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What is the Matrix? Control. The Matrix is a computer-generated dreamworld built to keep us under control in order to change a human being into this [holds battery]. The Matrix 1999 starring Keanu Reeves & Laurence Fishburne & Carrie-Anne Moss & Hugo Weaving & Joe Pantoliano & Gloria Foster & Marcus Chong & Julian Arahanga & Matt Doran & Belinda McClory et al, directors Andy & Lana Wachowski, Morpheus
Never send a human to do a machine’s job. ibid. man in black
What is man, when you come to think upon him, but a minutely set, ingenious machine for turning, with infinite artfulness, the red wine of Shiraz into urine? Isak Dinesen, 1885-1962, Danish novelist, Seven Gothic Tales, 1934
Men are convicted of the capital crime of poverty. We must not allow mankind to be sacrificed to improvements in mechanisms. Lord Byron, defence of Luddites
Machine men, with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines, you are not cattle, you are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts. You don’t hate: only the unloved hate, the unloved and the unnatural. Soldiers, don’t fight for slavery, fight for liberty! You the people have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness! You the people have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure! Then, in the name of democracy, let us use that power. Let us all unite! Let us fight for a new world, a decent world. Charles Chaplin, The Great Dictator, 1940
How is it that the machine in its modern form now seems just a threat? Jacob Bronowski, The Ascent of Man 2/13: The Harvest of the Seasons, BBC 1973
2009: Rage Against the Machine. The Christmas No.1 Story, BBC 2012
He [Da Vinci] designed machines for transportation and warfare. Alan Yentob, Leonardo: The Man Who Wanted to Know Everything, BBC 2011
Violent robotic humanoids are trapped in an angular wilderness. They look like nightmares. But they were Wyndham Lewis’s dream of a mechanical world order. Dr James Fox, British Masters, BBC 2011
Los Angeles 2029 A.D. The machines rose from the ashes of the nuclear fire. Their war to exterminate mankind had raged for decades, but the final battle would not be fought in the future. It would be fought here, in our present. The Terminator 1984 starring Arnold Schwarzenegger & Michael Biehn & Linda Hamilton & Lance Henriksen & Paul Winfield & Bess Motta & Earl Boen & Rick Rossovich et al, director James Cameron, opening scene and caption
The Terminator’s an infiltration unit, part man, part machine. Underneath, it's a hyper-alloy combat chassis – micro-processor controlled, fully armoured. Very tough. But outside, it’s living human tissue – flesh, skin, hair, blood, grown for the cyborgs ... The 600 series had rubber skin. We spotted them easy. But these are new, they look human. Sweat, bad breath, everything. Very hard to spot. I had to wait till he moved on you before I could zero him. ibid. Kyle
My name is John Connor. They tried to murder me before I was born. When I was 13 they tried again. Machines from the future: Terminator. Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines 2003 starring Arnold Schwarzenegger & Nick Stahl & Clare Danes & Kristanna Loken & David Andrews & Mark Famiglietti & Earl Boen & Jau Acovone & Mark Hicks et al, director Jonathan Mostow, opening commentary
Before they died my parents told me stories of how the world once was. What it was like long before I was born. Before the war with the machines. Terminator Genisys 2015 starring Arnold Schwarzenegger & Brett Azar & Jason Clarke & Emilia Clarke & Willa Taylor & Jai Courtney & Bryant Prince & Lee Byung-hun & J K Simmons & Wayne Bastrup & Sandrine Holt & Matt Smith et al, director Alan Taylor, opening commentary
I speak of rights. A machine has none. A man must. My client has the right to face his accuser, and if you do not grant him that right, you have brought us down to the level of the machine. Indeed, you have elevated that machine above us. Star Trek s1e20: Court Martial, Cogley
I suppose technically speaking I’m not a real person. Star Trek: Voyager s5e25: Warhead, Doctor to machine, with Harry & Lang
Look at it this way. You and I have something in common. Just because we’re not organic beings doesn’t mean we’re in any way inferior. ibid. doctor to machine
A planet populated by living machines. Star Trek: The Motion Picture 1979 starring William Shatner & Leonard Nimoy & DeForest Kelley & James Doohan & Walter Koenig & Nichelle Nichols & George Takei & Persis Khambatta & Stephen Collins et al, director Robert Wise, Spock
A machine planet sending a machine to Earth looking for its creator. ibid. Kirk
A love of nature, and also [sic] of the machine. Andrew Graham-Dixon, The Art of Germany, BBC 2010
Britain entered the modern machine age. Dr Lucy Worsley, Elegance and Decadence 3/3: The Age of the Regency, BBC 2011
Byron thought this was outrageously repressive and he travelled south to London by coach to plead the cause of the weavers in his maiden speech in the House of Lords. ibid.
The machine! Someone must stay with the machine. Metropolis 1927 starring Brigitte Helm & Gustav Frohlich & Alfred Abel & Rudolph Klein-Rogge & Theodor Loos & Fritz Rasp et al, director Fritz Lang
I have created a machine in the image of man that never tires or makes a mistake. ibid. inventor
The workers are destroying the machines. ibid.
Unfortunately machines – from the Maxim gun to the computer – are for the most part means by which an authoritarian regime can keep man in subjection. Kenneth Clark, Civilisation 13/13: Heroic Materialism, BBC 1969
Our other speciality is the urge to destruction. With the help of machines we did our best to destroy ourselves in two wars and in doing so we released a flood of evil. ibid.
With the introduction of agriculture mankind entered upon a long period of meanness, misery, and madness, from which they are only now being freed by the beneficent operation of the machine. Bertrand Russell
Unlike their counterparts in the United States, most Arts and Crafts practitioners in Britain had strong, slightly incoherent, negative feelings about machinery. They thought of ‘the craftsman’ as free, creative, and working with his hands, ‘the machine’ as soulless, repetitive, and inhuman. These contrasting images derive in part from John Ruskin’s (1819-1900) The Stones of Venice, an architectural history of Venice that contains a powerful denunciation of modern industrialism to which Arts and Crafts designers returned again and again. Distrust for the machine lay behind the many little workshops that turned their backs on the industrial world around 1900, using preindustrial techniques to create what they called ‘crafts’. Alan Crawford, W A S Benson, Machinery, and the Arts and Crafts Movement in Britain
Abominable things these machines. Elephant Man ***** 1980 starring John Hurt & Anthony Hopkins & Anne Bancroft & John Gielgud & Wendy Hiller & Freddie Jones & Dexter Fletcher & Michael Elphick & Hannah Gordon & Helen Ryan & John Standing & Lesley Dunlop & Phoebe Nicholls & Morgan Sheppard & Kenny Baker et al, director David Lynch, doctor
And get the machine that goes ping! Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life 1983 starring Graham Chapman & John Cleese & Terry Gilliam & Eric Idle & Terry Jones & Michael Palin & Carol Cleveland & Patricia Quinn & Simon Jones & Matt Frewer et al, director Terry Jones, doctor in theatre
And that’s the most expensive machine in the whole hospital. ibid. doctor to patient
Hospital Administrator: Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favourite. You see we lease this back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account. ibid.
There could be machines that behave exactly like our own bodies. Professor Simon Schaffer, Mechanical Marvels: Clockwork Dreams, BBC 2013
This is an automaton, a self-moving machine that simulates the actions of a living being. ibid.