I know what it means to work hard on machines

[venta]

I need your help. Yes, yours.

Could you tell me - before you read what's under the cut - what you think constitutes a machine. Include any specific things it must or must not have. You may continue in comments if a textbox isn't long enough.

[Poll #1186515]

Recently I was involved in a guessing game. As games go, it wasn't a great one, it was "guess what Simon's second favourite sport is". Now, Simon is your typical pale, thin, smart indiekid who, in defiance of all stereotypes, plays a lot of football.

At the point at which I joined in the game, it had already been established that Simon's Second Favourite Sport (SSFS) involved a machine. Further questions established that the machine was not used for scoring, was integral to the sport...

Eventually, SSFS was identified as cycling. At which point I felt decidedly cheated. Firstly, because I don't think cycling is a sport - it's a means of getting from A to B, or at best a passtime. But I'm aware others don't agree on this one.

Secondly, I'd never call a bicycle a machine. I'm aware that they have been historically referred to as machines, but whenever I read it it strikes me as odd. After some thinking, I finally pinned down the problem: in my mind, a machine must be somehow powered (oil, gas, electricity, clockwork, but not human).

I feel it should also have moving parts, and perform some task which would otherwise be done laboriously by hand. However, the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that my definition wouldn't stand up in a court of law. My classification is much more arbitrary than I'd thought.

So...

[Poll #1186516]

When challenged, I insisted that bicycles should be categorised as "contraptions".

Comments

[smiorgan.livejournal.com]

I take undyingking's definition.

The moving parts definition is quite convenient. By that virtue, a cooker is a tool if used for heating up food, but becomes a machine if, for example, you use it to bisect mice by slamming the door on them.

I thought of the ipod nano. That has no moving parts per se. Is it a machine? It causes the air to move in a pair of attached headphones, so I guess so. But, what about a passively cooled, solid state computer, i.e. zero moving parts?

I suppose it would exert a force on LiveJournal, in the right hands.

[secondhand-rick.livejournal.com]

You use a cooker for bisecting mice?

Haven't you got a microwave?