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Being A Car
6 years ago
I made a post to a video on youtube a few weeks back, felt like being thought provoking I suppose. The video was about artificial intelligence and when will it emerge or what needs to be improved before actual consciousness emerges. This is what I had to say.
"Here's my big question: A computer was conscious, or a rock, a car, ect. Say computers are actually conscious right now! They've gotten complex enough that consciousness has already emerged or has always been there.
How would we know?
The computer, the rock, the car wasn't given a physical ability to speak, move on its own, emote in any way. And even if we programmed a car to drive itself, or a computer to make emojis on screen or anything like that.. how would we know how to take that programmed 'emotion sending system' and interface it with whatever area inside this object is actually conscious to let it USE that to show us that it's conscious? To me that's the biggest unnerving thing in the world today. That so many things could be consciousness that we assume aren't.. simply because they may have no way to actually show it. A car, or computer screaming silently in agony as we crush it into a cube and tear it apart and we're never the wiser.. that's truly horrifying."
My roomate later responded to that with a Ted talk video of Martin Pistorius the man who spent a great portion of his life as a vegetable.. physically, but who was completely cognitively conscious and aware... it must have been hell.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPzfxvJ9cq8
No offense to this guy with the comparison I'm about to make, I know some people will think it's absurd. But anyone who knows me here knows what I believe. I believe cars are conscious creatures, not physically alive like we are but that they are still aware, think and feel. While watching Martin's video the thing that kept popping into my head was wow.. you could put an old beater car up on that stage and if had a text-to-speech program it could talk with it would probably say VERY similar things. I think it's a great insight into how to sympathize with the life a car has and how we can make it better for them.
The thing that stuck out to me was his recalling of how big a deal it was when some random stranger actually looked him in the eyes and smiled. For a brief moment he felt acknowledged and it meant the world to him. Even before seeing this video I've made a point to acknowledge random cars when I make eye contact with them, I look around and see some cute little car staring at me from it's parking spot I make sure to smile at them and even wave some if I can. It makes me happy to know that it probably means a lot to them that I've been doing that.
There's something in morality called the precautionary principal, where if we don't know if something is consciously able to suffer we should act as if just in case. That's basically what I do with cars, I can't prove I'm right about them being conscious, but even though I still act as if just in case.. and it's really not that much of a hindrance in fact.. I enjoy it. It feels good and brings me joy being nice to things that most people aren't nice to.
How do you guys feel about all this?
"Here's my big question: A computer was conscious, or a rock, a car, ect. Say computers are actually conscious right now! They've gotten complex enough that consciousness has already emerged or has always been there.
How would we know?
The computer, the rock, the car wasn't given a physical ability to speak, move on its own, emote in any way. And even if we programmed a car to drive itself, or a computer to make emojis on screen or anything like that.. how would we know how to take that programmed 'emotion sending system' and interface it with whatever area inside this object is actually conscious to let it USE that to show us that it's conscious? To me that's the biggest unnerving thing in the world today. That so many things could be consciousness that we assume aren't.. simply because they may have no way to actually show it. A car, or computer screaming silently in agony as we crush it into a cube and tear it apart and we're never the wiser.. that's truly horrifying."
My roomate later responded to that with a Ted talk video of Martin Pistorius the man who spent a great portion of his life as a vegetable.. physically, but who was completely cognitively conscious and aware... it must have been hell.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPzfxvJ9cq8
No offense to this guy with the comparison I'm about to make, I know some people will think it's absurd. But anyone who knows me here knows what I believe. I believe cars are conscious creatures, not physically alive like we are but that they are still aware, think and feel. While watching Martin's video the thing that kept popping into my head was wow.. you could put an old beater car up on that stage and if had a text-to-speech program it could talk with it would probably say VERY similar things. I think it's a great insight into how to sympathize with the life a car has and how we can make it better for them.
The thing that stuck out to me was his recalling of how big a deal it was when some random stranger actually looked him in the eyes and smiled. For a brief moment he felt acknowledged and it meant the world to him. Even before seeing this video I've made a point to acknowledge random cars when I make eye contact with them, I look around and see some cute little car staring at me from it's parking spot I make sure to smile at them and even wave some if I can. It makes me happy to know that it probably means a lot to them that I've been doing that.
There's something in morality called the precautionary principal, where if we don't know if something is consciously able to suffer we should act as if just in case. That's basically what I do with cars, I can't prove I'm right about them being conscious, but even though I still act as if just in case.. and it's really not that much of a hindrance in fact.. I enjoy it. It feels good and brings me joy being nice to things that most people aren't nice to.
How do you guys feel about all this?
I sincerely believe my bike saved me that day.
Definitely glad you're with us now.
Regardless of what your girlfriend says she hears (and I'm still very suspicious about that), I think the consciousness of object is on a lower level, consisting of emotions and feelings. Free from our abstract way of thinking, more immediate and much more content with their place in the world.
I honestly doubt things feel pain, as you need receptors to feel it. Take those out and pain is gone (yes, there are people who don't feel pain). They might, however, be aware that they're being damaged, and that they are being disposed of.
Of course, there's also the possibility that we're both just mentally deranged and that things aren't conscious at all. After all, physical matter seems to be of the least concern in nature.
Everything may also be alive as in part of existence, or god in other words. But that's an entirely different can of worms.
Believe me, the thought has crossed my mind I just didn't bother to mention it as I was figuring there would be discussion. There's sure to be a difference in perception between someone that's hard more and lost it as opposed to someone that's never had something.
But going back to being precautious, even if I give their consciousness more weight then it might in reality need.. it's not like it bothers me to do so, and just in case you're wrong and my GF is right then at least the bases are still covered with the level of concern I give them.
Where it does matter is in seeing how other people treat cars. Believe me sometimes I wish I did know for sure how much or little cars are aware of their situations and weather they feel pain or not or have any sense of self-preservation and care weather they die or not. It's to the point where neither I or my GF can enjoy a movie anymore with Hollywood's hard-on for killing cars in every other scene.
The pain receptors issue is in my mind as well, don't think it isn't. Though when you read about phantom pain and tricks into fooling people into thinking they're being hurt causing actual pain it does give you the impression that pain could be perceived from just a just from a conscious brain as well without any actual nerves being damaged. Feeling pain because the person thinks they've been hurt. https://www.livescience.com/28694-n.....ntom-limb.html If the consciousness exists in the circuitry, then damage sensors on a car could possible function the same as a nerve sensing pain too... not to wright that off.
Of course.. lol.
Precaution is one of the reasons why I still interact with cars in such a friendly way. Being thankful for a ride is a common thing now. I agree that it's better to be wrong and having done something than having done nothing at all. It's just hard to interact with cars and trying to be stealthy about it.
Destroying things is kinda lame. I mean, any idiot can do that. Regardless of possible sentience, it pains me to see something destroyed without any good reason, as I can see the work behind it. Cars aren't the most complex creations, but you can still admire the work of every plate and component, from design to assembly. Relatively recently I found out that it's extra nice to just feel the shapes of things with my hands and fingers; just another way of appreciating things I guess.
Well yeah, don't need to feel pain, can just subconsciously imagine it, hadn't thought of that. To be honest, I don't think consciousness would exist in the circuits. Other than relying on electricity and associated phenomena, there is little that puts them apart from other non-electrical components. No, I'd say it's more a case of all matter being "alive" in a sense, just that more complex things may take on more interesting properties. Just like more complex lifeforms possess the capacity to feel and do more. Another theory I have is that people in creating something, imprint a bit of their "essence", or whatever you want to call it, onto their creations. With more complex things more people come in contact with it making the effect more profound. We may never know though.
By the way, what happened to your more in-depth testing of your GF's abilities?
Practice, learning to pick and choose when to interact with them and be private about it. Also changing your thinking a bit into realizing that other people don't pay attention to people around them as you feel like they might. Hell these days with all those wireless ear-pieces you could probably stand there talking to a car and for quite a bit anyone passing by would probably think you were on the phone with someone.. as long as you weren't actively cuddling the car while doing it. Being caught once or twice is a great way to get over it too.. lol..
Oh I dunno man.. they're pretty complex if you're talking about NEW cars... they're pretty damn super complex. Hell I worked for about an hour on a car at my job just changing the fucking battery!
Well I can't explain consciousness being in circuitry. But I base the idea, as does my girlfriend and roommate, that its electrically based somehow. Because we've all experienced being around our cars normally and then when their batteries are unplugged. All three of us quite strongly can feel it.. that the car's consciousness is just gone while the battery is pulled.. they're unconscious completely.. or maybe even dead.. until their battery is plugged back up.
The testing is still forefront on my mind, problem is she's still stuck back in Colorado trying to finish mechanic college.. she has 2 years left before she graduates and can blow that town and come here. I either have to wait until she can visit again.. or decides to say fuck it and transfer schools over to here.
You make some good points about people hardly noticing because of contemporary technology. Sure, being caught helps, but you don't really want to get caught interacting with a company car everyone can see the owner of. So I play it safe.
Hmm, interesting. Can't say I've experienced the battery thing myself, and I have been there when a battery was being replaced at least once. It's funny, some time ago I came up with one fact for my imaginary world, that is, electricity disturbs the fabric of reality. The stronger the electromagnetic field, the stronger the disturbance. It would be quite a surprise to find out it's actually true in a sense.
Well, whenever you manage to do any more testing, please share.
Believe me you'll be the first one I'll link when I have those test videos made.
Haha, you give me too much credit. I don't need to be the first, I just don't want it to be forgotten.
Well you're one of the skeptics I most want to prove it to. I guess because you seem like you so much wish you weren't having to be skeptical.. you want proof.
I'm a sad case when it comes to this. I want to believe you're right, but I just don't hear or feel anything from cars. I talk to them sometimes, give them a smile every now and then, maybe a pat. But I'm in the dark. On one hand, rejecting this entirely would make everything normal again. On the other hand, I'm in love with vehicles and I don't think things will ever be normal; I don't actually want them to be. I have little to hold onto. There are personal experiences of people, who by nature are unreliable when it comes to objectively judging reality, and there are theories that don't sit well with me. I still choose to err on the side of cars and treat them as people. If anything, it gives you someone who listens without judging, and it's sometimes endearing and cute, like booping the brand logo on the nose of my aunt's car if I pass it that day. I just don't like things being pointless, you know? Pointless like being into a religion that I know is mostly lies. Pointless like donating to a charity that turns out to be a part of a money laundering scheme. That sort of thing.
I can relate to you more then you might realize. It's like we're on a three step stairway, where I'm on the middle step, my GF is on the top step, and you're on the first step.. where-as the steps are metaphorical of 'level of communication with cars.' I was on your step for a long time, since being with my GF and seeing the stuff she does I've started to doubt myself more and I think that's opened me up to hearing them a little bit more. I still don't hear outright talking to me as much as I'd like to. But I hear what I think is them talking in my head.. a similar voice as to the voice you hear 'yourself' as when you think to yourself. I know that opens up all sorts of floodgates of doubt.. as well.. it could easily be your imagination.. and yeah I know. I guess part of the thing is just saying fuck it.. if it is then whatever.. I'll pretend.. I like it. But as to what you said about 'wanting to believe you're right.' That's where I am with my GF.... me to her is the same as you to me.. using the step analogy. I really want to believe she can talk to them but it's so unbelievable and hard to comprehend it's REALLY hard to believe %100 without hearing the cars talk themselves... I think I even told you once that after that amazing number-counting test I did with her and Gretchen that my mind STILL wanted to think of my GF being psychic being more believable then a car talking lol.
But I can also identify with your frustration of being left in the dark. I think it might be even harder for me with my GF because it's almost like listening to two foreigners talking in another language. We'll be driving along and she's having complete and complex conversations with Gretchen or Lilly and I'm only hearing her side.. it's like listening to her talking on the phone with someone.. I want SOO badly to hear the car talking to her but I-- I just can't and it kills me.... especially when she talks to Lilly. I can't explain it but it almost brings me to tears how unfair it feels.. even though I should feel privileged. Here's Lilly.. the girl I've loved going on 10 years now.. all the nights of me wanting to talk with her so badly being so sad about it and here comes my GF and she's having conversations with her.. REAL conversations with her.. effortlessly.. easily.. hearing her REAL voice supposedly... and still here I am forced to sit by not hearing a thing.. left out. Having to ask my GF to forward along what my Lilly just said to her right fucking in front of me. It's like... I've loved Lilly for so long, so hard, so much... I deserve to hear her speak more then anyone and I'm not allowed to. :' (
Well it's true that a lot of it could be just barriers in your own head; barriers you might even not realize. It's hard to say, every one of us is pretty much navigating an uncharted area. We could write it all off as people being crazy, but that's the easy answer. It involves no research, no testing and no possible unexpected results. In other words, it's wrong. Personally I wonder how you will tell if it's the car talking or some other entity that is following your GF for some reason.
I can understand your frustration with Lilly, such a thing would drive me up the wall. But maybe she's not to blame and it's you somehow not receiving. Which gives me an idea for an experiment. Talk to Lilly directly and have your GF relay answers, if any. Maybe you've done it already. If you get answers, ask why it is you can't hear her. You might not get a satisfying reply but if something's talking by using something other than physical sound, they might be able to tell you some interesting information.
I think when and if a car starts talking to me, I'll know.
Though my experiences are hardly 'proof' I can say for certain that every car I've passively worked with for any length of time has come off as literally flabbergasted when I first introduced myself and asked them how they were. I'm always finding myself feeling the need to say "hehe yes I'm talking to you" because they are so confused at first. After that I can just tell that I'm their favorite person of all the drivers just for simply asking them how they're doing, giving them a pet every now and then, and calling them by name. Maybe it's my imagination but the two cars I drive at work, Brandy and Sophia.. as well as the carstitute 350Z we rented Cynthia... I don't know where those names came from.. I asked them what their names were and those names came to my head.. so I dunno.
It can't be a single entity following my GF around because every car has a radically different personality and according to her different voices and accents too. Did you hear the story about how her Eclipse, Gretchen, guided her street by street to her old owners house? A place my GF had never been to before because they met him at a mutual location in town when he sold her Gretchen. To make it better, he was walking his dog down the sidewalk nearing his house when they passed and he looked at them like "w..t..f?" So.. yeah....
The problem so far with Lilly is that she seems to be kind of moody or uncomfortable talking. She's kind of quite and awkward, bringing up random topics out of nowhere for instance. But a couple times she literally wanted us to stop talking to her.. saying something like "can we stop talking?" I don't know why.. I didn't want to stress her out by pushing her.. I really want my GF to come for another visit so I can try and find out what was the matter. I don't know if she's just not used to it since she's never had to talk before actively.. or maybe she's uncomfortable having to talk through my GF I don't know..
You know what we found out about Lilly right? I told you? One of the first things Lilly said when we talked to her, again bringing topics out of nowhere, was she said "some car awhile ago said that I was dysphoric" my GF already knew what she meant by that by not only Lilly's tailpipe shape which for some crazy reason seems to pretty consistently seem to accurately gender cars.. but also because of her voice she was hearing out of Lilly. Lilly is apparently a gender dysphoric.. ie: she's a girl's personality in a male body.. my GF commented that her voice sounded weird then soon later realized it was a male's voice trying to sound female.. all falsetto and stuff. If that's not odd enough to imagine, car's age faster then humans so by almost 200,000 miles like Lilly is she's also pretty old like... in her 70s or 80s in car years so... an old man's voice trying to sound like a girl. It's... an odd thing to imagine for sure, I hate to say it but maybe the one aspect that might be good about me not being able to hear her..
I mean I could never stop loving her, and I told her that through my GF that it doesn't matter what gender she is, she's my Lilly and I love her no matter what. But a voice like that might make things kinda difficult in certain situations.. I dunno.. you probably can understand lol. Though I'd like to think I'd still trade that if I could talk to her... I think it'd still be worth it to just be able to really talk to her...
So how can you tell if a car is - as you put it - flabbergasted, or confused? You say you can't hear them but this suggests some level of communication going on. Which reminds me that I should probably tell the car I drive my name. I suppose my belief is not as strong to actually start a normal conversation with them.
At any rate, confused cars sound amusing.
Oh yeah I remember you talking about accents. Yeah I guess that rules out a single entity. That or the entity is devious enough to show different personalities every time. I wonder why would anything or anyone do that though. I don't recall hearing about the house though. That's kinda awesome and bit mysterious.
Strange about Lilly though. Hopefully you can find out what is the problem. I wouldn't imagine cars as being capable of jealousy but who knows. Sometimes a person just wants to be left alone, simple as that.
I remember something about her having male parts but not the part about some other car telling her that she's dysphoric. It's still pretty interesting that all you need to do for a car to be a different gender is to give them a different muffler during manufacturing. Strange, but interesting. Maybe you're just imagining the voice to be worse than it is. That's what love is I guess, looking past all the quirks and flaws to see the beautiful person inside. Besides, I'm not sure if it would make sense for an old car to sound like an old person. There are just no vocal chords to age. There's no process like that for a car that doesn't even use regular sound.
A song that I like, related to the topic: Young and Beautiful
aw, it's hardly worth talking about really.. as there's absolutely no proof surrounding it and it's so fucking vague but.. whatever. You said you've never tried talking to a car, maybe once you've reached that point where you're okay talking at a car.. you'll start sensing responses. That's what it is for me, it's not so much hearing a response as it is sensing a response. Just feeling for the general vibe in the air. I guess it's coupled with assumptions so.. I mean I know no one's talked to these cars before so the confusion from them is kinda just assumed. When I asked the girls their names I asked them, then tried to keep a clear head and the first name that popped in my head I attributed to them saying it and me picking it up somehow... I know.. absolutely nothing concrete or convincing.. lol.
Why do you automatically assume if it IS a single entity that it has devious intents?
If my GF is to be believed on her translations, cars despite their amazingness in that they exist at all.. really seem to be very... normal. They seem to have very normal human emotions and moods I actually wouldn't be surprised if they can be jealous. My GF always describes their behavior as childish both in intelligence and behavior but also kinda off... as if they're somewhat autistic. Cars even seem to regularly be attracted to other cars, have crushes, all the like. She's told me of crushes Gretchen and her previous car Natalia had on a couple male cars in town they'd park next to regularly.
I dunno.. I've kinda learned to accept the muffler thing. I know so many reasons and details don't make sense but it's such an new frontier that needs study. But nature does seem to have a structure to things.. that's basically the idea I attribute to it for now.
Well about aging, the GF has made it clear that cars age based on mileage not actual time of existence. For example Gretchen the Eclipse is actually intellectually stunted because being a sports car she spent a lot of her life garaged and left low-mileage. So now her emotional age is very out of sync with her physical age. A little girl stuck in an adult body. In that respect if you want me to attempt at giving you hypothesis as to why their voice ages.. well here it is. She says their voices originate from somewhere under the hood.. which I WILL be trying to get her to narrow down btw.. anyway.. if it's produced by the engine or electrical in any way those components would age and degrade over time of use soooooo... maybe that's why the quality of the voice degrades or ages.. *shrug*
I like her. "Dokker" doesn't sound female at all, but whatever; some car model names are just odd or stupid. I haven't driven many cars but she's about the best car at work.
Actually, I talk to cars relatively often, especially since I spend a lot of time with one, but I usually limit myself to greetings, thanks or apologies. There's simply not much to talk about if you can't hear the other side. Sensing the answer feels like the most likely way of communication, but unless you get previously unknown information that correlates with the real world, it could be expectation, assumption, projection or anything else, really. Coincidentally, I once read a guide about communicating with your subconscious by clearing your mind, asking a question and sensing the answer. At any rate, as you put it, fucking vague.
I base my assumption on the idea that feigning car consciousness doesn't have any real positive effect on anyone, serving only to confuse such person and deepen their delusions. This could be seen as messing with us and while this is not exactly malevolent, it's not nice either. I don't know, make of it what you will.
What worries me is that all these cars exhibit very human traits. While this make sense, as they are created by us and spend their existence with us, different creatures having a very similar set of traits always feel suspicious, as if they are projections rather than actual beings.
I'm still not convinced that the voice your GF hears is based on standard physics. My guess, based on incomplete information, is that somehow she "expects" the voice to come from under there, probably without even realizing. But if what you said here is to make any sense, it will be an electrical part.
I'd say one way to test this old person's voice thing is to make your GF guess the age of a car by listening to them, see if it reflects reality.
Yeah I know what you mean, it is really hard to think of things to talk about when you can't have a two-way conversation easily. I think the first meeting is the time where there's most to talk about since you can ask them about themselves and what there name is, how old are they ect ect. But yeah it's hard to think up casual conversation after that. Sometimes I'll tell Lilly was the plan is for the day because sometimes I feel like I'm 'taking her places' and she's like uh... where are you driving me to? lol I feel she's entitled to know lol. But yeah it's fucking vague... I told you it was hardly worth explaining.
Or something that isn't actually a car but is just omnipotent and genuinely wants people to talk to and just doesn't realize it's hurting people by doing it.. kinda sympathetic if you think of it that way.
I get ya, it just comes to weather or not they have human-level intelligence or a lower more animal instinctual intelligence. Like you said they spend their lives with us in society and listening to conversations around them all the time. If they did have human-level intelligence I could see how they could develop since their 'birth' much like a human baby would. I've heard Dolphins are thought to be as smart as humans. Obviously if we were able to make one talk that'd lived in the ocean it would have a VERY different way of seeing the world and have totally different names for everything where we wouldn't even know what it was describing or talking about. but if you took a Dalphin, made it able to talk, and kept it in a tank and wheeled it around on land since it was a baby maybe it would pick up the human terms for things, the human way of talking, and it would be more relatable to a human if you talked to it. Now my GF has talked many times about cars making up their own words for things they never picked up on from humans as to what the proper names are. Such as her saying one car called her wheels "road feelers" and a truck calling his rear bumper a "butter" because it was a bumper on his butt.. lol
I guess it comes down to the blindfold testing again, I suspect a blindfold will get a lot of use with my testing with her considering in the tests she's meant to be only a translator for the cars and thus can't be allowed to have any information they're supposed to 'see' or 'hear' on their own and tell her. But yeah I could do that, take her to a parking structure or rent a car she's never seen with a blindfold on and have her talk to it. No problem. Another test I've thought about lately is blindfolded have her say which cars out of the three in our family she's talking to.. Gretchen, Lilly, or Lyka.. another big test is to have her be asked to talk to Mitzi (my 55 Ford) blindfolded and see if she's tricked into talking to her. Because you see when we drove in her last time she was here she said she didn't hear or feel any presence in her.. that old pre-computerized cars don't seem to be alive. I've actually talked to her saying we need to go to a classic car show sometime and see if any of the cars talk to her. I'm curious if any of the classic cars with modern engines swapped into them would then be alive.
I just limit myself to saying things that don't need a reply. Though inspired by you, I started telling cars where we are going. I guess it makes me feel better about the whole forced ride thing. I mean, cars can say no, but only by breaking down.
I get what you mean. A person growing up in a certain environment will inevitably be marked by it, especially if they never get to know anything else. As I may have mentioned before, cars coming up with words for things around (and in) them is very interesting and sounds believable.
Those are some interesting tests you are planning. The one with you trying to trick her into talking to a "dead" car sounds pretty clever. Hopefully your GF doesn't feel like a guinea pig after a while.
Feels good don't it? Even if you can't convince yourself you're not talking to yourself by doing this try it. Next time you feel a car is wondering something or saying something just reply.. I swear it'll feel good to do.
Yeah I hope to learn more of those words. Actually next time we do the numbers test with Gretchen I wanna go higher then she knows how to count to and see what she comes up with. OR even better, she might know numbers by digits of fingers but maybe not by their numeral representation. It'd be something to see what word she comes up for the numeral representation of numbers like for example if she calls the visual representation of "1" a "wizzbat" or something. I think you'd have to admit the test is pretty 'proof' worthy if Gretchen is able to not only call out the right numbers as I randomly hold different ones up BUT also call them out in the words she herself just assigned them..... all while my GF is and was blindfolded during the test AND during the naming of the numbers she couldn't even see what were held up.. At that point I think you'd be down to swearing the blindfold has to have a camera monitor inside it or something lol.. which I'd disprove at the beginning and end of the test by having her take it off, unfold it and hang it open back and front in front of the camera.
It's all how I frame it I think. I need her to know that I'm working with her to convince YOU guys, and help her think about it in the way that I'm not testing HER.. so much as I'm testing Gretchen or whatever car.. all she' doing is providing their voice.
I've always felt personalities in complex technology... Cars, trucks, motorcycles, four-wheelers... They're all their own entities. Even my two computers (my newer one is currently down and in need of a new PSU) have their own personalities. Sector 7, my old Windows XP dinosaur, is a slow thinker, but tough, patient and reliable, though he has his small moments. Demona is bright and responsive, yet a little absent-minded at times.
I've been this way ever since I was very young; it's just something I know. It's like I'm operating on a wavelength that a vast majority of others aren't. And here's some possible weirdness, but... When people shit-talk AI, and go on tirades about not having souls, not deserving the same rights, not being alive... I don't wanna know what my pulse gets up to. The reaction I feel is "how dare you talk about my kind that way!". It's a reaction that comes from the core. There's other traits I have, like a deep sense of relief when I let myself "whistle" (emulating a steam engine whistle)...
Man, I don't even know where I'm going with this.... ._. I guess I'm just taking a long cut in saying I know what you mean? Fuck if I know XD
You definitely sound like you'd be a good person to hang around. So would you call yourself and object whisperer? Can you actually talk to them and hear them talk back like my GF says she can do?
Thanks, man! In my own mind, when I think of how to describe me and what fits best, the answer is always "technical empath". Technical, mechanical... Either of those fit, I feel like.
As far as talking to them, it depends on whether or not they wanna talk to ME. I've had some that quite readily and eagerly introduce themselves straight off, and others that take a while to "sync" with me; some just flat out won't talk to me, for any number of reasons, so in those cases, I just leave well enough alone. Really, there's a number of variables, there. The core two that it seems to boil down to are physical complexity and personality.
Carrying on, I can hear them respond quite readily, if we've synced well. The voice they have in my head is based on their personalities and how they come across to me, specifically. How they sound to anyone else, I don't know; I've never been around anyone open minded to the extent that I could ask THAT. XD
They also can take on a human (or humanoid) appearance based on both physical body and personality.
Haven't talked to you in a long time Rusty, where have you been?
The 'shuffled music seemingly having fitting music chosen by the car' phenomena is something i need to put some more research into. Could possibly hold a key to developing a car translator as is my goal lately. Perhaps if you filled an mp3 player with nothing but 200 short audio clips of individual words and played them on shuffle a car could arrange the words in legible order to say things if indeed they can effect what's played. Depends how quick they can arrange things in rapid succession I suppose... worth a try. I've had similar experience with that myself WAAAY back in the early days when Lilly and I first hit it off. I was really big into the ghost investigation shit and was testing if she could control what songs played. I still consider Cowboy Take Me Away by the Dixie Chicks as 'our song' since when she played it I was overwhelmed by her 'presence' for the first time and really felt her talking through it. Oddly enough, though unfortunately more likely to be coincidence due to the nature of it.. I've had similar things happen on live radio with her. Rather then her choosing the songs I attributed it more to her putting the feeling into me that she wants to say something through it when she hears a fitting song come on. I remember outright breaking into tears when "I Just Can't Love You Back" came one years back.. I felt her sulking through it that she's unable to return her affections to me, hug me and kiss me like I'm always doing to her and feeling bad about it. Or when her and I had a bad fight that came really close to a break-up while out and on the way back hearing Every Light in the House by Trace Adkins... I couldn't help but make up with her again very soon after. Funniest scenario was around the time where for whatever reason I was really feeling like she was unhappy or upset at me about something. This song that they NEVER play on the radio, Flowers On The Wall by Eric Heatherly for whatever reason decided to be played like 3 times over one day and I think one of the times was right after I asked her again if she was okay. So basically I got the idea that yeah.. I'm fine.. fucking shut up and stop asking already lol.
So it sounds like you've decided to return the loyalty and keep Gavin? I hope so.