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"There was a time when one old eccentric guy with a notebook could do something important to science. Now even the resources of a major university are often not enough."
- Jerry Pournelle
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| Synchrophased Power Beams | ||
| Focuses energy beams from multiple planets on the same object. |
Intruders! The object entering the solar system on what appears to be a cometary orbit is plainly no comet. Better blast first and ask questions later.
| The Department of War was being feverishly organized to coordinate every erg of energy in the entire solar system into synchrophased power beams which at a given moment would stab out from the four planets at once - all of them on the same side of the sun - and converge terribly on the pseudo comet. There would be no material weapon for the ships detectors to note in time for any maneuver of escape. This weapon would strike at the speed of light. An object in the focus of the combined beams would experience the interior temperature of a sun... But the computation of the phase relationships of the moving planetary projectors, so that the separate beams would reinforce instead of partially canceling one another, was a task of terrifying complexity... Days or weeks were required for the adjustment of the multitude of beams for a hit on a predetermined spot. |
| Technovelgy from Propagandist,
by Murray Leinster. Published by Astounding Science-Fiction in 1947 Additional resources -
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'Looks like she has bought the Avatar Construction Set and put together her own...'
'Across the ground something small and metallic came, flashing in the dull sunlight of midday.'
'A broken circle with arrows pointing to a right-hand flow appeared in the chalf.'
'The object seemed melted together like wax — nothing was distinguishable.'
'Midges have many capabilities. To the untrained eye, they look like sparrows.'
'I made disks of my own voice to the number of five hundred very carefully chosen words.'
'His sensors out and working, and the whirring of the tape that sucked up sight and sound and shape and smell and form...'
