure all components continue to speak to each other? What if the machines were capable of learning & experiencing as a human?
Most modern vehicles are so technologically advanced, that modern mechanics have got to have an understanding of & interpret data to diagnose a fault. Gone are the days when a mechanic used traditional understanding to diagnose a fault. The modern mechanics interpret multiple data streams to isolate fault codes & more often than not, use the same diagnostic machinery to cure them from within.
Virtually Smart Ltd have already explored the theories of AI in business & how AI is now touching our lives on a daily basis through the machines surrounding us. However, I wonder how many drivers & riders realise just how much of their journeys are dictated by the brain of their vehicle learning & adapting to each & every situation? I wonder how many drivers or riders take a moment to consider just how like a human their vehicle or machine is becoming?
With this in mind, virtually Smart Ltd present ‘Ghosts in the Machine’ a modern twist on the Deus Ex Machina story.
Ghost in the Machine – Deus Ex Machina
The keeper of the machine growled one more time in anguish & anxiety. The plume on his face, the anger in his blood & all because the ‘machine’ had stopped working. The keeper hurled his keys at the architect & demanded an answer.
As the architect wheeled the limp & lifeless machine through the grating gates, he soothed & reassured her. Once nestled in her cradle, the machine rested. Tired & weary she had been harshly treated & needed regeneration.
The architect began the pain staking process of dismantling the machine. First the panels were removed, revealing a naked, bare & vulnerable skeleton. The battery, the heart of the machine was disconnected & she slept.
Delicately the architect disconnected her nervous system, a mesh of wires & tubes usually vibrant with power, fluids & lubricants; lay limp in his hands. The burnt fuses, her nerve endings, red & raw & the acrid smell of burnt plastic hung in the air like charred hair. Gently the architect, with scalpel in hand, unbound the nerve endings & released the central nervous system.
Beneath the panels, the belly of the machine lay full of aged poisons fed to her by her keeper. With precision & dexterity, the architect clamped off the tubes, removed her tank & drained her of her toxins.
As the architect carefully pulled her claws away from the brake discs, he noted the pitted marks where she has been gripping on in fear & misery. Her shins, stanchions, rusty & pock marked, a sign of abuse from her owner. Once apart, lubricated & sealed with care; her once arthritic suspension, became free once more.
The architect ran golden oil through her veins, her brake lines, her working parts, to ease her suffering & lubricate her soul.
A diagnosis for her sadness became apparent when the architect attached her once again to the power source for her heart. Her brain, the very core of her being had been damaged by abuse & the misguided power sources from her nervous system had scarred her cortex.
The architect replaced her ECU, undamaged & un-scarred by human intervention. New connections, connectors, transistors all renewed, replenished, revitalised. With the power connected & her heart throbbing the machine sighed with relief, her soul revved & her nervous system buzzed with a renewed energy. The ghost in the machine found her body once again.
The theory of Deus Ex Machina is repeated on a daily basis in the engineering world. Solutions to fault codes & problematic diagnosis are common place & a daily event. The question posed here is, how often do end users actually consider the vast amount of technologies which are buzzing merrily beneath them daily? How often do end users consider the way that machines replicate humans in so many ways? Just as we can consider the notion of global memory, the ghost in the machine & the theory & practice of data memory; so too must we consider the evolving similarities between the machines which transport us, diagnose us, gather information for us, communicate for us & a human being.
Written by Katy Jane on behalf of Virtually Smart Ltd
