Originally Posted by Altazi
“I am sure this is just a disconnect on my part, but I do not understand how one can have an emotional connection with a vehicle – a thing. I’d love to hear an explanation, if anyone is up to it.”

I myself studied painting at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California. When I was in high school, I even took life drawing classes there and it was at this point I became enamored with automotive design. Art Center has one of the best automotive design programs in the world. During my studies there I would often wander into the automotive design classes and look at the work that was being done and I would often spend hours looking at the automotive designs in the school gallery. I chose to be a painter instead of an automotive designer but your question remains the same for both. A painting and a car are inanimate objects and how can one have an emotional attachment to them? For starters, there are three words that popped into my mind when you asked this question: fetish, anthropomorphize, and phenomenology. Here is what they mean:

fe·tish
1 a: an object (as a small stone carving of an animal) believed to have magical power to protect or aid its owner ; broadly : a material object regarded with superstitious or extravagant trust or reverence b: an object of irrational reverence or obsessive devotion : prepossession c: an object or bodily part whose real or fantasied presence is psychologically necessary for sexual gratification and that is an object of fixation to the extent that it may interfere with complete sexual expression
2: a rite or cult of fetish worshipers
3: fixation

an·thro·po·mor·phize
: to attribute human form or personality to
: to attribute human form or personality to things not human

phe·nom·e·nol·o·gy
1: the study of the development of human consciousness and self-awareness as a preface to or a part of philosophy
2 a (1): a philosophical movement that describes the formal structure of the objects of awareness and of awareness itself in abstraction from any claims concerning existence (2): the typological classification of a class of phenomena

I am sorry to have posted such lengthy definitions but I thought these would be more thorough than if I had defined them myself. Sigmund Freud has written extensively about fetishes. For instance, according to Freud, a golf club can be a fetish; it is a subconscious representation of the penis. Therefore, an emotional attachment to a golf club can be an expression of ones own attachment to the penis and in some cases be an expression of castration anxiety. This is just one example of a fetish and of course an automobile can be a fetish as well. There can be many different permutations of fetishes and explanations about them but lets move on to the next word that popped into my mind; anthropomorphizing. Being a painter and being an avid student of art history, I have often heard explained that the surface of a painting can be seen as a kind of second skin. Painters have been concerned for centuries with “anthropomorphizing” the surface of a painting, by trying to make the painting come “alive.” This is done through the painters “touch.” An aritsts sensitivity to the layering on of paint and varnish expresses this aspect of painting. In addition, sometimes unsuccessful works of art are said to lack this feeling. The famous 18th century French painter Ingres said that, “oil paint was invented to paint flesh.” Some psychoanalysts have even promoted the idea that the very idea of painting is a regression back to childhood sexual development. In regards to automobiles, the body of a car, its curves and color is often expressed in anthropomorphic terms. In addition, anyone can walk into a hardware store and something as simple as a screw is described as being either male or female. Phenomenology is interesting too. I remember reading this one essay about how women used to wear these large ornate hats and would somehow walk through doorways without so much as ruffling a feather. These women would bend their knees just at the right moment and ever so slightly to avoid potential catastrophe. The point to this essay was that perhaps ones sense of personal space extends beyond the reaches of your limbs. Likewise, to bring this all back to the subject of cars, ones personal space can be felt beyond the placement of your hands on the steering wheel. Have you ever felt an acute awareness of the front corners of your car? The point being is where does one draw the line between the body and the object? I propose that this line is often difficult to delineate and that bodies and objects flow fluidly in and out of consciousness. Since I am artist, the degree in which these ideas of the fetish, anthropomorphism, and phenomenology, are expressed in my emotions will differ perhaps than that of an engineer. In fact I am quite amazed with what I’ve read on other posts about the Chevy Volt from people with a more scientific bent. In the end, I think that these concepts are immanent in all people, but of course, the vast role that emotions play in our lives isn’t limited by these ideas. What I have said is just a framework in which to explain how people become emotionally attached to things. There are a myriad of approaches to this subject, but for a post on a forum such as this, I think I have introduced a few ideas. I know this was a long winded answer but at least it was an attempt to answer your question thoughtfully.

Americans never knew how to build good cars… Without being connected with big oil companies. They had the almost perfect electric car 20 years ago and they crushed it for a gas guzzler, (Hummer), to please the oil companies. The Volt is not an EV but an advanced hybrid. For a cheaper price and better car I will keep and buy again an hybrid Japanese car.

Thank you GM. Too less too late !

Americans build cars the same way as they elect their president…

This technology may not pan out, but if it does, GM will have an edge. That edge could potentially be leveraged into tens of thousands of jobs and hundreds of billions of dollars for our economy.

We should all cheer for GM!

The high cost of energy is driving us to build and purchase cars like the Volt, and that is reducing our carbon footprints.

In other words, the energy crisis may save the environment!