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"...the people dealing with these new technologies will still be derived from the human stock we're familiar with today."
- Charles Stross
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| Short-Wave Surgical Knife | ||
| A means of performing an internal cut without breaking the skin. |
The perfect companion device to the X-ray.
| "The entire scheme has its origin in Valenski's research on the short-wave surgical knife. Possibly you are familiar with that device. It severs flesh and seals the capillaries as it goes through..."
"...Valenski tried to develop an adjustable focus sufficient in length, accuracy, and sensitivity to permit interior surgery without surface penetration. Such an instrument seemed the natural adjunct to a three-dimensional X-ray apparatus..." "...After some years Valenski achieved his aim with a device that projected two converging ultra-short-wave beams. Each was innocuous in itself, but when the two were projected simultaneously and out of phase they cut at their mutual focal point, which had a diameter as fine as point two millimeters. |
| Technovelgy from Boomerang (A Great Deal of Power),
by Eric Frank Russell. Published by King-Size Publications in 1953 Additional resources -
|
I'm not aware of any device that purports to make internal cuts without breaking the skin. Lasers have been in use in medical research and practice since the 1970's, but they are used externally (as in LASIK eye surgery).
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and Technology from Boomerang (A Great Deal of Power)
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Tech news articles related to works by Eric Frank Russell
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'Space-sickness is one of the most unpleasant sensations that a human being can experience. Not all are subject to it...'
'...I saw a nice black heavy-looking cloud sailing by just now, and I can get the electrical machine out in five minutes to draw it down.'
'From a distance it could resolve the cosmic rays reflected from various substances.'
'The answer to the dumb student's prayer.'
'He had travelled the space-lanes of the solar system for the greater part of his life...'
'The dinner was excellent. It was completely vegetarian — grown in specially prepared gardens in this Moon base...'
'Telepaths had their sensitiveness enlarged to an immense range by the pin-sets, which were telepathic amplifiers adapted to the mammal mind.'
'It was a relief to enter one of the comfortable autos, whisper a direction down the tube, and just know that you would be taken to your destination in the quickest, safest, and cheapest manner.'
'But he didn't get very far with it before another noise in his ear radio scattered his thoughts. George winced...'
