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You could make the argument that the water wheel and grinder have a memory. It "knows" how to turn, transfer power to the grinder, and the grinding stone "knows" how to move around and grind the grain.
But the machine doesn't know anything. The wheel turns because of gravity. The grinder turns because power is transferred through gears. Just because something does something, on the molecular scale like atoms bonding to each other, doesn't mean it has a memory. It is a chain of events based on input. Just like a water wheel, or an air turbine power generator. Something doesn't have to know how to do something in order to do it. If you throw a rock the rock doesn't "know" how to sail through the air. It sails through the air because a force (you throwing it) acted upon the rock, and it will keep sailing until other forces stop it (air resistance, gravity)