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The books and fluff always refer to the machine spirit and involve the Adeptus Mechanicus praying and performing rites in order to get machinery to work. Is the machine spirit AI? The native american belief that every rock and tree and creature has a spirit and name? Is it all just hooey and not able to accomplish anything? Now in game I know that certain SM vehicles can have a machine spirit, so there are some game rules to back up that belief. I am trying to figure out if the Mechanicus are stupid, actually doing it right, or just putting on a show to keep everyone else in the dark to how it really works.

I also recall in the old necron codex that the Machine God was possibly a Ctan, but I have no idea if that is in the new one or not.

The Machine-Spirits are very low intensity AI.

The best way I think I could explain it is:

In the modern era, we have very advanced AIs for video-games. Unfortunately, we cannot program those AIs to operate in the real world because we have no way of getting them to map and recognize reality.

If we overcome that hurdle, then we could program robots who act juts like Elites in Halo or the like - not very smart, but capable of limited independent action.

This is just like the Machine-Spirit in 40k - capable of limited independent action, but not terribly smart.

OTOH, 40k does have the Silica Anima, true artificial intelligence, but that is banned by the orthodox Mechanicus, and only the Logicians heretek cult researches such glorious and wondrous machines...

Machine Spirits are either superstitious nonsense (such as the "machine spirit" of a lasgun) or what the Mechanicum call AI systems (which even Rhinos have to a degree, while Titans and warships have fairly advanced ones leftover from the Dark Age of Technology).

Unit1126PLL wrote:The Machine-Spirits are very low intensity AI.

The best way I think I could explain it is:

In the modern era, we have very advanced AIs for video-games. Unfortunately, we cannot program those AIs to operate in the real world because we have no way of getting them to map and recognize reality.

If we overcome that hurdle, then we could program robots who act juts like Elites in Halo or the like - not very smart, but capable of limited independent action.

This is just like the Machine-Spirit in 40k - capable of limited independent action, but not terribly smart.

OTOH, 40k does have the Silica Anima, true artificial intelligence, but that is banned by the orthodox Mechanicus, and only the Logicians heretek cult researches such glorious and wondrous machines...

All that and other "more advanced" Machine Spirits (like those in say the Land Raider) are capable of independent action. there is a story of a lone (pilot less) Land Raider fighting a solo war against an Ork warband after its chapter was destroyed. the Land Raider spirit is not terribly "inttelligent" but is capable of nera autonamous action, (but that doesn't mean you can send a ton of land raiders willy nilly at the enemy and expect them to kill the enemy by themselves), the tanks are seeming capable of basic warfare (drive towards enemy, SHOOT ANYTHING THAT COMES NEAR!, find more targets, repeat process)


edit: otherwise the "machine spirit" is any supersticious concept of a spirit controling any technological device (in theory a tech preist could convice that a simple Lighter could have a machine spirit).

^^ What Uni1126PLL said.

I'd also note that all the prayer, etc that surrounds the machines of the Mechanicus is pointless for the most part. It may have a sort of phychic effect like the extreme faith of the sisters of battle effecting them in battle-shrugging off plasma rounds, having hands that cut through power armour- at times though. The Squats regarded the mechanicus as foolish, and were often looked down on by the Imperium for their lack of respect towards machines-ie there was a squat mechanic in the Inquisitor War series who applied practical skills towards his job, rather than just religion, and was probably the best in the fleet. In the 3rd edition codex there is a mechanicum start up prayer for a Thunderbolt. It goes something like " attone the console with the sacred oil, pray to the machine spirit thrice, wait five seconds before lighting the sacred candles, etc", before its final line "and strike the mighty sigil that states "on"". Its a fun piece, but shows the whole pointlessness of all the prayer etc. However if they didn't have it the whole organisation may not have lasted until the 41st millenium. =/

its a computer program, end of story

So why is there zero possibility of them being right? I mean chaos gods and their rituals are real, why not the Machine God and his rituals?

Actually, it depends on how you interpret the fluff of the Mechanicus.

Points of view:
1) The Mechanicus are a bunch of numbnuts, following tradition and rote ritual as the only way to preserve knowledge.

2) The lower-level Adepts are told it is sorcery and mysticism as an easier method of explaining it, while the higher echelons know and understand machinery (and the Machine-God they worship is a more esoteric, philosophical concept of perfection rather than simple machine-spirits).

3) The entire Mechanicus view the Machine-God as a spiritual, philosophical entity and each and every one understands technology. The worship of technology as a "God" and the rituals required to make it function are a ruse to ensure that the rest of humanity believes that technology really is inaccessible to the uninitiated.

EDIT:
Personally, I have several beliefs. I'm normally, basically in-line with the second interpretation above, but I also believe that the Mechanicus, just like all religions is fragmented and intricate, and so each and every one of these viewpoints could possibly simultaneously exist in different parts of the galaxy. That is to say, I don't really think that there is such a thing as "orthodox Mechanicus" in the same manner that "orthodox Christian" doesn't really exist.

Has anyone read Asimov's Foundation series? They have a period with technology as religion, and it was a religion created so that the rest of the galaxy doesn't mess with stuff, keeps the members of the relatively weak "priesthood" around, and doesn't figure out how to use the tech themselves and turn it on the people giving it to them. In the 40k galaxy, it could have started out like this, but the people at the top forgot it was all BS.

From what I can tell "Machine spirits are, The operating system of the machine, very low A.I(like video games) or just something they think is there.

I mean not every machine has one, but they act like it does. they have a "rite" to appease the machine sprite of a gun to unjam it. Not like Evey gun as an A.I or Operating system. I get the feeling that many "Sprites" are simply programing glitches thay do not understand. They not if they do the correct "rite" it makes it happy and does as they want. And the rite is really just the correct command or simply the way you need to "Juggle the handle" to make it work.

How many people do you know who say something like "Oww come on work!" to something that isn't working right? I mean I know very little about cars and sometimes I am doing something and I know if I wiggle this wire or move that thing that keeps being stuck or grease that thing there it works. I couldn't tell you why it now works, I just now it needed it.

Now you move forward a few thousand years. Very few people understand how things work and they guys who kinda understand say the machine has a "sprite" in it. Now to make it do what you want when it refuses or messes up you need to "Pray" to it or do the correct "rite"