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
"The trick is not becoming a writer. The trick is staying a writer. Day after month after year after story after book."
- Harlan Ellison
 |
| Softlight | ||
| Personality erasure via laser imprinted subliminal commands. |
Douglas McEwan is a convicted murderer about to undergo a new kind of treatment at the Clinical Rehabilitation Institute. A treatment that would leave his body intact, while destroying the person - a "mental execution."
| The Bureau had originally hoped the doctors could use laser imprinted subliminal commands to insert new behaviour patterns into the more stubborn social recidivists. A technique that would produce, if not model citizens, at least reasonably honest ones. That research was still continuing, but for the last year the Institute had concentrated on developing Softlight.
It had been the idea of Doctor Michael Elliot, a neurologist who had been studying memory retention to see how long the rectification commands would last. What his research uncovered was the amnesia mechanism, the method by which grey cells discard the unwanted memories of each day's events, preventing the brain from being cluttered up with a billion irrelevant details. Elliot isolated the governing neurological code and managed to adapt the laser imprint technique to transmit the sequence throughout the brain. Softlight: the total erasure of memory and behaviour patterns. Personality death. Anyone committing a capital crime could be mentally executed, leaving behind a perfectly viable body; an adult infant ready to be named, educated, and returned to the world as fully functional members of society. Capital punishment without death. For the PC politicians of the Brussels Federal Assembly it was a dream solution... Officially it was laboratory complex seven. But Douglas knew the Institute staff had taken to calling it the Light Chamber; and the press had somehow got hold of that title. It resembled a dental surgery, with a bulky hydraulic chair in the middle of the floor, a glass-topped desk, several cabinets of electronic equipment, and two voice-activated computer terminals. The Softlight imprinter was a triple-segment metal arm standing next to the chair; it ended in a bulbous plastic strip moulded to fit over the eyes like an optician's mask. |
| Technovelgy from Softlight Sins,
by Peter F. Hamilton. Published by Birmingham Science Fiction Group in 1997 Additional resources -
|
It seems to work like a charm. But there are problems.
Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |
Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from Softlight Sins
More Ideas
and Technology by Peter F. Hamilton
Tech news articles related to Softlight Sins
Tech news articles related to works by Peter F. Hamilton
| Brain Implant Is Able To Capture Your Inner Dialogue |
| 'Pregnancy Humanoids' From China Replace Moms |
| Bacteria Turns Plastic Into Pain Relief? That Gives Me An Idea. |
| Heart Patches Grown In The Lab Repair Hearts |
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
'If you're one of those rarities who haven't attended a rocket-polo "carnage", let me tell you it's a colorful affair.'
'They filed clumsily into the battleroom, like children in a swimming pool for the first time, clinging to the handholds along the side.'
'a walking balloon proceeded with long strides of its aluminum legs...'
'There was nowhere on the planet where science and technology could not provide one with a comfortable home...'
'Most men updated their PIP on New Year's Day...'
'...a misshapen, many-tentacled thing about twice the size of a man.'
