Car driving is a religion. Modernism as a whole resembles an arena, a self-contained circuit. That's why Formula One races are so important. They are the modern proof of what St Paul the Apostle wrote: the godless go round in circles. The circular rides in the circus contradict the elemental hope, the key theme of the modern age: the primacy of the journey out, opening up new spheres. If technology is the perfect control of sequences of movement, this leaves us with only one progressive function: braking.

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… the culture of soul journeys begins with the observation that individuals can lose their souls. In depression some people become separated from the principle that animates them[…] Shamanism became important here because they know the art of looking for the depressed person's lost free soul somewhere at the edge of the world, and bringing it back to its owner. The early movement experiments and shamanic soul journeys were meant to revive the alliance between humans and their animators, that is, their companion spirits, the forces that help to arouse enthusiasm[…]

… the car is a machine for increasing self-confidence. The difference is that an external engine causes the movement. The car gives its driver additional power and reach. I think we have to see the vehicles of humans in the first place as a means of idealization and intensification, and consequently as a kinetic anti-depressant[…] Two our of three movements are escapes: people drive to their lovers, they take trips to the countryside or on holiday, they go visiting, or they use the car for letting off steam. We could almost think people use the car as revenge on the heavy demands of settledness.

Peter Sloterdijk, Selected Exaggerations