"Consciousness, Anna translated. Group consciousness. Well, was that so strange? She had felt it more than once on stage, when a group of dancers had transcended what they were individually, had become a unity moving to the music in the creation of beauty. Such moments had, for her, taken the place of religion."
-"The Erdmann Nexus", Nancy Kress, 2208 Hugo Award winner for best novella.
This is the same as when a group of musicians hits "chemistry" and all know where the entire thing is going, and interweave and contribute in accordance, effortlessly. The same thing as when an idea appears, a moment of clarity. These are examples of where humans tap into what is...higher.
Can something as simple as a piece of music equipment even begin to exhibit such characteristics, or better, inspire such perception in a user?
"Carrie, have you ever heard of the principle of 'emergent complexity'?" ... 'Emergent complexity' means that as an evolving organism grows more complex, it develops form. In other words, teh whole becomes greater than the sum of the parts. Somewhere along the line, our primitive human ancestors developed self-awareness. Higher consciousness. That was a new thing in evolution." -Erdman Nexus
Of course I don't expect a piece of gear to soon gain self-awareness, but certainly, those with a higher perception of the -whole- of an instrument, of parts interweaving into something greater than the whole, provide us with something that should be experienced and cherished.
