# Machine-Gods, in fiction? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 20, 2008, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073 "2008-04-20T02:22:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/1 "2008-04-20T02:22:39Z")
Out of idle curiosity, and since Wikipedia doesn’t seem to have a category for this, yet, I was wondering…would anyone care to suggest candidates for a list of (mostly fictional, I’d presume) machine gods? That is, a list that would include; a) Deities having dominion or patronage over machines b) Deities that manifested or incarnated in the form of a machine c) Machines that ascended into godhood d) Machines worshipped as deities I think that covers all the major categories, at the risk of being overbroad. Also, at the risk of SPOILERS, so far, I’ve got— •The Molochmaschine from Lang’s _Metropolis_ (If visions/hallucinations count) •[Unicron](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicron) (Depending on the canon, he may be some kind of a god) •Vaal, and arguably Landru, from Star Trek. •The [Warhammer Machine God](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cult_Mechanicus#The_Machine_God) •Issac Asimov’s Universal AC from _The Last Question_ •Fredric Brown’s _Answer_. So…who am I missing? ---
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/2 "2008-04-20T02:44:33Z")
What about the atom bomb that was worshipped in _Beneath the Planet of the Apes_? ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/3 "2008-04-20T03:00:58Z")
[QUOTE=Ranchoth] •[Unicron](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicron) (Depending on the canon, he may be some kind of a god) [/QUOTE] Don’t forget [Primus](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primus_(Transformers)). And in certain continuities, the All-Spark is akin to a god. And in the IDW main-line books Nemesis Prime is either regarded as deific himself, or is the highest ranked agent of some unknown deific entity. (Or else the prophet of a non-theistic cult. Information has been slow coming out. I think this entry counts, anyway.) ---
**Author:** ![Khampelf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Khampelf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khampelf)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/4 "2008-04-20T03:29:35Z")
Don’t forget the old school. Hephestus, god of the forge for machinery, and Hermes, god of communication for radio, internet, et al. ---
**Author:** ![Monkey\_Chews](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/65b543/32.png) [@Monkey\_Chews](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monkey_Chews)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/5 "2008-04-20T04:24:33Z")
In David Zindell’s **Neverness** , and it’s sequel series **A Requiem For Homo Sapiens** , there are several machine-gods: **Ede The God** - a computer containing the mind of Nicolas Daru Ede, the first human to download his brain into a computer and thus achieve immportality. Edeism is the largest human religion at this time, and its followers look forward to the day when the traces of their brain patters are downloaded and absorbed into the computer and they are thus joined with god. The Ede computer is continually expanding and Edeists believe it will eventually incorporate every bit of matter in existence - thus uniting Ede, his followers and the entire universe into one entity. **The Solid State Entity** - a nebula-sized brain made up of thousands of bio-computers the size of planets, it began life as a young girl from the order of Warrior-Poets, whose brain was artificially enlarged and expanded in an attempt to make her both the pefect warrior and the perfect poet **The Silicon God** - created as a self-aware computer who, as soon as it was switched on, figured out space travel, warped away, and was founds centuries later having greatly enlarged itself and at war with the other gods using information viruses **The April Colonial Intelligence** - a man-made nanorobotic bacterium which got out of control and overran part of the galaxy, forming an enormous intelligent being The **Doctor Who** story “The Face of Evil”, featured the descendants of a crashed Earth ship, who had split into two tribes, the Sevateem (descendants of the Survey Team who had been locked out of the ship), and the Tesh (the descendants of the Tech team who had stayed inside). Both tribes worshipped the ships computer Xoanon as a god, with elaborate myths and rituals built up over the centuries. ---
**Author:** ![phil417](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/6bbea6/32.png) [@phil417](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phil417)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/6 "2008-04-20T04:31:40Z")
Assuming you’re spelling the word with a small g…“god”, how about Leibowitz, as in the novel A Canticle for Leibowitz? LIC, Phil ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/7 "2008-04-20T04:46:42Z")
In one of Fred Saberhagen’s beserker short stories there’s a group of people who worship the defense computer of a collapsed civilization, and another one which talks about folks who worship the beserkers (giant Death Star like machines which destroy life bearing planets) as gods. Pity none of his stuff got turned into movies. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Them](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/898d66/32.png) [@The\_Them](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Them)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/8 "2008-04-20T05:23:09Z")
**A Wrinkle In Time** by Madeleine l’Engle has a version of this, IIRC. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/9 "2008-04-20T05:26:21Z")
Not a machine GOD, per se, but if you stretch the definition, [St. Vidicon of Cathode](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Vidicon) might count… ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/10 "2008-04-20T05:30:39Z")
Do’h! How could we forget Bender being worshipped as a god after being flung across the cosmos? :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tapioca_Dextrin)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/11 "2008-04-20T05:32:18Z")
Does [Deep Thought](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_characters_from_The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy#Deep_Thought) count? ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/12 "2008-04-20T05:36:23Z")
:smack: C3PO was worshipped as a god by the ewoks in Return of the Jedi… ---
**Author:** ![Gerome](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/85e7bf/32.png) [@Gerome](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gerome)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/13 "2008-04-20T05:46:09Z")
[QUOTE=Tuckerfan] Do’h! How could we forget Bender being worshipped as a god after being flung across the cosmos? :smack: [/QUOTE] Or the FemPuter, who ruled the Amazonians? Of course, she was really a fem-bot… ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 6:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/14 "2008-04-20T06:01:42Z")
Hmm… was VALIS a machine? (And was it a god?) -FrL- ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 6:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/15 "2008-04-20T06:09:10Z")
This book, [Digital Deli](http://www.atariarchives.org/deli/index.php) made a big impression on me a few years just after I came to America, It had bits of everything regarding new digital technology. A book with an anarchy of design that surprisingly did work and included an early cartoon by [Larry Gonick](http://www.atariarchives.org/deli/digital_watch.php) and a bit describing an early tale on the subject: [OF GOD, HUMANS AND MACHINES](http://www.atariarchives.org/deli/god_humans_machines.php) The computer in science fiction by Michael Kurland The article talked about John W Campbell’s \* “The Machine.” In a 1935(!) story from Astounding Science-Fiction. Even though I have not read it, the summary of the tale stuck in my mind: > [@](#): > > _On the planet Dwranl, of the star you know as Sirius, a great race lived… Twenty-one thousand seven hundred and eleven of your years ago, they attained their goal of the machine that could think. > [The Machine’s] progress meant gradual branching out, and as it increased in scope, it included in itself the other machines and took over their duties, and it expanded, and because it had been set to make a machine most helpful to the race of that planet, it went on and helped the race automatically. > It was a process so built into the Machine that it could not stop itself now, it could only improve its helpfulness to the race. More and more it did, till … the Machine became all. It did all. It must, for that was being more helpful to the race, as it had been set to do, and had made itself to be. > The process went on for twenty-one thousand and ninety-three years, and for all but two hundred and thirty-two of those years, the Machine had done anything within its capabilities demanded by the race, and it was not till the last seventy-eight years that the Machine developed itself to the point of recognizing the beneficence of punishment and of refusal._ > > Behaving like the ultimate parental figure, the Machine began to refuse requests when they were ultimately damaging to the race. And because they no longer understood its workings, the members came to call the Machine “what you would express by God” and sacrificed young females in the hope that it would start up again. Finally, in order to stop this slide back down to savagery, the Machine was forced to leave the planet-and leave the race to fend for itself in rebuilding its civilization. The thesis here is that if you do too much for people, they forget how to do for themselves. Or perhaps: God helps those who help themselves. \*Asimov attributed the Laws of Robotics to John W. Campbell ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 6:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/16 "2008-04-20T06:16:36Z")
[ARDNEH](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Books_of_the_Swords#ARDNEH) was a machine who later came to be regarded as a god–even by the other gods who really _were_ gods for most purposes. -FrL- ---
**Author:** ![The\_Them](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/898d66/32.png) [@The\_Them](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Them)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 8:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/17 "2008-04-20T08:16:24Z")
**GIGObuster,** you’ve heard of Larry Gonick?! I wanna be your friend. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 8:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/18 "2008-04-20T08:57:23Z")
[QUOTE=The Them] **GIGObuster,** you’ve heard of Larry Gonick?! I wanna be your friend. 😉 [/QUOTE] Well, I’m a guy, so it depends, 😉 In any case you are a doper. So we have already a lot in common. Related bit: there was once a thread in GC that questioned the reckless zealotry of early Christians after the fire in ancient Rome: \*When Christianity was a nutty cult \* > **[When Christianity was a nutty cult](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=364577)** > > I’d be interested in reading how the Romans and other first-century peoples regarded the followers of “Christos”. What are some good sources, and how biased or accurate are they considered to be? I did send Larry Gonick a note to clarify something and he did reply! But because the thread died I never bother posting what he told me with his permission. :smack: Might as well do it here. > [@](#): > > **Originally me to Gonick** : > > I’m a member of a message board from the Chicago Reader magazine, the > Straight Dope message board, owned by that fellow Cecil Adams. We got > into a discussion on how pleased the Christians were when in 64 AD the > big fire ravaged Rome. > > One very knowledgeable fellow is claiming that the balloon from page > 240 showing Christians happy for the fire or the commentary by the > Roman that “the sect of Christians seemed awfully pleased” has no > basis whatsoever in any ancient text, He dismisses also research by > Professor Gerhard Baudy saying that there is no evidence for what the > professor said in a recent PBS episode that Christians were > circulating vengeful texts predicting that a raging inferno would > reduce the city to ashes. ([http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/case\_rome/clues.html](http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/case_rome/clues.html) ) can you help us > a little here pointing out were the source of the Christian joy came > exactly from? > > I thank you for your attention for what it a mundane issue, but over here one of the missions is to fight ignorance, and boy this one bites. > > Sincerely. > > GB. [QUOTE=Larry Gonick] Boy, can I not remember any more. It doesn’t surprise me that there’s no documentary evidence for the circulation of Christian texts. My source was probably Tacitus, who of course was biased and can’t be double-checked against anybody. I put it in because it makes sense. Early Christian texts (which would have to postdate the fire by at least 150 years or so) are, if I may say so, even worse, since they were eager to prove themselves loyal Romans and discount any subversive intent their predecessors may have had. [/QUOTE] > [@](#): > > **Originally me to Gonick** : > > No reply yet from the German historian. > Can I have your permission to quote from your reply? > > Once again, thanks a million for your previous reply. [QUOTE=Larry Gonick] Yeah, you can quote me. You might also add this little confession: sometimes I put things in–usually as comments from characters–that are only plausible conjectures. In this case, I had something like this in mind: the history of “un-Christian” attitudes and behavior among Christians is ancient; you might even say it goes back to Jesus himself. It simply defies credulity that _everyone_ in a persecuted minority would feel totally forgiving when a calamity befell the persecutors, even if the official line is to love your brother and turn the other cheek. There simply _must_ have been expressions of satisfaction, especially when you consider that other Jews–plenty of these Christians were Jews, remember–had openly demonstrated against Rome. Otherwise they wouldn’t have been human–and human they were! Even if everyone miraculously succeeded in keeping his mouth shut, we can easily imagine police informants who would have _reported_ their feeling. Note that the speech balloon in question is in the mouth of a Roman officer, not a Christian. How do your contributors feel about the tradition that the persecution of Christians stepped up after the fire? Larry Gonick [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 9:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/19 "2008-04-20T09:28:27Z")
The Zygote people have a god of science and machinery in the manga, Aqua Knight. But I’ve only read the Japanese version so I’m not sure what the English translation of the name is, nor even the Japanese since my copy is somewhere hidden at the moment… ---
**Author:** ![Pushkin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ee59a6/32.png) [@Pushkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pushkin)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2008, 11:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073/20 "2008-04-20T11:08:15Z")
There’s a short PKD story about a machine in a post apocalyptic world that was worshipped by humans. They ask it a story that they think unanswerable, if it answers successfully, it digest them. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/machine-gods-in-fiction/446073.md?page=2)