Obviously, this site is dedicated to people that do. I'm talking about the general population of let's say the United States. It really doesn't matter the place though. Woman especially seem offended like I'm talking about killing people or something. Most of the time outside there are more vehicles in sight than people. It's almost like a door that you have to go through before you see what's on the other side.

I have a friend that consistently dresses well and sometimes I used talk about cars around him. He would get upset and say the most frequently said line "Who cares about cars?" He cares passionately about how he looks but not about the aesthetic qualities of the vehicle that he drives? A car IS your clothing when you're inside it. To not care about it but dress nicely is slightly ridiculous. Why not dress well and have a car that matches your personality? Now obviously younger people can't afford the car they want even if they did care.

Many people watch Deathproof (the last car chase for example) and think Wow those cars are awesome. But they don't know why or more importantly what they are. How much better would their experience be if they did know? In my case, my friend got me into cars. We would go to the gas station and get the Indiana Auto sales magazine and try to find the most obscure models for sale. Then I started going on Ebay to look at cars and that NEVER gets boring. I enjoy it even though I can't afford any of the cars I look at. Now everywhere I go and every movie I watch is a better experience because I understand one more thing in my surroundings.

I would say its just a matter of preference. People are different, we all like different things. It’s what makes each and everyone of us special. I know people who don’t care about cars or even pay their own car any attention until something happens to it (i.e. it brakes down) as it then becomes an inconvenience.

On the other end of the spectrum however, I also know of a few people who really are absolutely car nuts (these guys would make us look like normal people ... ) however they still don’t have wives or children and they're almost as old as me – go figure.

On a scale of 0 to 10 (zero being not interested at all in anything mechanical in nature, and ten being an absolute certifiable car nut) I would be somewhere in the middle – say a 5 or 6.

Even among carlovers, there are many levels of appreciation, and no one can say which is the best. Collectors usually want a car that looks, smells, and drives just the same as the day it was minted. For another group, their memories of cars weren't when they were new. Some had replaced engines, worn or aftermarket paint, malformed or second-hand body panels.

This has been true of Cuban carlovers for reasons of necessity, however European and Asian imports may be replacing this piece of the world car culture.

In this latter group, into which I would include my father, cars sentimentally carried them through each period of their lives, and the unoriginality added a bit of character that peppered these experiences and permanently fused the cars into their memories.

For me the best way to appreciate a vehicle is to see it on the road, in any safe condition, not under glass for only one fortunate soul to survey. Neptune, I rate myself a high 6, which is as far one can go with neither a classic car to possess nor the mechanical aptitude required to care for it.

*I edited "purvey," which means to sell, so that it correctly reads "survey." Oops!

I agree with that 58_Roadmaster. I just was never against learning about cars in the first place. When my friend started talking about old Toyota Land Cruisers (and when I saw what they looked like) I was obsessed. I would say I'm a 5 because I'm not sure if I have as much knowledge as you guys. I guess I like the way vehicles look (but mechanically I'm not so hot). I guess I'm just tired of seeing an amazing vintage vehicle right in front of me and not being able to discuss it with my friends (because the car is invisible to them).

Probably the same cause you don´t wanna talk with women about their 163 shoes.

Though I´m German I drive American vehicles for more than a decade. Some people in Germany understand that and some don´t. To me these vehicles are like a custom-made siut unlike an off-the-peg suit.

Neptune, where the Ford Expedition is concerned you are definetely a 10!

People coming on this site are by definition already at least at 7 on that scale, IMHO; 8 or more for regular members & admins

I'm alright with that!

I think that no one would have said better, i agree with these sentence a lot, we all like cars, but in many different ways, some know a lot more than others, years, engines, how it works, trims, others just like cars but are not much interested in knowing them all, others are more interested in an specific continent market etc etc, but we are all car fanatic, and we have showed it enough during these years, i dont know which grade i could get out of ten, but i consider myself a complet car fanatic despite not being very interested in the mechanical part for example, or despite knowing certain markets better than others.

One of the reasons I love cars is that they are literaly everywhere. As 93_Montero said, many times there are more cars than people when you are outside. Whenever I am walking around or riding in a car or bus, I just love looking at all the cars around me. I love to just examine their designs, size, color, and general shape of the body. Sometimes I like to play a little game in my mind where I try to identify the years of cars, just so I can keep all the years and generations straight, but also just for entertainment. For instance, I may see a Taurus and think "well it's definitely this generation, so at least a 1992-1995. But it has body colored bumpers so at least 1993... plus it has body-colored door handles so it must be a 1994 or 1995. And it had transparent headlights, so it's the sportier LX model..." This may seem like kind of a weird thing to do, but hey, it keeps me entertained and it's what I like.

In Yorkshire, the county where I live people my age and much older like cars a real lot. It's just a shame that they have to be 'economical' and buy cheap European hatches and mass-produced Aisian cars and not splash out on a car they really like. Yet, you often find people who have the money to do that in West Yorkshire, where you can often find lots of sports cars and classics in places like the good side of Leeds, Harrogate and exclusive places like that. Cars are like clothes, they say something about you and explore what type of person you are. Much like Arnie Cunningham in 'Christine', if only people loved their cars as much as him, however he went over the top a lil' bit.

I think most people don't really like 'things', they like art (more often TV, movies, and music then theatre, painting, or sculpture, but it's all art), sports, social interaction. Not to say that car enthusiasts don't (obviously the people here like movies as well), but we are at least partially more object centered (falling under the same umbrella as model railway builders, aviations enthusiasts, firearms enthusiasts, boat people, collectors of any sort). As I see it, a lot of the time when mainstream socity seems to be materialistic, what they're actually focused on is social standing. It doesn't actually matter to them if the object is actually good, it's the preception and connotations. Like... A Jaguar X-type. A car enthusiast will look at it and see a tarted-up Mondeo (it's just an example, your views on X-Types and Mondeos may vary), but to the 'materialistic' person that bought it, that doesn't matter. What matters is that it's a Jaguar and it shows (in their opinion) that they're reasonably well off and have sophisticated taste.
I don't know why people are like that. Some cavemen hunted leopards because they had nice warm pelts, some cavemen hunted leopards because it made them look bad ass.
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Sometimes I feel like I know quite a lot about cars. None of my friends know very much, so I seem encyclopedic by comparison. I have certain areas of expertise, of course, but generally if it was made by a major manufacturer between 1965 and today, and sold in North America, I can tell you at least a little bit about it. But, it seems like some people can do this sort of analysis-

-with any car. It boggles the mind. I can pretty much only do that sort of breakdown with MkII Supras, and they're really easy.

Well, if you take enough time and put enough thought into it, most people can memorize this sort of info. Most car lovers have their specialty of course, I guess yours is the MkII Supra

I personally wouldn't consider myself to really have a specialty however. I guess if I had to choose, it would be the Toyota Camry, hence my Camry Encyclopedia. But I know this kind of information about most every car. Mind you though, the extent of my knowledge is only for American and Japanese made cars sold in North America from about 1975 on. Most cars before that I have close to no idea about and Europeans cars- man those are just crazy! I don't think I could ever memorize all of them even if I tried! And note that it took me over four years to accumilate all of the knowledge I have today. Plus I spent most all of my freetime researching these cars

And even people not interested in cars often memorize this kind of information about a different subject. For instance, my brother knows every little thing about trains that you could ever imagine. Every company, every model, every rail line, anything!

It just goes to show, if you're really interested in something, you can really learn a lot about it and keep that information with you for a long time