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"SF looks towards an imaginary future, while fantasy, by and large, looks towards an imaginary past."
- Frederik Pohl
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| Aero Bus (Flying Bus) | ||
| A flying bus. |
Sometimes referred to as a "flying bus" also called a "street airplane".
| When they next met it was by chance, in a street aeroplane. The aero was full, and they didn't take much notice of each other till something went wrong with the machinery and they were falling street-wards, probably on the top of that unfortunate shop, Swan and Edgar's. In that dizzy moment the Minister swayed towards Kitty and said, "Relax the body and don't protrude the tongue," and then the crash came.
They only grazed Swan and Edgar's, and came down in Piccadilly, amid a crowd of men who scattered like a herd of frightened sheep. No one was much hurt (street aeros were carefully padded and springed, against these catastrophes), but Kitty chanced to strike the back of her head and to be knocked silly. It was only for a moment, and when she recovered consciousness the Minister was bending over her and whispering, "She's killed. She's killed. Oh God." "Not at all," said Kitty, sitting up, very white. "It takes quite a lot more than that." |
| Technovelgy from What Not: A Prophetic Comedy,
by Rose Macaulay. Published by London Constable And Company Ltd. in 1918 Additional resources -
|
Here are the rules:
Then a picture:
"If you hope to achieve safety in a street aero
(1) Do not alight before the aero does.
(2) Do not attempt to jump up into an aero in motion."
"A will be killed because he is standing immediately beneath a descending aero bus.
B will be killed because he and others like him have shaken the nerve of the aviator."
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More Ideas
and Technology from What Not: A Prophetic Comedy
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Tech news articles related to works by Rose Macaulay
| CORLEO Robotic Horse Concept Looks Ready To Ride |
| Futuristic Transit Elevated Bus Never Really Worked |
| Japan Automated Cargo Transport |
| Tesla Electric 'Giga Train' Operational In Germany |
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'Their only check on the growth and development of Vulcan 3 lay in two clues: the amount of rock thrown up to the surface... and the amount of the raw materials and tools and parts which the computer requested.'
'I guess there's nobody round this table who doesn't have a Crosswell [tapeworm] working for him in the small intestine.'
'Figments of his mind in one sense, of course, for he had shaped them...'
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'...nurse drones that would cruise around dumping large amounts of power into randomly selected pods.'
'It's done with a flip of the third joint of the tentacle on the down beat.'
'...for months Grantline bores had dug into the cliff.'
'I hope all those other cars are on automatic,' he said anxiously.
'It’s smart enough to go wrong in very complicated ways, but not smart enough to help us find out what’s wrong.'
