Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Latest By
Category:
Armor
Artificial
Intelligence
Biology
Clothing
Communication
Computers
Culture
Data Storage
Displays
Engineering
Entertainment
Food
Input Devices
Lifestyle
Living Space
Manufacturing
Material
Media
Medical
Miscellaneous
Robotics
Security
Space Tech
Spacecraft
Surveillance
Transportation
Travel
Vehicle
Virtual
Person
Warfare
Weapon
Work
"In WWII, they had a saying that there are no atheists in foxholes. I think the modern equivalent of that is that there are no jaded, bored people in the high-tech industry, in the land of really good hardcore geeks."
- Neal Stephenson
 |
| Dental Switchboard | ||
| A control device tied in with teeth and nerve endings. |
This device provides a hands-free way to control other devices; in this case, a set of body modifications. In the novel, Gully Foyle seeks revenge on those who abandoned him in space; he has his entire body rewired for greater strength and speed.
| He pressed hard with his tongue against his right upper first molar. The operation that had transformed half his body into an electronic machine, had located the control switchboard in his teeth. Foyle pressed a tooth with his tongue and the peripheral cells of his retina were excited into emitting a soft light. He looked down two pale beams at the corpse of a man... |
| Technovelgy from The Stars My Destination,
by Alfred Bester. Published by Berkley in 1956 Additional resources -
|
I can't find this as an assistive device for people who are unable to use ordinary controllers (like people with high spinal injuries); I wonder if it is worth exploring. An interesting use of computers as an assistive device is found in this article Spinal Cord Injury and how to live with it. It describes a mouse-substitute that can be operated with lips and tongue alone. Left and right mouse clicks are done by sipping from or puffing into the "hollow joystick."
It would be handy for athletes; here's a bit more:
Foyle touched his tongue to the switchboard wired into the nerve endings of his teeth. He accelerated...
He backed a step and pressed his tongue against his upper incisors. Neural circuits buzzed and every sense and response in his body was accelerated by a factor of five.
William Gibson uses this with his razorgirl Molly in Neuromancer (1984):
She pressed her tongue hard against her lower front teeth. One moved slightly, activating her microchannel amps; the random bounce of photons through the darkness was converted to a pulse of electrons, the concrete around her coming up ghost-pale and grainy. `Okay, honey. Now we go out to play.'
Compare to the Ullran enunciator from Uller Uprising (1952) by H. Beam Piper and the tongue mouse from Quantico (2007) by Greg Bear.
Every nerve plexus had been rewired, microscopic transistors and transformers had been buried in muscle and bone...
TIME MOLLY TIME NOW.
Comment/Join this discussion ( 7 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |
Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from The Stars My Destination
More Ideas
and Technology by Alfred Bester
Tech news articles related to The Stars My Destination
Tech news articles related to works by Alfred Bester
Dental Switchboard-related
news articles:
- Tongue Controller Uses Tongue Magnets
- Tongue Drive System Validated In Clinical Trial
- iLickit App Reveals iPhone Tongue Interface
- Intraoral Tongue Drive System
- Tongue Mouse Created By Valve Engineer
- Cyborg Eye Flashlight Lights Up The Room
- MouthPad Supports Head And Tongue Tracking
| MIT Headset Lets You Communicate Without Speaking |
| Tongue Mouse Created By Valve Engineer |
| Skinput Uses Your Skin As An Input Device |
| AcceleGlove Open-Source Data Glove |
Want to Contribute an
Item?
It's easy:
Get the name of the item, a
quote, the book's name and the author's name, and Add
it here.
| <Previous | Next> |
|
|
|
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Science Fiction Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
|
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
'Then she looked up with a smile and moved closer to the camera.'
'... folios and tapes and playable discs of platinum alloy.'
'... another corner of his mind began to think about the shields.'
'Michel Ardan, as a Frenchman, was declared chief cook, an important function, which raised no rival.'
'Sapiro’s computer just kept dialing at random, hanging up on humans, until it got a fellow computer of the same type as itself.'
'I request that you feed the correlation between those dots and the levers of the panel into my memory banks.'
