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"I can remember when the first pulsars were discovered. I was able to go and sit down and listen to graduate students talking about what their theories, to explain what pulsars really were."
- Vernor Vinge
 |
| Pocket Universe | ||
| A created, separate space within the normal space of the universe. |
A unique, early use of this term and idea.
| He'd evidently put aside the small contrivance I'd last seen him working on, and he'd made a gadget—a diamagnet or whatever it ought to be called—a thing that closed space around itself in a pocket universe when it was turned on—that was extendible. |
| Technovelgy from Pocket Universes,
by Murray Leinster. Published by Thrilling Wonder Stories in 1946 Additional resources -
|
A bit of pseudoscience:
I slipped the paper-clip on it and stretched
it between the thumb and forefinger of my
hand. Then — feeling very foolish— I made
two ink-spots on the rubber. They were a
couple of inches from each other, with the
paper-clip in between.
The paper-clip represented the copper-glass-wire contrivance, and the ink-spots
two arbitrary places on the table. Then I
twisted the paper-clip so that it wound up
the rubber band about itself. It stretched.
The ink-spots approached each other. Presently they touched. Then I let go the paperclip and everything slipped back. They were
far apart again, with the clip in between.
That was it, exactly. Einstein has proved
that space is elastic. The rubber band was
also elastic. When the paper-clip — representing the weird object on the work-table —
wrapped the rubber band which represented
space about itself, why, presently there
wasn’t any rubber band or space between
the two dots. But when I released it, everything went back to normal and there was
space and a metal object between them.
The diamagnet wrapped space about it-
self. It absorbed space. The reason one’s
eyes hurt when looking at the place where
space had been absorbed was that they tried
to focus impossibly. Objects behind the vanished gadget were nearer than objects which
weren’t behind it. They hadn’t moved, of
course. But a certain amount of space — of distance — had been removed.
Compare to the worldcraft bubbles from Philip K Dick's The Trouble With Bubbles (1953).
So I went over to the table where Santos
wrote up his notes and picked up a rubber
band and a paper-clip. It was a red rubber
band, I remember.
This term was used in a spiritual sense in the late nineteenth century.
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and Technology from Pocket Universes
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Tech news articles related to works by Murray Leinster
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'After twenty generations of shillyshallying...'
'Our planes are going to start bringing in bales of discarded plastics...'
'... completely forgetting the ship at sight of the awesome figure and great head of the giant Gaut...'
'So, Ender, we will now begin your education.'
'What strange sensitivity! What an amazing development of science was manifested in every move and act and word of this Robot!'
'Forget the head atop it, the legs below, feet, arms, hands. It compels erasure.'
'That explains how it was so easy for me to remain motionless in midair or to perch on a flagpole in imitation of a giant bird, even in the windy city of Chicago.'
